WOW Fail Blog website feedback
Posted by Lindsayanng on April 16th, 2009I have noticed lately that all of the WOW blogs look the same, at least they do to me. I am not really a gamer. The extent of my gaming is playing 007 on my game cube from 6 years ago. So I did some research on the top blogs in that field to see what others have done. But, web design is still web design, and the rules still apply.
My first impression, as I have said was “yet another WOW blog” because it looks the same to me. They all have the WOW seal and the same colors. Yellow, blue and black. You have the color scheme down though. You did not seem to over do it, but I think that you should do some more things that make it look more like a “special” blog. Something different than every other WOW blog.
I like what you did with the seal. The “fail” part falling off of it. How dead set are you at KEEPING that big shiny WOW seal/graphic thing? I know that it is the essence of your website, but can you create a graphic that is similar to that but in your own style. I would think that it being a “fail” blog, it might be funny to just create a sketchy drawing of it, or a crayon drawing.. Something that is satire of the actual graphic, but maintaining the feeling of it. If you do that, you can continue with that look through out the blog, using text headers that look like they were just scribbled on paper. Or if you don’t want to do that, maybe you can ditch the symbol all together and just use plain text that says “World Of Warcraft” and FAIL BLOG similar to what you have now. When I google “world of warcraft blog” the first blog on the list does not have that seal there.
Here is a link to a “world of warcraft” font that you can customize to make it look 3D
Those will make it easy for you to create a new graphic that will keep the style and the notability of “World Of Warcraft” while customizing it to fit your own.
Moving on from your website’s banner.. The overall top half is very busy. If i were you, I would choose the WOW Seal/graphic or the background, but not both. With those two together, it makes your site look “top heavy” and really, you want the banner to be memorable, but you want people ultimately look at the content. You top advertisement is also busy, and I think that if you loose the background graphic, it will look less busy. It is a good advertisement and it goes with your site. That is a good choice and decent placement.
Moving downwards, I now see the graphic that goes along the top of your content area. I think that is a nice graphic, and I’m sure it coinsides with the WOW look, and I think you should keep it. But I would only keep it if you tone down the rest of your header. I still like my idea of a crayon WOW graphic, but thats just me.
Then you have the top on your content. This looks like a mess. There is no separation of items in there. Have a look here at your site. Taking this picture without the rest of your site, you can really get a feel of how messy that area is right?
You should consider creating some padding around your main table elements. By doing so, you will see a border around your side bars and the center, and that will start you off in the right direction of organizing it. I am a big fan of separating sidebars from the main content. When there is no border or color change showing you that there are 3 separate elements in this main content, it looks cluttered.
That little graphic on the top left sidebar is redundant. Its the same picture as the header and there is no need for that little one there. I would remove it and move your EC widget up, or put something else there. That area is prime real estate, you should definitely use it to your advantage. Actually, a PERFECT idea and this will kill two birds with one stone.
In your jumbled center/top area, you have text that says “Remember to Submit your LOLs and Fails” You can remove that and instead, create a 125px x 150px graphic that says the same thing, but in a more fun way that is a LOT more eye Catching. Instead of using all that text, just use a graphic that says “SUBMIT YOUR FAILS HERE” You don’t really need to say “lols OR fails” People should understand what is worth submitting. You then link that picture to your submission page and there you have killed two birds. Removed some of the messy text and filled an empty space.
So other stuff up there can also be streamlined into something on your sidebars, or even put into your newer, cleaner header. For instance, an RSS graphic that says SUBSCRIBE HERE (in smallish print) in the header is a good thing. Having the subscribe in the header is good simply because people always go to the header when they get lost on a site and need to get back. They look at the header multiple times during one visit. You can even do a grid of the social bookmark graphics up there. Like a 2 x 2 square of 4 graphics total. (then you can also move that “share this” out of there)
You tell people to “submit” about 3 times within that one little paragraph. I think that having those things more strategically placed though out your site, you will get even MORE submissions. Use images and what I call “inner website advertising” Make a little image that urges people to submit, but create it as if you were going to put it on a blog that wasn’t yours. When you do this, you get a much better looking advertisement that gives the visitor all the information they need to know before clicking.
