Feb 1, 2016 / Community Pool

Community Pool

The place for feedback, advice, and friendly blogging chatter.

Have you just published a new post and are dying for some feedback? Did you recently start your blog and could use some layout or design advice from your more seasoned peers?

Did you just start blogging and you’re not sure how to get going? Has your blog been dormant for a while but you’d like to give it a jolt of life? Join our free Blogging 101 course (or any of our other offerings at Blogging U.).

Tap into the wisdom of The Daily Post blogging community and leave your question here in the comments. Others can then click through and offer input either on your site, or in the comments here (feel free to indicate which you’d prefer).

To help us make the Community Pool a productive space for discussion, here are some tips you might find useful:

TIP: To keep from losing your place in the comment thread while you visit others’ blogs, right-click on a link to open it in a new tab or window.

  • While you’re not required to, we encourage everyone who requests feedback to also reply to at least one or two other bloggers who need some help. Spread the love!
  • The Community Pool comments section can get quite big — and starting duplicate threads doesn’t help. Thanks for not posting the same question more than once!
  • If you’re looking for quality feedback, be as specific as you can. Questions about a particular post tend to draw more comments than ones about entire blogs. Questions about specific design elements are more likely to be answered than ones asking for general layout advice.
  • We discourage leaving links without a more substantive message or question. These are often overlooked by other bloggers, and we frequently remove them to make the comment reading experience smoother.
  • Please keep all comments civil and constructive. The idea is to have fun — it’s a pool, after all!
  • If you haven’t looked at our Commenting Guidelines in a while, now might be a good time.
  • No running on the deck.
Show Comments

791 Comments

Comments are closed.

Close Comments

Comments

  1. Hey!!! I just recently made a blog focusing on just my everyday thoughts. I need some help though! I just recently found this page as I was scrolling through the feed on wordpress. I read the insert about new bloggers and thought hey, this is where I need to be. I would love for people to check out my blog, maybe give me some pointers. As you will see I don’t have very many post up just yet, I need all of the help that I can get! So check it out leave me some feedback, I could always use more followers!! Thanks! 🙂

    Liked by 4 people

    2. You’ve come to the right place!
      I suggest you make an About page, as that’s usually the first place newcomers go.
      Also, I don’t know if you noticed or if it’s a problem (as it really isn’t) but in your Blogs I Follow widget, the double digit numbers get cut off, but like I said, that’s not a big deal.
      Happy Blogging! 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

    1. I Love, love, love the bi-lingual aspect of your blog. absolutely the ONLY thing I could suggest is double then triple check spelling. otherwise it is terrific. the theme is nice, clean and professional looking. can hardly wait for your postings! http://www.suziland.net

      Liked by 2 people

  5. Hi, just started my new blog. Despite the name, I don’t intend to post only about parenting. It’s a space where I’ll be sharing life experiences, from my point of view. I intend to go back to writing, after a few years of being on pause. Let me know what you think and hope you like it. Thanks

    Liked by 2 people

  6. Hey lovely people, being the 574th comment i doubt anyone will scroll down this far but it’s worth a shot right? I run a new anorexia recovery blog which has very few readers:( I hope to inspire those suffering with or have suffered this disorder in the past. Happy reading 🙂 https://stillbeautiful98.wordpress.com/

    Liked by 2 people

  8. I posted a couple of months ago asking for suggestions about redesigning my blog as it was black background with white type and hard for some people to read. I am NOT a designer and am grateful for the out-of-the-box options WP offers for free. So, I’ve got a new design and am interested in feedback. This is just a simple blog but if there’s something obvious missing, let me know, and let me know what you think. Thank you!

    https://rockandrollmama.wordpress.com

    Liked by 1 person

    2. very nice looking blog. my only suggestion would be to possibly use a “read more”. it is a cool lil thing that creates a shortened version and when clicked opens up the entire blog in a new page. You can fit way more stuff on your post page without having to scroll so far. ask Mike S. he’s around here somewhere and knows exactly how to explain it.

      Liked by 1 person

  10. Hi,

    I wrote a gig review the other day – something a little different for my blog, but very fun! I’d really appreciate any tips or ideas for my next review.

    Lucy Rose

    I’m pretty new to this game so any recommendations for blogs to follow would be very welcome.

