Honest Opinion - Does my blog suck?

I think you need to start using paragraphs. I also think it's a pretty broad topic.

What fin said... I would toss in a few images also.

Maybe also make the background white. Blue is pretty distracting.

A little bit, I would suggest you to change the theme

What is the goal of this blog?

If you want readers to subscribe then you are going to have to narrow your topics a little more and speak specifically to your niche market.

If you are asking about the design, I like it.

Is your blog suppose to be about getting rid of debt? I see some articles completely unrelated to debt.

Also I must say the theme is pretty average. You should go look for a better theme on wordpress. There are a lot of free themes that are much nicer looking than the one you have.

You should remove the "Meta" widget on the sidebar.

Thanks for all the tips guys. It seems that the general consensus is that it definitely sucks I'll work on making some of the changes. To Cedric, it's more of a general blog about my goal of getting out of debt and some of the things I'm trying to earn extra money or to save money.

I could definitely start over and just focus on tips for how to get out of debt, but I was trying to make it a more personal blog with the hope of getting visitors to hang around in the future.

I was looking it over earlier and thinking that maybe I was wasting my time and that I should just start sharing information I've learned about getting out of debt. The problem I saw with that idea is that I'm clearly not an expert and I'd be trying to rank against Dave Ramsey.

There are lots of free themes you can download. Then, you may tweak them a bit (customization). Apart from that, I'm not sure which niche is your focal point there.

You can add image or video to increase the "life" of your blog.. I'd say you worry about the design next time (At least get the basics done - like what Fin suggested, change your background to white, blue is pretty distracting) and work on your content first.

I really like the content. I saved it to my "favorites." I am not familiar with blog web pages, but could you put all of the titles on the right the same way you have recent posts on the right. I didn't want to scroll all the way down to find the posts I am interested. Does this make sense?

I think a picture or an "about me" page would be good. It seems very generic and impersonal to me.

As others have already said, it seems to bounce from one topic to another.

Rose

It looks good...adding images will make it engaging...

To be frankly, there are too many affiliate links in your blog, arrrgon. It would be good, if you can reduce the amount of affiliate links a little bit...

You can always change the theme and design in the future if you stick with Wordpress. Maybe something to consider.

Thanks for the tips. What pictures are you referring to? If it's the viglink code I didn't think that was a big deal.

Sorry, I can't send private messages yet, but I made a bunch of changes based off of what you guys said. I didn't add any pictures or a banner yet, but I plan to. Does the writing look better and a bit more focused to you guys now?

Definitely need to make it more compelling. If i clicked through & saw a wall of text like that i'd hit the back button pretty quick...

Also, need to add a logo which should speak of the topic.

The page is pretty flat, too much blue--take some of the suggestions in here-a few images, a logo, and use paragraphs, it makes the content that much more readable

First thing I noticed is that the titles need to be more catchy, something that would entice the reader to read the paragraphs underneath the title. And I totally agree with the others, you need to add a picture or two; to spice up the page.

Hi

I agree with everyone who said add more images and make it more personal. You are already writing in the first person and talk about things you and your wife do. Add a picture of yourself or the two of you so visitors know who you are. It will help generate more social interaction.

Add at least one image to each article. It can be a single medium sized image in the upper left (or right) with the post text wrapped around it. This will make the articles look better and can be used as a thumnail for the front page summaries. You can us a WP plugin to automatically create a thumbnail from the article image if the theme doesn't support that already.

For example you could find a free picture of frozen food for your most recent posts from a commons or public domain site.

You need an opt-in to start building a list. I suggest that you (and your wife) write a short money-savings tips ebook to give away free for opt-in. There are many PLR ones you could use to start.

Once on your list, you can send tips to your list, encourage them to engage on the blog, send notifications of new posts and content and, of course, affiliate offers to things you found helpful and/or recommend.

Mahlon

Social interaction would do your site a ton of good. More photos and perhaps some video on ther would allow your audience to connect with your brand.

Seems like the info is pretty good, maybe just narrow your niche, and use your sidebar to start building a list!

Just thought I would throw in my two pennies and pocket lint:

First - Only your target prospects are qualified to answer that question based on sales you generate (or lack thereof).

