New Design for Our First Birthday!
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On the 5th of August 2007, I published my first article, The Crucial Ingredients of a First Impression. Now, one year later, it’s birthday time for Pro Blog Design!
With over 2000 subscribers, 2000 comments and 120 posts, it’s been a great year. We’re celebrating with a new look, and some changes to make the next one even better. Hope you like it!
The New Design
If you’re reading this in your feed reader, please click through onto the site to see the new look. Let me know what you think of it!
A lot of time and effort has gone into the design, and I’m really pleased with it. If you like it though, it’s entirely possible to do the same with your own blog.
Every design is made up of individual steps. Instead of talking through the design here, I’ll list some of those steps below. It all links back to different articles where I’ve written about the topics before, so you’ll be able to apply the knowledge to your own blog.
- Two column layout (Though the title of that article is out of date now!), with the sidebar on the right and content ordered by importance.
- Suitable color scheme chosen, but using some of the same colors from the old design so that it wouldn’t lose all resemblance. The logo hasn’t changed at all.
- Designed using what I think makes a design look good. What you think looks good could be completely different!
- Using very limited post previews on the homepage. The idea is to highlight the most recent post most, and then each successive set of posts less. There are 9 posts shown on the homepage, but it’s less than a screen-full.
- Work put into the small details, like effects for the comment fields, custom gravatars,and putting the RSS counter in plain text.
- Worked on the typography to make the posts easily readable, e.g. Now using a larger font-size and line-height than before.
- Cool RSS icons chosen, as well as some icons from the FamFamFam set.
- Personalizing some of the standard messages to make things unique, and setting up a fun 404 page.
- Site tested in all major browsers (Even the iPhone works well and has a webclip icon set up!)
- Print style sheets set up, and perfected.
Advertising
Adding adverts to a site after so long without them is always a controversial decision, but I think it’s for the best. The money from the adverts is not for me. It will be used to help pay for other writers to write articles for Pro Blog Design. That way, we’ll have more content for you, and from a wider range of views.
And there will be no sponsored posts, hidden affiliate links or adverts in the content. It’s just ads in the top of the sidebar, so it won’t affect your reading.
The regular cost will be $45, but for the first 4 advertisers interested, there will be a discount rate of $30. First come, first-serve though! You can see our traffic stats, and contact form here.
Other Changes Around Here
As well as the overall look, there are a few other changes to the way things will work. Hopefully, it will make the next year even better than the last!
- Author section at the end of the posts. At the end of each post, there is now a fairly large author bio and picture. That’s to give credit to anyone who wants to take-up the Write for Us offer.
- Recommend your own links for the link feed. The link feed has been moved to the footer (More space there!), and you can now recommend your own links by sending them to me via StumbleUpon, Twitter or Delicious. Read more here.
- Site map added. With 124 posts in the archive at the time of writing, a site map was needed. You can see it here.
- Merged Contact and About pages. The contact page only had the contact form on it, and the About page is short. They’re now merged into one (Largely because the navigation at the top of the page looks nicer that way!).
Thanks Are Due
I was almost going to leave this section out, because I wasn’t sure it could be done! I can only list a very few here, and in no particular order! Sorry I couldn’t list everyone.
A huge thanks to Smashing Magazine for including me in their blogroll; at the very least, it’s done wonders for me ego! Another huge thanks to Darren Rowse for letting me guest-post on ProBlogger several times. That’s been another honor and highlight of the past year!
Also owe a lot of thanks to the other great blogs in the same niche as this one. They’ve taught me more than I care to admit! Some of the best (And well worth checking out) are Vandelay Design, Noupe, Creative Curio and Just Creative Design.
There are too many great people who have left comments here to even attempt that seriously, but a huge thanks have to go to Milo, Matt and Kristarella in particular. I wouldn’t be surprised if yous had left more comments here than me!
So, what do you think? Thoughts, comments? I’d love to hear them all!
Enjoy this post? You should follow me on Twitter!
Looks great, I’m hoping to enrol my proper design for my site in the next few weeks, any tips for putting out a new theme or layout to a blog?