    Liked by 2 people

  12. Check my new site i’ll be talking about everything that concerns each one of us. From photography to technology and all sort of “people” actuality. Go check worldnewsandtrends.wordpress.com

    Liked by 2 people

    1. Heyyy just visited your blog.. its realy nice as i am a mother too the topics i fund are good and helpful. I think you should include something related to labor before and after labor and topics related to feeding issues and sleepless nights and some measures to cope with them.. they will be very helpful for those who are going to be mother soon…

      Liked by 2 people

      2. Heyy thank you so much for checking it out and for giving AMAZING feedback and ideas. Your totally right about the labor before afterbirth lol thought about that after time to get to writing ! But you’ve given me some great idea so thank you again!

        Liked by 2 people

  15. Hi, guys!
    I’ve just started a blog for the first time and I would love some opinions on my sight. If ya’ll could go check it out and tell me if there is anything I’m missing or need to fix, I would really appreciate it! Also, any comments on my posts are welcome! Thank you!

    https://evermoreaux.wordpress.com

    Liked by 2 people

  16. Hi just curious. I started my blog. Http:/www.magentathemua.com and I have been getting a lot of views (over 55,000) but not a lot of followers. What are somethings I can do to convert my traffic into followers?

    Liked by 2 people

    1. Hey Vandana, that slug of the blogpost is too lengthy for an URL. It’s better to carefully choose only a couple of words which roughly give an idea what the post might contain. For Example:
      ‘lemon-coriander-tangy-soup’ is more than enough to do an url’s job. All those ‘A’ and ‘THE’s etc. just make it look confusing. Hope that helps.

      Liked by 1 person

  25. Hello everyone! I keep plugging away with my blog, trying to make sure that I post with regularity. My goal has simply been to put up two articles a week, which I’ve been pretty successful with. I just want to make sure that that’s enough though; I could probably manage three posts a week, but I’m mindful that I don’t want to overload people with content.

    I’m especially aware of that since I’ve learned that Google gives better positions in search results to blog posts over 1,000 words long. Mine have been between 500 and 700 typically, because I want to get to the point and not bore people. But, writing in a slightly longer format I definitely don’t want people to stop reading because they get bored.

    My most recent article ( https://ethanol.wordpress.com/2016/02/02/sauza-silver/ ) was only slightly longer, at about 800 words. I want to ask if it feels like it has been padded out or otherwise fluffed. As I work to make my writing a bit longer, I want to make sure that it’s still all killer with no filler.

    Liked by 2 people

  27. Hi, fellow ‘pressers.

    I’ve recently revamped my blog (https://cairnscommunications.wordpress.com/) – so I have
    my themed pic of the day each day, then a daily post:

    *monday media (mostly radio),
    *tuesday cruiseday (material related to the cruiseline industry),
    *wednesday workshops (training tips),
    *thursday thoughts, (random comments)
    *friday travel (no-cruise-related travel musings),
    *saturday arts (movies, entertainment, music, books ..), and then
    *sunday podcast – the Rear View Microphone.

    Can you take a look at it, and see if the structure works for you?

    I’m considering changing the ‘stay-on-top’ images to a gallery, for example – or perhaps providing larger links to each category: perhaps a thumbnail of the feature image from each week’s post)

    Also, if you get a chance to check out any of the blogposts, let me know what you think: I’m aiming for a ‘sunday newspaper’ feel to the articles, or perhaps a ‘company newsletter’ for the training tips.

    Are they Readable? Engaging? Too long? Too short? Any advice would be gratefully received…

    Cheers in advance!

    GraC

    Liked by 2 people

    1. Hello, Graham.

      I’ve checked your blog. I loved it: great job – concise, easy to read articles. But I personally think that alluring the reader since the very beginning (the landing page) is really important. And, honestly, I’d rather feature something like your “Training v. Real World” article (which by the way I found pretty damn good) instead of your Travel Pics Theme series. But, hey, that’s me.

      Keep up the good work.

      Liked by 1 person

    2. I like the layout, it’s clean and well organized. I’m not sure what else you’re planning on changing, but I found it to be easy to navigate.

      The posts are very informative and enjoyable to read. I agree with the previous comment, the Training vs Real World post is great.

      Liked by 1 person

  30. Has anyone made the jump from a free account to a premium? I was wondering if you thought it was worth it and could provide any insights?

    Liked by 2 people