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- How to Select the Perfect WordPress Theme for Your Blog
This guest post is by Karol K of ThemeFuse.
Selecting a WordPress theme is one of those tasks that seem fairly easy at first How hard can it be? you ask yourself. You simply go to Google, type in “best free WordPress themes” and you’re good to go, right?
I’m sure you already know where I’m going with this. So let’s just say it out loud so we can put it behind us: Forget about free themes! They are evil! This is something I’ve been saying for a little more than a year now. And hey, don’t blame me, it’s just the way it is.
Long story short, almost all free WordPress themes include some kind of strange code in their structures, usually in the footer section. The code is encrypted, and, often, the theme stops working if you try to remove it. Also, you don’t have a clue about what’s actually in that code until you decrypt it. Just to make things clear, as a developer, designer, or simply a website owner, you never want to have any unknown code on your site.
What other solutions are there if free themes are out of the game, then? Three main ones:
- You can have the theme developed by someone on a contract agreement.
- You can develop the theme yourself on top of a popular theme framework (and create the design as well).
- You can buy a premium theme.
Of course, at ThemeFuse (the theme store I’m a part of), we strongly encourage you to take advantage of the last option because, well, that’s our business.
But I’m not speaking as a businessman now. I’m speaking as a WordPress developer. So let me take you through the most important elements of the decision-making process, so you can select the perfect WordPress theme for your website or blog.
What do you need the theme for?
This is the first and the most important question you can ask yourself.
Every website has its own purpose. And this purpose will greatly affect the kind of theme you should be searching for.
WordPress was originally designed to work with traditional text blogs, but over the years this purpose has evolved into something much broader. Nowadays, WordPress can successfully run almost any kind of website.
Some possible applications include:
- Video blogs: this is a new breed in the blogging world. Every day there are more and more bloggers who present their content exclusively through video.
- Photo blogs (or graphical portfolios): These blogs are popular among photographers and designers who want to showcase their work.
- Online magazines: These sites are created around the idea of publishing news from a given field, often along with a descriptive image to accompany text content.
- Business sites: These sites are owned by all kinds of professionals and contract workers, from dentists and tailors, to consultants and teachers … and more!
- Traditional blogs: These are run by people who want to share their own articles. Mostly, traditional blogs are text only content. In other words, these are blogs like we know them.
- Corporate sites: Big companies have a slightly different idea of what a good website contains, and that’s why the corporate style has sprouted up.
- Software/app/product sites: Some businesses are built around a given product or a piece of software. The websites of such businesses tend to focus on the product, rather than on the business itself.
- Small to medium-sized business sites: Such businesses often find it hard to choose a site design. The corporate style is too big, and a product site just doesn’t seem to fit many service-based businesses.
- Real-world, local business sites: This is a type of site that’s targeted towards all kinds of physical businesses, like hotels, restaurants, galleries, shopping malls, and every other brick-and-mortar business imaginable.
There are probably tens of other types of sites that WordPress can handle, but let’s just stop here as I’m sure you get the idea.
Whatever you hope your site will end up to be, you have to start with its purpose. That purpose will suggest specific goals for your site, and its design should reflect those goals. Only when you’ve decided what’s important for your future site and what isn’t, can you start searching for a theme.
The most important features of a WordPress theme
There are tons of features a custom WordPress theme can provide you with, but let’s just focus on the most essential stuff—the things you’ll actually use on a daily basis (or during the initial setup).
Price and license
This is probably the most important factor to consider when you’re choosing a theme. Just like every soon-to-be website owner, you’ll have a specific budget set aside for this, and you’ll tell yourself you won’t get anything too expensive no matter how great it is. This is a perfectly reasonable approach.
Therefore, there are some important things to be aware of here. For instance, ask:
- Does the license you’re about to get allow you to use the theme on more than one site?
- Do you get free support?
- Do you get the PSD files?
- Do you get the source files?
- Do you get any additional bonuses?
