Blog Structure?

by jakecoop79

Posted: 14 years ago 12 replies

WEB DESIGN

I'm looking for some advice on how to structure a blog.

I'm not sure how involved my blog will become, so I don't want to do anything in the beginning that will limit me. The blog will be about a very broad topic and so there will be many different types of things to blog about. Also, the topics I blog about could easily be listed in multiple categories. So how should I approach the blog structure?

Should I start making categories right away, or should I start with just going by date and then in the sidebar when you click on a month the blog titles will drop down, then once I have much more content, then start creating and assigning categories?

Also, any suggestions on a good wordpress theme for blogging? This isn't a make money online blog and I won't be selling products. I might use google adsense.

#blog #structure

JennyPellicer Banned 14 years ago

I'd start with categories to have everything organized from the start.
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jaiganeshv 14 years ago

The default twenty ten theme is far better.
I don't think categories are great, i minimise using categories, for a new blog i will add at least last 10 posts in the home page above the fold. Also i will display tags in home page for new blogs.

Don't forget the mandatory pages like about us, privacy policy, disclaimer pages becoz you will not have time to add those pages once your blog is established...
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- John Romaine 14 years ago
  
  Originally Posted by jaiganeshv
  
  I don't think categories are great, i minimise using categories.
  
  You should ALWAYS use categories. Consider them similiar to the contents of a well organised book.
  
  In addition, categories will help you in terms of onsite optimisation, in that your URL structure will be more efficient.
  
  eg.
  
  www.yourdomain.com/category-keywords/
  
  Then you file all articles related to that category (that also contain your keywords) within that category.
  
  Understand?
  
  Originally Posted by jaiganeshv
  
  ...becoz you will not have time to add those pages once your blog is established...
  
  Why not? :rolleyes:
  
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WilliamBlah 14 years ago

You can add and edit categories at a later date. If you suffer from the same perfectionism as myself, it would be my advice to not worry about getting everything perfect straight away, and instead focus on just getting started. Add categories as you go along, and you'll soon see which categories are most important by which ones end up with the greatest number of posts in each.

If you are writing a broad topic without the specific intention to monetise, then just search for a few keywords within the "Theme" options within your WordPress control panel. Remember that WordPress is primarily a platform for blogging, so most of the themes available should be suited to your need. Just pick one that you like the look of.

Regards
Will
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jakecoop79 14 years ago

Thanks for all the advice so far.

Is it ok to have posts listed under multiple categories? So if my broad topic is "Mental Health" and I have a post that could be categorized under "Shame", "Codependency" and "Coping".

Should I create all those categories right away and list the post under all those? Or should I just start blogging, have the sidebar go by month with the titles dropping down and then do the categories later?

Is it ok to have the same post in multiple categories?
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- John Romaine 14 years ago
  
  Originally Posted by jakecoop79
  
  Should I create all those categories right away and list the post under all those?
  
  Im not sure anyone could answer this with absolute certainty.
  
  The only thing that *is* likely to happen, is that your blog, (so long as you continue to maintain it) will evolve.
  
  I wouldnt worry too much about it at this point, Im sure later on you can reorganise your categories as you need without disrupting too much.
  
  PS. Im no wordpress expert, but Im sure Ive seen some blogs where the articles are listed beneath multiple categories.
  
  EDIT * Yep, looks doable. Have a look at James's blog. See where it reads "Posted by James in Business growth, How To, James Schramko" They appear to be separate categories.
  
  http://www.internetmarketingspeed.co...ith-ed-okeefe/
  
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money200 14 years ago

Your blog should be good as a visitor point of view.
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EmmaWilliams 14 years ago

Things to remember when blogging:
- hitting the keywords without stuffing thus making the wordpress blog senseless
- educational
- informative
- entertaining
- interesting
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Istvan Horvath 14 years ago

Just as a reminder:
Post do not exist outside of categories - in other words, every post MUST be in at least one category.
(Pages don't have categories)

A post can belong to multiple categories.

Categories can be hierarchical; i.e. in a parent/child relation; a.k.a. subcategories.

Plan the structure of your blog's content on a piece of paper: make a "chart" how you will structure your content. Most people make the mistake to skip this step
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jakecoop79 14 years ago

How easy or difficult is it to change wordpress themes down the road?

Should I spend a lot of time now picking a theme because it is difficult to switch or is it easy to switch?
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Tadresources 14 years ago

WordPress themes are quite simple to change from the Dashboard. Just a few clicks of the mouse.

However, the larger your site gets, the more involved the process will be for checking to make sure that an theme update did not cause any errors in your layout or site navigation.
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jakecoop79 14 years ago

Ok, one more question, is it best to "no index" category pages so that only the posts themselves are getting indexed?
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