Now that we’ve covered how to START you blog, I figured it’d be helpful to cover some useful things to include on your blog as well. I’ll go through each part of my blog’s home page and give some tips for set up and inclusion.
If you’re looking for the first step, see my post on How to Start a Profitable Blog From Scratch. If you’ve already started your blog, here are some tips on what to do with your page after you’ve got the initial parts set up.
HOME PAGE
Make sure when you pick your theme, you pick one that you love and that’s easy to navigate. I much prefer the simple layouts personally, but everyone has their own style. I’ve been to visit a few blogs and their page had so much going on or was so confusing that I left — overstimulation is a thing!!
When it comes to your home page, there are a few things you want to get set up:
YOUR HEADER & LOGO
I use Canva for every graphic I make for my site, including my header. It’s SO easy to use and best of all it’s FREE!! Seriously fantastic haha. Pick a color scheme and an easy to read font and start designing! They offer a ton of free images, and they have some great stock ones for $1. Keep in mind that although is says $1, you have to pay to use it 10 times, so it’s really $10. That was my one downside, but there are so many free ones it doesn’t matter. Or you can upload your own! Just make sure you’re not using someone’s copyrighted work.
SET UP YOUR EMAIL SUBSCRIPTION
Regardless of if you have a brand new blog, set up your email subscription. It’s a great way to connect with your audience and give them special perks down the line. I use MailChimp for mine and it’s free to the first 2000 subscribers. They have really easy to use templates, too so it makes setup a breeze. This is coming from someone who was not at all tech savvy at the beginning of her blogging journey haha.
CREATE SOCIAL MEDIA PAGES
Social media is the biggest life source to your blog. No one will know about it if you don’t share it! I recommend setting up a Facebook Business Page, an Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest account for your blog. I also set up Tumblr and Bloglovin as well for mine just to cover all bases. When I was first starting out, Facebook was my number 1 source of traffic. Now it’s Pinterest thanks to Tailwind.
Related: How to Use Tailwind to Explode Your Blog Traffic
For my Instagram and Pinterest accounts, I just changed my personal accounts into business accounts. Changing them (or creating new ones) allows you to see the analytics of people viewing your site so you can know what people like and don’t like, when your followers are most active during the day to reach them at the best time, etc.
There are so many great advantages of the business pages. I set up new accounts for Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook Business and Bloglovin’ as I didn’t have them before I started. Side note, I didn’t think I needed a Facebook Business page but it actually is very helpful, and it’s required to have a business Instagram account.
I have multiple places on my blog where my social media icons are to maximize exposure. I have them at the very top of the page beside my search bar, under my About Me on the sidebar, and at the bottom of posts for sharing. Some people have a widget that displays them off to the side, or at the top of each blog post. Lay them out however you prefer!
MENU PAGES
For your menu, you can decide how you want things to be sorted. I recommend having an About page to tell people something about you. Your readers need to trust you and connect to you, so make this a little bit personal and share some a few details about who you are and why you blog. I also recommend having some place on your blog for people to contact you. If not a whole page, add this to the sidebar. Blogger and WordPress have a Contact widget that makes it super easy.
Have pages for your main topics you are going to blog about. If it’s fashion and beauty, those are the ones to include. You can also create drop downs to go to sub-categories for related topics. This is pretty easy, if you need help DM me and I’ll be glad to help you get it set up.
Keep your menu simple and don’t try to include everything. Simple is always better. I’ve been to blogs that have 10 or more across the top and 6 per drop down and I was like woah. Yes, being organized is good, but it can also be intimidating and unappealing to someone trying to navigate your blog for the first time. Stick to broad topics and have a few things under that umbrella. This is also why you have a search bar if people want to find something specific.
FOOTER
The footer of your page is another handy place to have your social media icons. A lot of people also have their instagram feed running across their footer *ahem, me*. I think it adds some extra color and personalization. You can also have an additional contact form down there as well.
SIDE BAR
ABOUT ME
I like when people have a little blurb about themselves on the sidebar. It helps to connect you with the blogger and learn something about them. Keep this section short and simple, and go more into depth on your About Me page.
INSTAGRAM FEED
I have my instagram feed featured on my sidebar as it ties in with my blog. A lot of fashion bloggers do this as we blog about clothes haha, so it’s your call whether you want this over there or not. I used Light Widget to get the code, then on your Layout page, paste the code into an HTML/Javascript widget and you’re done! It’ll automatically update once a day and you can customize it multiple different ways to whatever suits you.
ADS/AFFILIATE LINKS
You can put ads anywhere on your site. Top, bottom, sides, in posts, above and below posts, etc. Everyone does things differently here, but I put this under “sidebar” as this is where I have mine at usually. I don’t typically have large ads in my posts, but will on occasion if they’re relevant (like this one) or I don’t have many affiliate links in a post. I’ll have some visually appealing ads in my sidebar to rep things I love instead of flooding all of my posts with them. You add these the same way you add the Instagram code, through the HTML/Javascript widget.
I also recommend having a search bar on the side bar for people that want a specific post. You can also add other things like another email opt-in spot, a Popular Posts or Recent Posts widget, and many others.
I think that about covers the bases on the home page. If you guys need any help getting things set up or have questions, please feel free to reach out!!
Have a wonderful Wednesday!
XO,
Dani
