Blog Critique: Gillian Hefer

In this series I give constructive feedback about the look and function of an author blog from a marketing perspective. As always, I rely on help from graphic designers Tom Barnes (my hubby) and Joe LaRue. To review the blog elements we look at or to submit your own blog for critique, go here.

Let me tell you all a little about my blog critique process. If I am not currently a follower of your blog and you ask me to critique you, I will generally not go look at your blog until a week or so before I review you. Why? I want the first impression to be new in my mind. 

Well, let me tell you I was slightly surprised when I first visited today's blog: Gillian Hefer's A Daft Scots Lass. First, I generally only critique author blogs, and Gillian's is not striving for authorship as far as I can tell. (I will have some slightly different advice for her because of this.) Second, she's got a mouth on her, so please be prepared for that when you check out her page. Then hurry on back so we can discuss.

Oh, oh, Gillian. I love you. The first post I read was your 5 gigs of porn addition to the 12 days of Christmas. I had to show my husband because I was LMAO. So awesome, you have personality.

But even personality needs a filter.

After I watched your "Because I'm a Red Head" youtube video, I completely got the red upon red in your blog design. You are funny, crass, and abrasive (in an entertaining way). The look of your blog is also very crass and abrasive.  I get that this is your thing.  But you can get your personality across in ways that are a little more pleasing to the eye. Ways that will keep your readers on your blog just a wee bit longer. Here's some suggestions (mostly from our graphic designer, Joe):

• Vary that font. It's fine for your post headers but it's hard to read for an entire post. Choose something like gill sans - it actually appears quite elegant and at first glance may not feel the way you want it to, but it is the classic comedy font, according to Joe. You will see it on most comedy movie posters. It portrays the comedy feeling without making your readers cringe.  
• Lose the white space in your posts. Once you clean up your font that white space will stand out even more. Right now it is almost necessary to have it because the font is too hard to read for a long period of time but you're really just fixing a sin with another sin. 
• You need to get a palette. Right now you are mostly red and white and that's not a color palette, that's just one color. Yes, you throw in some blue here and there but it really doesn't go - it's just another bright color. Visit here for some ideas on how to expand that palette. Then use these new additional colors in your header, post titles, date title, etc. And keep them consistent. 
• Separate your sidebar. It's on white just like your main posts with nothing to indicate where one ends and one begins. Give it another background color, if you can. Speaking of your sidebar...
• Clean it up. You got tons of junk there. Pick five things you just have to keep and lose the rest. That's my suggestion.
• Make your pics feel the entire width of your blog post. If they don't or you can't change the width to make them do so, put them on the side of text. All that white space, as I said before, is just awkward.  

To finish this review off, I'd like to share five very lovely things about your outrageous blog:

1. I know who you are.
2. Your profile pic and About Me is very appropriately positioned.
3. Your profile pic is gorgeous.
4. You make me laugh (read her 100 things about me)
5. You talk about your boobs and camel toe.

Love you, Gillian. Hope these suggestions help. You're uniquely awesome. Thanks for making my day!