If you’re a WordPress developer and you plan on using a given theme for more than one client, you should consider getting a multiple site license, or maybe even a complete theme package (containing all themes a given theme store has to offer). Of course, the more you want, the more you have to spend, but such an investment might pay off soon.
If you’re only looking for a theme for your own site, then getting the most basic license will probably be the best choice for you.
An SEO friendly structure
No matter what other website owners are saying, SEO still is, and will remain, a very important element for the whole “getting popular on the internet” thing.
An SEO friendly theme is a really valuable asset. If you’re planning on doing any kind of SEO work around your site, then such a theme is essential. And even if you don’t have time for SEO, an SEO friendly theme can do a surprisingly big part of the work for you anyway.
Good SEO always starts with getting the basic characteristics of your site just right. Only then you can tackle link-building and other off-page SEO tasks.
How can you find out whether a theme is SEO friendly or not? Unfortunately, you can’t know for sure until you start working with a given theme. However, there are still some things to look for when you’re playing with a theme’s live demo, or analyzing the screenshots of a theme.
- Is there the ability to set the titles and descriptions for every post and page individually (including the homepage)?
- Does the theme use <H> headings?
- Are the categories and tags visible?
- Is the layout clean and simple?
- Does the theme support major SEO plugins?
Some of these factors can be seen when you’re looking at a theme, while others are simply listed in the promotional materials of the theme. Make sure to pay attention to these considerations, though. The more SEO features a theme has, the better.
Compatibility with every browser
This is a very important feature to look for when you’re selecting a theme. Your visitors will always use a range of browsers and devices to access your site. You, as the website owner or the developer need to make sure that the site looks the same in every environment. This is difficult to do if your theme doesn’t provide that functionality from the get-go.
There are a couple of ways to find out whether the theme you’re interested in has cross-browser and device compatibility built in. The time-consuming way is to check the live demo on different browsers yourself. The easy way is to look for the information in the theme’s promotional materials.
Customizable design
Your new theme shouldn’t force you to stick to the default layout. It’s usually difficult to find a theme that fits your requirements exactly. Serious theme developers understand this, so they provide you with the possibility to change the layout a bit.
Changes like switching to a two sidebar layout, or moving sidebars from left to right should be available inside a good theme.
Also, the sidebars should be dynamic, so that you don’t have to settle for a given layout for the whole site. You should be able to choose custom layouts for individual pages of your blog.
Different color schemes available
Sticking to the topic of customization, let’s have a word about color schemes.
Every website needs a brand identity or some other point of differentiation. Chances are that you already have a logo made, and that you want to use it with your new theme. The logo itself represents most of your visual identity, so the theme should follow the same direction and be in tune with the logo.
There’s no easier way of keeping everything in tune than by simply changing the color scheme of your theme. Good themes have a couple of predefined color schemes built in, as well as a number of well-defined CSS classes that enable you to create new color schemes with little effort.
This might not sound important at first, but it actually makes tuning the theme a lot easier if you have a color scheme in place at the outset.
Easily customizable header
Whenever someone gets a new theme, the header is always the first place where any sort of customization happens. This isn’t surprising at all: everyone wants to include their own logo, their own menu, or an advertisement banner.
Customizable headers are essential for every theme. If the theme you’re considering doesn’t support this, it’s going to be really time-consuming for you to do any kind of modifications by hand (i.e. by working with HTML and PHP code).
Widget-ready areas
Widgets are small blocks of content you can include in various areas of your blog’s structure. The most common location for widgets is the sidebar, but that’s not a rule.
Every quality theme has a number of widget-ready areas predefined within its structure. Such areas are not only a form of a placeholder, but in most cases, they’re set with custom formatting and styling too.
The most common uses of widgets are:
- displaying your Twitter stream and other social media icons
- displaying recent comments
- offering an additional search field
- showing categories and tags
- listing recent posts
- showing popular posts
- displaying archive links
- displaying ads, additional menus, and so on.
