Archive for the ‘Website/Blog design’ Category

A couple weeks ago, I talked about how you should choose colors for your website, and today, I want to continue with picking a blog layout. While many of these principals will correspond with a complete website as well, I am specifically focusing on just blogs…not a blog integrated into a website.

When you create a blog layout, there are 3 areas you need to think about:

Navigation: Your blog should have at minimum a contact page and an about the author page. These pages will allow the reader to interact with your site more effectively. But, there are many ways to show off that navigation. The design for GalleyGirl utilizes the traditional top navigation, which is most common as it is the easiest to find and use. Another great option is in the sidebar, either as text or as buttons. I prefer the buttons like in LifeIllustrated. Of course, there is also the footer navigation. This one I don’t usually recommend as it can be forgotten about very easily, so I don’t have an example of it…but it can be done.

Content area: The type of content that you share is going to heavily affect the layout of your page. If you are sharing videos, you will need the content width to be at least 650px wide (about the width of my content area. This will allow for large videos that are easy to view within your blog. This way, you don’t need to direct them to youtube. if you are just sharing text, you can have a narrower content area, even just 400px wide is okay. This will allow for wider sidebars. Finally, if you are sharing mostly photos, you will want a content area that is as wide as possible – in fact having no sidebars would be ideal so that you can have 850px+ for the pictures.

Sidebar: RSS Feed button, email button, twitter, facebook and more. This is where people expect to find the ways they can connect and subscribe to your content. While some blogs are moving this to the header area, it is still most commonly accepted in the sidebar (either to the left or right of the content). Your sidebar can also include advertising, links to other sites you recommend, your categories and archives. In fact, you can pretty much put whatever you want on there. Whether it is simple, like MarnieStyle or busy with buttons like OrangeCountyDailyPhoto, it is a great place to keep things you don’t want your audience to miss.

Of course, there are tons of ways to combine these 3 into the perfect design, but the more you know about what you want, the easier it will be when you talk with a designer!

I am in love with technology – the tools, the tricks, the abilities it has to create amazing things and utilize the world in whole new ways. Adobe photoshop, email, wordpress and my phone are four of my favorite tools…and most days, it would be impossible to live without them. However, I do like the traditional ways of creation – paper, pen, face-to-face conversation, film based cameras, live performances, and some days, that is all I want.

I want to listen to live music, sketch out designs on real paper and sit and talk with people in person. On days like this, I pull out my notepads, draw a little, write a little and enjoy the feeling of looking at something other than a digital screen. It is fabulously freeing, and when I am done with the “traditional”, it has usually refreshed my mental state and my love for new technology. Trust me, after 2 hours of writing with a pen…my fingers are itching to get back to a keyboard.

So, I challenge you to try it – turn off the computer and write your blog post ideas, map out a client design, or just write whatever comes to your mind…0n real paper. Then tell me what you’ve experienced.

104 weeks, 730 days, 470 blog posts and a lot of lessons later… writing this blog has been one of the most challenging and rewarding pieces of my business, and life. I love this blog, and every single person who has commented, read and lurked here. It is a place for my ramblings, thoughts and business advice. Even more, it is a place for learning. Especially for me. So in honor of my 2 year anniversary, here are the 24 lessons I have learned in writing Wright Creativity (one for every month I’ve had it):

1. Spellcheck doesn’t always work. Six looks a lot like sex when you are reading quickly…proofread closer!
2. If you are getting rude comments, you’re doing something right.
3. There are at least three sides to every topic – and it’s guaranteed you’ll get to hear all of them!
4. Just because you find the topic interesting, doesn’t mean your readers will.
5. The posts that become the most popular will surprise you.
6. The more you write, the easier it gets, but the easier it is to repeat yourself.
7. Use pictures. People like pictures. Especially of cute animals…like this:
   
8. Being funny is not easy. Neither is being clever. So if it doesn’t come naturally, don’t try it.
9. It is okay to decide you never want to write about a topic again…and then change your mind.
10. Archives are forever.
11. Linking to another bloggers site is the sincerest form of flattery.
12. I am never going to be famous from my blog, but that’s perfectly okay.
13. If I can help one person with what I write each day, I did my job.
14. Getting comments is like Christmas morning. Seriously.
15. Ask questions. A lot of them.
16. Narrowing your categories will improve your writing and focus.
17. Take a notepad or your phone everywhere, just in case you think of a blog post.
18. Use plugins.
19. Make sure you save while writing, even if you think wordpress auto saves.
20. Posting 5 days a week is easier said than done. But, it is worth trying every week.
21. Formatting in posts is imperative, and it makes it easier to read.
22. Titles, while they may be obnoxious to come up with, are helpful and needed.
23. If you can make it into a list, it will get more traffic.
24. I will probably keep writing this blog as long as people keep reading it.

