Taking stock
Having been a member of WA for nearly two months now I have been creating content, going through the training, making no money (LOL) and just enjoying being part of the community.
Some of the great feedback provided by other members has led me to look at the site navigation and possible additions to each page to bolster up the design. Having a good amount of knowledge on coding and design has been very helpful for me. I decided from the outset to use some tricks in terms of colour combinations in order to "increase engagement" - it's a web design psychology trick I learned on the job. Basically choose 4 specific colours and use just these four within your website in order to create a familiarity among pages. There are lots of examples of this online if you just google 'website colour palettes/templates" or something to that effect. Now, in order to use these colours to their maximum effect you would need to go into the CSS editors and do some basic style codes. I use various hexadecimal values on different element classes.
Also I reworked the navbar menu so that it is less 'weighty' by making one nav area for categories and the others being the About, Contact and Privacy Policy. As my content continues to increase I will more than likely have to amend this. For now it's fine. As they say, design is a constant learning experience. You're never truly completely done!
I'm hoping that my niche begins to convert in the new year. It really is a great community here.
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Great post. You're lucky that you have the background to work with. Not a lot of people here do and you can tell how frustrating it is for them. I plan on doing some training in the future to help them get the basics. I'll be sure to include the four colors thing in there. I actually have an online palette wheel that I use that allows you to pick a color and then shows you the three complimentary colors. Thanks for the ideas.
Yea we should do some training on basic html and css. Only problem with wordpress is that it uses php which can be a whole other kettle of fish. I would suggest possibly doing some inline css stuff maybe - inline style code will override any external styling provided by "style.css" and allow people to really customise stuff.
I'd also love to do some accessibility stuff too - making your site inclusive for every visitor no matter their ability or disability. Wordpress is pretty good but there is always room for improvements!
Great tips (I mean, use 4 colors only)! Thank you, sir. I will check my site and make adjustments, if needed. :)
Sure, give me a shout if I can give any advice. My four colors are:
#404040 (Blackish)
#6DBDD6 (Blueish)
#B71427 (Reddish)
#FFE658 (Yellowish)
In terms of where to use them, be conscience of conoctations different people and cultures have towards color. E.G. Most cultures associate red with danger. Blue tones tend to invoke trust and calmness, etc... White in Asian cultures (I believe) is associated with death? I'm hoping to write a training post on these areas but haven't been a member long enough yet. Best of luck.
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It's good that you have that know how to go in an change stuff like that.
If I can ever help Adrian give us a shout.