RA Project Redesign Possibilities

Today’s post is a guest contribution from Penny, who manages WP-Premiums.

Ronald recently left a comment on one of my posts about graphic design, saying that he was uncertain about how to arrange the site without making it too crowded or overdone, so I thought that it might be fun to provide some ideas on how to arrange the different sections of this website. I’m aware that Ronald is planning to revamp this site with the sleek Mimbo Pro premium theme so I’ve created a very rough preview of how the site could look with that theme’s functionality.

I’ve used a blue colour scheme as the original design uses some blue elements, and because blue is a pleasant, calming colour which most readers will appreciate. When designing your site you’ll need to keep in mind the two kinds of visitors who will be using it: regulars and new visitors. The regulars will know how to navigate to the content they require and won’t want you to change the site navigation too much, whereas your new visitors will want to be able to read your best and/or most recent articles without having to hunt for them.One of the problems with the recent proliferation of magazine themes is that while they can provide a very attractive way of organising your content, they can also make it more difficult to have a chronological reading experience without lots of clicking between pages.I’ve numbered the main areas of this mocked-up home page design and will take them all in turn.

1. I think that it may be the right time to review the logo image, as I feel that its meaning is unclear. I think that a more stylised logo, yet one which could look good even as a 16×16 favicon would be a good improvement.
2. After looking at the RAP sitemap, I’ve provided headings to link to the subject areas on which this site focuses most: Blogging issues, Case Studies, Tips, Misconceptions and Site News. This is a good exercise to do if you’re ever feeling like you need to pin down your site’s main focus. I’ve also added the usual RSS logo next to the search bar as most readers expect to see this logo at the top of the site.
3. The recent articles section is a good way of alerting readers to these articles.
4. The top featured article is a great place to highlight promotional content like contests or features which may be active for some time. It’s also a good location for any articles which you wish to highlight as examples of flagship content.
5. The article carousel offered by Mimbo Pro could be used as another way of linking to recent or popular articles in one or more categories, but it’s not essential and could be omitted to minimise clutter.
6. I’ve chosen to list the site pages, downloads and contributors within the main sidebar, but other items could also be listed here. I feel that it’s important not to clutter up the sidebar with unnecessary widgets and buttons, as it’s an area which is meant to benefit the reader, not the blogger. As the RAP archives are filled with so much great content which might be overwhelming for a new reader, I would recommend using the SRG Clean Archives plugin to provide a sexy way to view this content by month. A list of categories could also be provided in the sidebar to allow readers to navigate similar content more easily if the main headings at the top of the page are insufficient.
7. A recent post could be provided here to give new visitors the opportunity to read a full post without having to move to another page. Or else one or more post snippets could be provided here to provide a full magazine-style layout. If post snippets are used, perhaps the From the Vault and Reader Spotlight features currently used by RAP could be located here.
8. Sidebar 2: 125×125 ads, Adsense blocks and/or a blogroll could be placed in this area.
9. In the last year it’s become quite fashionable to have a functional footer, which may act like an extended sidebar. It’s important to acknowledge that some of your visitors may not reach this far down the page, so any information placed here should be useful, but not essential to navigating your site.

I’m really looking forward to seeing the redesigned Reader Appreciation Project website, and I hope that you’ll find my tips helpful when considering your own blog or website layout.

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