Blog Reviews by Bloggeries

Reviews of blogs from around the globe since 2006.
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Archive for the ‘Web Design’ Category

Nomad One – Blog Review

Thursday, May 15th, 2008

Nomad One Blog ReviewIf you are looking for another blog that may offer you some fresh and professional opinions in the world of website management, have a look at the Nomad One, a blog that offers you advice from a strategically focused, ethically motivated, creative professional.  The blog is found on its own domain at and is owned and authored by an independent design and web consultant.  The blogger is a designer and graphics expert both online and offline, and also works in communications and marketing consulting.  He sees himself as a nomad, and is constantly migrating towards ‘a positive sustainable future’.  He feels he has a responsibility towards humanity to add value to others lives, and to be beneficial to people in order to help everyone create a beautiful future.  You can see this for yourself in the nomad’s recent bloggeries:  What’s this about then? About Us Pages and Their Purpose, VeloCITI Session #3 – An introduction to Finance, The benefits of a Free Wordpress Website for Startups, Time to Refresh my GTD Approach with GTD inbox for gmail, Springwise: See-saw power for Schools,  Wordpress Meetup #3 Planning Gains momentum, and The Benefits of a Free Wordpress.com blog for startups .

Navigation on this site is interesting, as this site’s appearance looks more like  website than a blog per se.  There is regular posting, and these bloggeries are left marginalized.  Generally left marginalized blogs offer a right navigation system, however there is no right navigation system here and this space is left blank on the blog.  There are navigation buttons on the header to see services the blogger offers in design for web, logo, print, illustration, animation, and advertising.  The footer offers a navigation system where you will find social networking contacts, What I’m Doing menu, Search bar, Archives Menu, and a blogroll sorted by categories such as sustainability, creative, web, and so on.

I am giving this blog a 3/5 and primarily because this blog reads more like a resume and less like a blog thus affecting its blog score.  Because the blog is focused on promoting the blogger’s career and services, it is lacking a lot of the blog meat that makes a blog interesting to read.  This ultimately may be affecting the blog’s readership.  Appearance scores need help here as mentioned mainly because of the empty sidebars.  This leaves a lot of empty space on the blog that the blogger could use with some necessary blog meat.  The blog could use some menus such as a categories menu and recent posts menu for example to beef up the blog a little.  I also think the about page could be better read to indicate more what the blog offers as opposed to what the blogger himself offers in terms of services.  It is difficult to tell for example, other than resume purposes, what the blog is offering to the blog community. The content is well written however in a personal user friendly voice there, and if this is maintained the blogger will connect with his readers well.  However the activity is lacking with bloggeries having several days in between posts, and regular traffic will be more likely with regular activity.  Overall however, the blogger clearly has a lot to offer and if he organizes his blog a little bit better, he will be able to communicate that clearly to the blogosphere.

-Chrissie

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eruANNA dot Net – Personal Blog Review

Thursday, August 23rd, 2007

rate4 eruANNA dot Net   Personal Blog ReviewIf you are looking for yet another source on blogging, or more particularly, Word Press, you may want to check out Han’s Blog eruANNA.net. To get full advantage of this site, you definitely want to view it in Mozilla Firefox, as with IE I did find some formatting issues. However, with Firefox, you don’t even notice them. On the blog you will get a chance to meet Han, the owner and author of this blog. The blog itself is powered by Word Press, and Han has a passion for this. She uses the blog to post about her life and also to provide tutorials and resources on Word Press and other things for her readers – because she’s nice like that. I find it interesting how she describes the meaning of her domain – eruanna. The name means “grace” in Quenya, and her name Han, also means grace. And if you spend a few minutes on her blog, then you will see she is holding well to her namesake. Her most recent bloggeries include Dodgy Cupcake Things, Wow – Stumbled!, From a Dream, One of Those Posts – 17 Wordpress Plugins, Who’s a Blogger, How to Write Your Own Wordpress Theme and Why I hate Domain Email.

Navigation on the site is very simple and straightforward. Posts are centralized with both left and right navigation bars. The appearance of the blog is very appealing. Posts are black text on white background. The blog also has a very feminine appeal to it without being too pink or girly, but headers are in a very pretty scrolled font. Each of her bloggeries also contains relevant pictures that add to the relevancy of the bloggerie. My favorite picture on the blog so far is from her “From a Dream” post where she did some photo manipulation, however it is just a breathtaking shot that definitely reaches the readers.

