Welcome to the new look at Blog Income.


How do you like it?


It’s been a long time coming.   Back in February I had posted here that the site was to go under the knife.  The site had just undergone peer review at the time and the verdict was in loud and clear … Change the look!


I had just changed the theme about 6 months ago and was mindful that frequent appearance overhauls were not the best thing – visitors get used to a certain look and expect it.  But these were people from my Internet Mastermind group and there is some real deep expertise in that room.  I decided that a change should be made sooner rather than later but this time I was going to take my time before choosing a theme.  And take time I did!


Aaahhh – procrastination!  Actually I was dead scared.  Given some of the technical issues I had experienced in the last few months  I would was so afraid that I would  just screw it up and so  I kept putting it off.


Now I mentioned in my last post here that I am part of the Gather Success Super Blogger Reality Show. Wednesday was our first check-in.  Blog Income was reviewed.  One of the areas of suggested improvement was to move content to the left and keep the sidebars to the right.


OK.   No more procrastination.  Time to make the bold move.


I actually had been doing some homework already.  Perhaps my experience might be of some help to you at some time in the future if you too are looking for a new look to your blog.   Here is the process I went through:


BLOG THEME WINDOW  SHOPPING


Now when I went blog hopping in addition to reading the posts and commenting I was looking at the design of the blog itself.  What did I like about it?   What was the overall look?  I checked out the theme name and made note of it.


CUSTOMIZABLE


What I began to notice is that a handful of themes began to appeal to me.  Interestingly enough even though they were just a handful, each blogger made their version a little different with some customization.  Now I know that a skilled tech type can do wonders with just about any theme, but the main reason I want a theme is so that I don`t have to take a separate course on how to hard code my CSS, so easy customization options were important for me.


NO PREMIUM THEM


I read somewhere that premium themes – i.e., paid themes – were better because they were more reliable in keeping up to date with WordPress advancements and they were extremely flexible when it came to customization.  I noticed however, that many of the bloggers I respected were not using premium themes.  I contacted them re their experiences and was really happy with the feedback I got, and blown away with the unconditional offer to help in any way they could.  You know who you are – THANK YOU.


ARCLITE


In the end I chose Arclite from the Elegant series of WordPress Themes.


The main reason is that it has some customizable features but not so many that I would need to buy a manual to implement my choices.  I like it`s clean lines.  No clutter.  What you see here today is not the finished product.  There are still lots of tweaks here and there and I would be most grateful for any suggestions you might have.


I`m sure this is not the last time that Blog Income will undergo a reno.


Oh yeah … the thing I was most scared of?  Having to spend hours and hours and the real possibility of screwing everything up?  LESS THAN AN HOUR!  And no problems!


You know what they say.  Face the thing that you fear the most and do it first. Your fear may have nothing to do with the look of your blog, but I bet there is something that you cringe having to do every time you think about.  Whatever it is JUST DO IT.   It`s keeping you from moving forward.









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