Second - Think about utility of purpose as well as what's "sexy" right now.

In other words...use pictures, video, memes, etc... get people at least interested.

Third - Is this stuff being posted on any of the social properties?

I hope that was helpful and I found out that although I'm primarily in the local niche, I h ave done a few product launches so I see what works the more I do.

I so hope you found that helpful.

Regards

Los

PS. Make sure you're also using Google's Optimizer tool or something similar.

I would throw in some pictures from Flickr creative commons. Also, go to you tube and get video embed code so you can insert some mini movies. Those are a great way to spruce it up. Think of pictures as adding a little spice.

For example, add a gold coin. Then talk about saving money.
Or, use a garbage can icon. Then say - Stop wasting your resources.

Nice site. How do you plan on monetizing it? I see no adsense or affiliate products anywhere.

Also, focus on driving large amounts of targeted traffic to your blog. Post once everyday and make sure your blog gets pinged afterwards.

Hey,

Took a good look at your blog. Read the posts and there's good advice. Here are some more things for you.

1. You know about adding images to posts. That's important because it helps draw eyes and keep the readers engaged or interested.

2. Optimize all images for the web. Helps with keeping browser load time down. I don't know if you want to try and rank, etc. Browser load time needs to be as low as possible.

Put a short description under each image. Make a point with it that ties into the post content.

3. Test blog in other browsers just to be sure they all look good.

4. You can find some beautiful themes at themeforest.

WordPress | ThemeForest

They're very professional. The prices are low because you are buying a license to use the theme. So you're not actually buying the theme. Up to you if you like that model or not. Some come with mobile themes as well as the regular blog theme.

5. The biggest thing, one of them, is your content.

Some paragraphs are too large. You have to make them scannable. Vary the paragraph lengths. No more than about 5 sentences per paragraph.

Relatively short sentences. Have some bullet points in each post. Vary everything. Odd number of bullets.

Use the inverted pyramid approach with your content. The first sentence tells what the point is about the paragraph. Then the rest of the paragraph supports the point made.

Feel free to use one sentence paragraphs here and there to break things up and also make it more scannable.

6. Have subheadlines in each post. Don't use keywords in them if you're trying to do SEO and rank. Avoid over-optimizing.

7. Very popular style of headline and posts are lists.

3 Ways to Save $50 Each Month ... give a tangible benefit.

5 Easy Methods for Giving Tangible Benefits

8. Make the headlines shorter so they work better with social media and sharing.

9. Get some social media sharing buttons. Just the major ones are fine.

10. I did not see any blog categories. You will not do well with SEO without them and a good site structure.

11. If you reorganize it to have categories, then be sure you add internal linking between relevant posts between categories.

12. Set up Google Alerts for relevant topics. Then write about what you learn. Do some research and add to the content.

13. Have external links in posts to authority sites about saving money.

14. Have a blogroll with links to authority sites. I don't know... half a dozen or so.

15. Not sure what exactly you mean by "Work Free" although I think I know what you mean. But it's misleading and completely inaccurate because it does take some effort to save money. Effort, discipline, a little pain here and there.

I'd suggest you re-think that one.

16. The main column content font seems small. I would suggest 12 point.

17. Have site accessibility features/elements such as the little clicky things to make the font larger or smaller. Maybe set it to a medium by default.

18. Keep an eye on the news and write about news stories and include a link to it.

Use different approaches such as disagreeing with points made in the news. Or you can add to it; write about how it applied to something you did once, etc.

19. Keep an eye on trends and report them.

20. Get a twitter acct and name it whatever your url is.

Look up hashtag resources and real time reporting. Tweet about each new post and use one or maybe two hashtags that are popular and relevant. Tweet using hashtags related to women. Trust me on that one.

Tweet once or twice a day. Between 2 and 5 PM is really good.

Tweet news items related to your overall theme.

***

Get the content situation straigtened out first.

No PLR. Original.

I'm a noob so feel free to ignore me. But the first thing I get from your site is BORING. I see a blue wall of text. I will echo the thoughts above. Change colors. Add images. Better titles.

