Designing A Perfect Sidebar On Blogger

I just wanted to share some information about sidebar which I think would benefit both the newbies, as well as the webmasters, who are striving hard to make money via blogging - to design a perfect sidebar for your blog. To start off, sidebar is basically a section on your blog that comes either to the left or to the right of the main section & includes information related to the blog posts.

It is very important to design this element, that is, put the right content on the right area to attract both the readers and advertisers. As far as I know, a well organized sidebar should include some of the most important widgets like subscription box, advertisements, recent or popular posts, search bar or any information related to the blog they are browsing. Many blogs like TechieMania, Shoutmeloud and my very own blog - EAB, includes optional widgets like Facebook Fan Page/ Twitter Updates or Google Friend Connect.

IMAGE CREDIT - www.woorkup.com

So, it's important to know what should come first and what should go at the last. The importance of each widget based on their function has been ordered as shown in the list below. The percentage for each widget in the picture depicts both the importance and the area it should occupy on a particular blog. So, just have a keen look at it!!!

SUBSCRIPTION OPTIONS:

This is a very common widget that could be found on most of the blogs. On an average, it should occupy 5% of the space provided for sidebar and I suggest you to include links to your RSS feed, Facebook and Twitter profile page. You can have a short and catchy description about your blog, as well.

ADVERTISEMENTS:

This is the most important element which every blog should possess. It's the ideal place for advertisements and should occupy, at the most 40% of the total space. It's very important that you don't place too many advertisements on your blog and make it look very ugly for the reader. Also, I suggest you have the width set to something more than 260px because you can have two advertisement blocks on the same row - just like the one on my blog. It's up to the individual to decide whether he wants to display ads related to the topic he is blogging about or just sell the ad space he has to run to meet his hosting/domain costs.

RECENT OR MOST POPULAR POSTS:

This is another important widget that every blogger should place on the sidebar or at least, at the footer section because the maximum traffic your blog receives would be due to the posts you wrote earlier, that is people land on post pages and not on the home page of your blog. So, when you have a recent or most popular posts widget on the sidebar, there is a very high probability that the readers goes to check out another article on your blog.

EXTERNAL WIDGETS:

This includes widget such as the Google Friend Connect, FaceBook Fan Page and so many other social bookmarking widgets. It's basically used to build better interaction with the readers. So, I suggest you can have these widgets though they are are not necessary. Make sure they don't occupy too much of your space. Limit the space allotment to not more than 10%.

OTHER ELEMENTS :

This additional space is basically for people to add miscellaneous widgets like job boards, tag cloud, etc... Limit the spacing for these elements to not more than 10%.

Basically, this post provides a quick summary about what should be present on your sidebar to make it more professional. So, I suggest you follow the same list especially if you are newbie. This schematic will definitely earn a better reputation rather than dumping a hell lot of widgets for no use. If you gotta share something, then just leave a comment. We love to hear from you!!!

Enjoyed the article?

Click here to subscribe to FREE email updates from "Everything About Blogging", so that you do not miss out anything that can be valuable to you and your blog!

What's Next?

Other Recommended Posts

Anonymous

I like to read this blog. Because i get many useful blogger customize tricks from here

Mukund said on February 26, 2011 at 7:22 PM :

@Anonymous: Thanks for the comment! I hope I provide such useful tips you expect! Enjoy the other articles!!!

Giftsaver said on February 27, 2011 at 5:42 AM :

Thanks for the tips on sorting out the clutter. You've shown by example and that makes a lot of sense.

Mukund said on February 27, 2011 at 7:47 AM :

@Giftsaver: Yeah! Thanks for your comment buddy! Would love to hear more from you! Hope you enjoy the other articles on my blog as well!

vamsi@Hover pc Hacks said on February 27, 2011 at 6:37 PM :

This is what my sidebar looks like ;)

Mukund said on February 28, 2011 at 6:10 PM :

@vamsi@Hover pc Hacks: That's great Vamsi! Thanks for your comment! Would love to see you more often on my blog!

Sharron said on March 1, 2011 at 7:31 AM :

Hi Mukund

Just as a matter of interest; I wonder if you'd be good enough to reveal how much money your sidebar is making for you? - It's just that I have a self-hosted WordPress blog, and to be honest I'm arriving at the conclusion that the sidebar is in fact in the main a waste of screen real-estate.

I've altered the php in all but the post template in order to eradicate the sidebar from all but posts on my blog. I've found that banner-ads in the sidebar are as good as useless unless they're very prominently positioned at the top or near the top of the sidebar, below which I like to add a few useful widgets: In short people find too much in-your-face choice of social-bookmarking, etc, intimidating.

Many bloggers have a strange desire to overload their sidebar with what amounts to basically a load of crap, usually to such an extent that nobody could find what they were looking for even if they could be bothered to look at the mess of far too many unnecessary choices available.

