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I have reviewed several personal blogs in the past, and compared to more niche oriented blogs I find them the most difficult to review. Personal blogs aren’t written with one specific topic in mind, but rather, can span a whole range of topics.

The one aspect of personal blogs that is different compared to some niche blogs is the frequency in which they are updated. Many are updated on a daily basis. This week I review a personal blog that is updated several times a day.

Web Site: My Ideas 4 You

Description: It’s a blog about my personal life as well as gadgets and tools which I have seen or used before. I will also publish my own point of views and reviews of movies, computing software and hardware.

Design 

The design of the blog and the colours chosen by the author is pretty unique to this blog. The author has chosen to go with a black background with orange and yellow highlighting. Since the background is so dark, and the orange and yellow is so bright, it provides a nice contrast between the colours.

The actual text used is a gray colour, which may be difficult to read as it isn’t nearly as bright as white would be in that situation.

The layout itself is really simple, with the content on the left and a navigation sidebar on the right. At the top is a bar that includes a menu and several options, such as font size and administration options. The adjustable font size is a nice feature to have. This allows a visitor to increase or decrease the size of the font to their liking.

Below the top menubar is a few links, a calendar, the subscription information, and a hitcounter. The calendar highlights the days containing posts, which you can click on to display the posts.

The navigation sidebar is nicely organized with the main navigational links at the top to make them easy to find. One nice touch to the categories is the grouping of certain topics, such as a Technology topic with several related topics below that.

The blog layout overall is really well done, not too crowded and easy to navigate.

Focus 

From what I can get out of My Ideas 4 You, it appears to be a personal blog about whatever the author feels about talking about. This can lead to a lack of focus as is evident when you read the blog. The author has chosen to discuss many topics so there is no real focus to the blog.

A solution to this problem is to simply create multiple blogs, one for each topic, which would help keep the blog in focus.

Content 

The content is updated several times on a daily basis. This is great for those that like to read personal blogs regularily as there will always be a post on this blog.

The posts themselves are not long and can contain only one or two paragraphs. If the posts were longer, the author may not write as many. Of course the other downside to so many posts is the lack of images. Only a few posts each week contain an image, which reduces the amount of colour on the blog.

If you enjoy reading blogs with short content, few images, and updated on a regular basis, then you may want to check out My Ideas 4 you.

Spelling and Grammar 

The spelling and grammar is the weakest part of the blog. Although, My Ideas 4 You isn’t dominated by bad spelling and grammar, it can make it difficult to read a few posts. I had to reread a few sentences because of either a word missing, or a long run-on sentence. Using a spellchecker and reading the posts before they are published would definitely help this blog.

As I read the free review e-mail that the author sent me, I noticed that he did make mention about his grammar, and is aware of it.

Overall 

My Ideas 4 You has some nice features that aren’t common in other blogs, such as the font size modifiers and the calendar control at the top. The blog’s layout is by far its strongest part, with the spelling and grammar being the weakest.

The blog is updated several times on a daily basis, which is great for those that like to read the blog. A few more images in the posts would add some much needed colour to the blog, especially considering it uses a black background.

Making a few changes, such as the images and correcting the spelling and grammar would greatly improve My Ideas 4 You.

It seems most people that start a Web site or blog attempt to make money in some form from their endeavour. I for one have a few money making items on Technically Easy, so I fall into that category.

There are many new blogs that have started up with the main focus being making money online. This week’s review focuses on one of those blogs. This week I review a relatively new-comer to the “make money online” arena called BloggerNoob.

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All the previous blogs that I reviewed had a set focus that was easy to determine once you read the blog. This week’s review is a little bit of a change. There are probably millions of blogs on the Internet, and a great many of them are personal blogs where the author just rights about anything. I review a blog that falls into this category this week.

Suburbian Queen is written by a mother of 2 who obviously enjoys writing on her blog. Although the focus may be a little hard to determine, her posts are far from boring.

Design 

The design of Suburbian Queen is a simple design with the main content on the left, and a navigation bar on the right. The provides an easy to read layout for the blog.

There are a few flaws that I can see in the current design of the blog. The first is the background image. I found it too distracting, and think a solid grey colour, or a faded image in the background would be better. Another issue I found with the design in the fact that all text is bolded. This seems to be a common trait for many blogs, but I feel bold should be used for emphasis only.

The last issue I had with the design is the order of the items in the navigation bar. I would move some of the post navigation links, such as the categories and archive links to the top of the navigation bar. This will allow visitors to easily navigate around the blog.

Besides the simple layout, I did like the size of the font, which made it very easy to read the posts. The menu at the top of the page stands out as the font is large, capitalized and is fairly dark compared to the white background.

Overall the design of the blog makes reading and navigating the blog easy.

Focus 

The focus of the blog can be confusing to a visitor who has not heard of Suburbian Queen in the past. There is no brief description of the blog in the header, which would have been nice.

The description of the blog sent to me by the author is as follows: “Suburbian Queen is a blog about everything in general. Sometimes funny and often times thought-provoking. This blog has something for everyone”, which after reading a few posts becomes quite obvious. This brief description would be nice in the header of the blog to prevent visitors from being confused.

Content 

Unlike my posts, the posts on Suburbian Queen are short and sweet. Many posts can easily fit on a single page without causing the page to become too large. This is a big plus, since many visitors probably won’t want to read large posts.

Another thing I also like about the posts are the little images the author has inserted at the beginning of each one. Each image the acommpanies each post is simple, yet appropriate, to the subject of the post. Images are always a nice touch to any blog.

Spelling and Grammar 

This is the first blog to receive a perfect 5 star rating in any category. It is hard to find a Web site, or blog for that matter, which has near perfect spelling and grammar. Suburbian Queen has well written posts that are very easy to read. The author has definitely spent some time to ensure to correct any spelling and grammar mistakes, and it shows in the posts.

Overall 

Suburbian Queen is an interesting blog that is fun to read. The design of the blog doesn’t distract or make it difficult to read the blog. The focus may be a little confusing to a new visitor, but after reading several posts you have an idea of what the author is trying to achieve. The posts are nice and short, and include simple and appropriate images. The spelling and grammar is top notch and achieved a perfect 5 star rating, a first in any category.