Aug 22, 2016 / Community Pool

Community Pool

The place for feedback, advice, and friendly blogging chatter.

Have you just published a new post and are dying for some feedback? Are you redesigning your blog and could use some layout or design advice from your more seasoned peers?

The Community Pool is for peer feedback and advice. Looking for more specific information? Check out some of these resources:

Tap into the wisdom of The Daily Post blogging community and leave your question here in the comments. Others can then click through and offer input either on your site, or in the comments here (feel free to indicate which you’d prefer).

Looking for free, self-guided courses to help you get started with your blog (or revive a dormant one)? Check out our current offerings at Blogging U.

To help us make the Community Pool a productive space for discussion, here are some tips and guidelines you might find useful:

  • While you’re not required to, we encourage everyone who requests feedback to also reply to at least one or two other bloggers who need some help. Spread the love!
  • The Community Pool comments section can get quite big — and starting duplicate threads doesn’t help. Thanks for not posting the same question more than once, as well as for not starting numerous threads in a single Pool.
  • If you’re looking for quality feedback, be as specific as you can. Questions about a particular post tend to draw more comments than ones about entire blogs. Questions about specific design elements are more likely to be answered than ones asking for general layout advice.
  • We discourage leaving links without a more substantive message or question. These are often overlooked by other bloggers, and we frequently remove them to make the comment reading experience smoother. Also note that including multiple links in your comment might automatically put it in the moderation queue, which will delay its publication.
  • Please keep all comments civil and constructive. The idea is to have fun — it’s a pool, after all!
  • To keep from losing your place in the comment thread while you visit others’ blogs, right-click on a link to open it in a new tab or window.
  • If you haven’t looked at our Commenting Guidelines in a while, now might be a good time.
  • No running on the deck.

Are you a new blogger looking to share your very first post? We have a special forum for bloggers just like you in our weekly First Friday posts.

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    1. A fascinating and inspiring story Jason. It just shows you don’t need to be born on Krypton or bitten by a radioactive spider to be super. Great post 🙂

      Liked by 3 people

    3. I remember this article from last year and rereading it now, I still think it’s great! I think your conversational style is perfect and I look forward to reading the next piece.

      Liked by 2 people

    4. I like the style of your blog, your cover picture (on top) is very pretty although I would change the text color because its not clearly readable. Great post btw.

      Liked by 1 person

    6. Your blog is great. You get up to some really interesting things and I really admire you for all your charitable work. Your writing style is fun. Hope to read more.

      Like

    7. I really enjoyed this post and the other ones I read. The only suggestion I have is to find a way that your blog’s subtitle can be seen easily. I know the last word is explore, but that is from reading through your blog. I can only see the exp clearly.

      Like

    1. Blog and the theme are really suited to your material I think. I’m not into metal that much, but writing a music and photography themed blog myself, I’m always up for musical exploration of any kind. I like that its pretty much about one genre, which makes it valuable to more hard core fans of the music. Only thing I’d suggest is adding a Pinterest link to the top of your post along with the FB page. I used to have the ‘visual’ link to my social media as well, but I’ve found I got better results with just the icon of each social media site. In time you could experiment with that perhaps. Otherwise, looks good!

      Liked by 5 people

      1. Thanks for the feedback! 😀 I’ll definitely try to include a Pinterest button in the sidebar- thank you for pointing that out 🙂 I had a look at your blog and I really like your use of photographs, especially in your Photo Shuffle series

        Liked by 1 person

    2. I really like the blog, especially the album covers with googly eyes post.
      One request- an intro paragraph for each band when you do the album reviews. I liked the reviews but found myself checking wikipedia to get more band info.

      Liked by 2 people

      1. Thanks for the great suggestion! I’ll definitely make sure I try to introduce bands in a paragraph or at least a few lines 🙂

        Like

    3. Your blog looks good, I don’t really know alot about the genre of albums you are reviewing, but the reviews are well written!

      Liked by 3 people

    4. Another person who doesn’t know much about metal, so I like how you’ve put a video from each album into the review. When the baby wakes up I’ll give some a listen 😉
      Your reviews are well written and your love of metal comes across well!

      Liked by 2 people

      1. Thanks for the support! I’ll make sure I keep trying to include at least one video per post 😀 I love the photographs you use on your blog, especially the ones that pop up in your Instagram widget!

        Liked by 1 person

    11. The layout of your blog is beautiful. You write from the heart. I read Jersey Pool and your feelings transcended out through my screen. Keep up the writing. Its very therapeutic. You have a new follower.

