Drive-By-Shooting Sunday: Abundance Blog

It had sounded so nice, like it should have been a high-end luxury resort in the South Pacific. Harry was disappointed there was no black sand beach or turquoise water paradise. Well, maybe the room wasn’t so bad…

He dropped the overnight bag and the SCUBA gear by the door. The bare room was plain, the walls a stark white and the blue blankets adorned a pair of single beds, not large, comfy king-sized ones. He’d been so looking forward to a vacation after last week’s hit.

“I told you so.”

Harry glanced at the smirk on James’ face and shrugged. Just because Harry had come ready for a tropical vacation didn’t mean he wasn’t prepared for business.

Today’s hit is for Abundance Blog, the blog of Marelisa Fabrega. Here’s what the site looked like when we drove by:

Harry crouched down next to the bag and dug out the revolvers. No silencers today – they needed the extra distraction the ringing shots would offer. “At least there’s a nice view.”

“Makes up for the road we had to take to get here.” James flopped down on a bed, thinking of the long tricky road. The GPS had rejected the data twice. “Easy access hotel, my ass. The guy at the gas station didn’t even know this place. That should’ve been your first clue this place wasn’t like the brochure claimed, you know,” he informed Harry.

The domain name is too long and very tricky to type. It includes two dashes and a period as well, which only adds more trickiness. Also, it’s difficult to pronounce and long to remember. In short, no one can remember the URL in his or her mind for long, and they certainly won’t be able to easily tell a friend where to go.

Also, the name of the site isn’t clear or relevant at a glance (and even afterwards). What’s Abundance Blog about? What will I get if I click here? What’s abundant – the information? The blogging? The help?

“Yeah, well, it’s clean,” Harry rummaged for bullets, glancing up at the room. “There’s something to be said for that. Do you remember that place we went to last year?” He replicated Jamie’s smirk of earlier, remembering the dive hotel they’d stayed at when they’d been too tired to drive.

“Yeah. That was bad.” James had just wanted to get off the road. He’d been the one to insist the place looked fine – until they opened the door.

They’d ended up sleeping in the chairs the room offered – no one wanted to touch the beds.

James started wandering the room, checking everything out. It wasn’t ugly by any means, no, but the walls were plain and lacked the comfort he so enjoyed. No one enjoyed clutter or dirt, but a few paintings or maybe a splash of color would’ve made the room feel more pleasant.

Adding imagery to the banner, such as a small logo or photo, would probably help the visual appeal a great deal. The banner’s title also breaks onto two lines, which should be corrected. The break looks like a mistake, and that doesn’t reflect well on its overall image. Simply putting your title on one line would make a big difference.

Add a tagline to the banner to tell people right away what this site is about, what the site offers and what they’ll receive if they stay to read. People need to see this information right away. Unfortunately, there’s nothing to provide that instant hook.

“Certainly can’t say the architecture is bad.” James poked his head in the bathroom and noted the toilet and shower were well located. There was a small kitchen area, too, and he could navigate it easily.

“The closet’s small.” Harry gave it a cursory glance and went to settle by the window. “I like everything in its place, not jammed together.”

Split your About and Contact page into two pages. They really don’t go together at all. Also, having your contact information below the fold, it makes people search to get in touch with you. Remember, they’re lazy. They won’t look – they’ll just click away.

We’d suggest using a contact form versus simply having your email. Give people a way to quickly, easily and instantly get in touch with you. Contact forms do work and are easily added with a plugin.

An email address should figure in your contact info, yes, because people like choices. Only indicating the email address forces the extra effort to get in touch with you. Again, people are lazy. If they can avoid opening their email and having to double check your address before sending, they will.

While Harry set up the rest of the equipment, James tried the TV. “Oh, cool. Field of Dreams is on. “ But if he wanted to watch it, he had to press this button. Then that one. Then… “Screw it,” he tossed the remote on the bed. “I don’t have time for this.”

When we click to see what Amazon Store is all about, we’re just taken to a page that says we have to click again. Don’t do that. The second click is one too many and the extra page in between here and there is unnecessary. Take people directly to your store and don’t add steps that don’t offer value.

“Call for a pizza, would you?” Tying knots was hungry work, and Harry heard another rumble in his stomach as he tested the knot of the rope attached to the grappling hook.

“Roger.” He found a small telephone book in a drawer, but James blinked when all he found was empty pages between the covers. “What the hell? What is this, a notebook?” He flipped through it a few times. “There’s nothing in here.”

Another problem is that your Recommended Products page is terribly empty. We highly suggest removing it completely if it can’t be filled up with reviews and images because empty doesn’t make people want to buy. They need choice and selection to be tempted.

A crash made James whirl on a heel, but there was nothing but Harry and a broken lamp.

“Sorry.” Apologetic green eyes glanced up at James. “Bumped the lamp with my elbow. It was too close to the edge.”

The RSS, Technorati button and Alltop button in your right-hand sidebar aren’t well lined up. The elements should sit directly over the rest of the links below and should be lined up evenly with the edge of those links. As is, the buttons appear to stick out to the left, which creates an unprofessional look. Center those buttons and make them look like they fit properly.

