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Churning

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I’ve noticed that some folks I know have a tendency to rev. their blog design rather frequently. I’m starting to see a correlation between compelling content and long gaps between blog design revisions (and vice versa).

Discuss.

Popularity: 15% [?]

Posted October 16th, 2007 @ 11:26 PM

11 Replies

Geof F. Morris adds this Comment:

My anecdotal knowledge lines up with yours, in two ways:

1. I run a WordPress-powered Weblog community, and the best bloggers there have had the same design to their site for years. Conversely, the ones who aspire to be great but won’t put the time in seek to change their theme every six weeks.

2. I only ever feel like changing my design when everything else is going to hell with my Weblogs and I’m not writing anything interesting.

October 17th, 2007 at 4:54 am
Chris Hubbs adds this Comment:

Geof has stolen my thunder, and indeed much of my experience with bloggers is from the community he runs. I wholeheartedly agree with his two points.

With the advent of feed readers, though, who notices design changes any more? I only notice them when a) the blogger notes it in a post, or b) when I actually visit the site to leave a comment.

October 17th, 2007 at 5:21 am
Joe Casabona adds this Comment:

I agree. I actually used to change every six months or so because I wasn’t really happy with the design, and let’s face it, I didn’t have much important to say.

Now I feel the design is good enough and easy enough to bone up a little if needed, without a total over-haul. Plus, I am writing what I feel are better posts than I was say, 2 years ago.

October 17th, 2007 at 6:13 am
Bruce Keener adds this Comment:

I also agree with your observation. As a relatively new blogger, I am beginning to recognize I have changed designs too often, and that time is better spent on content.

My trying out different designs has been to find one that “is me” and one that does not looks “professional enough.” Also, it has been prompted by an obsession with trying to get better numbers in Google Analytics (pages per visit, time on each page, etc). But, as I look around at sites like Scoble’s, Vanessa Fox, and others, I do not see their designs as being particularly compelling, but they clearly have high traffic (because of their content).

It is a lesson that is learned slowly (at least in my case), and seeing your post makes me think I just need to pick a design and stick with it. Thanks for the post.

October 17th, 2007 at 8:45 am
Micah Baldwin adds this Comment:

There are two types of bloggers:

1) Writers: The design needs to be functional and support the content. Once the right design is found, it probably never really changes.

2) Designers: The design matters more than the content. Probably post a lot of pictures, while the content may be focused, it probably is not. Therefore designs change more often.

Caveat to above: new bloggers. They keep finding new themes and want to play with them. Also, I would imagine infrequent bloggers like to change out their themes to increase the freshness / newness of the blog.

At the end of the day, I think there is little correlation between quality of content and design. It may be, Alex, that you are reading more blogs written by writers than designers. You are a coder after all!

October 17th, 2007 at 9:58 am
Alex adds this Comment:

Micah, I think that this may be an extension of “people that do” rather than “people that think about doing” - blogging is another way this shows itself.

What you do is interesting, ideas that you do not actually follow up on are not so interesting. It’s the same as product ideas vs. execution - it’s the execution that matters.

Back to design - there are some great blogs from designers who write very little, but instead post their design work.

You are a coder after all!

Originally I was a designer, not a coder - but what I have always been is a “do-er”. I guess I gravitate towards my own kind.

October 17th, 2007 at 10:11 am
Geof F. Morris adds this Comment:

I guess I gravitate towards my own kind.

Holy confirmation bias, Batman!

[I like operators. I like working with operators. I like being an operator. I like kicking ass.]

October 17th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
Quick blog random update.. | Blog Random adds this Pingback:

[…] I’ve spent the last two weeks working on some plugins and a design for this blog. It’s been good fun and I needed to get rid of the template from wp themes but it took up a lot of spare time. Now that the design is out the way I’m planning to spend a lot more time on some decent quality posts. I don’t want to be a churner (alex king blog). […]

October 18th, 2007 at 4:57 pm
Roland Hesz adds this Comment:

I agree - my blog is boring, and I changed my design lately, so there is correlation I can attest to it. Though, I change my design only because the one I used fell apart when WP2.3 came out, and I can’t find a layout I like.

So your statement is quite true.

October 19th, 2007 at 3:01 pm
My personal blog. » Blog Archive » Welcome to the ad free me adds this Pingback:

[…] you and come again. No more revisions, and more focusing on the […]

October 20th, 2007 at 7:55 pm
owen clivet adds this Comment:

churning??
at least you could have a better name for the topic!!!

June 24th, 2008 at 8:17 am

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