When people go to visit your site, they will already have some ideas about its content based on information provided by the referring source. For example, search engine results may provide a clip of text from your site that includes relevant keywords. In many cases, if the promised information is not delivered within the first page, you can rest assured that potential buyers will simply look for another website. Therefore, the way you structure your blog is extremely important.

1) Headers and Banners

Today, many webmasters create niche specific different domains in order to keep the content as relevant as possible. This includes rotating banners, or special content headers at the top and bottom of the blog. Surprisingly enough, this does not advance search engine ranking, let alone assure that customers are going to buy from your site.

When it comes to banners, you need to stop and ask yourself three very important questions:

1. When searching for specific information, do you even bother to look at banners, or do you quickly scroll down to find the content?

2. Have you ever clicked away from a page because it took too long for the banners or headers to load?

3. Do you often associate banners at the top of a page with “free” webhosting sites, and therefore, form a mental impression that the site may not be very creditable?

If you answered “yes” to any one of these questions, chances are the majority of site visitors are also thinking the same way. No matter how you look at it, the advice related to creating massive advertising campaigns based on headers is useless, and downright harmful. As a general rule of thumb, you will always be better served by using these areas of your website for sensible sales pitches that can set the tone and the mood of the potential buyer.

2) Page Loading Speed

There is no question that DSL, satellite, and cable modems are a vast improvement over dial up. On the other hand, many of these services also limit consumer bandwidth usage. As a general rule of thumb, if you page takes too long to load, it may also take up too much bandwidth. Under these circumstances, you can rest assured that potential customers will be annoyed and not want to come back to your site, let alone buy anything from it. While you may want to have a fancy website with lots of frills, you will always be better served by a clean, neat, fast loading website.

3) The Ideal Number of Columns

When you open a newspaper, you will notice that the text is divided into a number of columns. Many webmasters try to duplicate this effect with their blogs. It is very important to realize that newspapers must make use of every available spot on a printed page. Therefore, when they break up text onto different pages, it makes sense. On the other hand, when you have more than three or four columns on your site, it can create a great deal of confusion. In fact, if your site has five or even six columns, some of them may be inaccessible to visitors with small screens. This problem becomes even pronounced if the browser does not support the vertical scrolling instructions found in the code for your blog. As a general rule of thumb, you should try to your site focused mainly on post and page content.

Today, it is not always easy to draw a balance between a well designed website and one that looks contemporary. For example, if every other webmaster has a site with five or six columns, you may be tempted to clutter up your own site up. On the other hand, if you give it some though, you will soon realize that components such as extra columns and flash banners won’t gain any added value in search engine ranking. At the same time, potential buyers may become frustrated with slow loading pages, as well as ones that do not deliver the desired information. If you have to change design elements, you will be well served by changing logos, menu styles, and other features that will give your blog a contemporary look without sacrificing the functionality of the site.

Author Bio: Learn how to make money blogging today. Visit Brian’s website, http://www.HomebasedBlogging.com and learn how you can make money online from blogging using social media, affiliate marketing, podcasting, article marketing, and many other money-making topics from blogging professionals.

Category: Writing
Keywords: blogging, work at home, make money online, freelance writing, social media, blogger