Today I am launching one of the latest features of my blog, that is sure to quickly become one of the most popular. You may have noticed on the SOB homepage a box titled ‘Free Blog Reviews’, well the funny thing is, that I put that over a week ago however I got zero entries – seemed like no one was interested in getting their blog reviewed for FREE (what is going on there?).

I decided to take my new feature to the StandOutBlogger family and sent an email to my list (scroll up to subscribe) letting them know about the offer -  and got 11 entries (not bad for the first one!)

However there can be only one lucky blogger each week so if that wasn’t you then head over to the “Free Blog Review” page and put your entry in for next week!

This weeks Stand Out Blog is:

BloggingElements.com

Mike, the owner of BloggingElements.com captured my attention with just one short sentence.

If you are not willing to be criticized you probably are not willing to do what it takes to be great.

As soon as I read this I knew Mike was serious about creating a ‘stand out’ blog, and helping bloggers achieve that is the goal of StandOutBlogger.com. So without anything further, let’s take a deep look at BloggingElements.com and if you as readers have anything to add at the end, Mike would love to hear your comments!

• Design & Aesthetics

  
  Let’s start with the first thing that people see when they visit BloggingElements.com.

  MY INITIAL THOUGHTS are that the design is very clean, with a great deal of focus on the content – I LIKE THIS A LOT!

  Scrolling to the footer I find that the blog is using the Vigilance Theme, I have no problems with free themes as long as they do not detract from the content or contain a heap of footer links. This theme does neither of these and I think it is perfect for the blog.

  Another thing that I really like is the limited amount of advertising.

  I think for a professional blog, that a lot of advertising really detracts from the quality of the content AND could limit the chances of new visitors returning.

  How I Would Improve The Design
  I just wanted to throw a few thoughts around that I think may just optimise your design a little bit, they are just my opinions and you can take them or leave them.

  1. Get  A Logo
     One of the things I push frequently on SOB is BRANDING, you want people to instantly recognize your blog and while your layout is important, having a recognizable logo is just as vital. Your logo is great for getting noticed when you comment other blogs, as most blogs now days have gravatars enabled – which shows a selected image with each comment you leave.
  2. Greater Focus On Newsletter Sign Up
     I don’t know if it is just me, but your newsletter sign up form seems to just blend into your content and sidebar. Find a way to draw visitors attention to your signup – without doing it in a off-putting way. Start with putting a border around the whole form and consider using graphics to draw people in.

• Content & Direction

  I really cannot flaw the content of this blog. The quality of the articles are great and they are short and sharp – a quick and easy read with lots of quick tips.

  The only thing I will add to this is that the length of articles is usually associated with the frequency of posting. Blogs posting longer articles are known to usually post one, maybe two times a week while blogs posting shorter articles usually post 3 or more times a week.  Just a thought…but keep the quality content coming!

• Branding & Marketing

  Branding
  This is definitely my favourite part of blogging because it is the one thing that can either make a blog successful or give it an early last breath.

  When I look at BloggingElements.com I definitely see a lack of branding. You have a fantastic brandable image as your gravatar picture, but when I visit the blog I do not see that photo anywhere. When people visit through one of the comments you have left on another blog, they are looking for an instant connection – something that is familiar. This is why I usually recommend that people use one of two things as their gravatar picture:

  1. Their Logo
     Unless you are branding yourself using your blog , then this is the method I recommend. I personally have successful branded StandOutBlogger quite successfully using this method. If you are commenting frequently then this is definitely a fantastic to get your logo well recognized in your blogging niche.
  2. A Photo Of The Blogger
     The only time I recommend doing this is when you also have a picture of yourself above the fold of your blog homepage.

  Marketing
  This is definitely just a preference based on each blogger. All you have to do is find what works for you and do that. For StandOutBlogger it has always been blog commenting that has worked best, but for you it may be social networking, guest blogging, or anything else that gets you traffic. The main thing is that you are marketing your blog.

• Monetization

  
  If you are serious about blogging full-time then you need to have a money making blog. Don’t think of it as selling out, instead think of it as a way of funding your ability to post quality, creative content.Now there are definitely right and wrong ways to go about this and I won’t go into all the details, but instead let’s look at BloggingElements.com and see what they are doing and maybe suggest a few things that Mike could try.

  What I like:

  Limited & Well Placed Advertising
  I really like that how there are only a couple of ad spaces available in the side bar, and they are not a distraction from the content (which is the focus). All the ads are well focused towards the blogs target market which is also good.

  A Few Thoughts…

  However, I am guessing that any money earned from those links are not a huge amount of money. So how do you go about increasing your blogs income without filling it with advertising? There are a couple of options:

  1. Focus On One Affiliate Program
     Unless you have a large amount of traffic, chances are that selling private ads are not making you more than $50 a month – total. You can make that from one affiliate sale (depending on the program). So instead of having 4 people pay you $10 for a 125×125 ad spot in your side bar, why not have a larger 250×250 ad spot banner to your favourite affiliate program. I have seem a lot of bloggers doing this with the Thesis Blog Theme. This helps direct your visitors to one common source, instead of confusing them with too many exit options. You could even have a second advertisement for the same affiliate at the bottom of each post.
  2. Build That List
     BloggingElements.com already has a list (and I subscribed), but as everyone keeps quoting, “The money is in the list.”Your list is what will hold your community together. They are the ones that will be interested when you write a new post – so let them know. They are the the people who are wanting to improve their blogging, so will be willing to invest in products that you can prove the value of.

     So I would definitely put the focus on building your list, provide quality information to your subscribers and when you find a product you would like to recommend you will have people who will trust your opinion – just don’t abuse their trust!

     A few quick fixes to the Blogging Elements Newsletter

     Thank You Page – When I subscribed to the newsletter, I confirmed my email address and was directed to an Error 404 page saying that the page I was looking for did not exist. The thank you page is a great way to win instant trust by offering an bonus unadvertised free gift, or some bonus content – so make the most of it!

     Email Formatting – I noticed that the Newsletter is using Aweber (good choice), they have a large selection of fantastic free email templates, which is why I was a little surprised to see the welcome email to be plain text, but the font quite large. I would recommend finding a nice email template or just going with regular size font in plain text (using Awebers width guidelines).

In Conclusion

Definitely a blog with a lot of potential. I would just spend some time working on branding Blogging Elements, keep the quality of your blog posts up, and just keep focusing on building your list. These few things will help take BloggingElements.com to the next level.

Now it is over your you, if you have any input that you believe would help Mike make BloggingElements.com even better, then leave a comment below.

If you would like  a review of your blog like this, then head over to our Free Weekly Blog Review page as I will be giving away a free review each week as a way for us all to gain insight from other blogs.

About Thomas Sinfield

Thomas run multiple blogs and is busy testing different strategies and systems to increase profitability and exposure. He is currently working on a new project (yes another blog) that is set to be his most profitable yet.