I’m loving the headers (comments, extra) they ones, nice colour scheme… just not sure about the background colour on the links
the new look is awesome. I really like it, especially the comments part.
congratulation on your first year :)
Very nicely done. I’ve been thinking about doing the same for my own blog. I think my design is getting quite dated. ;) Well done.
New design looks good! And, yes, I remember I said I’d contribute a post or two sometime. I’ve been busy, but I’ll get around to it sometime. :D
Great job with the design.
Happy Birthday! It seems a lot of blogs are having their birthday around this time! Thank you for the link out too, glad JCD has been of help :)
Congratulations on a great first year, Michael. It’s a marvellous achievement to have 2,000 subscribers in your first twelve months. Your writing is one of the inspirations for me and my blog. Keep up the great work.
Long Time Subscriber – First Time Commenter!
You blog is fantastic – It’s my primary resource when doing anything blog design related.
2,000 Subscribers in 12 Months! – Well Done!.
Also, The Design is fantastic!
Glorious new design Michael! I love it and it’s way much better than the original though I must say, I would gladly take the old design anytime :D
I am glad to be part of your community here though I have not been leaving comments for a couple of months already. Rest assured I will still be following Pro Blog Design :D
p/s: I sold my blog ;)
Congratulations on your first year and on your successful new redesign. It looks like no detail has been left unstyled. I love it.
Sexy :) I liked the twitter part the most :)
Happy Birthday and congrats on the new look: clean and sober ;)
Some great looking design touches, I like it!
Congrats on turning 1 and very niche design. Great update from the old one.
Happy birthday PBD, and congrats on the redesign. It looks great :)
At first I liked it and wasn’t so sure about a couple of small bits, but the whole thing is growing on me more and more. Nice work!
Also, thanks for the link and you’re always welcome for comments!
I really like the comments and recommended links sections.
Also, I totally support the decision to put ads in. I’m thinking of doing some affiliate links myself since bandwidth is taking money out the door at an increasing rate. I don’t think I’ll do ads because I’m not sure that they’re really suitable for a personal blog, but affiliates I can really endorse and if someone finds them worthy of buying, then cool.
Happy blog birthday, Michael! You’ve published some stellar content over the past year, and I look forward to much more.
Michael,
Happy birthday and thanks for the mention. It’s been fun following your blog for the past year and I’m interested to see what happens in the next few months by adding some new writers. Good luck for year number 2!
Grant,
Set up an identical second WordPress install, with some of your posts copied over. Make sure it works perfectly there, and even install the plugins. Then it’s just a matter of downloading the theme and uploading it to your real site (Though I see I forgot about the subscribe to comments plugin now!)
Marco,
Thanks! And thanks for all the comments you’ve left over the past year. I should have had you in the post as well! I knew I’d fail at that Thank-You section…
Deron,
Thanks. A new design can be a lot of fun to work on (I love working on personal projects!) but Random Jabber still looks good. It doesn’t feel dated. :D
Redwall,
Haha, cheers. :D
Jacob,
True. I guess people have more time in the Summer, so it’s easier to set up a blog then. At least, that’s what the reason was for me. :)
Tracey,
Thanks, that means a lot. Really glad you enjoy the posts here!
Aaron,
Thanks for leaving the comment! Really glad you find the site useful, and it was nice to meet ya. :D
Pablopabla,
You sold it?? It really has been too long since I’ve seen you, sorry!! I should have noticed something big like that! Hope you were well paid for it. Blogs Review was one of the first places to ever link to me!
Ian,
Thanks! I hope not, but as the weeks go by, I’m sure things will crop up. They always do!
Dinu,
Thanks. Starting to love Twitter. Couldn’t leave it out!
Milo,
Thanks. Hope that’s true about the blogger as well! ;)
Chris,
Thanks! Glad you like it. :D
Mike Smith,
Cheers. The old one really was feeling quite old. I’m glad to have a new look out now!
Mike Robinson,
Thanks! And thanks for all the comments you’ve left on the posts here. Really appreciate them!