Have photoshop will design seems to be the motto of many “designers” these days. They have customized some buttons on their blog, created a header and feel on top of the world. So then they start thinking that it could make them some money if they did the same thing for other people. No, no full designs. No, no real research into the user of the sites, what the site really needs or how to create a compelling design. Just a few “cute” buttons is all they do. And they call themselves designers. On top of that, they charge ridiculously low prices for their work and the novice looking for help is ecstatic to get an “awesome” price!

This is like me, calling myself a golf instructor because I can hit a golf ball, charging really low prices, and convincing people that I can teach them to play.

Look, I understand that we all want the best price possible on things – and no one wants to pay more than they have to for services. At the same time, you get what you pay for. When you compare designers and compare prices, there is always going to be the high, middle and low ground. And while I am not suggesting to always go with the most expensive, I am suggesting that you be realistic. If you receive 5 quotes, and 4 of them are between $1000-$1500 and then one is only $500…there is a reason for the discrepancy. They are cutting corners somewhere, and they are definitely not delivering the same quality. When you choose a designer, you need to look at 4 different areas:

1. Their experience. What type of design do they do? Are they familiar with the type of work that you do? You are better off with a designer who has worked with many industries than a designer who has only ever done one type of site. Versatility is important!
2. Their portfolio. Is every design they do the same look, with different image? Probably not going to give you anything different then either. Choose a designer who designs with the client in mind – not with templates.
3. Their demeanor. This one is tougher to determine, but can usually be done through a few phone calls or a meeting. Choose a designer that you click with – that is easy to understand and makes you feel comfortable.
4. Finally, their price. Just like clothing…there is always the Target, Nordstrom and Couture Designer option. Choose the range that you feel comfortable with, but understand that you will get the quality that you pay for – there is a reason that couture designers can charge $2000 for a pair of shoes, and Target only charges $20.

What are your thoughts on “cheap” designers? Or “cheap” versions of any service provider?

Colors bring out an emotional response in everyone – and while it may not be the same emotion in all of us, there are some commonly accepted ties to certain colors. Pulling a small segment from a 2004 article written by Naz Kaya, Ph.D. and Helen H. Eppds, Ph.D., professors from the Department of Textiles, Merchandising and Interiors at The University of Georgia:

The color red has been associated with excitement, orange has been perceived as distressing and upsetting, purple as dignified and stately, yellow as cheerful, and blue has been associated with comfort and security. Moreover, some colors may be associated with several different emotions and some emotions are associated with more than one color. Red, symbolically known as a dominant and dynamic color, has an exciting and stimulating hue effect. It has both positive and negative impressions such as active, strong, passionate, warm, but on the other hand aggressive, bloody, raging and intense. Green has been found to have a retiring and relaxing effect. It too has both positive and negative impressions such as refreshment, quietness, naturalness, and conversely tiredness and guilt. – Relationship between color and emotion: a study of college students

The article goes further in depth to analyze the difference in reaction to principle hues (i.e., red, yellow, green, blue, purple), intermediate hues (i.e., yellow-red, green-yellow, blue-green, purple-blue, and red-purple), and achromatic colors (white, gray, and black). While it is not necessary to go into this level of analysis when choosing colors for a website design, the understanding of colors is imperative for a successful response to your design.

Before taking on any new web design project, I always follow these three steps to choose the colors for a website:

1. What am I trying to sell? Selling fluffy pillows needs different colors than selling chainsaws – and not just because they appeal to different genders. The product or the service will be a huge determinant in the colors that you choose because of the emotion you need to product to incite. There are many products that people will not buy without a connection – and others, they want to feel as disconnected as possible when purchasing. Knowing the difference will help in choosing the colors.
2. What type of person will visit this site? As different as men and women are in their color choice – so are different types of women. A teenage female, a college age female and a mother of 4 will all react to colors differently. So it is not enough to just define the gender or basic age group – you must get down to the details. For some sites, they may appeal to many generations and all genders, which can make design difficult, but needs to be understood to have any chance of getting it right.
3. What do I want the visitors to feel when they see the site? Some sites, you want them to immediately react. Some, you want them to browse and feel welcome. Still others, you need to get them to share the information. We are accustomed to reacting to colors in traditional manners. Red, yellow and green have (and will always be) associated with stoplights. Therefore, most people will see stop, caution and go, when they see the primary versions. But what if you make them tones of the colors? It changes the reaction!

