How to Make Your Website a Party People Want to Attend

How to Make Your Website a Party People Want to Attend

Reader Comments (20)

  1. Jerod,

    I couldn’t agree more. I constantly have to battle with my clients about the importance of content over design, but that doesn’t mean “ignore design.” An appealing, aesthetically pleasing website also speaks to credibility, and tells your visitors you care enough about them to provide a good experience.

    I stumbled across the Ambience Pro theme with in 24 hours of launch and used it for my photography site — http://vscottellis.com — for anyone that wants a real life example, and it’s one of the few themes I’ve launched completely stock, which as a full time Genesis developer, says a lot!

    • Content IS design. πŸ™‚ And believe me, as a word guy, I hate thinking about design. Or, hated thinking about design. Being able to launch sites so easily that look great and are mobile responsive is so great for someone like me. That even someone like you feels comfortable doing the same says a lot.

    • How did you get your full menu to display on the desktop version without the little menu button? I recently switched over to Ambiance Pro and that’s the only thing I don’t fully love about it right now.

  2. This is beautiful. Question. I have a Shopify website for e-commerce. It also includes a blog that I really don’t use. However, I’m contemplating starting a blog on WordPress keeping it separate from my website. Perhaps integrate into my Shopify blog somehow. The blog will also stand alone. I just think shopping and reading about a specific topic should be separate but connected if the reader wants to take it further. Is this something I can do with Ambiance Pro?

    • Certainly you can incorporate ecommerce into Ambiance Pro. How much you want to keep things “separate” really just depends on your content and what you are selling. I certainly don’t think you want to keep it TOO separate. Would need a little more background to provide a specific answer.

  3. Mary Ann,

    First to answer your question, as Jared said, there are different ways you can have different platforms that are somewhat connects. One is to have your blog on a sub-domain, but that is just one of many possibilities so it does depend.

    I’m not going to spend a single minute trying to convince you to move off of Shopify and create a single integrated solution. Shopify makes things very easy (I’ve used them for clients in the past).

    But for reference, on the photography site I mentioned in my first comment, I also sell prints and the entire thing is done in WordPress and took me a few hours to set up (starting from scratch), and everything is fully integrated so it’s not all that difficult to do when you get there. Just food for future thought.

    • Scott,

      Nice website! Thanks for the input. I wonder if it would take a novice an hour to put together!

      My main site on Shopify sells tea, iced tea, etc. The reason I’m thinking of using Ambiance is to launch a daily tea meditation website. Each post would be short contemplative, self improvement, insightful type topics to meditate over a cup of tea. I just want to trial it to see what kind of reception it gets. I would include photos along with each post. Just thinking out loud.

      • Mary Ann, Sounds awesome and the Ambience theme would probably work well for that.

        Just make sure you have nice big images to go along with it but sounds like a killer use for the theme so let us know when it goes live!

  4. When I started my blog, I thought design just didn’t matter. After all, I’m writing for an audience of writers! It’s all about my beautiful words, right?

    Wrong. So, so wrong. Every positive design change I made brought new readers.

    The other thing I’ve done to make my blog a party is — have parties! I have a First Friday link party for writers that I’ve done monthly for a while, and then more recently quarterly.

    Giving my readers a chance to be the stars and link posts from their own blogs has helped readers get to know each other, and me get to know readers better. Bloggers need to be on the lookout for pportunities to connect with readers, and connect them to each other. That builds the relationships that make a great party atmosphere.

  5. Loved this – I wrote something similar the other day about a bad website is like a bad haircut – but I like this better. May I post this on my website with the proper credit (link) back to you and CopyBlogger?

  6. Loved this perspective to website design.

    I also find that ambiance is also created by the story or the why, and is what draws the text and design elements on a website together. Sites like this one, socialtriggers and amyporterfield incorporate this element, and is what helps make them stand out to their audience.

    To give a offline world example – what differentiates a pack of salt that I can buy from the supermarket for $1 versus Himalayan salt which sells for $70? It is the story and claims of Himalayan salt having health benefits. The packaging/ambiance around Himalayan salt reinforces the value as well.

  7. This is a great analogy of your site vs visitors. We are not just looking at the number of visits but also on how long our visitors stay interested on the site. This means how long they stay, page visits, and how often they go back.

  8. Hi Carol.. nice to see you on here. When I grow up to be more like you, I’ll invite myself to one of your parties… maybe even send you an invitation to one of mines.

    This is really nice! What’s happening graphically with Pinterest, Facebook, and even Twitter is testament to the fact that content may be king, but there’s a lot more to the Kingdom. And what better way to showcase it than with big, tasteful, strategically placed graphics?

    Mary-Ann, think BRANDING. I conceive of your Ambiance blog as something with great cultural content and strong branding components that fit together elegantly. If done right, it will drive a whole lot of people to shop for your teas. I just LOVE the idea. In fact, you may end up And the Ambiance theme is just perfect because it will help you to build that brand by subtly associating it with bigger, larger-than-life concepts you write about. I totally see you actually re-designing more elegant spaces associated with the Ambiance site that does E-commerce with the tea in a way that is consistent conceptually with your new brand. Go sign up for this course and build on your ideas: https://www.coursera.org/course/contentstrategy

    I can’t wait to see what you will do with this combination.

    • Rodney and Scott,

      Thank you for the encouraging words. I’m now more inclined to go forward. What size images are best for Ambiance Pro?

  9. That’s a great analogy. I’ve always thought about site design as a store front ( probably because of my retail background) but the idea of a party is an interesting one. Responsive themes nowadays are an absolute must. My only problem with the theme above is that there are no text snippets for the blog posts. Is that an option that can be added?

  10. Oh wow, I have been looking for a new WordPress theme lately and this looks like a cracker! $100 – I’m going to have to think long and hard about this!

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