Blog Bliss: 5 Design Tips

Being a total DIY girl myself, I understand where the impetus comes from wanting to create your own blog design. That said, because I’m in this line of work and also have the privilege of working with hundreds of mom-owned businesses daily, I can usually tell when someone designed their own blog, when they purchased a cheap “designer” template from someone, and when they have had the help of a professional designer.  In the process of helping entrepreneurs and individuals alike create sites to help build their business & personal brands, I’ve logged thousands of hours of research into blog design, and I have come to realize that there are really five main areas most DIYers tend to go overboard when designing their own blogs:

1. Stick to a simple color palette. Maintain consistency in your use of color throughout your blog (perhaps choose one specific color for all headlines, and another for all regular text) so that it serves a purpose other than just drawing attention to something. Too many colors causes the eye to go wonky and not know where to focus. Also, avoid using the color red as a main background color with white text: that’s reportedly the hardest color combo for the eye to read on monitors.

2. Use a clean, un-cluttered background. As a designer, a consumer, and just a human being with two eyes, I prefer solid colored backgrounds, but I’ve seen a few (and I mean, very few) patterned backgrounds that had clean lines and did not compete with the content on the site. The background should help bring out your content, not compete with it. By all means, whatever you do, do NOT use a red background with your main content. It is the most difficult to read on the web, and it just hurts the eyes in a short amount of time. Your goal is for readers to stay a while, get comfortable, right? Don’t use red or patterns.

3. If you have ads on your site, create a clean, uncluttered ad display with consistent sizing and location. Inconsistency with ad design makes the whole site seem cluttered, difficult to read, and unprofessional. Create specific design standards for your ads and make sure your advertisers stick to them. Create one consistent location for the ads, or maybe use a top banner ad with a right sidebar ad. The ads that float throughout the main body of a blog are disruptive to the content. Just because large online magazines that rely on massive amounts of advertising do it this way, doesn’t mean you should.

4. Within the confines of your overall brand, create a look for your blog that stands out in your industry. If you’re a tech company, go beyond the same old boring dark blue with dark grey, or stark white with huge black Helvetica titling. If you’re a mom blogger, break out of the overdone cheesy stock illustration of a “modern mom” with perky patterned background. If you want your readers to know that your blog is different from all the others, your design is the best way to do so quickly and effectively.

5. Go easy with the crazy fonts. And by go easy, I mean avoid using them on your blogs when possible, especially in your headers. I just looked at several blogs that had adorable, funky fonts for their headers…and I could barely read the majority of them. Worse than that, the font choice made absolutely no sense – there was no correlation to the blog brand whatsoever. Again, like with colors and background, keep your fonts simple. There are so many ways you can add personality and style to your blogs without cluttering them up with crazy type.

Hope these tips help! If you have any questions or examples of your favorite blog designs, feel free to post them here and let us know why you love ‘em!