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next Home Bio Portfolio Artist/Writer Info Kidlit411 Blog tips Ebooks Apps Infographics Reviews Interviews Contact Monday, January 16, 2012 8 Ways to Make a Blogger Blog Look and Act Like a Website Does your Blogger blog look too "blog-like" for your tastes? Here are some tips to make a Blogger blog look and feel more like a full-service website: 1. Buy a custom domain name and point your account to it. Instead of having your URL be www.yourwebsite.blogspot.com, you can have your URL be a more professional www.yourwebsite.com. You can buy a custom name either at a domain registration site or through Blogger (for $10 a year). Either way, set up the name by going to Settings --> Publishing ---> Publish on a custom domain. You can choose either to register with Blogger or you canuse another registration site (if you do, follow the "Switch to advanced settings" instructions). 2. Play with the advance layout options to customize the look of your site. Blogger has a fair variety of templates for your site. They aren't as snazzy as Wordpress templates, especially the premium (paid ones), but they are fully customizable. Here are three easy things to do: *.Add a custom header.At the "Layout" page, click on the Header box and add your own custom header image. *.Add a custom background.Go to "Template," click "Customize," and pick a basic template to start. Click the "background" link to add a custom background. *.Add custom details.Go to "Template," click "Customize," and start playing with all the details of each element of your blog. Here's an example of changing the various colors of links: 3. Add page tabs (About, FAQ, Contact). Blogger lets you add up to 20 standalone static pages that show up under your header as tabs. Go to the "Pages" section to add and edit pages. Click on the option "Show pages as Top tabs" to get page tabs across your header: Good pages to have are: About, Portfolio (if you're an artist), Books (if you're published), Contact, and FAQ. 4. Add a contact form. Once you've set up your Contact page, you can create a form for it, using Google Docs. See my post on How to Make a Contact Page for Bloggerfor instructions. 5. Add social media icons. Blogger includes social media sharing buttons for each post, but doesn't have a good gadget to allow people to follow you on your social sites. If you look to the top right of this blog, you'll see social media buttons that lead to my Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and Pinterest accounts, and that allow people to subscribe to this blog through an RSS reader or email. The way to add the icons is to use the "HTML/Javascript" gadget. Here are my instructions on how to add social media icons to your blog(I learned how to do this from Adventures as a Small Town Mombut have learned some added tips since then). The set of circular social icons I used can be found here. If you want to choose other images, google "free social media icons" or check out: 33 Beautiful Social Media Icon Sets for Designers and Bloggersand 50 Free Social Media Icon Sets. 6. Add a favicon. A favicon is the little icon that shows up next to a website address in the browser bar. Mine looks like this: See my post, How to Add a Favicon to your Blogger Blog, for easy instructions. 7. Use the Picture gadget to link to other sites. If you have an Amazon sales or Etsy page or a dedicated portfolio site, you can use the Picture gadget to feature the link in your sidebar. This blog uses a picture gadget to link to my Etsy store. 8. Add E-commerce features. If you want to sell something directly from your blog instead of through a separate service, you can add a Paypal button to your blog, either in the sidebar or in a page or post that describes your wares. Go to your Paypal account's "Merchant Services" section for instructions. P.S. If you're really ambitious, custom design your entire site. By the way, if you know HTML coding, the sky's the limit for changing your Blogger blog into a website, as you can edit every part of your site. Web designer David Kutcher has blogged about some amazing websites made on Blogger, and also provides useful tips on taking Blogger sites to the next level at Blogger Xpertise. (Update 2/28/13:Blogger Xpertise has some nice free templates to transform your blog. See my post on how I used the BoyBurnsBlog template to make an art portfolio). Please let me know if this has been helpful, or if you have any questions. If you liked this post, you may also like: *. How to Make a Contact Form in Blogger *. How to Add a Favicon to Your Blogger Blog *. Improve your Blog's SEO Title Without Giving Up Your Creativity *. How to Add Social Icons to Your Blogger Blog *. How to Remove the Blogger Navigation Bar Posted by Sylvia Liuat 12:24 PM Labels: Blogger, Blogger tips, blogging tips, creative blog design, social media 181 comments: Adventures as a Small Town Mom January 16, 2012 at 10:22 PM Thanks for referencing my social media tutorial! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 17, 2012 at 11:42 AM Thank you! I used your tutorial to get my social media buttons on this site. Sarthak Goel February 3, 2014 at 11:27 AM I got a very nice blog ! http://sarthakgoel.blogspot.com/ Reply Domain Names January 17, 2012 at 3:48 AM Hi, thanks for sharing this valuable post. Reply Replies commditytips March 14, 2014 at 7:04 AM Nice Article!!!!!!!!!! Free Trial Reply Amy LV January 17, 2012 at 8:28 AM This is great! Thank you so much. I am going to make a favicon and add a few of these other features to my Blogger site. Many thanks for your generosity! a. Reply Sandy Brehl January 17, 2012 at 11:36 AM What a great compilation of the kind of information I've been looking for to (eventually) improve the visual qualities and accessibility of my site. I will always feel like the proverbial "immigrant" to these processes, but at least you are helping me to speak and comprehend the language. Thanks. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 18, 2012 at 12:58 PM Thanks, Sandy. One of the easiest tips is adding the Pages tabs, which gives your readers good information about yourself or your work. Reply anniecardi January 17, 2012 at 1:25 PM Great suggestions! Platforms like blogger or wordpress are fantastic tools, and even a little customization can make them look a lot more interesting. I've been blogging for a little while, but think it would be worth it to learn more HTML and take the customization even further. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 18, 2012 at 12:58 PM Yes, one day I'll take the next step and learn more HTML to take the customization to the next level. But I have to get back to my other work...illustrating! Thanks for the comment. Reply sell my electronics January 17, 2012 at 3:02 PM Great idea to consider. Reply Helena Juhasz January 18, 2012 at 2:50 PM Wow! I can't thank you enough for this post! My goal is to eventually try every one of your suggestions except for learning code and doing the full customization - but, who knows? Reply mary kinser January 18, 2012 at 9:58 PM Great tips, thank you! I've been using Blogger for a while but I didn't know about the option to add page tabs. Going to have to check that out. Reply Camille January 18, 2012 at 10:50 PM These are great tips - thank you! I like the layout of your blog/website - it is very easy to use. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 19, 2012 at 12:04 PM Thanks for the comment! I still tweak this site every once in awhile, and I did it even yesterday just to make sure that it's the look I want. Reply MiKa Art January 19, 2012 at 10:03 AM You have great tips here! Thank you very much for sharing!! Reply Linda Knoll January 19, 2012 at 10:54 AM Thanks for these tips! I"ve been thinking of just giving up my "regular" website and going with a better blogger site... what do you think? Is it worth the time and trouble to maintain both? Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 19, 2012 at 12:02 PM I guess one question is which site are you spending more time with and more excited about? It's probably worth keeping a portfolio website to showcase your art, since Blogger doesn't do that very well. Maybe you can maintain a very streamlined portfolio site that is linked to your Blogger site as you spend more time on the Blogger site. David Kutcher May 21, 2012 at 11:28 AM Don't give up on Blogger for portfolio websites, you can definitely make a very beautiful and interactive portfolio site (image heavy) on Blogger. Check out our most recent Blogger site at http://www.concentricsrestaurants.com, specifically the portfolio section. If you can dream it up, you can probably code it in Blogger. Sylvia Liu May 21, 2012 at 1:20 PM Thanks, David. If you can dream it up, you can code it, but I'm not there yet! I do enjoy your sites. Very inspiring. Reply Lydia Kang January 19, 2012 at 5:29 PM I've done some but not all of these things. Great tips, thank you! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 21, 2012 at 7:21 AM You're welcome, and thanks for stopping by! Reply tina kugler January 20, 2012 at 11:06 PM Oooh, I'm trying some of these! When I have time... Just found your blog with the SBCWI Comment Challenge, very enjoyable! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 21, 2012 at 7:22 AM Thank you! I'm enjoying the comment challenge too. Reply Annie January 21, 2012 at 7:31 AM Have bookmarked and shared to Google+. All the info I've always wanted in one easy to find place. Thanks Sylvia. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 23, 2012 at 6:06 PM Thank you, Annie. Reply Mary Jo Guglielmo January 23, 2012 at 11:50 AM Great tips. I'm definitely going to work on the favicon. Thanks Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:12 PM Great - glad to be of help. Reply Dana Carey February 8, 2012 at 5:17 AM Thank you, Sylvia. You answered questions I'd been wondering about for a long time and you've made it so easy to set a site up, I don't have any more excuses not to! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:12 PM Dana, thanks for stopping by. Reply Elizabeth Stevens Omlor February 8, 2012 at 6:13 PM Love, love, LOVE this post! Thanks so much for sharing! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:12 PM Aww, thanks. Reply Jarm Del Boccio February 13, 2012 at 10:28 PM This is SUCH a helpful post! I have a Blogger site, so this is specific to my needs. Sure do appreciate it... Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:13 PM Glad to be of help! Reply sampath kumar March 6, 2012 at 11:53 AM Custom templates too make your blog look professional Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:13 PM Yes, definitely. Reply Susanna Leonard Hill March 11, 2012 at 7:49 PM This is unbelievably helpful, Sylvia! Thank you so much! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:12 PM You're welcome, Susanna! Reply Perth web design March 15, 2012 at 9:25 PM For me I think that it's all about presentation, thank you very much. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:12 PM Thank you. Reply erin May 2, 2012 at 8:25 PM Thanks for all of the great tips! You have a great blog. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:11 PM Thanks! Reply Johny June 6, 2012 at 4:50 AM Helped me a lot to tweak my blog the way i want.Thanks for the great tutorial Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:11 PM You're welcome! Reply The Needed June 20, 2012 at 10:22 PM Thank you so so much for the helpful post! Much appreciated! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:11 PM Thank you for stopping by. Reply adrian ciuca June 29, 2012 at 9:16 AM As others have said above, it was realy helpful info. I was looking for exactly the points you make in the article. Thanks. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:11 PM Thanks for stopping by; glad these were helpful! Reply Samer Alawad June 30, 2012 at 2:35 AM plz all take a look at my blog 3rd-half.tk Reply Shadlea Machat July 23, 2012 at 3:50 PM Please come and have a look at my blog, feel free to comment.. http://awkwardtimeswhen.blogspot.co.uk/ Reply pankaj chopra July 26, 2012 at 8:21 AM Nice article, really liked it, and have implemented in my post. I have submit my query to you, if you wanted to check my blog http://suresolution.blogspot.com/ Reply Sandy Marsh August 6, 2012 at 11:21 PM Thank you so much! I made the contact form in no time at all. It's a good start for me. I'm just taking this step by step. Unfortunately, I don't see your favicon in my browser :\ Reply Replies Sylvia Liu September 28, 2012 at 9:19 AM Thanks for stopping by! I wonder why you can't see the favicon? Have a great day. Reply John Parkes August 26, 2012 at 1:00 PM Just to say thanks for this - I have a website which I don't have the knowledge to properly update. I was going to use Wordpress instead but got really put off by all the techie stuff (mostly explaining how simple it all is!) - and I already had a blog - I Googled and your article came up - and after an hour or two looks much better! Still a way to go but even so... http://johnparkes.blogspot.co.uk/ Reply Replies Sylvia Liu September 28, 2012 at 9:16 AM Thanks for stopping by; I checked out your site. It looks great. Reply PDXJPrice September 1, 2012 at 6:51 PM I've been trying to add a link to my Amazon store but In can't figure out how to do so. Any advice? Reply Replies Sylvia Liu September 28, 2012 at 9:15 AM How about using the picture gadget (tip 7, above) in the side bar to link to your Amazon page. It would look like my link to my portfolio or Etsy site on my side bar. Reply Rahul Kharat September 5, 2012 at 3:27 AM Good information.......i like it its very useful for new blogger like me.. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:13 PM Thanks, Rahul, for stopping by. Reply Web Design Rochdale September 28, 2012 at 9:00 AM Thanks for sharing. These 8 tips of so important. Reply Remove Background October 8, 2012 at 8:15 AM Fantastic post and Thanks for sharing this info. It's very helpful…. Reply Kelly Coe October 11, 2012 at 4:56 AM Great tips! I am in the process of revamping my blog and your post was extremely helpful!!! Thx :) Reply Replies Sylvia Liu August 25, 2013 at 9:55 AM You're very welcome. Glad to be of help. Reply Mahendran October 28, 2012 at 11:01 AM Thanks for sharing.. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu November 13, 2012 at 8:48 AM You are very welcome. Reply atlanta web design November 4, 2012 at 8:28 PM This is very interesting, You are a very skilled blogger. I have joined your feed and look forward to seeking more of your excellent post. Also, I have shared your site in my social networks! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu November 13, 2012 at 8:47 AM Thanks so much; I appreciate it! Reply sakshi rana November 13, 2012 at 1:46 AM hi,nice article but i want my blog to look like yours Reply Replies Sylvia Liu November 13, 2012 at 8:52 AM Hi Sakshi. I made this blog look like this using these 8 tips. I started with Blogger's "Simple" template and customized the colors and fonts using the template designer (you get to it by the "customize" button). I added my own banner, the tabs, and the side widgets, and this is the result. Thanks so much for stopping by! Reply aleeya Khan December 2, 2012 at 12:27 AM plz check my blog tell me my blog is ok or not: http://info-zon.blogspot.com/ Reply Replies Qasim Ibrar December 2, 2012 at 5:19 AM it is awesome Reply NUR HASANAH December 3, 2012 at 1:45 AM nice info for blogger, visit my site www.dodolan2.blogspot.com Reply Damon December 9, 2012 at 5:54 AM Good post. helps a lot.. Reply Jeannie December 17, 2012 at 5:35 AM Thanks for the info! Do you happen to have any tips on making the author picture and bio section more appealing? I used quite a few of your tips here, and now that's what I'm after next! :) Reply Replies Sylvia Liu December 17, 2012 at 6:06 PM Are you talking about the "About Me" section that is on your sidebar? I don't love the way Blogger shows that, so I sometimes just remove the widget. I have a separate tab "Bio" up in my tabs, and I figure I have more space to explain who I am in that section. Reply Agus Susetyo December 20, 2012 at 6:09 PM i love your blog friend BLOGGING Reply Jojo Scoble December 29, 2012 at 1:05 PM Can anyone help me make my blogger site have the multiple tab header bar feature. They've changed the interface wince you wrote this blog but I can't change the header. :( Very frustrated. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu December 29, 2012 at 2:05 PM I am still able to make tabs in the new interface. Go to "Pages" and in the upper right, you'll see an option to "Show pages as top tabs." It may depend on the template you have chosen, but I have several blogs with different templates and they all allow the tabs. I'll edit the main article to show the new template instructions. Good luck and let me know if it works. Reply Heather January 1, 2013 at 9:56 AM This is so helpful! I just ordered my domain name because of your site. I could not figure out where to do it from my dashboard (which is really unhelpful on Google's part--but it brought me to you when I searched! So, thank you Google!) I am bookmarking your page and will be using your tips to improve my blog. Happy New Year! and thank you again for using your blog to help others! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 1, 2013 at 4:45 PM Thank YOU for stopping by, and happy new year to you too! See you around in the blogosphere. Reply coolashfaq January 2, 2013 at 8:18 AM This comment has been removed by the author. Reply Replies coolashfaq January 2, 2013 at 8:20 AM how do u do your blogspot like www.sylvialiuland.com my one is coolashfaq.blogspot.com i also want to delete that blogspot link i want to put like u like www.admin.com please teach me Sylvia Liu January 2, 2013 at 8:54 AM You'll have to buy a custom domain name, for approximately $10/year. Blogger will sell it to you (see my first point above). Go to Settings, Publishing, Publish a Custom Link. If you have more questions, send me a note through the "Contact" tab. Good luck! Reply Anjali Rathod January 16, 2013 at 5:26 AM Hello Excellent post with excellent information. Thanks for sharing us, its very helpful for me. I have you bookmarked to check out new stuff you post. Keep sharing. Domain Registration Reply Cheryl February 6, 2013 at 3:02 PM Thank you Sylvia! These are great basic tips. Very valuable and inspiring advice. Reply Vishmi Ventures February 7, 2013 at 2:35 AM This is amazing, thanks a ton Sylvia! Reply shemword February 15, 2013 at 11:13 AM Thank you for the tips, I want to make a good blog, and your advices are very helpful. Reply Miss Martin February 24, 2013 at 12:18 PM Thanks so much for this article. I have been wanting to redirect my blogger blog to a domain name for a while now, but I wasn't sure how to do it. I just assumed it would be too complicated to be worth it! I had no idea how simple it was until I found this article and I completed it in about 5 minutes. Thanks! -Miss Martin Miss Martin’s Classroom Reply james drain February 25, 2013 at 7:35 PM Thanks a ton!! This has answered a lot of my questions, I want to do so much more but don't have the funds to spend at present and want to build an income online now I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu August 25, 2013 at 9:56 AM Your welcome. Glad to be of help. Reply Jolleen || The Graffitied Gardenia February 26, 2013 at 2:27 PM Great, Thank you! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu April 18, 2013 at 12:19 PM Thanks for stopping by. Reply Ramalingam K B March 23, 2013 at 11:05 AM hi mam your stuff's are good i like them, http://ramalingamaero.blogspot.in/ Reply Shivam Mahajan April 4, 2013 at 12:52 AM ThanQQQ..!! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu April 18, 2013 at 12:18 PM You're welcome! Reply Claire Bumperbunnydogz April 14, 2013 at 2:17 PM I must thank you. I had absolutely NO idea what I was doing on Blogspot, and this has helped so much! Thank you. I am defiantly following your blog. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu April 14, 2013 at 2:53 PM Thanks so much for stopping by! Reply Ketan Patel April 17, 2013 at 3:15 PM Thanks for all of the great tips! You have a very nice blog. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu April 18, 2013 at 12:18 PM Thanks for stopping by! Reply RebeccaLynn April 18, 2013 at 12:14 AM Hi Sylvia Liu.. I saw your blog and was attracted to it. You have a really nice blog. I have a couple of questions. I hope that you can help. I would like to know how I can get all my tabs to show on my blog (blogger). How do you get your category section to look like that (in a paragraph)? Thank you.. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu April 18, 2013 at 12:18 PM Thanks, Rebecca Lynn! To answer your questions: 1. To get all of your tabs to show, go to the Layout view. Click "edit" on your Pages box, and you'll get a pop up box called "Configure Page List." There you will be able to check all the pages you want to show up as tabs. 2. To have the categories show up as a paragraph, first make sure you are adding labels to each of your posts as you create them (it's on the right side in your edit post view). Then go to Layout, and click "Add a Gadget" in your sidebar. Then find the gadget called "Labels." Once you open that, you can show how the labels are displayed. Mine are displayed as a cloud, and I only show selected labels. Hope this helps. RebeccaLynn April 18, 2013 at 6:02 PM Thank you so much! Reply way2hacking.com April 19, 2013 at 8:25 AM Nice methods, I like it.. Reply Laura Totney April 23, 2013 at 9:22 PM Hi, I was wondering if you knew or could refer me to any tutorials to make my page tabs appear in a bar? :) Reply Replies Sylvia Liu June 7, 2013 at 8:41 AM Sorry I missed this question earlier. Go to the "Pages" tab on your editing screen, and then find the pulldown menu and click on the option "Show Pages as Top Tabs." That should do it. Reply Tamilarasan R April 25, 2013 at 4:35 PM A nice article to make one's blog look better... I started a blog few days ago I hav downloaded a blogger theme n customized it.. hav a look at my blog.. techeetalks.blogspot.com since I hav knowledge in HTML, CSS n jQuery it was easier to customize n implement my design... Reply Anthony Greentree May 18, 2013 at 6:12 PM Just want to thank you for helping me out. You have answered my question about setting up a blog as your own personal website. I have followed you steps like a recipe in a book! I think I may need a bit more salt, but I am getting there! Thanks again! :}> Reply Replies Sylvia Liu June 7, 2013 at 8:39 AM Thank you for stopping by; glad it was helpful! Reply Irfan Haq May 20, 2013 at 5:30 AM I believe one should only pivot to custom domain and hosting only when they have enough traffic and planning to take the blogging stuff seriously or even when they're in mood to sell their blog. But recently I came across this start-up called WEBSFORTwhich helps you in listing your blogspot or wordpress or tumblr hosted blogs also(one with no custom domain and hosting). Thus once a suitable buyer is found then the blog owner could easily invest few dollars on hosting and domain and sell it to the person. This does not violate the blog selling policies either as no actual transaction is being taken place on the WebsFort platform. I hope this might help a plenty of bloggers who wanted to sell their third party hosted blogs or for those who want to get an idea about their blog analytics and valuation. Reply Bretanne May 21, 2013 at 12:06 PM How did you remove the Blogger header? I'm talking about the narrow, usually navy header that has "more","new post" and the Blogger logo on it. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu May 21, 2013 at 12:10 PM Go to Layout, Click "edit" on the tab that says "NavBar" in the upper right, and click "Off." (I also explain a more difficult way at: http://www.sylvialiuland.com/2012/05 /how-to-remove-blogger-navigation- bar.html before Blogger made it really easy) Reply quizvook.com May 25, 2013 at 11:14 PM Very very useful tips thanks a lot for sharing... Reply Replies Sylvia Liu May 29, 2013 at 8:45 AM Thank you for stopping by! Reply jR aRt May 26, 2013 at 2:28 PM hi.. this is the most versatile and user friendly explanation to the given topic and i hope my blog will be immensely benefitted as i am desperate to make it look like a web site. i hope you would want to visit my blog and look for room for improvement and who knows you would like to buy some of my paintings. Please visit, www.inspiredbyalmighty.in Thanking You! Reply priteem behera July 9, 2013 at 4:26 AM very nice explanation and links..thanks a lot :) Reply Terminus July 15, 2013 at 5:04 PM Good post , you could also fine some templates o.line there are tons of themes. I even have seen a real estate website made out of Blogger Reply Geoff Smith July 18, 2013 at 9:12 AM Thank you for this wonderful tip. I am new to this platform and It will take me some time, until I make it look good, but with tips like that, at least it's starting to look a little better. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:10 PM Glad to be off help! Reply Tracy Garbett July 22, 2013 at 2:53 AM excellent tips. I am new to blogger and was thinking about leaving as couldn't get site how I really wanted it. Will look through your other articles regarding blogger. this is just what I have been looking for. thank you :) http://www.mummytoddlersandtantrums.blogsp ot.co.uk/ Reply Replies Sylvia Liu July 30, 2013 at 4:10 PM Thanks for stopping by, Tracy. Reply Shan thecaliph August 5, 2013 at 11:06 PM cool Reply Gary the crazy cat August 20, 2013 at 7:13 PM A lot of good ideas as I'm wanting to take my blog to the next level Reply Replies Sylvia Liu August 25, 2013 at 9:54 AM Thanks for visiting this blog! Reply Isabelle Lauder-Robb August 24, 2013 at 10:16 AM Wow thank you SO much! This post has been really helpful to me! so easy to understand for someone who has no idea AT ALL what they're doing, again, thanks :) Reply Replies Sylvia Liu August 25, 2013 at 9:54 AM Thanks for stopping by; I'm glad it helped. Reply Angela Bain September 1, 2013 at 7:47 PM Thank you for the info! Reply Indri Lidiawati September 5, 2013 at 9:38 AM Thamks for the nice tips! Reply James Blake September 7, 2013 at 1:04 AM Great tips. I'm definitely going to work on the favicon. Thanks website design Reply Dhrumil Faldu September 27, 2013 at 7:00 AM Thanks for your information this is very useful to me and my blog mya2zinfo.blogspot.com very very thanks again... Reply Steeve Frank October 4, 2013 at 7:42 AM Oooh, I'm trying some of these! When I have time... Just found your blog with the SBCWI Comment Challenge, very enjoyable! web designer in Toronto Reply Replies Sylvia Liu October 8, 2013 at 9:19 AM Thanks for stopping by! Reply apurva nagar October 14, 2013 at 5:40 AM Hello Sylvia, My name is Apurv Nagar and I run a blog along with my friends Shashwat Lahiri, Varun Singh and Anush Verma on the Google Blogger platform. We are 13 year old students from India and we can't spend money for advertising the blog or buying a custom domain. We have connected our blog to Facebook, Twitter and Google+ successfully, but we are not getting any subscriptions and also not a huge traffic on the blog (we have got only 1027 pageviews in the past 10 days).I have submitted the blog on blog directories and we are also in the Google index, We are even going to start a YouTube channel for it.. I regularly view other peoples blogs and comment and share them. We need your help ( some tips) in making our blog a success. Our blog name is Electric Web and the URl is - www.electronicmashup.blogspot.in/ . Thank you, Apurv Nagar( Electric Web - administrator and author) Reply Replies Sylvia Liu October 15, 2013 at 2:25 PM Apurv, your site looks great. Getting to larger numbers of page views can take a long time. I recommend that you do as much networking as possible - going to other sites in your space and commenting, joining online communities that do what you do, and generally getting yourselves known. The more communities you participate in, the more likely those people will come visit your site. You should also think about why you want more