NOW ON TO THE POST’S PAGES (taken a long time to get here)
When you click on a post on the main page, obviously it will bring you to the post’s page where you can comment and read others comments. Its a typical blog layout. Your post’s layout is the same as your front page, it seems haphazard. You have the little social media bookmarking links kind of scattered.
On the top right you have Stumble, Reddit, and a few others, then at the bottom of the post, the “green share this” link and then recent posts and THEN another one for Digg.
You should decide what is more important, getting the visitor to another post of yours, or getting them to share it. If you ask me, getting them to click further into your site is more important. Sharing is great, but I have a feeling that because of your content, people will be sharing anyways. SO i would put your recent posts up higher, and stream line them a little. Have the post titles show in a row instead of a list. If they post side by side with a divider in between, i think it will fit more into the page. You can use a bullet point or ‘ | ‘ to separate. I like the use of the ‘ | ‘ to separate text on a page, i think it looks nice.
Once you have the recent posts in a row instead of a list, i would do another row of your social bookmarks. You can take ALL of the bookmarks from all over and put them in a neat little row for people to choose from. It will look a whole lot more organized and will actually invite more people to click on one, because they will be in the same spot. Its likely people miss the one’s up top because they typically are not there. I would also put a link to subscribe by either RSS or email or both in every post. You can either put it right above the comment box, or underneath your social bookmarking links.
Again, i think that you need some type of color change or outline from the sidebars to the main content. I am not usually a fan of sidebars that end up looking like they belong on the main page. A separator to make it look more neat and organized will help GREATLY in the overall look, and just about everything else will fall into place after that.
Now your FOOTER. WTF? haha. I’m just kidding, but seriously, did you give up a little? Its just a load of stuff tucked in there. Make your footer a place for people to go who want ALL of the information at once. I see that you have links to CONTACT, TERMS, and ADVERTISING down there.. I did not even realize that you accepted advertising from your website until i clicked down there. I saw the little “you can be right here right now” but that took me to an advertising bidding site. If you take advertisements yourself, you should move that up a little. Or maybe consider getting something like OIO Publisher. I use it here and i LOVE it. Its cheap enough and super easy to integrate. Visitors can simple click on a BUY ADSPACE HERE NOW button and, choose where they want to advertise, and pay via paypal without EVER leaving your site. Pretty awesome. It also sends the advertising customer a weekly update of how their ad is doing, clicks, impressions, etc. Just a suggestion.
SO back to the footer. You have some links, but layout your footer a little differently because you have a LOT of stuff there. What I would do is something similar to what I have here. A row with 3 or 4 boxes inside that row. Then you can have one with all of your links to your contact, terms, submission, advertising, facebook, etc pages. Then in the other box you can shove all of those little graphics for the vaious websites in there. Then you last box can be something of a DIRECTORY LISTINGS or EXTERNAL LINKS and you can list all of the sites that you are listed on, or link exchange type things, affiliations..
So thats it. Overall, what I would do, is consider getting a magazine style theme. You website is SOO built on images, so why not get a theme that will show a load of images on the front page in an organized way? Then if someone lands on your main page, they can choose from a lot of funny pics or articles. Just a thought. Maybe if you build your blog more like a website, it will organize it more and bring you more advertisers and more readers?? Again, these are just my thoughts. I just think the basic blog layout is great for BLOGGING – journal entries and talking about life.. Things that, unless read in chronological order, would not make much sense. But for you, YOU can have a post from 10 months ago be one of the post popular post today if it still showed on your front page. Then that will get the reader interested and want to look further. Right now, your main page isnt a lot of “fails” like i have seen it in the past.. Thats fine, but having a layout that lets you stick a few “featured” items in there to show the people what you DO have, then you will get more NEW readers. A read who happened upon your blog today for the first time wouldnt nessecarily get “funny fail blog” on their first impression unless they clicked further.
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