Designing a Business Blog
Every blogging package comes with at least one default template, and it’s often from this basic layout that a new blogger might create his or her own look. Experienced Web surfers recognize the default templates and may pass judgment on a site that hasn’t taken the time to personalize its look. At the very least, they may assume this is a brand new blog and a brand new blogger. For personal use, many of the templates are clean and well done, but for business blogging, you want to create a design of your own. A memorable site draws more readers.
Whether you modify an existing blog template or create something entirely new, design plays a big part in how your readers think about your blog. Branding is just as important here as it is on your company’s business cards, stationery, and Web site. A well-designed blog typically includes:
� A distinctive logo or banner that clearly conveys the name of the blog.
� A limited color palette designed to increase the readability and attrac-tiveness of the blog.
� Branding that matches your existing corporate identity, especially styles established by other Web sites.
Some bloggers have taken artful design to a technological extreme most of us can admire but not emulate.It reflects the current time of day, phase of the moon, and weather conditions in an incredible 90 automatically updating combinations. It’s over-the-top, but unforgettable, and can’t be confused with any other blog.
For most blogs, a nicely designed logo/header at the top of the page and some well-selected background colors or patterns that don’t obscure text are more than sufficient. If you have an artist or graphic designer on staff, creating an attractive design isn’t a big issue, but we aren’t all blessed with big budgets or an artist’s eye, and sometimes hiring a designer may be the wisest course. Even if you do have an in-house artist, be aware that designing a print brochure and designing a Web site are very different skills. The technical limitations that are part of publishing a Web site are complex enough that your print designer may be frustrated rather than challenged by the new medium.
The fact is, design strategies that work well in print may not necessarily work online. One big technical difficulty is that your potential audience may be visiting your Web site on many different kinds of computers, using many different browsers — and different browser versions, each of which has potholes into which an inexperienced designer might stumble! All those variables mean that you need a skilled designer and a skilled HTML coder to produce a Web site that looks good and works right for most of your audience.
Hosted blog solution or independent blog software aside, you’ll be more comfortable and have a better blog if you have some basic HTML knowledge at your fingertips. HTML, or Hypertext Markup Language, is the code used to create pages for the Web. Though it can be incredibly complex when frames, dynamic database pages, or Cascading Style Sheets are used, the essentials are still quite simple to do.