Kristarella,
Which bits were they? Never too late to changes things about a bit. You could be right! :)
Affiliately ads probably would work very well on a personal blog. I’d trust you to only recommend things you believe in, in which case, they’re great! They only annoy me when you see 10 different sites at once all blogging about the latest product and all saying how great it is. But then you realize they’re just trying to be first to get their affiliate links out there… :(
David,
Thanks! Can’t believe I forgot about you in the Thanks section though! I knew I shouldn’t have attempted that thing… Sorry. :(
Steven,
Thanks! You’re welcome for the link. It’s been great following yours as well. I hope the new writers attempt works out well too. :)
Congratulations on the new design, I’m loving it. And a very happy birthday, you’re on a roll.
Looks great Michael. Congratulations on the anniversary, let’s hope for many more eh?
I think it was mainly the top right corner. It took me a second to figure out that the whole post bit overlapped the top of the blue bit, so the menu and the RSS looked like they were hanging there. Now that I recognise how it’s working, with the overlaps at the top and bottom I don’t have any suggestions on what would be better (which is why I didn’t mention it before, I only like constructive criticism). Hmm, maybe a shadow on the RSS icon so that it looks like it’s tucked in or something…
Also, I’m impressed with the simplicity of the menu: the two most important things for your blog/business at the top and then the other few things people might want to find, in the sidebar.
Ooh, did you know the header link with the window location thing prevents it opening in a new tab? That’s weird. Nice job on the transparent PNG though.
Happy Birthday! And I love the new design – congrats! :D
XIII,
Thanks. It’s kind of getting 2 birthdays this year! ;)
Ben,
Cheers! I hope so too. I could schedule birthday posts for the next 5 years now, and just hope for the best? :D
Kristarella,
Ah, I see what you mean now. The content area is supposed to look like it’s sitting on top of that blue background (That’s why the blue comes out both sides), but the RSS icon doesn’t quite fit in. I tried out a few different icons at the time, but none of them worked perfectly.
You’re definitely right about the header though. I didn’t really think of that. Using JS for that header is an old habit now, but it’s not a good one! I think that needs fixed!
Thanks for all the feedback. :D
Selene,
Thanks! I’m glad you like it. :D
I love, love, love the new design!
Well, Pro Blog Design is only 1-year-old and has more than 2K subscribers, that clearly shows that you’re doing something right, no? :D
I’d like to ask something though — What do you think about placing a “Next Post” and “Previous Post” links on the post page? I thought those links were useful, especially when a reader wants to navigate to the previous post, but I don’t see the feature on Pro Blog Design. What gives?
Cool! It’s my blog’s birthday this month, too! August 1, 2007 was my first post.
Wow, Michael, that is a great honor to be listed among the likes of Vandalay, Noupe and JCD. Thank you! I’m so pleased to hear you are learning new things from Creative Curio.
Congrats on your great success with Pro Blog Design!
Dude I think it looks awesome :) def much more modern, clean, fresh and alive :D
I couldn’t find the comment count, but I guess that is by choice? My fav parts are the soft gradients on the main content area, the new comment bg styles, the RSS count and twitter sidebar :)
Are you on Plurk too?
Michael,
Happy birthday and congratulations on the new design.
Great job and thanks for the mention ;)
Pelf,
Thanks! I thought about putting them in, but the text “Next Post” or “Previous Post” never really sold it to me. I like to know what I’m going to be reading before I click the link. Instead, I’m showing 4 of the most recent posts now (Where the Next/Previous links would otherwise be). Do you think they’re useful?
Lauren,
Thanks, and congrats to you too! Definitely learning new things. You write really fantastic articles! :)
Starfeeder,
Coming from someone with a blog as good looking as Starfeeder, that means a lot! Leaving out the comment count wasn’t really on purpose to be honest. I always just told myself that I’d find a place for it (I could build it into the comments, or the header or something!), but never did. Now that the design is actually live though, I miss it already! Will have to add it back in. :)
Noura,
Thanks! Welcome. Keep up the great work on Noupe! :D
I think the default text for the next and previous post link are the titles of those posts. ;)
I think those recent post links are quite useful. :)
Okay, my fingers must have spazzed out while I was typing my first comment on this post. Do you think you could change my name from my email to just the name?
Kristarella,
Ah, fair enough. Guess I was thinking of it like the “Previous Page” and “Next Page” ones. I suppose I could make the recent posts bit into a related posts section. Sort of a best of both. :) (Still get 4 nice looking links, but they’re different on every page)
And sure thing; fixed now. Hope no spambots caught up on it!