Custom homepage support
For a traditional blog, the homepage is simply a list of recent posts. This is how it used to work for years, and it’s still the default setting in WordPress. But as I said earlier, there are many possible uses of the WordPress platform these days, and this default listing is the optimal solution for almost none of them.
Of course, if you’re a blogger publishing insightful articles on a regular basis, then by all means you should make the default listing of recent posts your homepage. However, if you’re a business owner of any kind, you’re probably better off to create a custom homepage displaying the most important information about your business and its offerings.
Most quality themes enable you to create a custom homepage and choose the individual elements you want to place on it. This is either done by a special category or another widget area (depending on the theme).
Video and image friendly
Just to make things clear, you can obviously display videos and images on every WordPress blog … I haven’t stumbled upon a situation where a blog wouldn’t support images. However, some themes make working with multimedia really, really effortless.
For instance, here’s a YouTube video. If you want to embed it into a standard WordPress theme, you have to go to YouTube, click the Share button, click the Embed button, grab the embed code, go back to your blog, switch to HTML editor, and finally paste the embed code where you want it.
But if you know you’ll be using a lot of video and imagery, you’d do better to choose a theme that caters specifically to those content types. For example, doing the same thing in a Themefuse theme requires only one action. In the visual editor, you simply use the shortcode:
[youtube width="600" height="350" link="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keIGj-bTagE"]Making an image slideshow, or displaying a map from Google Maps is quite similar.
Social media integration
Social media and all of its forms is very popular. Everyone has a Twitter or Facebook account, if not tens of other profiles. Quality WordPress themes follow this trend and provide some form of social media integration. The most popular way is to show various share buttons next to the content, Follow or Like buttons, and sometimes even Twitter or Facebook streams.
Of course, you don’t have to use all of these options, but it’s good to make sure the theme you’re considering has a few possibilities you can choose from.
The “wow” effect: your theme’s looks
Setting all the features aside, there’s one really important characteristic that every good theme offers. All the features mean absolutely nothing if you simply don’t like the theme visually.
Some people will try to tell you that looks can always be changed and that you shouldn’t focus on this that much. I advise a different path here.
If you see a theme, and it doesn’t make you think something like “wow, this is great!” then don’t get it. Period.
Of course, remember your purpose for the theme. The looks itself are not enough to make a theme perfect for you—there are other important considerations as well, as we’ve just seen.
A theme can’t be overused
Popularity is a funny thing when it comes to WordPress themes. On one hand, it’s great to get a popular theme because you know that it’s a quality product. It’s a kind of social proof—if many people have decided to buy a certain theme, then it has to be good, right?
On the other hand, if too many people are using the same theme then it loses all of its uniqueness, and it can make branding it difficult.
Now, I’m not saying that an overall number of downloads for a given theme is important in itself, but it is important for your specific niche. The fact that 50 people might be using your theme in a different niche is not a problem. But if ten people are using your theme in your niche, that could be a big problem.
Simply do a little research before buying a theme to make sure that there aren’t too many people using it in the niche where you want to launch a site. (If no one is using the theme, that, of course, is the perfect scenario.)
Reviews are important
Depending on a theme’s popularity, you might be able to find some customer reviews, or even professional reviews to help you decide whether the theme is really worth purchasing.
The best way of finding those reviews is using Google. Search for something like “theme-name review”. The rule is simple: the larger the number of good reviews, the better.
On the other hand, if you don’t find anything, it doesn’t mean that the theme isn’t good quality. Usually, happy customers don’t spend time submitting reviews around the internet, they simply enjoy their purchase and go on with their lives.
Documentation and support
Some developers don’t believe in the power of documentation, and it’s hard to understand why. The fact is that even when you get a new washing machine, you get a user’s manual.
Essentially, digital products are no different—they, too, need a manual of some kind. Serious developers understand this so they always try to make their customers’ lives easier by providing documentation that’s easy to grasp.
Support is different. The better the product is, the less work support teams have. But still, there are times when you’ll need some assistance, either when something stops working or when you simply want to do something unusual with your theme.
