chrissie

If you are looking for a little getaway, but can’t actually take the getaway, why not stop into the Who’s Your Mama blog. Make sure you are using Mozilla Firefox when you check out this blog, as there were some serious issues with Internet Explorer when I first checked out this site. When you get to Who’s Your Mama, you will meet Kuanyin who describes herself as being a 250 year old Virgo in the Communications Industry. Kuanyin is a blogger from Maui, and blogs about Maui and other related personal interests. You can find out more about both Maui and Kuanyin through any of her recent bloggeries: Summer’s Last Hurrah, Thursday Thirteen – Memories of Elvis, Have you ever noticed that…., Hurricane Flossie Watch and Wait, Blog Contest – I’ll Remember You!!, What If?, Back to Life…Back to Reality, and Thursday Thirteen and Deliberations.

The blog is fairly simply laid out, and if you are not straying too far off the main page you will not have too many navigation issues. The blog opens up with a pretty header of a Maui sunset, and posts are right marginalized with a left navigation system. Bloggeries are black text on white background and most bloggeries contain relevant pictures that add to the feelings of the posts. In the left navigation bar, you will find the about information, advertising, subscription information, a clickable link for blogs that link here, archives listed by date, an extensive link roll, an extensive array of blog awards, and a scrolling menu for a blog roll which I thought was a nice feature on the blog. At this point I do not see any recent posts menus or categories menus, though I do notice there are labels attached to each of the bloggeries.

I am going with a 3.2 on this one. There are just a few formatting issues that can be changed to assist with some of the appearance issues. I found the left navigation bar to be extremely distracting with a little bit of everything everywhere. I would suggest moving the blog awards for example to one corner of the blog as it seems to distract from some of the links that are being highlighted. These are fairly hefty images and could benefit from being highlighted on their own elsewhere. I think moving all of the blog directory icons to one central location would have the same effect and neaten up the navigation bar a little bit. Navigation scores need some help as well as with no recent posts or categories menus the site is a little difficult to navigate. The blog has a unique enough niche that it would certainly benefit from the categories addition. I think the content is well written, and the blog is active enough to sustain a healthy readership. I could see this blog growing even more with some of these formatting changes. However, this blog with its beautiful pictures certainly does relate a wonderful appeal of Maui, and if you have interest in going, it is worth at least a peek.

-Chrissie

If you have ever found yourself wondering ‘I wonder if I could find a website on….’ then this blog may appeal to you. The blog is simply called Website Reviews. The blogger is Malthy Badri and she offers a wealth of websites and blogs that you can ‘stumble onto’ in any field. Malathy is a Math teacher in India and blogs for both fun and money. She will also review websites that appeal to her, but may take consideration for other reviews based on content, design, presentation, utility, and navigation. You can get a good feel for the types of sites that interest her through her recent bloggeries: Tools from Highfivez for blog promotion, Plug and play VOIP phones from Nimbus, Why Satrnum changed to Friend2Friend, Enter the Indian Thought Terminus, Read your Feeds through IM, The news feed merger, Join review bloggers blogroll, Listen to your own posts, free podcast, Adsense Alternative by Ask.com, and many more.

I generally like to say that blogs are easy to navigate, however this particular blog is fairly loaded with AdSense that I found it to be distracting from either navigation or content areas. The content is centralized and there are both left and right navigation bars. Bloggeries are a blue text on orange background and links are highlighted in red. The header is standard text with no graphics, and directly below is a large span of space that contains the About Page and some AdSense. In the left navigation bar you will find the about page and an Archive Menu that lists Recent Posts by link. In the right navigation bar you will find AdSense, sponsored links, tag clouds, and a feedburner that contains 1 reader. You will also find here the blogroll and a link of frequently visited links. There are labels attached to each post but at the time of review I did not see a categories menu. There also at this point no pictures associated with the bloggeries.

I will go with a 2/5 for this one, there is just too much going on here that has little to do with content. I think the AdSense is far too overloaded and it is the first thing you deal with on the blog. Also, while the site is very colorful, it loses some appearance points for not having pictures as well as the advertising issue. Content is well written but needs some activity. Currently there have only been 10 posts in August and more frequent posting would definitely help with traffic here. Being that this is a site on website reviews, a categories menu would benefit readers in knowing what kind of websites are reviewed. Also, some information as to how one would obtain a review would be extremely beneficial. For a blog that has been around since 2006 I am not much surprised that there is only one reader in the feedburner as this blog has too much distraction going on to allow the reader to focus on content. I hope the blogger can make some changes and consequently see this blog succeed.

-Chrissie

If you are one of those contest junkies that just can’t seem to get enough, you should really take some time to check out Reviewow – pronounced Review Wow. Like many blogs, started off as one thing and ended up as another. The author is very candid about his use of the blog which gives it a personal credible feel right off the start. The original intention of this blog was to post reviews, but this ended up being a blog on contests. The blogger joins contests hosted by other blogs and uses this blog as his ‘contest’ platform, but maintains his own personal blog elsewhere. You can see what kind of contests this blogger has been participating in through his most recent bloggeries: The Link Bait First Contest, blueJar Group Writing Project, Motorola Q Smartphone Giveaway, $250 Contest from NutsandMilk, Won $25 CAD – I Cool File Contest, Are you fooled by Ashwin Khanna?, and Arun’s Golden Egg Contest.

The blog is fairly new and has only been around since May 2007, so this makes it somewhat easy to navigate. In the top navigation bar you will find a Home Link, About Page, and Contact Information. You will find the posts are left marginalized with standard black text on white background and links are highlighted in orange. The header is a cute cow motif which you will see throughout the blog. In the right navigation system you will find an About page, Categories Menu, Archives Menu, Recent Comments Menu, and subscription information. If you go through the archives, you will find them very easy to navigate. This blogger has also added author links to the archive section so if there is a specific author you are looking for, it will be easy to find. Currently there is only one author on the docket, but as the blog grows I am sure you will see more links there. If you do happen to be one of those contest junkies, you can get your fix in any of the categories he offers: Contests, Contests Won, Free Links, Others, ReveiWOW News, Services, Softwares, and Websites.

I will go with a 3.6 for this one, for me it just seemed something was missing to offer it more points. The layout is standard but could probably use some pizzazz to get readers visits a little lengthier. Right now with the standard black text and odd picture, there is really nothing major jumping out at me. The posting is almost daily with a few days in between the odd posts. These updates are usually made up for on other days where sometimes 2 or 3 bloggeries will come in. I am not certain what the readership is here either, as this is a relatively new blog, but the comments menu looks fairly active so I think the blog would do well with some advertising or monetization. I also think adding a blogroll and getting some blog community going on the site would add to the appeal of the blog. The content is well done in a nice personal voice that works well with this type of niche. So I think this blog is definitely starting out on the right path and should see continued growth and success. Best of luck!

-Chrissie