Sweet design, Michael. You rock. Happy blog birthday man.
One tiny thing – right now I’m seeing “n/a subscribers” at the top right. Not sure if that’s just like a FeedBurner hiccup or something you have control over.
Easton,
Thanks! Glad you like it. :D
I think that was a FeedBurner problem. It happened around the same time yesterday, and when I logged into FeedBurner, it said I had 0 subscribers at the time. Hopefully it’s a temporary thing that they’ll fix soon. :(
Michael congrats on the birthday and wow about the design. It looks great and still retains enough in common with the old design to let everyone know they’re in the right place.
Now that I’m down here commenting I really like what you’ve done with the footer. Just a great job all around.
I know the decision about adding advertising. I did the same a few months back when I redesigned my site. I debated it for awhile, but decided it was the right thing to do and tried my best to set things up to allow people to still enjoy the reading experience without the ads being too in your face.
Again nice job with everything
Michael,
Congrats on the first year! Has it really been that long? The new design looks great, everything seems to flow really nice and the colors are very good as well!
Thanks for the inspiration to redo my site(s) now as well, and best wishes!
WOOOW! It looks great!
You’ve worked on every little detail, and it’s perfect. I really like the comments section at your posts, it looks more like a conversation now.
Congratulations on your first year!
I’ve always like PBD and always will. Keep up the good work!
Wow, amazing redesign. I really lover every detail you put in here, and no clutter at all.
Happy blogniversary. :D
Looking good!
Beautiful redesign!
Awesome design, looks real sweet. Grats on your first year. Here’s hoping for many more!
I really like the redesign it works really well.
Now that’s definitely an improvement! I’m loving it! :) (the footer rocks btw!) Congrats on turning one! Cheers!
Could further improve, by adding a small img tag over the avatar for the author ;- ) looks nice n feels right @ home
Hi. Used to post here back in your early days. Just stopped by and the new design is looking hot. No offense to your design skills, but your old one wasn’t cutting edge stuff. However your new one is one of the best blog designs I’ve seen in a while.
Steven,
Thanks. I’m glad that adding the advertising worked out well for you. It seems to have gone down well enough here as well. I haven’t had any comments objecting to it, and the ads have all been on topic, so I’m quite happy so far! :)
Elliott,
It doesn’t feel like it! Good luck with redoing your sites though. It’s always fun! :D
Arjen,
Thanks, I’m really happy with them too! The bigger gravatars looks great I think. I get to see everyone much more clearly now! :D
Goldfries,
Thanks. You were one of the first people to comment here! :D
Se7en,
I’ll *try* to keep it clutter free, but feel free to nudge me if I fail! ;)
Eastern, Fubiz, Self Defense, SJL,
Thanks guys!
Jon,
Cheers! It seemed to be a good way of taking a lot of clutter out of the sidebar. :D
Ehab,
Not sure what exactly you mean, sorry. Like a tooltip on the author’s image? :)
David,
Thanks! The old one was definitely feeling old. It always stung a little to load up some of the other awesome looking designs out there and then compare them to what mine had become… :(
Michael! I love the new design! :P
This made me laugh:
True, I just read the new rules for CSS last night and whoa. I wish they hurry up. XD
I like how you made good use of the space this time. The last blog design wasn’t
cutting-bleeding-edge stuff, I agree. This is excellent, though. A lot of blogs are using the background image thing and the custom field technique for the blog headlines, though [or is that what you’re using at all? That’s about the only technique I know. :lol: ]. I’m glad that you got rid of the DOMtabs… they were getting so passe. XDAnyway, great design, as always. :)
Thanks Pam! The old one definitely needed an update. I still like the DOMtabs though. They can be useful sometimes :) (But I ditched the category list, so they really weren’t needed in the new design :D )
The new CSS abilities look awesome, but I guess they’re still years away! :(
Wow site looks good and clean. Love the posts here
Keep it Up.
I definitely like the color scheme, similar to my site!
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http://www.submitmydesign.com
any plan to release your old theme as a free theme ?