To start a blog, one must think of a blog design first before anything else. This is because this will determine the level of user experience. When site visitors feel comfortable about what they see, they will stay and continue to read the content of the blog. On the other hand, potential readers may choose to leave if the design seems to irritate them.
Most bloggers are busy working to generate more traffic. However, this is useless if a visitor’s traffic will just bounce back to its origin. The real challenge is to keep the readership. When a blog site is user-friendly, readers are more likely to keep coming back to read fresher content. In fact, there is a great possibility for them to share your post with friends, followers, or connections.
What kind of blog design can attract visitors? This is the question a blogger should ask before doing anything else to start a blog. There are many blog designs one can choose from. Some of them are cool while others are boring. In choosing which one is good, the safest way is settle with a blog design that is simple yet beautiful.
Today, we will go over seven examples of simple yet beautiful blog designs.
- Transparency
This blog design has been around for many years, yet it is still popular. A transparency design can be simple or exotic. It shows visitors the mood of the blog. It emphasizes the background more than its white space. Moreover, transparency expresses the real feeling and personality of a blogger, so it helps readers determine who the blogger really is.
There are many bloggers who use transparent design for many reasons. Some of them consider it according to their niche. Others choose it according to their target readers. Whatever reason one may prefer, transparent design can easily fit. Nonetheless, it’s the best fit for personal branding.
- Typography
Typography is another blog design that is popular among journalists. This is because the style emulates the typical newspapers that were widely read by many people around the world decades ago when the Internet was just in its infancy. This design focuses on arranging the text and letters in order to be instantly visible and readable.
Not all site visitors are attracted to flashy colors or dynamic views. Some of them are just plain readers who are only interested in text content. These people are wide readers. They even read long blogs without getting bored. However, they want to see immediately most of what they can probably read. Therefore, typography design is for visitors like them.
- Texture and Pattern
The texture and pattern is a type of blog design that focuses on aesthetic characters of a blog. It expresses a particular community. Although some of the designs still use the plain white space as texture, patterns may become more prominent. Patterns like mail or letter are still popular. Some blogs use patterns that look like street billboards while others resort to a picture frame pattern.
There are some bloggers who focus on texture to replace the white text background. This is because some readers simply don’t want to see everything in white. They use light colors and even darker colors depending on the niche because this type of blog design is much more useful for several niches such as games, teens, technology, food, tourism, sports, trivia, and the like.
- Artwork
Another popular design used by many bloggers is artwork. This is primarily for the purpose of expressing one’s talent about a particular field of art that visitors may appreciate. It helps bloggers convey their message not only through text, but also through abstract expression. With this design, one can easily identify what a blog is all about.
Artwork design is not actually for all types of blogs. The design is ideal for art-related niches such as oil painting, graphics design, tattoo painting, and animation.
- Gallery
Gallery, on the other hand, is one of the most simplified blog designs that are very popular today. They are like a series of windows that are arranged horizontally or vertically to directly show visitors what they can expect to see on the blog. This design is ideal for showcasing high-quality photos, videos, or slides.
Gallery design is preferred by photographers, videographers, and interior designers. It enables them to directly tell their visitors what they can deliver especially if the bloggers are promoting their skills and talent to their target viewers.
- Collage
Most bloggers and blog readers want something fun and cool. Because of this, there are also many blogs that use collage design to look catchy. There are many types of collage designs, and they vary from one another. What is common about them is the fact that they are made up of combined photos and patterns to appear like a messy desk or a party backdrop. These designs are common for personal blogs.
- Minimalist
The minimalist design is the simplest design you can ever see on a blog. In fact, others say that minimalist design has no design at all. Nevertheless, this is becoming more and more popular, especially for bloggers of serious niches such as philosophy, personal development, and religion. Even a blog that only contains text without any photos or margins is considered minimalist. The principle behind this design is to avoid clutter and unnecessary designs.
Conclusion
Blog readers have their own specific interest. They don’t just look for a certain topic as there are many similar topics they don’t read at all. Readers also look for a particular personality whom they can be comfortable with. For bloggers, the only way to express their personality aside from their written content is their blog design.
If a blog site is too boring, the first impression of its visitors is that the blogger is boring, too. And if a blog is cluttered with so many annoying widgets and pop-ups, visitors may think that the blogger doesn’t care about the readers. The above designs are simple but not boring. They are beautiful and user-friendly.