Blog Review: Ask Hideki by Hideki

Site Title: Ask Hideki (http://askhideki.com)
Site Owner: Hideki
Genre: Technology
Platform: Wodpress

Cross Browser Check

• ✓Google Chrome 17.X
• ✓Mozilla Firefox 11.X
• ✓Safari 5.X
• ✗Internet Explorer 8
• ✗Internet Explorer 7

Advertisement as seen on Internet Explorer

Things Worth Mentioning

1. Really tricky advertisement (Even trickier as compared with the other blog reviews)
2. Nice author description at the end of every posts, it looks professional
3. Provides Title and Alt for images
4. Simple yet unique way of presenting About Me page.

Things that Need Attention

1. Too many advertisements
2. Contact Us page doesn't look like a contact page
3. Irregular thumbnail sizes for homepage
4. I usually have issues regarding your http and www links. It returns an invalid page.

Tips from BTT

1. Moderate your advertisement
   
   I know that being a blogger, publishing ads to earn is really tempting. But sometimes, placing too many ads annoys your visitors and instead of catching their attention, they will most likely leave your site.
   
   
2. Thumbnail for homepage
   
   Inserting thumbnails on homepage gives more color to the page and makes it more attractive, but color isn't everything - uniformity also counts! The irregular shapes of each thumbnail makes it confusing.
   
   Editing this file ../wp-content/themes/Norma/style.css might solve this
   
   

   .featured_image{
    [....other css attributes]
    width: [YOUR DESIRED WIDTH];
    height: [YOUR DESIRED HEIGHT];
   }
   

   
   
3. Clean your sidebar
   
   Though I can praise your way of hiding your advertisements through your page, I must say that majority of your sidebar tells nothing about your blog. The bad thing about ads is that you are actually trying to let people leave your site and since you hide it, they would actually think that the ad they click is still part of your site.
   
   
   
   
   

BTT Opinion on Ask Hideki

Design 3/5 ★★★★★

I love the color blue since it gives a cool refreshing feeling. I do appreciate using that color but I don't think that it mixes well on your background. Based on looking at your codes, I've seen that you are using Norma Theme from WP and the default color is red. Red looks good on the background but unfortunately, I don't find your shade of blue (#0000FB) right for this. One thing I can say is you either tone that color down or change the background (the gray one).

You have too many posts on the homepage, 10 in my count. Doing this creates a very long sidebar too that has too many spaces -- it looks unattractive.

Google Ad at the upper part too looks annoying, the sticky one that floats above -- I don't like it! Not to mention that you have TOO many ads on per page basis.

I find the menu too crowded.

Content 3/5 ★★★★★

Well, you have great contents for a techie blogger. You give not only what your visitors need but also a personal touch on your posts by giving opinions.

What annoys me is the presence of ads on your posts -- DUDE! You must be a millionaire by now. I'm actually counting the number of ads, you actually have per page. The front page has four google ads, two nuffnang and four churpchurps. The article page has - five google ads, one chitika, three nuffnang and four churpchurps. Not to mention the inline infolinks. What's worst is that they are scattered all over your page! Ninety percent of your sidebar is composed of advertisements!

Branding 3/5 ★★★★★

I love the logo and banner part. Though I'm pretty sure that I saw that avatar before from somewhere which made me think that this comes from a online generator. Now having that in mind, have you ever think that someone might be using the same avatar as you?

The banner "Ask Hideki", looks good. As well as the tag line, but it doesn't say anything at all. For me the tag line sounds like a personal blog rather than a techie one. I usually see this form of tag line in Personal blogs. Other variants of this goes like this: "Another blogger's blog", "Just Another Cliche", "Title Goes Here". There is nothing unique if you say "Just another..."

I don't get the idea of the favicon. It looks like a cellphone but more like a glass of water.

AudienceImpact 4/5 ★★★★★

Though I find your blog interesting and your approach similar to Karl's Daftcoder, I think the way it was package makes it a little dirty (I'm talking about design and the way it was posted). Overall, I MIGHT come back again.

Guest Judge's Opinion on Ask Hideki

For today, we invited a techie person that would really fit Hideki's blog. His name is Jayson (aka JS), a Web Developer. Currently he works in a private company in Mandaluyong, Philippines. He believes that "The problem with a programmer is that you can never tell what a programmer is until it is too late". Well he has a point in there :)

Here is what he can say about Ask Hideki

DISCLAIMER

The views expressed in comments by the guest judge published on this blog site are those of the comment writers alone. They do not represent the views or opinions of Beneath the Tree, nor do they represent the views or opinions of www.ajibanda.com, or any entity of, or affiliated with www.ajibanda.com

Design 2/5 ★★★★★

These are some of my notes regarding the content and design of the blog:

1. The content is ok, but the inline advertisement is not good, specially the ads on top which is not related to the content. It consumes space for the actual content.
2. The side bar [on the left] consumes almost half of the page.
3. Choice of color on the background is very dull
4. Color of the menu is not blending
5. Since it’s a technical blog, design should also represents the content
6. “Related Results”, “You might also like” and “Related posts” right after the blog content consumes most of the spaces, and it is somewhat redundant, you should prioritize what to display.

Content 4/5 ★★★★★

Nothing much to say on the content, all the articles and post are interesting and informative
Though some of the contents lack technical information and background information.

Branding 4/5 ★★★★★


Branding is ok, nothing much to say

AudienceImpact 5/5 ★★★★★

I find the blog interesting, and there’s a lot of content worth reading, so probably I will browse this blog site again.

Summary

Well, majority of the things I notice is about the advertisements that was scattered all over the place. It's not bad to have multiple ads but sometimes too many ads create an unprofessional atmosphere that annoys your visitor.

Though, this may sound a little bias since I'm on the field of technology, but your contents are really cool for me.

BTT Total Rating: 3.25

Guest Judge Rating: 3.75

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So that's it, again this is just a friendly review from BTT. We aim for a better site and not to insult the owners and administrators. Whether you follow our tips and suggestions depend on your decision. Ciao!

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