Don’t choose a theme that doesn’t have any documentation or support. This might be okay when you’re getting a theme for free, but when you’re paying money, it’s not acceptable.
Only up-to-date themes allowed
This is an easy trap to fall into. Here’s the scenario: you’re browsing the web to find a nice theme, you stumble upon one that’s interesting, and you decide to get it. Only afterwards you find out that the theme you’ve chosen hasn’t been updated lately and that it has been developed for version 2.7 of WordPress, for example.
I’m not saying that every next version of WordPress is completely different from the previous one, but some things do change, and you need to make sure that your theme implements all the new functionality and interesting features of the platform.
Every self-respecting theme store makes sure that the themes it offers are always up-to-date with current versions of WordPress and current trends of the web as a whole. So when you’re shopping for a theme, simply take notice of whether the theme you’re about to get has been updated lately and if it’s compatible with the newest version of WordPress.
A step-by-step approach
This has turned out to be a rather lengthy piece, so let me sum it up with a quick step-by-step guide on how to select the perfect theme for your blog:
- Start with the purpose of your site. When you decide what you need the site for, you’ll be able to list its most important traits—traits you need the theme to support.
- Note the details about the themes you’re considering. Some possibilities include: price and license, SEO friendly structure, compatibility with every browser, customizable design, different color schemes available, easily modifiable header, widget-ready areas, custom homepage support, video and image friendly, and support for social media integration.
- Let me quote myself: If you see a theme, and it doesn’t make you think something like “wow, this is great!”, don’t get it.
- Make sure that the theme is not overused in your niche.
- Try to find some customer or professional reviews.
- Make sure that documentation and support is available for the theme.
- Make sure that the theme is up to date with the current version of WordPress.
Even though it seems like there’s much to do when selecting a theme, it can actually be worked through very quickly. You just need to know where to look for the most important information.
Essentially, selecting a good theme is like selecting any other product—digital or otherwise. You just need to know what you’re looking for. Don’t forget to ask or read about the details that are important to you and your blog.
There’s been a lot of talking on my part here. Now it’s your turn: how did you go about selecting your current WordPress theme? What words of wisdom can you give those who are about to do it for the first time? Let us know in the comments—and don’t forget to visit again tomorrow, when I’ll show you how to install the theme you’ve selected, set by step.
Karol K. is a 20-something year old web 2.0 entrepreneur from Poland and a writer at ThemeFuse.com, where he shares various WordPress advice. Currently, he’s working on a new e-book titled “WordPress Startup Guide – little known things worth doing when creating a WordPress site.” The e-book launches soon, and now the best part … it’s free. Also, don’t forget to visit ThemeFuse to get your hands on some premium WordPress themes.
Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger
How to Select the Perfect WordPress Theme for Your Blog
Переслать - How Do You Tailor Content to Different User Levels?
Today on ProBlogger, we’re publishing the first in a little two-part series of posts on WordPress themes. The first is on choosing a theme, and the second is on installing themes.
Now, some ProBlogger readers might wonder if professional bloggers need this kind of information. Of course there will always be pro bloggers who haven’t ever installed a theme, and the articles may be helpful to them. But is that our key target audience here?
Understanding reader segments
The census we conducted earlier this year revealed a lot about ProBlogger readers—enough that we could break you up into different categories or audience sub-segments.
This is a useful exercise for any established blog, as it allows you to get a clearer picture of the different user types your content attracts. It can also help you to identify content gaps that you need to fill.
That’s exactly what our census did—it showed us that although many of our readers were blogging happily, and making money from their efforts, many were apprehensive about technology. There was also a specific sub-segment of bloggers who weren’t pro bloggers, but wanted to become so, and couldn’t without developing their technical skills.
“Pro” doesn’t translate to readers having professional or high-level skills in every aspect of blogging. So we need to cater to a range of skills levels in every topic we cover.
