My very first question comes from Tina at LuvemOrLeavem and she's wondering how to make her sidebars more attractive.
CLUTTER
First and foremost, as a general comment on sidebars, it isn't an issue for Tina but I can't seem to repeat it enough. Your posted articles are what's most important... it's the whole point of a blog not all the stuff placed in the sidebars. So please try not to clutter them with random widgets, gadgets, useless blinkies (I know they can be cute but make a post about it instead) and toooooo many ads.
It's like a house if it's cluttered it won't look good and you'll feel miserable same goes for blogs.
GROUPS
Secondly, try to keep things grouped within your sidebars. It gives a nicer look. For example everything relating to blog navigation, in other words, everything that has to do with your posts (recent post, recent comments, archives, feed, search, keep these together. The main reason being this is to make certain your readers do not have to search around to find the important things because most won't... it's just too much trouble. Again it's like trying to find a pair of clean socks in a teenage boy's room... no one wants that! Secondly, it will also be more pleasing to the eye. Mainly because all the widget I cited they are all text based so no ads, no images, so it looks neater in a column. Place all your ads, entrecard, buttons... anything image based together below post related widgets (if you have only one sidebar or in your second sidebar)... it will look much neater and also have a bigger impact. Readers will notice them more if they are grouped rather than lost among other sidebar things specially for ads. As for images based sidebar stuff try if at all possible to have them match in colors to your blog or at the very least make sure they are in themselves attractive. This is mainly for bloggers that place 125x125 ads of other blogs or entrecards in their sidebars... some are just plain ugly and won't help your blog look attractive so do not use them!
SHORT TITLES
Thirdly, keep your sidebar titles to a minimum. I often see sentences as titles and sidebars aren't very wide usually so the words have to be on several lines. It doesn't look very attractive but rather bulky and cluttered.
COLORS
Fourthly, on my designs I like to make links and text on sidebars all the same color and posted articles in another color. Technically speaking it's a no no! If one follows the normal web practices links ought to look different from normal text so readers know they can click on it. Now, the reason specially in your case Tina since your sidebars and posts background is all white without any separations, is that readers, with only a quick glance, will be able to differentiate sidebar from post. Here's what I'd do in Tina's case. Since all your links are red in the sidebar, make the sidebar text red as well... Now do not worry about your links they are underlined so they already look different and your readers will know they are links.
Now since your blog is a wordpress one I cannot tell Tina exactly how to achieve the change in color... As for your sidebar titles I'd make their background red and the text white so you get white text on a red bar... which would act like a divider. Or you can go with an image beside the title words like I'll explain further down.
I am not familiar on how easy it is to modify the template in wordpress but if you know how or can find tutorials on the matter it would be worth while.
DECORATIONS
Also, when it comes to sidebars I like to decorate them a bit using elements from your header graphic to tie everything together. In Tina's case I'd use a little red heart beside the sidebar titles. You may not know how to draw or make a heart? If that's the case try searching for the words free icons on google and you'll find some of various sizes, shapes and colors.
Tina's sidebar titles are made with the h4 tag... if she has access to her stylesheet on wordpress she should find the h4 tag in her stylesheet already all she would need to do is add the little heart image with the aid of background images. Here's a link where it's explained very clearly and tells you exactly what to do. It's quite simple but feel free to email me if you have issues I'll help as best as I can since I'm not to familiar on how wordpress accounts function.
If little images beside the titles doesn't appeal to you... there is also the option of dividers between each widget in your sidebar. Make sure to use an image that fits within your sidebar... you do not want it sticking out. The simplest and easiest way to add a divider between your widgets is to add an image widget in between your other widgets. It can be a longer process than playing in your stylesheet specially if you have many sidebar elements but if you're not a coding-wis it's definitely the easiest way and everyone can do it!
On another note, there's a few things I also recommend for Tina that are not directly involved with the sidebars but would help separate them from the posts.
1. There's a nice wordpress plugin (I wish blogger had something similar) that makes your post titles into images of words... now why would you want to do that... simply because it allows you to use a less common font or a non web standard font. For example in Tina's case I'd used the font from her blog tagline... it's pretty an readable small. But please make sure it's readable if you want to use this plugin.
2. Tina's blog is part of her website and on the other pages she has different elements and they have a nice rounded red border around them. I recommend doing the same for each individual post. Although, she would need to contact her web designer for this so there would be fees involved.
Well, hopefully, this helps clear up issues on the topic of attractive sidebars. Do not hesitate to send in more questions!!!
Stay tuned for tutorials on how to add title images and/or dividers to your sidebars!!!!