Once I have determined the product, the person and the action for the site, then I can move onto picking the colors. When I need to play with colors, I most often work in photoshop. I create 5 boxes (the average color palette for a site is only 5 colors, not including black or white), and make each one a different color. I play and test them until I get a set of 5 that I like the shade and the combination. But, there are also a lot of great free tools you can use to do the same thing! I recommend checking out:

1. 0 to 255 This is a great tool for finding shades of a color. For example, say you love this color pink but you want to turn it into a gradient – and not one that goes into white. Using this tool, you just enter the hex code (the six digit number that starts with # that defines any color) and it gives you the entire shade scale – like this! Then, you can choose any other color and then turn it into your gradient.
2. Kuler from Adobe Do you have trouble knowing which colors go together? Then kuler is your hero. Simply click “create” and place the hex code of a color you want to start with in the center box. Then, using the different rules, you can create a color palette that matches perfectly! Personally, I love using the complimentary and compound rules for websites. You can also look at other user created palettes for inspiration if you are feeling really stuck.
3. Colour Lovers I get lost in this site very easily – there is so much to do! From creating a color palette or seamless background , to browsing other users designs, I can spend hours on here. I recommend checking it out when you have a lot of free time, just so you can get used to it and find out everything that really exists. My favorite piece of the site? Trends! It shows color palettes for some of the most popular clothing fashions, web and print designs.

What do you think about colors? How did you pick your site colors? Let’s talk!

Yesterday I opened the floor to the conversation about web design – and the 10 questions any good web designer should ask. While these are great questions, and extremely important, it is also imperative that you ask your designer questions before you decide to hire them.

These questions will help clarify the scope of the work and eliminate a lot of the stress of working with someone new. Everyone will have their own concerns, but these are the 10 questions I believe everyone needs to get the answers to:

1. What are the payment options/deposits?
2. What is your process for designing?
3. How long will my project take?
4. How many rounds of edits do I get?
5. Can I contact your past clients?
6. Can I see the entire site active before placing it onto my website?
7. Do you input all the content from my old site (some designers charge more for this)?
8. Can you provide help with my copy and SEO too?
9. Do you offer training (especially important with new wordpress sites)?
10. Do you offer support after my site has gone live?

There is no right answer to each question, what matters is that the answer makes sense to you, to what you are paying for and to what you expected from your designer. At the end of the day, the best results, and the happiest clients will be found where there is a clear understanding of the project and what it entails.

What other questions would you ask a web designer?

Taking the leap from a basic free template blog to a completely custom one that does exactly what you want and looks the way you like is scary. It is also not cheap. So when you make the decision to go custom, you want to make sure you choose someone who knows what they are doing.

So how do you know that a designer is any good?

Of course, you can look at their portfolio, ask for referrals, check their pricing, and talk with them in person. But, the true measure of a designer is how well they can create a site that will be exactly what you want and what your audience needs. They will have a solid understanding of who you are, what your business is and how to attract an audience. To do this, they need to ask questions. And these are the 10 that I believe should be asked before any design is started.

1. What is your goal with the site?
2. Is the site for information, contact building or sharing product (or a combination)?
3. What do you want visitors to do on the site (read, click, sign up)?
4. Who are your clients: individuals, businesses, tech departments etc?
5. What are your verticals (which markets are you trying to reach)?
6. What type of person will visit your site: business owners, SAHM’s, kids, web geeks, etc?
7. What is your key marketing statement (your motto) and your elevator pitch?
8. Do you want to have a blog? (this should be seriously considered)
9. What websites have you seen that you like?
10. What websites have you seen that you don’t like?

The answers to these questions are what will make the difference between an average blog design and a completely custom, perfect for your business, amazing blog design. And, any good designer is going to ask them (or at least something close to them) because they aren’t psychic. They can’t know what you need just from a short conversation. They need details and insight into your business that only you can give them. And with solid answers to these questions, they can get a really clear understanding, which will equal a much better design!

What are your thoughts?

