A Brand New, Better Version of Me
After 18 months of blogging, I have gone from static HTML website, to free WordPress theme, to two premium themes, and now, finally, a custom theme. Today marks the complete relaunch of my website. I know many of you who read this via email or RSS don’t see the site itself very often but I encourage you to click through and visit my new site. This design, which will stay for the foreseeable future, produced a number of amazing and more visual changes to provide a better experience for visitors. These include:
- A custom header- I now have an illustrated header that better describes what I am about and is prettier than anything I have had before. I’m really thrilled about it.
- A bigger subscription box- This way people can get my content easier as well as find me on other platforms like Twitter and Facebook easier.
- Less Ads- I cleaned up my sidebar to make the advertising smoother, less ugly, and less intrusive. I also got rid of lots of silly text link ads.
- Ebook Section- I created a section on my sidebar so people can better find my ebooks. I currently online have the monetizing your blog book but I will soon be releases two more: One on teaching English overseas and another one on the basic mechanics of starting and building a website. It’s in response to many of the questions I received after the first ebook.
- Better Homepage- This is where a lot of the changes took place. I added more boxes of content so people can have better access to tips, gear, advice, and news.
- Travel News- Speaking of news, there is now a box on my homepage that deals with travel news, blog news, personal news, and interesting travel links. This will replace the carnival of travel blogs I do every so often.
So come and visit and let me know what you think about everything. I am sure there are a few bugs I still need to work out and some design issues but I would love feedback.
Moreover, if you use any social media websites, please add me for more real time updates, travel stories, thoughts, stumbles, and tweets. You can find me here:
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/nomadicmatt
Stumble Upon: http://nomadicmatt.stumbleupon.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/nomadicmatt
Friend Feed: http://www.friendfeed.com/nomadicmatt
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/keppiezbt
Lastly, I’d love some feedback on my videos and would appreciate it if you took a few seconds out to answer these polls:
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Thank you and I hope you enjoy the new site!!!
Like the custom work you’ve done here! Keep on rocking… errr … traveling
Great new look Matt ~ I like what you’ve done with the place!
This looks great, Matt! Nicely done!
I love it! congrats Matt. Its really a very smooth design and clean cut. This is very encouraging for the rest of us to keep going. The header is just amazing.
Hi Matt,
Looks brilliant. Did you buy this theme or pay a designer?
Congratulations Matt! I like the new ‘look and feel’.
Site looks gorgeous Matt! Love the colours, the top design and the roundy buttons
Smooth and clean, I like it. Started to complete the questionnaire on videos – problem is I can’t seem them very well on the internet connection in deepest darkest, er, Spain.
Don’t forget about us dinosaurs, forever locked in the world of stationary words and pics, will you?!
Great header! Your designer did a nice job for you.
Hard to answer the video questions just via the poll-some choices didn’t quite fit.
I don’t always watch videos (especially if it is one of the days I’m just surfing
thru from my other office and have just a few spare moment).
If the video involves sound or music, I can’t watch it at my other office…
and I don’t usually get back to it when I get back to the home offiice.
That said, the best videos to me are the little snippets that show something
in action that might be difficult to describe otherwise. I visited a site not too
long ago that had two short (30 to 70 second clips) videos–one showed a
Cambodian silk weaver at her loom…the other show a Cambodian noodle
maker in action (the noodle process was especially fascinating).
And I was able to watch both of those when I was at the other office.
I don’t watch a lot of lengthy interview or travel log videos as I really don’t
particularly care for watching that sort of stuff on my little computer screen.
I’m considering getting one of those mini camcorders and trying a bit of short
video on my site, so I’ll be interested to see what people say here.
Looks really great, Matt! Definitely a more defined (and refined) brand for you!
I like the picture on top:) I like the clean layout to!
Looks good Matt! Looking forward to seeing where you go with it!
Cheers,
G.
Neat and tidy design, I like the changes that speed it up, no drop down menu etc.
The thinner header makes it look more modern too.
The header is a big improvement!
Your site looks amazing!
Love it! Cute header, simple, to the point, gets across who you are and what you do in like 6 words. Brillz.
Love it!!! I love your new header and logo. What a great design.
As for the video, I typically can’t and don’t watch video much. I normally check my reader in the office so video is out for me. And sometimes, I check them from my iphone so again don’t get that good connection to watch video.
Love the design, especially the header. Plus the site loads much faster! Great job!
I like that it’s less “busy”…kudos!
Wow, just stopped by after seeing it for the first time in a couple weeks. Looks great. How many times have we all been that guy, just down the road from something cool, checking our map and trying to figure out how to get there?
The other one was better. This site looks childish (in a bad way).
Jon, would love more feedback. What don’t you like?
nice blog! i
Fantastic new site Matt! I love it. It is so vivid and colourful and bright and fun.
And yes, it is very slick and clean.
Looks great! I love your header–so cute! Er, I mean, manly of course
Matt, you need to fix the sidebar. In firefox (haven’t checked other browsers),
but the world of nomads box floats right of the orange GAP adventures square
ad, showing only 1cm of it. It also mucks up this comment textarea I’m writing
in right now.
Love the newlook!
Nice work Matt. You’ve done a terrific job! I really like what you’ve done. FYI, I’m viewing this from Safari and there’s something wonky gogoing on with the comment text box.
it look very like yoast website. I think the girls like it more than the boys because of the cute header. Renders fine. But the old feedcount is out of place. But hey if it work for yoast it work for you.
Very smart new look.
Cute header.
Nice job overall. There would be a few things that I would change (but you might not be able to if it was custom built for you).
1) The header is massive and takes up a decent portion of the site. If there is a way possible, I’d try to not make the height of the header banner so large.
2) The Youtube videos on the front page should probably be moved a bit lower so you could have those advertisements above it. The reason is that the advertisements will appear “on the fold” (you see them right away with out scrolling) as I don’t think the video is probably offering that much to your readers (I could be completely wrong on that though).
3) Lastly, you might want to clean up the XHTML+CSS as it doesn’t pass the validation that well (neither does mine!) but this will probably help search engine bots a bit more.
Just my two cents.
Looks good. clean and not “screaming” at you. The header is really cool too.
I like the clean new look – easier to read. “Life Untethered” is a nice tag line. If you have the ability, you might want to make the buttons across the top a tad bigger so they are more noticeable and readable.
I don’t generally watch videos – I know they are the thing for lots of people, but I prefer the written word.
Glad you didn’t use a Fraggle in your header
Matt-
Good job on the revamp of your site. I like the way you have organized the header navigation.
Hey Matt, Good stuff! Love the illustration – it will be great for branding and marketing the site
Nice one mate. The new look feels much sleeker and user friendly, the header is magic!
Great work Matt, a really good makeover!
This site definitely feels more personalized and owned by you entirely. The header has a much stronger purpose, and that’s smart of you to ask specific questions in order to improve your travel videos. Though the smaller excerpt boxes on your homepage are a little hard for me to read (the colors), I think you’ve done an excellent job throughout! Keep doing the damn thing…