traffic. Is it to spread the word of what you do? It may be that having 100 page views a day is fine. Also, consider what topics you might cover that would have a much wider appeal that could bring visitors to your blog. For this site, the topics that are dear to my heart (illustration, children's books) don't get nearly the same views at the blogging topics, which makes sense, as the blogging universe is much larger than the children's illustration universe. Reply sastraku October 18, 2013 at 9:45 AM Thanks for your information is very good My blog Obat tradisional Reply Dennis Moot October 19, 2013 at 8:27 AM Really insightful Reply Dubi stock October 29, 2013 at 6:30 AM Wow! you amaze Ms. Sylvia, Thanks for this post, I'm so glad that this was add to my learning, I'm practicing web design now and you give much idea about it. Reply Abiodun Aworeni November 4, 2013 at 5:35 PM Nice post, really helpful. I'm just starting my blog today. Although i have a wapka.mobi site and know much of Html and java but little idea of blogging. Please could you teach mé how to go with it Reply Replies Sylvia Liu November 22, 2013 at 1:19 PM Thanks for your comment, Abiodun. If you google "best tips for blogging" or "basics of blogging" or something similar, I am sure you will come across a ton of articles on how to go about blogging. At the most basic level, you need to (1) know what you want to blog about, (2) have an idea of who your audience is, and (3) start writing posts that fit 1 and 2. Try to blog consistently but know your limitations. I don't have a strict blogging schedule; at the moment, I'm quite busy, so I tend to only post 2-3 times a month. Other times I've been able to post weekly. Reply Rob from Portland November 10, 2013 at 10:41 PM Thanks for these tips. I will be using a few of them as I move forward building my site. www.oldhighwaynotes.blogspot.com Reply Jangbir Kashnia November 15, 2013 at 6:47 AM why you are not getting google ads sense Reply Replies Sylvia Liu November 15, 2013 at 10:23 AM Thanks for the question. It's just a personal preference thing. To me, the ads clutter up the page, and I'm not interested in making money off the blog. Reply eirene amarillo November 22, 2013 at 12:59 PM I followed your steps on how to add a fav icon and it turned out that the image has to be a square image else blogger won't accept it. Do you have a post on how to get the square image done and blogger can accept it? Reply Replies Sylvia Liu November 22, 2013 at 1:15 PM Do you have an image manipulation program like Photoshop? Because it shouldn't be too hard to cut and paste your image onto a square template and flatten it. If you contact me through my contact form and leave your email address, I can send you my email address and I can help you with the image. Reply James Murray November 30, 2013 at 4:42 AM Security measures are now the first priority to make the transaction secure and smooth. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu February 21, 2014 at 10:34 AM good point Reply PamBrunskill December 2, 2013 at 11:05 AM Incredibly helpful, Sylvia! Thanks for posting--I'm working on creating my blog/website now. :) Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 9, 2014 at 4:27 PM Hi Pam, Thanks for stopping by. Reply Shubham Sinha December 12, 2013 at 10:45 AM i had used the gadget slide show in which images are coming small i want it big and should at top of the pages Reply Replies Sylvia Liu December 12, 2013 at 11:08 AM Thanks for stopping by and commenting. I haven't used the slide show gadget yet, so I don't know how to help you. Sorry. Reply The Dark Avenger January 6, 2014 at 12:37 PM Hello Slyvia, thanks for posting this. I have just started blogging and when I googled for help on blogger, I found this blog and it has been great help for me! It has all the information I need and apart from this post, I also been reading your other articles regarding blogger. Thank you for putting your time and I'm surprised you have survived on blogger without getting deleted as I have heard google is very strict and delete million blogs everyday. Its a request if you get the time, please do make a new post on " Common rules Bloggers break" etc :) Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 9, 2014 at 4:26 PM Thanks for stopping by and sharing your thoughts. Are you asking what are common rules that Bloggers break that get their blogs deleted? I'm not really an expert on that, but I could do some research. Reply Ben Jackson January 9, 2014 at 4:08 PM Fantastic post!! Really useful, thank you Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 24, 2014 at 7:18 PM Thank you for visiting! Reply Beka January 14, 2014 at 5:04 PM SO helpful! My blog looks WAY better. Thanks!! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 24, 2014 at 7:17 PM Glad it was helpful. Thanks for stopping by. Reply Udit Khanduri January 24, 2014 at 6:13 PM Can you please tell me how to create a widget without entering the name Reply Replies Sylvia Liu January 24, 2014 at 7:16 PM What kind of widget are you asking about? For most of them, you can just delete the title of the widget. Udit Khanduri February 7, 2014 at 12:54 PM You may also like The Three Most Important Pages For a Blog and Website Reply Stefan Crainic January 26, 2014 at 11:05 AM Great blog. I learned a lot from this blog. Thank you ...and thumbs up !!! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu February 21, 2014 at 10:33 AM Thanks, Stefan! Reply The Dark Avenger January 28, 2014 at 12:14 PM Hey sylvia, I had this page bookmarked once again would like to say thank you for making it easy to create a almost proffesional looking blog in the first place as I had no idea what to do when I first made a blog until I read your blog. I have improved my blog a lot since then, I have changed the template of my blog which I think you should add on your blog about for people with experience :) http://www.theticgaming.blogspot.com/ cheers. Reply Vera January 29, 2014 at 8:50 PM Excellent! Thank you so much. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu February 21, 2014 at 10:32 AM You're welcome! Thanks for stopping by. Reply Udit Khanduri February 7, 2014 at 12:56 PM You may also like The Three Most Important Pages For a Blog and Website Reply Jenifer Jeny February 12, 2014 at 12:51 AM How's superb idea! Is it really possible to make a blog exactly as like a website? I made three blog for ghost mannequin service, glamor retouching serviceand image background knockout service. Reply khiraline February 18, 2014 at 11:24 AM I just came across this post. Very useful, thank you for the tips! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu February 21, 2014 at 10:32 AM You're welcome. Thanks for stopping by. Reply sadia fotoclipping February 19, 2014 at 10:48 PM Make sense, great tips and really informative! Thanks for sharing. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu February 21, 2014 at 10:31 AM Thanks for stopping by; glad it was useful. Reply Towab Muhammad Yusuf March 12, 2014 at 1:45 AM Your blog is really nice! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu March 27, 2014 at 8:42 AM Thank you and I appreciate you stopping by! Reply Denny Aulia March 26, 2014 at 11:31 PM Thank you for the great article Sylvia! I tried to add page tabs but under the "pages" section, there is no option "Show pages as Top tabs" to get page tabs across your header? Could you help? Thanks again! Reply Replies Sylvia Liu March 27, 2014 at 8:41 AM Hi Denny- I see they've changed the way tot do that. If your go to the Layout section (not Pages), and then click "Edit" on the Pages tab, it gives you a Tip: if you want the pages to show up as tabs, just move the whole gadget under the header. If you want it to show up on the sidebar, move the gadget to the side. Let me know if that works. Reply phonesoldier March 28, 2014 at 4:40 AM How to change the number of posts to display on the Main page? I changed the number to 20 in the settings, but it is still showing three! Take a look at phonesoldier.blogspot.in Reply Replies Sylvia Liu March 28, 2014 at 8:33 AM Sorry, I don't know why it didn't work. Were you on the Layout page and clicked "edit" Posts? Reply Suraj Thapa April 2, 2014 at 5:52 AM Thanks. My blog doesnt look like a website but i am trying to my best. Here is my blog http://surthapa.blogspot.com/ Reply Replies Sylvia Liu April 13, 2014 at 10:28 AM It looks fine to me! Reply Sujith Hs April 7, 2014 at 2:33 AM Hi Sylvia can you teach me how to create my own blog starting from the first step please ? Thanks in advance. Reply Replies Sylvia Liu April 13, 2014 at 10:27 AM Hi Sujith - why don't you send me a note through my Contact Me page and I can point you to the right direction. There are a ton of tutorials and posts about starting a blog. Reply Tayib Murjani April 28, 2014 at 5:20 AM I can't thank you enough for this post! My goal is to eventually try every one of your suggestions except for learning code and doing the full customization - but, who knows? by Agen Poker Online Indonesia Terpercaya Reply Jupiter Alappat April 30, 2014 at 2:11 PM Hi Thanks for the post..I just started a blog 6 months back. Now planning to move to a custom domain. Could you please tell me which will be good wordpress or blogger from your experience. I think you are using blogger , Don't you? BTW my website : http://www.sonaby- tech.blogspot.in this is blog I want to make changes. Please reply. Reply next