Are you looking to hire a web designer for your website or blog? You probably want this to be an easy process, and want it to go as smoothly as possible, right? Well then I suggest avoiding these 5 steps to pissing off your designer:

1. Don’t tell them what you want. Every (good) designer has a questionnaire they fill out about their clients. This includes what they want in the site, who their customers are, and all the important details that will make the design a rousing success without too many revisions. Unfortunately, designers are not mind readers, and unless you are willing to answer some questions and provide some details then the design is off to a bad start.
2. Don’t be available. A web design takes conversation. It takes revisions, it takes discussion and it certainly takes your approval. If your designer emails you for your thoughts on an image or a revision, and you take a week to get back to them, how do you expect the design to get completed in a timely manner? Just like you appreciate prompt replies, so does your designer. Being accessible during the process guarantees it will go much more effectively.
3. Change your mind 20 times. Having an idea in the middle of the project, and wanting to add something small is perfectly acceptable, and expected. Changing your mind every 10 minutes about the big details? Not okay. Before you hire someone, make sure that you are ready to let them design and have a clear understanding of what you want. Still in the “trying to get some clue of what I want” phase, make sure to let the designer know! Many are very willing to help with this, but need to know where you stand.
4. Bring in everyone you know to review the site. The designer knows you want the site to be perfect, so do they. Despite what you may think, the designer want your site to seriously rock. Wanna know why? Because a happy client is a client who will refer. So the designer is going to make a site that will work, looks good and covers all the bases. So when you bring in everyone from your business partner to your mother to review the site, it is a little frustrating and tells the designer one thing: You don’t actually trust the designer you hired to do a good job.
5. Ask for flash. Really, it’s that simple. If you want flash, call a flash designer. If you want a website that is gorgeous, easy to navigate and SEO friendly, then call a web designer.

So, remember, when it is time to hire a designer, we are your friends. We want you to have a killer site that works awesome and looks great. So trust us. We’re the professionals.

Last night I spoke at a Women in Business meet-up on the topic of blogging, twitter and facebook for small business. The event was a lot of fun, and I met a lot of wonderful women. At the end of the event, I had a few of the people ask me what I charge for my services and I couldn’t give them a straight answer. I know that this was frustrating for some of the women, but it was an honest answer. I explained that my prices vary based on the level of services needed, the size of the commitment, and the technical involvement. This, of course, was no more helpful as it still didn’t define my prices, but again, it was an honest answer. Finally, after realizing that this was not an answer they were happy with, I gave them price ranges, and explained that to give a truly valid price quote that I needed a lot more information from them. I could tell this still wasn’t exactly what they wanted, but it would have to do.

When I got home, I started thinking about my answers, and the way that products and services are priced. In most cases, you can look at a product and the prices are plainly printed on the tag (unless you’re in a city that likes the whole “let’s negotiate” system), so you don’t have any questions about the cost. Unfortunately, when it comes to most services, there is no easy answer to “what do you charge”. An automotive technician can give you an idea of the initial cost before looking at your car based on what you tell them, but until they look under the hood or inside the dash, there is no way to give a concrete answer. It is the same thing in my business – as much as I would love to say a web design costs x amount and blog management costs y, that is neither fair nor realistic. The benefit to the way that services are priced is that there’s no one-size fits all pricing, which means that a client will never pay more than they have to for exactly what they need. The downside is that the client is really at the mercy of the service provider, since there are no published prices to determine if they are getting the same price as another person.

I believe in the system that I use – pricing a project only after I have thoroughly understood what is needed. But, there are many people I know in my industry who have flat rate pricing because it is “easier”. I have heard the positive and negatives on both sides, and have my own thoughts, but want to hear yours:

What do you think about the pricing on services?

Do you struggle with pricing your services?

**Unsure why the title only has one word? Read my stand against blog titles.**

Yesterday, I covered the first 10 steps in creating a blog mockup in photoshop, today I will be wrapping it up with steps 11-20. When we left off, we were had just finished the header and were ready to move on. If you didn’t do yesterday’s steps, do so now and then come back. If you are ready to move forward, let’s move onto the next steps.

Step 11: Open the document you saved yesterday. Starting today, your design should have a completed header and space for the navigation, the content, the sidebar and the footer, just waiting for design. The next piece that we are going to work on is determining the colors that we want for the rest of the parts of the site. Remember, this is just a basic design to help you to get an idea of your site, so feel free to have fun and try out a few things. To work with a layer, you must select it in the layer panel first.