1043378055 540dd5cb5e o eruANNA dot Net   Personal Blog ReviewIn the right bar you will find advertising and widgets advertising her most recent visitors. In the left navigation system you will find a main menu that has links to Home, About, Contact, Downloads and Articles, Word Press Themes, Photoblog, Forum, Sitemap, and Advertise Here. This menu is followed by an Archives Menu, Find Me Menu (for her various social networking), Friends List, and a very handy Word Press Pull Down Menu.

I think a Recent Posts Menu would add further organization to the blog. Currently to access recent posts you have to dig through archives, or click on a button at the bottom of the page to reach previous entries. Overall I am going with a 4/5 on this one. I found this blog very appealing on many aspects. The blog scores well for activity, appearance, and definitely uniqueness of the niche. I also think the blog does well for the most part with navigation, but could do even better with a few of the mentioned changes here. The content as well is well-written and her tutorials are handled in such a way that they are extremely user friendly and knowledgeable enough to be credible sources. This blog is one that I definitely recommend if you wish to enjoy a little bit of personal experiences, as well as learn something valuable about blogging or web mastering at the same time.

- Chrissie

Vandelay Website Design Blog – Review

Thursday, August 16th, 2007

Website Design BlogAre you looking for a little help with your blog? You may want to check out Vandelay Website Design Blog. This blog is the blog component of a web design business called Vandelay Website Design. The company itself services both small and medium sized businesses by developing user-focused websites that are both attractive and functional. They use valid XHTML and CSS coding with their designs making them accessible to a wider range of users. You will find a link to their homepage on the blog if you are interested, but if you just want to learn how to use and market your blog more effectively, you will find any of the recent bloggeries very informative: 10 Tips for Making Your Blog Posts More del.icio.us, 101 Ways to Monetize your Website or Blog, User’s Guide to Google Webmaster Tools, Weekly Links, Getting the Most out of your FAQ Page, 10 Ways to Design for Impatient Visitors, A Guide to Promoting Your Blog Through Guest Posts, Weekly Links, 30 Keyword Tools to Use for Your Website, and July in Review. If you take a look through the business aspect of Vandelay’s Design portfolio and the services they offer, you will see that they know not only how to create effective websites, but how to market them as well. This alone gives credibility to the blog as far as the usefulness of the information provided.

Navigation on this blog is very simple and user friendly. Bloggeries are left marginalized with black text on white background and a light grey border around the page. The header contains an attractive business sense appeal in gun metal and light blue colors. The right navigation system contains subscription methods for the blog, a menu for top commenters listed by name as well as how often they have commented, a most popular posts menu, and a categories menu. In the categories you will find a wealth of information for blog assistance – blog promotion, blogging, CSS, design, hosting, links, marketing, and more. The most popular posts on the blog include bloggeries such as 10 Keys to Effective Writing for the Web, Customize your Own WordPress Theme, 83 Top Webmaster Resources, What Makes a Website Search Engine Friendly, 26 Steps to Successful Blogging, and Find the Perfect Colors for your Website. And as if that wasn’t enough, you can find more about Vandelay Website Design in a very handy top navigation bar that contains the Home, About Page, Services link, Portfolio, Resources, and a link directly to the blog.

This blog is getting a 4.8 from me, there is little I can offer for improvement, and more that I take away from it as valuable information for myself. The blog is aesthetically appealing with unique content. The only real suggestion I have is to make the header more dynamic and attention grabbing because at the moment it’s not at par with the content and it’s a shame if someone were to visit and not spend the time to read through all the quality content the author has produced. While the niche itself does not stand out in the crowd, the content definitely does. I like the connection the blog has with its readership by making note of the commenters and by highlighting popular posts. You can see this strategy is working very well for the blog as in July they saw 26,458 visitors and 45,896 pageviews. The blog does not contain advertising, and on the main page there are no pictures with the bloggeries, but if you click on the header for each post you will find relevant pictures posted with each bloggerie. Also, I find the use of social networking somewhat of a nuisance on many blogs, however this blog has made very effective use of social networking tools and incorporated them very effectively into the blog. Overall this blog has a lot to offer and I would highly recommend it to anyone starting out with blogging that may have questions, or to anyone that is wanting to make some tweaks to their current blog to make it more marketable and more effective. Great job Vandelay, and thank you for the resource!

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- Chrissie

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