What would you change? | Yakezie Reader Insights | Yakezie Forums

I am almost finished with a design change on my site and I'm looking for some input on items that should still be changed.

The biggest difference now, is the split navigation and the decreased size of the header.  I also increased the font size and the line spacing to create (what I've been told) more readable copy.

Now, I'm looking for feedback from all of you as readers.  when you look at my front page and the posts themselves, does it seem more readable?  Do the colors anywhere need adjusting?  Is the sidebar still too cluttered?  Let me know how it feels to be reading rather than from a blogger's functional or monitization standpoint.

Thanks!

If it were me, I'd make the post font a smidge smaller and perhaps take off two of the "advertise here" images.  I LOVE the header though- so snazzy and I love the colors.

Great job! :)

The footer needs something on the right side. It's unbalanced. Maybe recent posts or top comments?

I agree Aaron that you have too much going on in the header, it immediately takes your eye away from the content.

Font is a tad big.   What font are you using by the way?

@Paul: I've gone through and consolidated many of the header links.  It was a tad cluttered, but the goal was to have all of the important stuff centrally located.  I was using Verdana with a size of 12-14 and testing the different results.

@PKamp3: I'm not to concerned with using the blog as a driver to social media, and would like to have something of value in the footer.  Besides, with about section and the author box, I have the links in plenty of places.  I'm working on getting the footer more balanced, but still have a little work to do.

For anyone curious as to why I'm redoing the layout in the way I am, I'll let the experts explain.  Here are a few of the articles that really got me thinking on trying to optimize the layout rather than cram a bunch of stuff into it:

http://twohourblogger.com/bath/

http://www.problogger.net/arch…..og-design/

http://www.problogger.net/arch…..your-blog/

http://socialtriggers.com/best…..t-website/

http://socialtriggers.com/how-…..wse-blogs/

I really like the new look. The only thing I noticed was the unbalanced footer – but I'm a very symmetrical person. 

Great job!

I like it! Especially the ViperChill bar at the top.

I like the links you posted on why you chose the layout you did! I'll be making a few tweaks based on them. :)

One thing I'd add is having your subscribe/Twitter/Facebook and such buttons up top. You have e-mail subscribe up there – put the others with it, so I don't think e-mail is the only way to subscribe while I'm at the top of your page, reading a post I like. 

Thanks for following through on those links Penny.  People can really learn a lot from those guys, and I read their stuff all of the time.  What I like most is that it's not just personal preference with them, the advice comes from testing a bunch of different things to come to their conclusions.  And, I mentioned it somewhere before–Derek Halpern advised Chris Brogan on some of his sites, so if the advice is good enough for Brogan, who the heck am I to ignore it! 

SB: I already decided to get rid of those crappy links since I get relatively no traffic from being associated with those sites.  Based on the responses, even though I like the cleaner look, I think I may have to move the social links back to the top of the sidebar.  As far as the nav bars go, those I'm going to leave alone for a while since it's specifically outlined in one of Derek Halpern's posts and he even hilights Ramit's site as a perfect example of making it easy for people to find what they are looking for; and the teasers are going to be staying for a while too since I've read quite a bit about how people would rather click through once to read on and have the ability to scan more posts more quickly, especially if it's been a few days since their last visit.  I really appreciate the insights, though!

I really like the look of the site… a lot more going on than my site, but it makes me think I almost keep mine too simple.  Good job, wish I had the tech skills to tweak mine like you can.