Sidebars, to me, are no less than a distraction from the blog post that I'm trying to read.

Wedding Dress Berkshire said on March 3, 2011 at 6:14 PM :

Excellent tip, many thanks :-) This will look great on my wedding blog.

Mukund said on March 3, 2011 at 9:58 PM :

@Sharron: If that was the case, then many probloggers like Darren Rowse, Woorkup.com Owner and so many others should shut their sites and go home. It depends on the ad that you put there. So, may be you should re-frame your mind set about the sidebars.

Mukund said on March 3, 2011 at 10:00 PM :

@Wedding Dress Berkshire: Thanks for the comment buddy! I'm glad to that you enjoyed this post. My best wishes for your wedding blog!!!

Sharron said on March 4, 2011 at 7:58 PM :

@Mukund ..So are u saying that Darren Rowse, who is a very successful problogger, makes all his income from his banner-ads in the sidebar? If so then you've got that a little wrong: He makes a large major part of his income from creating and selling his own products, as do most successful probloggers.

Kent Wedding Photographer said on March 4, 2011 at 10:58 PM :

Thankyou Mukund. this is a great enhancement, I will be following your tips to a T :-)

Mukund said on March 5, 2011 at 10:01 AM :

@Sharron: I know that! He makes a good income from selling his own products but does he still have the sidebar ads when he is able to make enough cash from blogging. May be you should have a thought about that as well!!!

Mukund said on March 5, 2011 at 10:02 AM :

@Kent Wedding Photographer: Thanks for the comment! I hope you enjoy the other tips on my blog as well! I wish to see your comments more often on my blog!

Solicitors in Slough said on March 25, 2011 at 3:24 PM :

Hi Mukund, I agree with you, I include some of my most valuable widgets in the sidebar. Thanks for the tips!

Mukund said on March 25, 2011 at 3:50 PM :

@Solicitors in Slough: Thanks for the comment buddy! I hope you enjoy the other articles on my blog as well!

Magnetic Signs said on April 7, 2011 at 2:38 AM :

Thanks for this blog

Mukund said on April 7, 2011 at 6:45 AM :

@Magnetic Signs: Thanks for the comment buddy! Hope you enjoy the other articles on my blog as well!

Sharron said on April 19, 2011 at 10:48 PM :

@Mukund Well as u may notice when u view a post on my blog ( http://kkomp.com ) I do, as I said, still have a sidebar on posts only, and I do have a couple or three ads in it, in addition to a couple or three widgets. The thing is, and I do feel that this is rather important, as far as pages go, I'm usually trying to promote and idea or a product by way of a review on my pages.

Now as I said before; the more clutter on the screen, the more the readers' attention is distracted from the main article. In the case of posts the reader wants to read the post that they've just browsed to because they want the information that u give within it - so they're not gonna be easily distracted, and will prolly follow the main article anyway unless the post is such a mess that they can't find anything and can't follow the article.

In the case of pages promoting something, however, the idea is that I am trying to keep the reader/prospective customer's attention on the main article because I want to get them into my sales funnel. A sidebar is therefore simply an unnecessary distraction.

I appreciate that the prospect may be drawn to a banner ad and click it while reading the article. - But where do banner-ads lead? Invariably to another blog or website. - Result = Prospective customer lost to a rival who makes a sale as a result of that lead and gives me a pittance for leading them to their offer. I lose the prospect's attention and custom. They never even see my sales-funnel, all they see is my competitor's funnel, and I wasted my time writing the page and building my own funnel.

...So why does Darren Rowse do different to me? Answer: Darren Rowse is much better known as a competent problogger who provides value-for-money. People instantly see an offer on his blog and know that it's going to be great value, and they buy it. Me? I've been heard of, but I don't have the colossal reputation that DR (Darren Rowse or David Risley) has.

This is the step above relationship-marketing that I haven't yet reached: that being reputation-marketing. I'm a couple of generations below DR as far as the blogging-world is concerned, and I can't expect people to hear that I'm promoting a great offer and come running to buy it at this point in time. It's still a case of "Sharron who?" as far as a lot of people are concerned. - So I need to be able to get my message across without losing people's attention, and not having a sidebar as a distraction is just one of the methods I use.

Pundit Commentator said on May 1, 2011 at 12:18 PM :

I've experimented with my sidebar a lot and I'm finally happy with it the way it currently looks. The next shuffle will be whenever I'm approved for text link ads/AdSense. Both rejected my one month old blog.

Mukund said on May 2, 2011 at 12:08 AM :

@Pundit Commentator: That's great! These are basic stuffs that many people around the blogosphere have on their blogs. It's your blog, so your wish! It can be in any way!!!

Use the tab below to comment. No spam please!!!

POST YOUR COMMENT