When it comes to creating a blog, the focus is often on the content itself. However, the layout of the content is just as important in terms of how visitors interact with your message. The right layout can make all the difference in whether a visitor signs up for your email newsletter or bounces off your site. In this article, we will explore different types of blog layouts and how to choose the right one for your blog.
Types of Blog Layouts
There are several types of content layouts available for blog themes:
1. Single-Column or Full-Page: This layout takes up the entire page of a website, with the content of a blog post encompassing the full width of the browser. It often includes a large featured image, larger text, and text features like drop caps or fancy quotes. This layout is useful for literary journals, personal blogs, and travel blogs.
2. Two-Column (Usually With a Sidebar): This layout features a primary column containing the blog content and a secondary column or sidebar with auxiliary content like links to related blog posts, a search bar, an “about me” blurb, navigation, and so forth. This layout is considered the traditional or standard layout.
3. Three-Column: This layout is often used for magazines and blogs that feature a lot of content. The middle column contains the blog post content, while the two sidebars can feature a wider array of secondary information.
4. Grid/Gallery Layouts: This type of blog layout is used on image-heavy blogs and features each link to a post displayed in card style laid out in a grid that visitors can scroll through. Galleries can be identical to the grid layout style but may render the featured image of each post in higher resolution.
5. Traditional Business: Most business websites have blogs on them nowadays. Company websites will often have a static homepage with a blog included as a secondary link. Within that, the content layout could adhere to any of the above options described.
Choosing the Right Layout for Your Blog
Deciding on the best content layout for your blog will depend on the type of blog you run, what sorts of content you’ll publish, and what overall look you want to convey. Here are a few things to keep in mind:
1. Is your blog image-heavy?
2. Do you create long-form, in-depth posts?
3. Will you be publishing frequently like for an online newspaper or magazine?
4. Will you be selling products on your website, either digital or physical?
Answering these questions will help you categorize the type of blog you plan on creating and give you some ideas about the type of layout that would best suit your content.
WordPress Themes with Full-Page Blog Layouts
While any theme can be configured to display blog posts as full-width, there are several WordPress themes that offer a truly immersive content experience:
1. Fullpane: This WordPress theme offers a fullscreen experience throughout your site, not just on the blog, and relies on parallax effects.
2. Pineapple (Free Theme): The classic single column layout of the free Pineapple WordPress theme offers up a large featured image, a post snippet, and a “continue reading” button that allows visitors to click through and read your content.
Traditional Blog with a Sidebar WordPress Themes
There are plenty of options for traditional blog layouts with a sidebar. Here are a couple of nice-looking choices:
1. Beautiful: The Beautiful WordPress theme provides a standard blog layout with the sort of sidebar we’ve all come to expect. But the overall look is gorgeously minimalist.
2. Corner: This theme allows you to display your blog content in a traditional way as well. However, it does offer up a bit of variation by including all navigation in the top left-hand corner of the page.
Blog Themes with a Masonry or Grid Layout
For blogs and portfolios, a grid is a great layout option. Here are a few of the best masonry grid WordPress themes:
1. Total: This theme offers access to a lot of demos, one of which is Mason, a masonry grid layout for blogs.
2. ART.: The ART. WordPress theme is a multipurpose portfolio but has some great blog-specific options worth mentioning. For instance, the grid layout creates a wall of pictures with no space between them.
Gallery-Style WordPress Themes
Here are a few gallery-style WordPress themes that prioritize images and other media:
1. Soho: This photo and video WordPress theme features a variety of layout options. Its fullscreen layout offers a grid-style gallery that includes social media-esque interaction on the blog homepage.
2. Stockholm: This multipurpose theme prioritizes the gallery style layout for its blog template and could easily be used as such for a photographer’s portfolio, an online store, or a content curator.
Business Themes with Blogs
Many traditional business website themes include blog templates as well. Here are a couple of options:
1. Elegant (Free Theme): Elegant is a free theme created by WPExplorer that includes all the features you’ve come to expect from a business theme like dedicated sections for your team and portfolio, but it also has a great blog template that’s clean and to the point.
2. Karma: The standard Karma theme was designed for businesses but has a blog and professional features as well that caught my eye.
Choosing the Right Content Layout for Your Blog Matters
Deciding on the right content layout for your blog is important because it dictates how visitors will interact with your content and can shape their first impressions and whether or not they’ll convert. Every aspect of your site is important, and each detail can bear weight in terms of how your content and overall brand is received. Hopefully, this guide will help you get one step closer toward making a decision about what will work best for you.
