It’s that time of week again.
This week was mostly focusing on eliminating cluttered on the blog. Eliminate distractions. Focus on content. Focus on opt-ins. It is somewhat your more minimalistic approach to blogging.
You really can’t go wrong with narrowing the things someone can do on your website. If you look at my music blog, you see the follow:
- You can look at my content pages (currently only have 1 content page and my about page). More is going to be added.
- You can read my latest post.
- Or you can opt in.
- Or read my most popular posts (which is actually static but probably some stuff my targeted audience would want to look at).
So content pages are my way of linking to my categories but really highlighting my best content. This is better for pulling out all the posts a new person on your site WANTS to see. I’ve learned that the problem with blogs is that it’s not always easy to find someone’s BEST posts. This also gives another method of getting people to opt in. In general, content pages will follow this following format:
- Give a small intro
- List my best posts (or in the existing example, my downloads).
- Offer an opt-in form
- List more ways to learn about ___________
- And then another opt-in form
Notice also, that I don’t have a sidebar on my content pages or my about page. This is the whole part of eliminating distraction. Content pages are meant to be “Hey see my best content in this category here and then sign up for my email list”
My about page is suppose to say “Hey, here is what this site is all about and you should opt-in to my email list.”
To the point, you want people to subscribe and while you don’t want to be too “in your face” with email forms, you want it to be obvious that “hey, we have a mailing list where you can get updates”
At least that was my thinking.
With very little technical work left to do on my blog, I have nothing left aside from writing content and creating more pages. Promotion and all that will always continue, of course.
Must Keep Blogging 