      Liked by 2 people

    1. Your blog looks good. Nice menu selection at the top to let people who get to your blog have a look around. To answer your question I hope…, WordPress basically has a ‘soft’ way to read a blog, when you click on a blog in the Reader. This will usually be just the words and the photos or other links on a plain white page. If you click on the name of the blog itself however, you should land on the blog itself, which might have a background color, links to older posts, a menu, social media links, that sort of thing. In addition, when you write a post you can insert a ‘Continue Reading’ link in your post. Usually its good to do it about a quarter or maybe half way through a post so you don’t have to constantly scroll down from your Home Page.

      Liked by 3 people

      1. Just in case that’s what you were asking, hope this is helpful: Try going into your Admin page, navigate to the “Settings” tab and then select “Reading.” on that page, there will be an option that says “For each article in a feed, show..” and you can select the “Summary” option. People will now have to click “Continue reading” to see the entire posts on your blog.

        Liked by 2 people

    5. Hi,
      I really like the theme of your blog. It’s very fitting to the type of content you have. The post itself was great! I really enjoyed all the pictures you took and I also appreciated how thorough you were in describing the place and what you did. Keep up the great work! I would really love it if you could also take a look at my blog as well! Thanks and cheers!

      Liked by 1 person

    1. I thought you used the photos well to introduce breaks for the reader since your post was longer. My only suggestion was to maybe think about providing some context for the first. Since I’ve never read your previous blog posts, I felt like I was randomly dropped into your story after reading the first sentence. Perhaps you could also link to the previous post about Mount Kinabalu to clarify that there’s a part 1 to the story.
      That said, I enjoyed the post and the level of detail you used in describing your travels!

      Liked by 1 person

    3. Thanks for posting, I’m a sucker for travel writing.
      I really like your photo galleries in your articles, they help bring the stories to life.

      The cover photo in Greece is stunning. Where is that?

      Liked by 1 person

      1. Glad you enjoyed the story and photos!
        The cover picture was taken from Oia in Santorini. It is an absolutely beautiful place and the sunsets are almost always amazing. I spent a very lazy week there just staring at the views…

        Like

    4. Loved it. First and foremost, I like your theme because it’s very clean and simple. I always preferred a simplistic look. As for the post itself, I think it was lovely. The post length perhaps can be a little long considering I feel like people have short attention spans nowadays but I didn’t mind it. I appreciated all the little details. The pictures you put up are phenomenal! Superb job 🙂 Keep up the great work. If you could take a look at my blog, I would appreciate it a lot!

      Liked by 3 people

      1. Thanks for reading it John. I’m glad you enjoyed it. I did wonder if the post was too long, but I like reading detailed travel stories so thought I’d write a longer post!
        I’ve visited and commented on your blog 🙂

        Liked by 1 person

    2. It’s always awesome to see other bloggers post about their travels! You have a lovely blog. The theme is very cute! I’ve never been to Europe and it’s definitely on my bucket list. Going through your Europe post was great because I got to vicariously live through your experiences! I really enjoyed all the little details and your photography. Great job 🙂 I would appreciate it so much if you could also take a look at my blog as well! Cheers!

      Liked by 1 person

    1. I like your blog and just followed! Your posts deal with the subject of psychology in approachable way, and your last post just gave me some homework for this weekend 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

  13. Happy Monday Everyone,

    Are happy Mondays such a thing?

    Anyway, my name is Malik Anderson and I run a blog about skateboarding. It consist of recent news and my sentiments about all aspects about skateboarding.

    Giving it a peek (and maybe some advice) would be greatly appreciated , and I’ll gladly return the favor 🙂

    Enjoy your day!

    Liked by 6 people

    1. I like how you’ve opted to write about something completely different from what most blogs are about, and I can’t wait to read more! 😀

      Liked by 1 person

      1. Hey! Thanks a lot for taking the time out to check it out. While I’m not such a metal guy, I could appreciate what you’re doing, discussing something that you love. May even come to find out that I do like it, new experiences is what we’re here for, right?

        Liked by 1 person

      1. I’m glad I could take you back down memory lane. I really appreciate you taking the time out to check out my site, and as well as giving me a lead, you’re awesome. I’ve never seen this before, but will definitely look into writing something up about it.

        Thank a ton!

        Like

  14. Hello all!

    I just started my blog last week and the poor thing only has one follower! Any advice to brand new bloggers like me and how you got your first followers?

    If anyone here is interested in writing and character development feel free to follow me yourselves too 🙂 My blogs all about it!

    Blog: https://talking2myselves.com/

    Thanks guys!

    Liked by 6 people

      1. Thank you so much! I just checked out your blog and read the first poem I saw and I really liked it 🙂 You have quite a rhythm to your poetry, I ended up reading it in my head like it was spoken word. Really neat stuff!

