Colour Resources for Blog Design Inspiration

February 3, 2012 By 2 Comments
Psychology of Colour

It's no secret that colour in our environment (clothes, home furnishings, paintings, nature) can have a huge impact on our emotions. The blue of the ocean or the green of a park can be calming and relaxing, a woman wearing reds and oranges could be considered passionate (and perhaps even a little aggressive) and grey clouds can make you feel a little somber. So just as the clothes you wear and the environment you live in can impact on your emotions, so too can the websites you visit (which you have no control over other than to click away if you don't like them) or the website/blog you own (which you do have complete control over). Your Brand New Blog Let's say you're interested in creating a brand new blog (self-hosted WordPress of course) and you're looking for some inspiration. While some people may start looking at different theme templates (a theme is simply an outfit for your website), this can be overwhelming because there are so many to choose from, both free and premium. … [Read more...]

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Real Life Inspiration – Sports Marketer to Zumba Queen

January 25, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Real life inspiration

Real life Inspiration is a new addition to WP for Moms and I plan to share stories like this whenever I come across a Mum living her dream. Rebecca Rogoff is featured on the website London Mums and she shares her story about the move from a career in sports marketing to becoming the Zumba Instructor and absolutely loving it. You can read the full story here: http://londonmumsmagazine.com/2012/zumba-queen If you have an inspiring story you'd like to share (about yourself or someone you know) I'd love to hear about it. … [Read more...]

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Blog or Website – What’s the Difference

January 23, 2012 By 1 Comment
Woman with questions

Being a web designer and completely immersed in the technical world designing and coding, I sometimes forget that the average person isn't up to speed on all the jargon in the web world that seems common place to me. Blogs or Blog Posts? When I hear people on Facebook referring to the "blogs" they have written, I cringe and want to tell them that a blog is actually the entire site - a collection of articles - and that the "blogs" they are referring to are actually blog posts. You have one blog with multiple blog posts/posts/articles (whatever you like to call them). This is very separate to those people who actually do have multiple blogs (separate sites on separate domain names). While you can call me pedantic, I think it helps your credibility when you can actually use the correct terminology - you can then be taken more seriously about your area of expertise. Is a Blog a Website, is a Website a Blog? The next misunderstanding is between the terms Blog and Website. Recently my … [Read more...]

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Budgeting for Your New Blog or Website

January 13, 2012 By 4 Comments
piggy bank with dollars poking out

The temptation when starting out on the internet is to sign up to one of the free blogging or website builder platforms - after all, they're free, easy and you can be up and running in less than 10 minutes. You might be surprised at me saying this, but if you've never had a blog or website before and you're wondering how they work, then absolutely go ahead and give it a go. The three I've tried are Blogger, WordPress.com and Tumblr. Each has their pros and cons, and from a beginners standpoint, they provide a great opportunity to play, without the fear of ruining something you've paid a lot of money for. However, if you're choosing one of these (to start a business or build a reputation) because your budget is tight and you think it's all you need - please think again. Please put a higher value on the image you are portraying with your online presence. The Real Cost of Getting Started There seems to be a misconception with newcomers to the web world that to get your own website … [Read more...]

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Transformation

January 13, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Metamorphosis

I've learnt this past year that a web designer should never work on his/her own website. Why? This site has been in the making for over 12 months. With no one to be accountable to but myself, it's been all to easy to tinker endlessly on the design, tweak my service offerings trying to find the perfect combination of services, and just stop working on the site altogether for extended periods of time because of my overly critical self. My serious website transformation (or metamorphosis) started late last year when I found an incredible mentor to work with. My mentor is a web/graphic designer herself, who has been through the tough early stages of starting a new design business and has the experience of creating a very successful web design business. This mentoring finally provided that much needed accountability to keep me on track to my goal of launching this new business of mine. Now my launch day has finally arrived. My site is ready (and looking awesome if I say so myself) … [Read more...]

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