Understanding Blog Usability — November 20, 2007
I’m somewhat new to blogging. When I decided to change my static site to a dynamic site I ended up using WordPress as the engine. The designer in me however didn’t allow me to use someone else’s theme but to make one on my own. The current theme1 you are seeing on this site is the fifth iteration of the effort.
When I started designing this theme, I didn’t have any expertise on WordPress. The principles of blogging were completely new to me. I looked into many other blogs to figure out the essentials of theming. Ironically most themes were structurally the same except they looked different in presentation. But is this commonly accepted structure really usable? This is what I discovered.
File Away
Some details presented on blogs are unwanted or rarely used. The archive for example has no significance to an average user. Since majority of users end up in a blog post by getting referred by a search engine, there is very little chance that someone visiting to read a certain blog post would drill down the archive to read other posts.
Attention to Detail
Only posts matter. Everything else is inferior. Even static pages have less significance unless information presented on static pages can draw more interest than posts. Having a mechanism to list and summarize the most recent posts can be beneficial.
No one dare to spare time on the archive. Give it less attention. Have a page that list all post titles that is groped monthly or yearly. This actually depends on how much you write; but reduces confusion and the hap-hazard nature of the archive.
Prevent making countless categories. Use a small number of categories to group different areas of interests. Make use of the new WordPress tags to brief your visitor about the post. By the way, that tag cloud makes no sense to many people. But it’s a good way of showing your intents. So use it judiciously, don’t throw it on the face.
Least but not last, avoid the top ten design mistakes when creating your blog. Remember, usability guidelines applicable to a regular websites are applicable to blogs too.
1 - current theme as at 20th November, 2007