This post is the third in a series of 5 free quick blog reviews worth a total of $500 that I’m giving away to promote my blog consultancy. First review: Caroline Middlebrook, Livin Online.
unTECHy
First impressions
Keith runs unTECHy, a blog whose tag line says it’s about “online reviews from an unTECHy point of view.
The navigation of the blog seems clunky. I know Keith is considering switching to WordPress, having read this on his blog. I totally support this idea. WordPress absolutely rocks, and if your blog is self-hosted, my opinion is that you should be using WordPress. Keith will find a huge selection of fantastic WordPress themes to pick from. I don’t have anything against Nucleus CMS, but WordPress has massive support and resources available for it. If Keith signs up for a blog at WordPress.com, he can take WordPress for the test drive before deciding to commit to it on his self-hosted blog.
Content and purpose
The content for unTECHy is online reviews from an “unTECHy” point of view. I like the overall idea — after all, I do a fair amount of writing for non-technical people. This is always valuable, because there are always new people who need it. Keith is on good ground with this idea.
But Keith is new to this, too: new to blogging, anyways. As I go over the content of unTECHy, I see some posts about Ebay and many metablogging-ish kinds of posts. The Ebay posts would be hard to do well without any Ebay experience. The other categories are “Webmasters” and “Online Income.” There is a link called “About,” but it doesn’t go an about page! Is Keith an experienced webmaster? Does he have experience and expertise in generating online income? He doesn’t say, but I’m not sure that he does, and that presents a bit of a credibility problem.
unTECHy needs to have a clearer focus. The term “online review” is a bit vague. Does it mean the reviews are online? Does it mean that things which are online get reviewed? One step Keith should take that will bring the purpose of his blog into sharp focus is this: pick a specific type or category of something to review, and make it something he knows about.
If Keith wants to do a journaling-style “learn what I learn” kind of blog, then he needs to be up front about that and make sure that aspect of the blog is unmistakable by honing the tag line and creating a strong About page. He seems to be blogging in this style, but then at other times he presents himself as more like an expert. You can start off with a journaling style of blog and eventually become an expert, but I don’t think people are really going to buy that he’s an expert if he’s just starting.
I think what Keith really needs to do is sit down with himself and ask himself: why am I writing this blog? From there, determine the single main goal of the blog. Then create a plan with a series of steps to get there. It doesn’t have to be complicated or lengthy. But he should have a goal and a plan. And then eliminate everything that doesn’t help to reach that goal. Strengthen the points that will help him reach it.
In order to really get where he wants to eventually go, Keith may have to treat unTECHy as a “starter blog” and move on to something better entirely. But if he wants to keep it and take the training wheels off of it, he needs to keep blogging and attend to a few things I’ll list below.
Recommendations
- Figure out motivation for blogging — be honest or it won’t be any help.
- Determine single most important goal of the blog — write it down in exact language.
- Work backwards from the goal to craft a series of steps to get there — don’t overdo the details, and be prepared to change it and be flexible as reality dictates.
- Rewrite the tagline to match the motivation and the goal of the blog.
- Switch to WordPress and get a new theme.
- Create a strong About page.
Alright, Keith… you’ve got some work cut out for you, but I think you’ll be much happier with the results after you do it.
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I sencerely appreciate your review,and yes I do have my work cut out for me.
You are correct that I am not an “expert” at pretty much anything. Thus- unTECHy. You mention ‘Training-wheels’ which is exactly how I feel when it comes to blogging.
I will take everything you posted into consideration for future (success?) of unTECHy.com
Thank you for your review.
You’re welcome, Keith! I really look forward to seeing what you do with it. Shoot me an email after you have gone a little further and let me know how you’re doing.
Michael – I am enjoying these quick blog reviews. I am getting something out of each one for my own blog. – Ashley
wow Michael – you are really getting to the core issues of each of these blogs… I am really enjoying these reviews.
My favorite point here: “Figure out motivation for blogging — be honest or it won’t be any help.”
Awesome…
Michael,
Quite some time has passed since your review. I feel I’ve been leading my blog down its’ destined path.
Whereas I may never be a problogger, I have started achieving the goals I set out to achieve.
I now receive on average 2,000 pageviews per month (not alot in your eyes, but it’s a great step in the right direction).
In March, I earned over $100 in revenue from unTECHy.com. Though this isn’t why I started unTECHy, I’m sure you’ll agree that monetization is a plus if you can do it without ruining the credibility of your site.
I feel I owe a big thanks to you for your review and suggestions. Though I haven’t followed them to the tee, I have used them as a guide and inspiration for unTECHy.
Once again I thank you for your review of my blog.
@ Keith – very cool to hear that you’ve done well and found the review valuable! Keep rockin’ and I wish you success!