Blog Renovations

It’s been almost two years since I started Chase Your Lion and it’s time for some Blog Renovations.  It has been such a great learning experience and blessing for me.  I know I’ve been hot and cold with the blog.  My brain knows what to do, but yada yada yada.  I’ve discovered two great blogs since October 2009 that have been a tremendous encouragement and guide to great blogging.  Michael Hyatt and John Saddington(aka The Tentblogger) have two of the best blogs out there and give great tips and advice.  A lot of what you see here is a result of what I see them do as far as look and feel.  We all use Tentblogger’s Standard Theme.  Believe me, it is the easiest premium theme I have purchased and used by far.

With all that in mind, it’s time for some Blog Renovations around here.  It’s going to be a lot of work, but here’s an overview of what’s happening.

1. I have switched from the All In One SEO Pack to Yoast’s WordPress SEO.  These are plugins that give your blog a better chance of being discovered on search engines(Search Engine Optimization).  I took the time to write this stuff.  I want people to find it and read it.  Yoast’s plugin is easier to use and has deeper options.
2. I will be adding a picture to every post to make the nRelate Related Content plugin look prettier.  It will hopefully get more clicks to older posts as people see nice shiny pictures instead of a default picture or text.
3. I am clearing out the category clutter.  I’m using Tentblogger’s Category plugin to help with SEO as well.  The more blogs I read, the more I think the consensus is fewer categories is better.  I’m hoping for 5 to 10.  Right now, I’m staring at 30.
4. I just installed Jetpack which brings some wordpress.com functionality to wordpress.org self-hosted blogs.  If you read that sentence and feel like your head is going to explode then here’s a great post to explain the wordpress differences.
5. This post showed me how to add the Google +1 button to my sidebar.

The goal is to improve my blogging skills as I seek to help people get started with social media and blogging.  As a circuit riding pastor, it’s imperative that I invest my time wisely.  I believe God has given me a passion for these things and a desire to pass on what I’ve learned.  I’ve also gotten the podcast itch since joining the Techology Show every Wednesday at 9 am so there’s another resource I’m trying to perfect.  Once these Blog Renovations are completed the future looks bright.

What’s keeping you from blogging?  Let me know how I can help get you in the game!