the next contestant in the blogging game is a volunteer from twitter, @thehouseofheart. crystal runs a sweet vintage shop on etsy and blogs about her life, shares her boyfriend’s art (fabulous!), and brings her creative inspiration to the web.

i like

i like – nay, i love! – the way the branding is carried through from the logo to the smallest detail. kudos! these bold, simple details make her site pop in a very professional way. recognizable branding is a sure way for people to feel more comfortable purchasing from you online. if your blog & shop & email newsletter are disjointed, people get nervous. or, at least, i do. +30 points!

i also really like how the sidebar is organized: search bar at the top, then calendar to search posts by date, then a super categories list, and, finally, the archives (which in my opinion should always be last). +10 points!

oh, and pictures of cute kitties… +10 points!

in addition to the excellent branding through the blog, i should add that there is nothing taking away from that clear visual message either. you may have a great logo or great details – but if there is other distracting visual information, you’re sunk. you’ve just diluted your brand. but crystal has taken her stark logo and carried the white, black, and red throughout the site as the main colors. the only variation is a soft tan for the body of the blog – quite unusual! – and it works well since it softens the harder palette. +10points!

things to improve

if you know me or you’ve been reading along, you might know what’s first on my list here. about page! oh crystal, i had to go to your etsy shop & then to your profile page to even find out that that was your name. i would copy & paste crystal’s etsy profile and just expand on the philosophy of shopping vintage that she hints at there. luckily, crystal uses wordpress and adding a page is just as easy as adding a post! once she’s done that, my suggestion would be to add a small about “widget” to her sidebar that just explain her brand or herself in 1-2 sentences and then invites reads to click through to the about page for more information. -30 points…

next, on to link opportunities. in this post on a coming shop update, crystal missed a few great opportunities for link building! she writes about “her man” and “the shop” – these are both places that are worth links. for a new reader like me, i could have found the information i need more quickly if those little spots were links.

anytime you can link within your blog (from post to post, from post to page…) you should. linking within your website or blog improves your search engine optimization and search authority. of course, it just makes you site easier to use, too!

on the flip side, any time you can link to a related website outside of your blog, you should. that creates a network of websites trading SEO value. and, again, makes your site more useful for readers new & old alike! -15 points…

crystal, thanks so much for volunteering your blog for the blogging game!

what do you think? do you have other suggestions for the house of hearts? maybe somethings you really like about the blog that i should have pointed out? share them in the comments!