Translating needs into content
Having identified the need among this audience segment for helpful, approachable articles on WordPress basics, we were able to approach experts to write guest posts covering those topics.
As well as being technically and factually accurate, and useful for those among us who want to go out and, for example, install their first WordPress theme, the content serves other purposes, too.
It helps to show those who are just starting out blogging that ProBlogger can take them on the journey from would-be-blogger to blogging professional. And it supports the friendly, helpful and professional ProBlogger brand—which is helpful in continuing loyalty among all our readers.
Undermining “pro” positioning?
Some would argue that publishing anything other than high-level content that assumes readers have a professional level of skill with every key aspect of blogging risks undermining the “pro” positioning of my blog.
I disagree. As I mentioned above, even the most experienced bloggers are less-skilled in some aspects of the field. We all need extra help in different areas.
Also, those pros who are, for example, comfortable with choosing and installing WordPress themes may well do nothing more than notice or glance over today’s and tomorrow’s articles. But unconsciously, they may be more likely to recommend the blog to a blogging friend who’s not as skilled with the technology, or to search here for the topics that they themselves know they lack skills in.
Scheduling for maximum impact
One of the key elements of avoiding undermining a particular brand position when you offer content that suits a sub-segment of readers who are at a different level than your main readership is to consider how you’ll present and publish that content.
As an example, the pieces we’ll be publishing have the following characteristics:
- They acknowledge in their introductions that the content is probably known by a lot of readers—but will defnitely be helpful to a targeted sub-segment.
- They follow one after another, to keep the continuity of the message strong. This also can help lessen the potential for diffusion of brand value, since the two parts are published consecutively. High-level, loyal ProBlogger readers who aren’t interested won’t feel like they “keep seeing” low-level content in their ProBlogger feeds or lists: we expect they’re more likely to read, say, this post, then understand that the next two posts that are coming won’t be for them. But after that, they know to expect that we’ll resume programming as usual.
- They’re expert pieces, so they’re well-written and are more likely to include information that may surprise even experienced bloggers.
- They’re scheduled to published in “off-peak” timeslots during the ProBlogger week. We leave “on-peak” days for content that meets the needs of the majority of our primary audience. Using this approach, we can get valuable, needed content onto the site (and into the search engines), meeting the needs of a valuable sub-segment of readers, without distracting the majority of readers from our core content.
- As I mentioned above, they’re supported by this post, which is targeted to high-level ProBlogger readers of the type who already know the information that’s explained in the two posts that will follow. This post gives those two context, clearly supports the “pro” in the ProBlogger branding, and ensures that our core readership gets value even as a result of posts that aren’t targeted to them.
How do you tailor posts to different audience segments?
This basic outline should shed some light on the approach we take to publishing content for users who are at different stages of their problogging journey. But we’d love to hear how you meet the needs of different sub-segments of your blog’s audience.
Do you do this consciously? Is it an ongoing part of your posting approach? Share your advice with us in the comments.
Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger
How Do You Tailor Content to Different User Levels?
Переслать - Take a New Road with Your Blog
This guest post is by Lars Holdgaard of Gode Karakterer.
So you have a blog which has some kind of self-defined success. You are maybe making a good portion of money and you can see the visitors numbers rising. Your position in Google is also doing better and better every month, and everything is progressing.
But maybe it doesn't feel right. You can see the results, but it still doesn't feel right. Writing every blog post feels like a pain, and you postpone it as much as possible. Actually, you would much rather just write about something else. But your current audience are used to your current way of doing things—so, what to do?
Let's take a case
Let's take a look at Timothy Ferris as he is a good case for this subject. I bet most of you know who he is, but for those who don't, you should really consider buying his book The 4-Hour Work Week.
He wrote that book in 2007. It’s a book about building a lifestyle earning money from passive income, so you can spend the time just the way you want it. Back when the book became popular, his blog became massively popular too. Every new blog post got between 50 and 100 comments within days. Tim primary posted about business ventures, productivity and tips to outsource.
