20 Aug
2010
If you are planning on being a blogger, we recommend using Google Reader as a tool.
What is Google Reader? (I hear you cry)
Its a free tool made by Google that lets you see a feed of the headlines and previews of different blog articles on your favourite blogs.(The official definition on Wikipedia is extremely technical – in my opinion)
A good blogger will be regularly reading blogs and will need a way to organise these. By reading other blog posts regularly you get a good feel about the different types of blog posts out there, how to structure them, how the best blog posts are broken up and what blogs are possible.
You will need to have a Google account, and be logged in. This is free if you dont have one, go to https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount
Here is a step by step instruction:
1. When you see a tweet or a link to a blog post you like, check what the actual blog’s main URL (or website address) is. For example if the blog URL is http://www.dailycandy.com/all-cities/gallery/84804/10-Ice-Cream-Flavors-You-Wont-Find-at-Baskin-Robbins then the main URL is http://www.dailycandy.com
3. Copy this URL (we like using shortcuts, like Ctrl C!)
4. Go to Google.com/reader – and make sure you are logged in.
5. Click on the tiny downward facing arrow next to the “Subscriptions” and click – “add a subscription”
6. Paste in the URL (Ctrl V)
7. Do this a few more times with other blogs you like.
8. Then Google reader will show a stream of all the articles from your favourite blogs
Try it and see how you like it, and please comment below if you have any feedback, questions or tips!
Posted by Keren, 17.25 20th August, 2010
15 Jun
2010
If you really are stuck for a new blog post, one little “cheat” you can do is called a “reblog”. This is where you have found some FANTASTIC post on another blog. Then you just write a couple of lines above about how FANTASTIC this blog post is.
For more on the many different types of blog posts, please have a look at this blog we wrote on Types of Blog Posts that Make Blogging Easy (see how we did that? Clever, hey?)
Posted by Keren, 13.34 15th June, 2010
4 Jun
2010
We just launched the Northstar UK blog site. A brilliant project – and the Northstar team created 37 blog posts in time for the launch – which is amazing – there were 10 of them working on the blog posts. We gave them a few training sessions on Twitter, Linkedin and Blogging and sourcing/putting images into blogposts. The result is what we call a “social” site – which has changes made regularly and a variety of good content. Great marketing tool for them!
Visit the site at: www.northstarblog.co.uk
Posted by Keren, 14.26 4th June, 2010
19 Jan
2010
We have just launched a joint offer with Public Relations agency Bright Star Public Relations, to provide a combination of a blog, social media training and PR consultancy. We have put this offer up on our Top Left Design site. Hope you find it useful!
Read full story here
Download PDF of the offer here
Posted by Keren, 15.52 19th January, 2010
9 Oct
2009
All websites need to be hosted, but when a website has a blog, the hosting needs to have the capabilities of handling blogs. We at Top Left Design can provide this and we also take care of:
- helping with domain name registration
- creating the blog on the correct URL/Website address
- Putting up a holding page on the website URL while the website/blog is being designed
- Helping with setup of email addresses
We do all of this as part of our hosting offering!
But you can also have a look at this page: http://wordpress.org/hosting – as these companies are the ones WordPress approves of, and we approve of WordPress!
Posted by Keren, 14.34 9th October, 2009
1 Oct
2009
This is the relaunch of Make My Blog. What an opportunity there is to show off the wonders of WordPress! We wont be the first who would do it, but that’s ok, from the seeds of giants, come monsters. This of course may not be the appropriate phrase to use there.
Some links to integrated blogs we have made on recently launched websites – NOTE – the content is edited and formatted by clients so not always within our control:
Posted by Keren, 00.10 1st October, 2009
30 Sep
2009
Top Left Design has been very busy creating new blogs for our clients. These vary from integrated blogs which are branded within the website, and standalone blog sites.
We would like to create more to show the infinite possibilities available within blogs. Please see below for some example designs.
Posted by Keren, 10.48 30th September, 2009
