I was looking for inspiration for a project recently, and turned to the WebRevelation Portfolio, where I found some great stuff.  The WebRev staff is very talented, and so are the customers - when those talents come together, there are some great results.  This week, I'll be pointing out some of the website features that caught my eye.

Let's start with themes.  The theme includes the colors, fonts, and templates and layout of the site.  In many cases, a simple, no-frills theme is preferable.  In fact, a theme that is too busy can be a distraction, rather than an enhancement.  It takes some skill and talent to strike the perfect balance between the "creative" and  the"useful" needs of your website.  Here are a few sites that found that balance.

Choice Facility Partners is a company that helps governmental organizations and non-profits with purchasing buildings.  The theme they chose looks like a house, or building.  When you enter the site, you automatically know what industry you're in.  The theme, however, does not distract from the information provided on the site.  Very well done.

Ethnic Graphic Media is (as the name implies) a media company. Since they're all about putting on a show, they have chosen a slideshow theme to showcase their movies and services.  Very interesting.

Johnny's Charcoal Broiler started out with a fairly generic, well-designed, easy-to-read, red and black theme, but added their own graphics.  I guarantee if you spend a few minutes on this site, you'll be craving a good burger.

What's Cooking: Real Food for Real People is my favorite in the "theme" category.  Maybe it has something to do with that chocolate-covered strawberry in the header (we'll discuss headers later this week), but I also really love the humorous way they have set up their menus as "fancy" serving trays.  The colors used are stylish, trendy, and fun.  Within a split second after landing on this site, you know exactly who these folks are and what they're about.  I just wished they were near me.

Jennifer Pointer (e-mail) is a trainer and tech writer in Tulsa, OK. She promotes a simple, a low-tech approach to effective online profile management, search engine optimization and social networking. Her weakness is the mocha frappuccino.

The theme is the personality of your site.  It includes the "look" and "feel" of the site, as well as the content, and prescribes your choices of color, font, logo, images, and story material.   Previously, in What type of blog do you want, we talked about choosing a consistent content theme.  Now, let's talk about some important considerations in choosing a theme for the look and feel of the site.

Overall Online Profile

Remember, that your blog is going to be part of your overall online profile and digital reputation.  The logo you design for your website or blog will need to have a square version that looks good and is easily recognizable in the 100x100 size for avatars on social networks.  Your motto and "about me" information should include a tag line of 140 characters or less for the profile section of those networks, consistent with what is on your website or blog.

Appropriate to your Demographic

Know your target audience.  If your audience is going to be mostly young, technology-savvy users, you'll want to focus on mobile technology (making sure your site looks great and is easy to read on mobile phones of all types), and includes multi-media.  If you're catering mostly to retirees in Middle America, you'll want to remember that many of your users are on dial-up, and many don't know there are options to Internet Explorer, and forego anything that slows your download speed, or requires Firefox or Chrome to function properly.

Readability, User-Friendliness

Keep in mind that at least in the beginning, most of your readers will be seeing your site for the first time, and will stay only a few seconds.  You want your posts to be easy to read, and your additional content easy to find from any post on your blog.  You want a good contrast between the text and hyperlinks and background.  The older your target demographic, the more important the color contrasts will be, as some folks develop visual challenges with age.  Links to your "about" and "contact" information should be easy to find on every post and page (usually in the sidebar or header), as should the link to add your feed to a reader.

Jennifer Pointer (e-mail) is a trainer and tech writer in Tulsa, OK. She promotes a simple, a low-tech approach to effective online profile management, search engine optimization and social networking. Her weakness is the mocha frappuccino.