Step 12: Changing colors to the pieces. When you created this document, the background was automatically created in white. If you want another color, you simply need to create a new rectangle the entire size of the mockup. Once it has been created, make sure to drag it behind all other layers. Then, double click on the layer to open the color panel and change it to whatever color you would like the background to be.  You will do this same step (double clicking on the layer to open the color panel) for each of the piece that you want to change. For mine, I want the background to be the color of the edges of my header, because I plan on using gradients and effects so that it blends into the background and looks like melted gold. I want the content areas to blend into the background as they reach the bottom and want the navigation and footer areas to look like gold bars. While I could walk you through how I created this look, I’d be giving away all my secrets…and well, that’s just not happening . I will leave you with a couple tips though:

• When you pick colors, choose colors that work well together and are easy on the eyes.
• Try, try and try again. Testing tons of colors and how they look together is the only way to really learn what you want and looks well together
• There is no right or wrong. Love lime green and tangerine orange? Who says they can’t work together!

After I made my tweaks, the colors now look like this:

Step 13: Adding social media buttons: I like working on the sidebar before I work on any other area as it has the most graphics and so it can be overwhelming at first. To start, I recommend looking for some social media icons that you love. You will need (at a minimum): an rss button, an envelope, a twitter button, and a facebook button. When I am looking for great images, I use Smashing Magazine. Their freebies collection has tons of great images that you can work with and the downloads are always safe. When you pick your social media icons, make sure that they fit with the theme you are creating. You will be adding text next to the images, so they can just be a symbol. Once you have selected them, download and save the images. For this design, I am sticking with the metallic look and have chosen symbols that fit with that look. To place the social media icons, make sure you have selected your sidebar in the layers panel. This will make sure that they are placed above this. Then, click on the arrow at the very top of the left bar. This will make it easier to work with the pieces, and must be selected to move them later. When you are ready, go up to ‘file’ and select ‘place’, just like you did with the header image. But, this time, just click the check mark to okay the image, do not re-size anything yet. Place all 4 images on the page and approve them all. They should be too large, it is okay. Once they are all on the page, they should have placed one on top of the other. If they didn’t, and you need to align them, click on the top one in the layers panel, hold down shift, and click on the bottom one in the layers panel. This will select them all. Then in the top navigation, use the alignment tools. Now that you have them all aligned, we are going to size them as a group. If you haven’t yet, select all of them in the layers panel by clicking on the top one, holding shift and clicking on the bottom one. Now, make sure that the arrow tool (top on the left bar) is selected and you will see the dotted line around them with squares at the corners. Click on the bottom right corner, hold down shift, and then drag to make them smaller. Once you have them the size that you want, click the check to approve that size, and then move them over to the top of the sidebar. Once there, unselect the rss button from the layer pannels. Drag the remaining three down. Then, unselect the email button and drag the remaining two down. Finally, unselect the facebook button and drag it below the twitter button. You will have something that looks like this:

Step 14: Adding text to the sidebar. The sidebar needs to have text, not only to explain what these buttons are but you may want categories, archives, or other buttons. Because this is just a simple mockup to show a designer, things like categories and archives don’t need to be fully detailed. We are going to add text to the social buttons and then placeholder text f or the rest of the items that you want on the sidebar. First, it will help if you zoom into 100% and focus on just the sidebar. Click on the magnifying glass on the left side and then in the top panel, click ‘actual pixels. Use the scroll bars to center the sidebar in your window. To add text next to a social button, make sure you click on the button you want to be working with in the layers panel. This will make sure that the text is in the right order. Then, click on the “T” in the left panel to select text and draw a text box next to your symbol. It will create a dotted box for you to add text into. Before you start typing, make sure to change the font size and color in the top navigation. It will still be set to the same size you had in your header. I suggest leaving the font type the same, to create a unique look. If while you are typing, you see the box and the cursor moving, but no text, make sure that the text layer placed above your sidebar. If it did not, select the text layer in the layers panel and drag it above the sidebar layer. If you need to get back into the text box to edit it, make sure that the “T” is selected on the left panel, and that you have selected the text layer in the layers panel and then simply click on one of the letters. It will show the edit box. Repeat the steps for creating a text box next to each of the symbols and adding text. Make sure you click the check box each time to approve the text and then move the box to align with the symbol. Also, make sure to keep the font size and type consistent for all symbols. Once you have added the text for the symbols, add a large text box below the bottom symbol. In this box, add the names of anything else that you want to go on the sidebar (remember, this should all be in the word document you created yesterday). Your finished sidebar should look something like this:

Step 15: Navigation bar: Your navigation bar is where the pages for your blog will go. These are the pages that we wrote down yesterday. For your navigation bar, I recommend using a text that is easy to read and will match the content area. A couple good fonts to consider are Arial, Century Gothic, Georgia and Myriad Pro. I am going to be working with Century Gothic for the content on this site. To add the navigation text, select the navigation bar in the layer panel so that it will place the text layer above this. Then, click on “T” on the left side and drag out a text box the same size as the navigation bar (zooming to 100% and focusing on the nav bar will be helpful for this step). Select the font type, color and size in the upper panel. Type the names of your pages, just adding one space between each name. Then, select all the text (the same way you would in any document, by dragging over all of it) and click the center alignment in the upper panel. Now, click between each page title and add 2 more spaces. This will give you a total of 3 spaces between each page. Adjust the size of your font to look right on the navigation bar. In some case, you may decide to make the navigation bar smaller or larger. In this case, my navigation bar needed to be made smaller. To do this, I simply click on the navigation bar in the layers panel, click on the top arrow on the left panel and dragged the top of the nav bar down until it was the size I wanted and then clicked the check box to approve it. My site now looks like this:

Step 16: Fixing spacing. If you notice, because I made the navigation bar smaller, there is a lot more space between the header and where the navigation bar starts than there was before. I want the spacing fixed. So, I select all layers in the layer panel except for the background and the header. This will allow me to move everything as a group. To do this, click on each layer you want while holding the ctrl key. This allows you to just pick the ones you want, instead of the group. Then, simply use the up arrow on your keyboard to push it up to where you want it to be. If you just want to move certain pieces up, you can just select those pieces and move them. Once you have the spacing right, we can move onto adding the styling for the blog posts themselves.

Step 17: The blog posts. This is the largest amount of content on your site – this is where all the text will be and where you will entertain and share with your readers.We are going to use one large text box to create just one blog post so that you can choose colors and determine formatting. Then, open a browser. We are going to generate some Lorem Ipsum, or placeholder text, for you to work with. I recommend selecting 3 paragraphs. Once you click generate, select and copy all three paragraphs. Now, go back to photoshop. Create a text box the same width and height as your content area. Select the font color, size (recommend 14 pt) and make sure it is the same font type as you used in the navigation. Type in a title for the blog post, the date for the blog post, categories and tags. Then, paste the 3 paragraphs of lorem ipsum that we copied. Click the check box to approve it.
If you notice, the text looks very crowded to the sides of the box and there is no separation in sizes or fonts. Also, the spacing is very small and it is difficult to read. The next step will guide you through fixing all of this

Step 18: Formatting the text. To work with the text again, select the text layer in the layers panel and then click anywhere in the text box. First, drag the left edge of the bounding box in so that the text comes off the left side of the content area, then do the same for the right. We want space on either side of the text. Then we will move on to the text. We are going to start by working with the blog title. Select just the blog title and increase the size of the font to match the same size you used in the navigation bar. Then, click on the A| in the panel just to the left of the layers panel. This is the advanced text editing, and where you can make it bold, underlined, etc. I suggest making it bold and underlining it. Then, decide what color you want. I suggest something different – something that stands out. Then, test out spacing between the lines, moving the blog title away from the rest of the content. I recommend making the blog date, categories and tags smaller and placing a different colored bar behind them to make them standout. I have also increased the line spacing between the content (another trick you can ask a designer about) so that the reading is easier. Once I have worked with the formating, the post now looks like this:

Step 19:The little extras. What makes a good design a great design is the little extras that are involved. For example, having something happen in the navigation bar to show you which page you are on. Having a special look to your comments section rather than just white and black. Using fun images on the sidebar or at the bottom of every post that makes people remember you. All of these things can be added to differentiate you from the rest of the pack. Using the tools that I have taught in this tutorial, add some of  your own special tweaks and make it something that makes you proud. Can’t figure out how to do them? Write notes where you want things to be and save that for the designer.

Step 20: Send this to your graphic designer and at your first meeting, walk through your thought process. The goal will be to just provide them with a clearer understanding of what you are looking for.

Want to see what mine ended up looking like? Check out my added touches…

Click on the image to see the full size version