So on Friday I discussed starting a blog as a way to gain a following to launch your book to. Today I'll teach you how I designed my blog--hopefully it'll help you guys out! Even if you have a blog already, maybe you'll learn something. Let's go!
First of all, you'll need a Blogger account. You don't have to use blogger, but if you use something else my tutorial won't apply to it. No worries though, there are plenty of tutorials out there for other blogging platforms. Just give it a google.
In order to set this up, you'll need a few things:
-A blog name
A lot of people get stuck here. DON'T. It honestly doesn't matter what your blog's name is. Hey, two of the most influential companies out there are named Apple and Nike for crying out loud. Don't sweat this. Just make sure it's easy to type and remember.
-An e-mail
I'd highly suggest setting up a separate e-mail to use for everything BLOG. If possible, it should be the same as your blog name (mainly because it looks like totally cool and professional). So if your blog's name is Susan's Stitches, ideally your e-mail should be susansstitches@emailprovider.com.
-A profile picture
I'll admit, I don't have this yet. I'm still working out what mine should be! But from everything I've read it should be a nice, quality picture of you. I'm not talking a lowlight selfie. Get yourself a friend and have him or her snap a fabulous picture of you outside or in really nice lighting.
All right, once you have that set up (it's a pretty self explanatory process), we get to the good stuff.
Before you do anything, go to your blogger dashboard, drop down the triangle next to the page icon and click on "Template."
If it's not already selected, apply the WHITE "Simple Blog" template to your blog. I believe blogger defaults to the orange one, which makes it semi-difficult to design around.
Creating your header:
All right, now that you have your blog created, head over to Pic Monkey. This place is DA BOMB and I would highly recommend paying for the premium version. You get more fonts and features. But, no worries, it's still DA BOMB if you choose not to.
We have a few steps here:
1. Hover over "Design"
2. Click on "Custom"
3. Input 1100 pixels in the first box and 400 in the second
4. Go crazy with text and accents!
Actually no, don't go crazy. There's a ton of stuff you can do with Pic Monkey, and it's very easy to get overwhelmed by it all and USE ALL THE STICKERS but I'd discourage that. Just keep it simple with a few fonts and a couple colors. For me, I used Ultra for "how to write a book", RNS Camelia for "knitting", and League Gothic for the description in my header.
Another lovely feature of Pic Monkey is the ability to use HEX codes. If you select a word you inserted to your design, it'll bring up a box. At the top of this box you'll see a "#" with a number behind it. If you find a color you like, write down this number. Don't skip doing this step! If you do this, when you come back to blogger, you can match various blog components to this color. This will give your blog a cohesive-ness about it.
When you finish your masterpiece, save it.
Head back over to your blogger dashboard and instead of going to the "Template" tab, go to "Layout." Find the long rectangle that says "Header" and click edit. This will bring up a window that allows you to browse for your image. Once you've uploaded your design. there's a VERY IMPORTANT THING YOU HAVE TO DO. This thing is: click "Instead of title and description." Now save that!
Boom! Custom header made!
While you're on your layout page, head over to the rectangle that says "Navbar." Then click "off." I personally think this really cleans up the look of your blog.
Ok, now we're going to fine tune some things:
Go back to your "Template" page and click the big "Customize" button. Now, I work in Internet Explorer and this customize feature doesn't work for me. I have to switch over to Firefox to be able to use it. Give it a try though, it works for a lot of people in Internet Explorer.
Once this customize page opens, you'll see a live preview of your blog. You may notice that your header has been cut off on the right side. To fix this, go over to the left hand side and click "Adjust Widths." Drag the toggles until your entire header appears. Boom!
Now click over to "Advanced" instead of "Adjust Widths" and go crazy designing your blog. The advanced tab has a bunch of things you can choose colors and fonts and font sizes for. I would suggest focusing on Page Text, Post Title, Date Header, and Links. Remember those HEX codes you wrote down while designing your header? Use those when customizing these things. It'll tie it all together and make your blog look fantabulous.
All right! That's how I created my blog. I plan to add more features in the future, and you can bet I'll let you know when and how I implement those things.
On Friday I'll teach you how to create your Ravelry group and grow it!
See you then,
Grace