However, some months before the release of his second book, The 4-Hour Body, the blog changed slightly. There were several blog posts about training, the body, and sport. Now, there could be many reasons for making this change, and of course, one of them being marketing and building up the hype for the book. But the other reason, which Tim also have revealed in interviews, is that The 4-Hour Work Week made it possible to write the book he was really passionate about—The 4-Hour Body. His biggest passion is the body.
I personally stopped following the blog at this time, because the focus was different from when I signed up and followed the blog. I know quite a lot people stopped following the blog because of this change, but at the same time, its popularity grew. So when he changed his style, more people actually came and followed Tim.
Why change style?
Why is this case interesting? I am a firm believer that you have to follow your passion. When we follow our deepest passion, we as human beings, have so much more power. We will find solutions we wouldn't have found otherwise.
And let's be honest: if you have been blogging on the same subject for several years, your current biggest passion has probably changed. Changing your style of blogging allows you to come closer to your current life situation. If you have been blogging about growing orchids for two years, maybe it is time to expand to sunflowers or ranunculus. As our interests change from time to time, it is very wise to question how we can change our blog’s style regularly, too.
Changing style has its consequences
However, when we change our style, it has consequences. It doesn't matter what you do—if you change your theme, change subjects, change writing style, or anything else—it will have consequences.
Some people will definitely not like your changes. Some will most likely even hate it. If you have a fair amount of followers, some people will mail you and tell the change is the worst thing ever you've done in your whole life. Just look at the global rage each time Facebook makes some kind of update—everyone has to give their opinion and share it with the world.
When you change style, you will lose followers. If ProBlogger suddenly started to blog about Java programming, a fair chunk of the regular followers would most likely be upset and stop following, as the new style is not what they signed up for. This is what happened with a lot of people with Timothy Ferris.
But when you change, there is a very positive side too. You will attract new followers. As any change you make hopefully will make come closer to your passion, it will shine through. People can feel your energy and passion in your words. So something you will probably experience during change of style is a decrease in visitors for a short time span, and then it will rise again.
Case example: Maj Wismann
I’d like to show you a real life example. Maj Wismann runs the Danish sex and relationships website www.websexolog.dk. She teaches people to focus on love and the relationship before focusing on the sex.
Now, when you write about sex, there are two obvious styles you can choose. First, you can choose the boring and factual way. However, you can also choose a more subtle angle by being very direct and naughty in your communication.
When Maj started her website, she took the first approach. This attracted quite lot followers who bought her products. Maj actually made quite a lot of money from doing this, and changing her approach was really risky. But she wanted to change her tone to become more direct, to write about subjects which are taboo in a very open way—and even to write her articles using profanity!
Even though she was extremely scared about making the change, she adopted it 100%. After her old website had run for three months, she changed the style overnight. Her new style of writing was what was "real" to hear. However, she feared correctly—some of her readers did not like the new style, and she actually lost quite a lot of followers.
But a funny thing happened—the new style let her connect better with the rest of her readers. Those readers started to recommend her website, and today she has many times more subscribers than before. Now, nine months later, she has eight times more subscribers than before.
Why did this change work? It's hard to say, but I would guess it's because Danes are open towards sex. An open attitude towards sex and being direct, and even a bit naughty, wasn’t a problem. Doing the same trick in USA or Asia wouldn't necessarily be a good idea.
Ways to change your style
Let's now look at how you can change your style of blogging. Not everyone will do it the same way as Maj did, so let's look at the options.
1. Doing nothing
The first and easiest solution is to do nothing. You can ignore your decreasing passion, and keeping on hating writing each and every blog post.
But truth is that you will most likely burn out. Even if you live from the income you earn through the blog, it won't be suitable in the long run. Hopefully you don't see this as an option.
2. Slow and steady change
The easiest and probably most common way is to make a slow change. Give your audience an appetizer of what you really want to write about, and move slowly toward that new position over time.
If it is a new writing style, try that. If you want to write more about cats and your current blog is about dogs, try to make some posts about cats—and make sure they are high-quality posts.
