Consolidate
It’s now time to consolidate. As mentioned in my previous blog post “In sneltreinvaart digitaal” , the main elements of my blog are now in place. I’m content with the progress I made the last months on the technical side of the website. On the blog side I’ve now been able to switch my attention to creating articles.
Over the last weeks I’ve spoken to several colleagues and family members who’ve started following me and gave feedback on my content. It’s great to be able to have this interaction with people based on the material I put out, they give me the opportunity to learn and improve.
In the remainder of this piece I’ll briefly recap on the promises and updates I gave in “Blog development update 2” and give an update on recent new exciting developments on this digital journey. These include a new site logo and upcoming release of my podcast channel and first episodes so stay tuned!
Recent blog developments
Logo: I decided to take it to the next level and make it more personal. Through online marketplace Fiverr I found artist “Aishdesigner” and commissioned the design of a new logo for my blog. Revisions were no hassle at all and the end result captures the essence of this blog and I as a person. My new logo in the meanwhile has gone live. I’d recommend anyone looking to design a logo to browse on Fiverr and in particular to check out the portfolio of Aishdesigner.
Updated site lay-out: Driven by site complexity and loading speed I decided to simplify certain parts of the landing page and sub pages. This includes simplifying or removing animations altogether and removing videos I used in the background. This should help in webpage efficiency. I also decided to make the pages more uniform by applying the same background image.
Updated site mechanics and further integration of social media: Currently thinking about removing the Twitter feed from the menu pop up. I suspect this element causes extra loading time whereas speed is what we are all looking for. I’ll decide on this the coming days, but I’m leaning toward removing it. Last time I mentioned planning to integrate my Instagram feed on the page. Done! It’s a simple way to make a blog more visually appealing and it’s here to stay.
Upcoming developments and podcasts
All major works on the blog have been done for now. Content is key and this where my focus will be. As already announced in my previous post I was gearing up to start releasing podcasts in about 1 week from now. Currently preparations are in full swing and I managed to record a trailer and first episode. The first episode will contain an introduction to the podcast channel and touch on the topic of personal leadership. A topic I recently also wrote about in Dutch in “Persoonlijk leiderschap” (please use the automated translation widget if you want to read it in English, you’ll have to excuse me for wonky English translations as the original article still only is in Dutch).
I have to say the wish to start podcasting opened up a new box of unknowns and challenges. This includes the technical side of recording and producing, coming up with interesting stuff to talk about and getting podcasts published. With currently also one full episode recorded I was able to apply to the known publishing hubs like Apple podcasts, Spotify and Google podcasts. Applications are on the way but I’m confident they’ll come through.
As part of the preparation I had to come up with some sort of cover for my podcast, which I also decided to design. The result will be featured in my next post and will help in recognizability of my channel. I’d like to give a shout out to artist Prodesign47 for coming up with awesome art which fully reflected my order and subsequent revisional requests, I’m more than happy with it.
Upcoming podcast episodes
The first full episodes with guests will be in Dutch as I’m also using the start up period to get a hang of interviewing people as a podcast host. Talking in Dutch increases the chance that the end result overall will be satisfactory as I’m a native Dutch speaker and I’ll then be able to put enough attention into detailing. After a short while I’ll then also start publishing English podcasts.
As mentioned earlier the first episode will contain an introduction of the podcast channel and touch on the subject of personal leadership. I had fun recording it and I hope you’ll have fun listening to it, I’ll post links in a follow up post on release and I’ll also include a Podcast widget on the homepage of this blog to easily make it available to readers of the blog.
The second episode will include my sister in law Wandana who is a midwife in the Netherlands. We’ll talk about current “market” conditions for her and the way she’s coping and planning currently. The third episode will touch on motivation and self motivation and will include Richard who is a personal trainer and nutritional coach in the Amterdam area. Personally I think this will result in insights to which many of my audience can relate to, so again stay tuned.
Thanks for reading!