“S’okay.” James helped pick up some pieces and set them in a corner. “Are we almost set up here?” The grappling hooks were ready, the guns were loaded… All that was missing was an open window, so James flicked the locks and slid it wide.

“Hell of a drop,” he leaned out and looked down at the ground below. Hazel eyes traced the path from street to the alley a few blocks down where the car was parked.

“You scared?”

“Hell no,” James grinned back over his shoulder. “You?”

Harry just grunted in reply and went to search for a real phone book, one with listings for restaurants.

He found it, but it was long. Some listings were repeated and the rest were just too many names for him to absorb. It would’ve been easier to flip a coin or call the first place on the list.

Remove the Pages widget from the left sidebar. It’s redundant, because there is already clear, visible navigation, and it’s wasted space.

Both sidebars are long lists that need to be chopped down without mercy. There are too many Categories. Many overlap in relevance and can be combined. There are way too many Recent Posts as well. The Archives don’t need to be there at all – the site hasn’t been around long enough to require this extra navigation and Categories gives people what they need.

Have no more than 7 links in any widget, and we suggest 5 as a nice number to give people choice without overwhelming them.

The Blogroll is okay, but honestly, if the site is supposed to keep people and help them earn you money, it makes little sense to send them somewhere else. If you do decide to keep the Blogroll, chop that down to five sites and not ones that compete with your focus or topic area.

Drop the “From the Blogosphere” widget as well for the same reason; it doesn’t add value to your site and it only gives people other places to go besides your site.

They settled on Chinese and called the order in. There was nothing left to do now but wait. Harry figured out how to get the movie working and the men watched TV for a while, but it got a little boring. James started pacing again, opening drawers he’d already looked at.

“Well, look at this.” He held up a leaflet with a beautiful image of an all-dressed pizza on the front. “Too bad for them; they lost a sale.”

The banner ads at the bottom of the site are in a bad location to do anything for you. Ads should be nicely up above the fold where people can see them and click them. This is especially important if they earn you money – but where they are now and in such an awkward position, they won’t earn much at all.

Reduce the extra steps to earning income and present an element where people can see it to encourage click-throughs.

We suggest organizing your sidebars as follows: In the left-hand column, have Recent Posts at the top, followed by Categories and Recent Comments. In the right-hand column, have your RSS and buttons, then have your banner ads in a vertical line. Make sure everything is well lined up and nicely laid out.

“What’s this say?” Harry squinted at the page of text he’d found. It looked like a story or maybe a review. He couldn’t read it well, though, not without straining. The text was too small and a grey shade that didn’t look right on white.

“Gettin’ old, are you?” James snatched the page with a flourish and went to read. “Maybe you need glas- Ow. This is tiny.” He did manage to read, though, and the little story was fine, but when he got to the bottom where sign-up offers abounded, he winced.

Remove the RSS subscription button from the bottom of posts. You already have a text that asks people to subscribe, you have the RSS icon in the sidebar… it’s overkill and not necessary.

You may want to consider adding a social media plugin such as Sociables to encourage submission for driving traffic, though.

We found that the size of the photos used in posts, the left alignment and the blank space beside each photo brought the visual appeal down. It’s a better idea to go large and center photos or to reduce the size of photos and wrap the text to make them part of the post, not just a tacked-on afterthought.

All in all, the site isn’t bad. It needs a little cleanup, a few tweaks and a touch of bling in the banner, but it’s clean and easy to use, so overall, well done!

“Hey, if they aren’t coming, let’s try to see if we can use that SCUBA gear of yours,” James offered. “Go for a drive, find a reef and-“

“Shh.” Harry held up a hand. “Hear that?” He cocked his head, and then both boys sprang into motion.

As swiftly as they could, they took position while the sound of footsteps in the hall became louder and louder. The short wall beneath them supported their backs, the open window waited, grappling hooks were ready and two guns were aimed straight at the door. The noise of the shots would give them just enough time.

The air filled with tension. No one dared to breathe. The steps approached the door, slowed and stopped.

The seconds that followed felt like years. Nerves screamed. And then the scrape of a key in a lock broke the silence, and the door swung open. The victim’s eyes widened.

“We couldn’t have pizza,” James told the victim. “Sorry, but we’re a little upset.”

Those were the last words she ever heard before the sound of gunshots filled the air.

Want more? You got it. Check out the lineup of upcoming hit jobs:

August 17 – Your Writing Cure
August 24 – Yes to Me
August 31 – LitGuides
September 7 – Miramar Mike 2.0
September 14 – Green Plan(t)
September 21 – Fawnskin Flyer
September 28 – Forty Plus Two
October 5 – The Enhance Life
October 12 – Creative Texture Tools
October 19 – Ulla Hennig’s Weblog
October 26 – Simplistic Thoughts
November 2 – Positioning Strategy
November 9 – Sushi Day
November 16 – The D Spot Redux
November 23 – The Antisocial Social Worker

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Come on. You know you wanna.