By looking at the response from your audience, you can estimate how well a radical change will be perceived. This was what Timothy Ferris did—since the launch of his blog, he had few posts about the body and health. People responded really well to these articles, and since it was his passion, he knew it would be a success.
3. A complete change
Instead of making a series of small changes over time, you can do it will a full heart. Change your style overnight, and let the followers live with it.
This will, of course, have bigger consequences than making the change slowly. This way, you can risk losing a large number of followers within a very short time span.
However, if you do it, it has its positive sides too. Yes, it is a big change—but it lets you come closer to what you really want to be doing, in a much shorter timeframe. Therefore the quality of what you do will most likely be much higher.
4. A new blog
Another option is to create a completely new blog. By making a new blog, you can keep the old audience. This is a totally risk-free option, as your old audience need not know about your new project.
However, you will have to start over. Getting visitors for a new blog can be a huge amount of work—especially because you can't rely on the search engines for quite a while.
You have to be unique
Remember that today, more than anything, blogging success is about being unique. Just look at the comments on all these blog posts on ProBlogger—there are so many people trying to compete on the Internet. And if we are being honest, how many blogs do each of us really follow? It is primary the best ones.
Those we follow are the ones that are really exceptional and unique. Mediocrity isn’t interesting anymore, as we can go to another blog right away. As so many people have written before me, today it's about being the best, as the competition online is fierce.
If you currently don't love what you blog about, change. You can either change slowly, fully, or take on a new project—the most important thing is that you do change. You will lose followers, and you will hear from people telling you that you are making a mistake, but believe in yourself. Your passion will shine through, which is exactly what we need and want today.
This article was written by Lars Holdgaard. He owns two websites which both have active blogs: Gode Karakterer which helps Danish students with everything regarding to school and Mulius which is a Danish toys webshop.
Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger
Take a New Road with Your Blog
Переслать - 9 Steps to Take When You Loathe Your Own Blog
This guest post is by Ryan Barton, author of Smart Marketing.
You’ve got an editorial calendar, you’ve scheduled blog posts weeks in advance. Look how professional you are. Well done. You’re an inspiration.
You press Publish and bask in retweets, praise, and a flood of comments. You’re “resonating” with your “tribe.” You’re prolific. You’re a cocky so-and-so.
Then it hits: the loathing.
You're exhausted. You’re ignoring your calendar. You can’t be bothered to think about new topics. Your writer’s well is bone-dry. You’ve met the resistance and it has won.
Your writing becomes programmed (verse, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus). It’s no longer art, and no longer an exercise in intellect. It lacks moxy. You’re phoning it in.
This is a low point. Have you been there?
If you bore yourself, how do you expect your readers to read, let alone share, your content?
What do you do when you loathe your own blog?
Find a way to restart, tabula rasa. And you’re the only one who can make it happen.
1. Do a design refresh
You buy new running shoes, and suddenly you want—need—to run. I must satisfy the shoes, it is their reason for existence. You buy a new car and instantly you cease dreading your hour-long commute.
It's the same with your blog. Launch a new theme and you’ll feel the need to create new content that mirrors the sophistication of your new design. It pulls you back in and urges you forward. Clearly, your own boredom isn’t reason enough for a design overhaul, but it’ll certainly reignite your fire.
2. Narrow your focus
When I launched The Smart Marketing Blog in 2007, my posts were eclectic random. Readers didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t know what to expect. One day, a post about bus stop ads, the next day, how to set-up PDFs to open at screen height, and another day, musings on a new social network. There was no focus.
But now, when I focus only on smart marketing for small business success, my readers know what to expect. I have focus—a roadmap.
3. Take off the chains
Darren publishes daily. Sort of. Somebody on the collective ProBlogger team publishes daily. But I think he'd agree that expecting you, by yourself, to generate mind-blowing content daily is expecting too much.
