I have mentioned before that a blog is not a junkyard and I prepared there a list of the things that need to be taken care of so that a blog starts looking better. And since I mentioned the sidebar there too, let’s try and see now which of the items we have on a sidebar kinda waste space.

1. Google PR and Alexa rank buttons.

I know they are cute, but honestly, most of the people who want to know this have some nice plugins installed on their browser (I have both show in the status bar in Firefox for any site I want to see).

There is also a nice button from dnscoop.com (those who don’t know this: it’s a site that calculates the price for a site .. well, it’s not perfect, but it’s nice seeing the value. It takes into account the domain’s age, PR, Alexa rank etc.) Even if it’s a cool button, I wouldn’t use it on my professional blog since it’s tacky.

2. Feedjit and all other useless junk

I have seen these too. Some widgets that show where people are coming from, what they ate and how much they weigh. I know they seem cool, but I am interested in your CONTENT, not know that all your latest traffic comes from Entrecard or StumbleUpon

3. All kinds of widgets from programs that might help you advertise

I still have the MyBlogLog widget, but to be honest I don’t quite see its use anymore. Still, if you use such widgets try to have their color blend with the others. In the end we want the content to be seen first, not too fancy widgets.

4. Kill some of the ads.

Right now we have few banners: Entrecash (my latest project), linkworth and text link ads since they pay me now 400 USD/month (increasing) and HostGator since we’re on their servers and now I am pretty pleased with them.

The Entrecard widget and that should be it. I understand you try all kinds of possible revenue streams, just don’t try them all at once. It screams “desperate” and you don’t have too many chances to get a good revenue when you don’t know your true focus.

Advertising is very good, but has to be managed with care.

Each time you feel the need to put something else on the sidebar try to think if you really need this for the blog. Is there such an important information for your readers? Is this important as ad revenue is concerned? Try to be “cheap” with the space on your sidebar, most professional blogs do this.

Filed under: Blogging by ramona