The one thing I'm not sure I agree on is the idea of making longer posts. They feel long already to me but that may be because they are boring. Maybe its your writing style but the posts feel very rambling. They are very general and cover multiple topics within one post. I think each one could be more laser focused and divided into multiple posts.

For example, the freezing food post could focus more on what foods are good to freeze and what are not. How long things last in the freezer. Show a picture of your organized freezer. Maybe have little tips like using ice trays to freeze chicken stock that can then be used in small batches. Then a different post could talk about the coupon thing. There are whole sites dedicated to coupon cutting where you could get ideas. And yet another post could talk about cooking instead of eating out, maybe with some graph you find somewhere showing the money saved vs the cost of eating out.
So that one very general, boring post could be divided and much more focused and much more useful to people.

You also seem like you are trying to rank for keywords. For example, you say "slow cooker" four times in one paragraph. Then you have "debt free" five times in your about page. I don't know if this is accidental or on purpose but it feels artificial. An IM'er will be cynical and think you're stuffing keywords. A regular person will just think you are a bad writer.

Also, if its supposed to be personal, make it feel personal. Make your personality shine through in the posts. If the posts currently reflect your(lack of) a personality, make one up. Right now, its really dry.

First off, despite what some people above have said, a broad subject theme is preferable if you are going to write a real blog. The theme of my own blog (at my main site) is personal development; it is a very broad subject. The advantage is that it gives me a lot to write about and that's what you need if you intend to write a decent blog. I also make a full time income from my main site, so don't let people tell you that it can't be done unless you focus on a narrow niche.

Second, with regard to design, it does look a little dated. As people have said, there are many excellent free themes for WP, so I am sure you could do better. That said, if you simply a) use graphics in your posts and b) change your body font to Verdana, your blog would instantly look much better.

Thirdly, with regard to your content, I would suggest you work on your titles. Try to come us with titles that invite your audience into your articles. Just as a quick example, instead of 'Freezing Food To Save Money' you might think about 'How a Rusty Old Freezer got me to the Superbowl'. Of course, you would have to work on your article, but you could explain how you saved enough money to buy a ticket by doing what you said in that article.

Good luck with it.

Will

I don't see anything wrong with the color of your background and yes you need images and paragraphs too. You can drive traffic to your site by updating your content daily and also pinging.

I liked your blog. but some things are missing
No image in articles.
NO headings
No paragraphs
No internal Links
unprofessional theme
Try to focus on ON page SEO

Actualy no, the blog doesn't suck BUT it can be better.

A lot of people have already said stuff about the paragraphs as well as the lack of images. I like the theme though. I think its easy for the eyes.

You could also add some videos there too.

Also how about an opt-in box to capture leads? (if that is your intention).

Like others have said, social plugins would also be good. Allows people to follow you through different channels.

And yeah, some On-page SEO and internal linking would be good, but if you're still learning, take it one step at a time.

Other than that really, it's all about good quality content. If you want your stuff to be found, then you will have to learn a bit of marketing to bring traffic to it (SEO is only one method).

I do think however, that the message of the blog is pretty easy to feel and recognize but that's just my opinion.

Thanks again for all of the tips guys. Do you think that a tutorial on how to set up a budget using google docs would be a good thing to use for opt-ins?

The site is a little pale. I think you can remodel it. But the blog is cool and it does not suck.. Content is short and too the point. So my suggestion is keep up the god work and now and then bring in videos and imgaes.

You need to think about your blog design and permalink.
Here is my blog

Why don't you use some media? Your blog is looking very boring. You should add some images and videos to make it more attractive.

Could those of you that didn't like my content take a look at my post on freezing food again and tell me what you think of my changes?

Thanks again for the help everyone. I think it's time for me to get some sleep.

Also, I'm going to take a picture of our food in our deep freeze tomorrow. I'll add the picture to that blog post as well.

Images,
Make the article longer and some social media

i like the theme of your site

I think the title can be confusing. Work Free Debt Free? Is it about not working or working for free? Because I didn't see any articles relating to either one.

When every visitor comes to your blog, don't let them run away without doing something. Such as "join your list", "click something", "make a sale"....