At one point, I followed an editorial calendar that scheduled posts twice a week. But even those posts were rubbish. They weren’t inspired, they were the result of a self-imposed guideline. Sure, publishing more frequently drives more traffic, but also yields disappointed readers who are trying to digest your traffic-driven rubbish.
Write because you can’t help it, not because there’s a blank post to fill. Today, I write only when I can imagine giving a speech on my topic. The topic is that good. So good, I can visualize myself preaching from a soapbox. And you know what, my traffic has remained the same, despite publishing much less frequently.
4. Ship something
I don’t advocate shipping something simply for the sake of shipping; that only yields mediocrity. But shipping evokes pride and passion and a fierce sense of taking names. Last year I published my book on smart marketing for small businesses, this year I launched my newsletter, and in the months ahead I have two other books in the works. Each functions to inspire and refill my writer's well.
Aside from your blog—because your blog is not your product, your blog supports your product—what can you create to inject that same inspiration?
5. Change your routine
Want to find new inspiration? Approach your trivial, mundane tasks in a new way. When you break your habits, you force yourself to problem-solve, expand your thinking, and consider other solutions. It’s that same thinking that yanks you out of your writer’s rut. Purposefully take the longer route to the office, travel to a foreign country, run instead of lifting weights, read a different genre book to stretch your mind, expand your palette with a new coffee brewing method, keep your phone off when it’s normally on, watch a documentary instead of that sitcom—or better yet, read a book … with pages, not a screen.
6. Change how and where you write
Last week, I sat in a dark parking lot waiting for takeout from a local eatery. I was isolated, undisturbed, and focused. So much so, I made great progress on a blog post in the matter of minutes. Just me, a journal, and a soft dome light. Working out of coffee grinder-dominated cafes doesn’t foster the same productivity. Neither does sitting in front of a television or high-traffic public venues. Sure, use the excuse that people-watching inspires you. Rubbish.
Take yourself seriously, hide yourself, sever ties to notifications, reminders, and the urge to make sure you’re always in-the-know. Your writing—your art—deserves nothing less than your undivided attention.
7. Read new, not more
How many blogs do you subscribe to? Right now, how many blog posts sit unread? If you’re no longer challenged—if you’re glazing over posts out of habit, if you’re no longer being inspired and challenged—unsubscribe and find new ways to be stimulated. Stop wondering if you’re missing out on anything, cut ties, and stretch yourself. You may be out of school, but that’s no excuse for not remaining a student.
8. Who’s your muse?
Who do you work for? Wake up for? Breathe for? Write for them. Is it your wife, your lover, your most loyal subscriber, or your unborn child? Use them as your motivation to keep driving when you’re not strong enough to persist yourself. Keep this person’s photo nearby as a reminder. Don’t get so busy that you forget why or for whom you’re working so hard.
9. Declare victory or failure
When starting a new project, name your goal. How else will you measure success? Seth said it best, “Declare one or the other, but declare.” Maybe it’s time for self-evaluation. Maybe it’s time to reflect and determine what you did right (to do it again) and what you’ll avoid the next time. Because there will be a next time. “Failure” isn’t never blogging again. No, failure is taking valuable lessons and proactively applying what you’ve learned to the next iteration of your blog.
We’re artists. We all feel the urge to tweak our logos and change our avatars. We see the same “us” every day, and we're bored. But what we find repetitive and boring and loathe-worthy, our tribe views as consistency and resonation.
The real artists find a way to push through, put their shoulders back and chin up, and reignite their own passion.
Talk back
Have you hit the blogging loathe-wall before? How did you bust through it? Leave a comment below so others might be inspired to do the same. And stick around—later today we’ll take a look at a case example of a blogger who changed their blog’s writing style overnight—and reaped the rewards.
Ryan Barton is a small business marketing, social media, and design consultant. He is the author of Smart Marketing, blogs at The Smart Marketing Blog, tweets at www.twitter.com/RyanBarton, and lives in Los Angeles.
Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger
9 Steps to Take When You Loathe Your Own Blog
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