        Liked by 2 people

      1. Thank you for the welcome! Yeah I agree with the post listings but I sacrificed it for now since I liked it the best. But If it becomes annoying I might have to 🙂

        I checked out your blog and I LOVE the name and the idea behind it. Great work 🙂

        Liked by 1 person

      1. Thank you so much! I really loved your last post too! And the layout is so dreamy and instantly made me feel creative and inspired. Such a neat site! I followed and can’t wait to see what you write about next 🙂

        Liked by 2 people

    5. Congrats on starting your blog! You’ll have so much fun and you’ll find that the WordPress community is super supportive. As others have mentioned, posting and reading other’s comments on Community Pool is a great way to connect with other bloggers and bring awareness to your own blog.

      Another thing that you can do is use the Reader to follow specific tags that you write about like “Writing.” That way you can see new posts from other bloggers who write about similar topics and you can build relationships by commenting on their posts and following blogs that you like. You’ll find that many will return the favor.

      P.S. I followed you and look forward to your future posts 🙂

      Liked by 2 people

      1. Thank you so much! It truly is a supportive community. I’ve gotten so much feedback from this group! And thank you for the advice. I had no idea you could follow a tag– that will definitely come in handy 🙂

        I followed you too and look forward to seeing more of your posts.

        Like

    6. Hello!
      I personally liked looking through your blog. Especially your about page! I feel like you’re off to a great start. The ascetics of your blog looks very nice. I also like the header image too. Everything looks clean and crisp and I had no trouble navigating around. Perhaps one thing you can do is eventually create more categories so that readers can distinguish different posts and it can bring a tasteful complexity to your blog. Followers will come in time. Patience is key 🙂 I remember I was stuck at 40 followers for months. So don’t worry! I wish you the best of luck 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

      1. Thank you John! I’ll definitely look into making categories for posts that’s great advice 🙂 thank you for the encouragement!

        Liked by 1 person

  16. Hi everyone!

    I’ve written a lot since last week – three blog posts, including one today! I’m not sure I can keep up this pace though. I tried to include some of your feedback from last week, including using the “readmore” function and trying to put in more pictures, though pictures are hard for me because I’m really not sure what I can and can’t use unless I take the picture myself.

    I would appreciate any more general feedback on my blog, or on any of my posts!

    (Also I got a suggestion to make an archive page, which I thought was a good idea, but I can’t figure out how to do it. Can someone help me with that?)

    https://nikkispeaksfromtheheart.wordpress.com/

    Liked by 5 people

    1. hey! i liked the way you put it! well said
      i noticedd some informal words like “gonna” but i think its okay as the slang sounds more like you are talking to your readers and hences bonding on certain level 🙂 cheers…

      Liked by 2 people

  20. Hi everyone, happy Monday! I blog about baby, character, and historical names. I’ve just reorganized/cleaned up my sidebar so that the follow-button and recent and top posts are towards the top of the page and the tags at the bottom. Would love to know what y’all think of it now, and if I should move any more of the widgets up or down the page?

    Feel free to read my posts, too! 🙂 Link: https://wellinformednamer.wordpress.com/

    Liked by 7 people

    1. Hey there… I saw your blog… Looks great… I loved your freckles…a D I guess it is a trend at your place… Here in India a clear fair complexion is so sought after that folks would never accept it here ! Your content is great but you should perhaps divide it with sub headings for easy readability…. Do check out my blog …I also talk about beauty, life style & design. Cheers 💟

      Liked by 2 people

  29. Hiya there!

    I’ve written this super fun (my editor says so!) series which is a rehashed version of The Little Mermaid.

    We’re already up to Part 4, which is the last one before the big finale and I would be ever so grateful if you would check it out!

    There’s the link:

    The Little Mermaid: Part 4

    I also have a generally pleasant (Okay, so this is me) blog where I write about books and reviews, TV shows, short fiction and random thoughts.

    Check it out, please? Like it, criticize it or hit the golden ‘Follow’ button.

    I would love to read your works too!

    Cheers 🙂

    Liked by 4 people

    1. Lele, you have a wonderful collection of poems ! I loved the one called Summer ! Its wonderful how different places associate different things with season, here in India, especially the central part of the country the summer is exceptionally harsh ! We put in a lot of effort time and money to prepare ourselves to combat summer !! hahah !!! Irony!

      You should perhaps consider increasing the the darkness of the body font ! it will improve legibility ! Also work towards crediting images from their original source, because a lot of designers like me work really hard to prepare graphics !

      Do you mind taking a look at my blog and giving me some feedback! Cheers.

      Liked by 1 person