Church Communications Pro is updated regularly and has some great archives that are of real value. My favorite is the series of posts on using Word Press for a church web site. The best part is their content benefits churches and non-churches alike.

My fledgling blog on Vermont, South West Vermont.com uses one of their nicest themes, though I am intrigued by their latest “newspaper” themes.

And speaking of Word Press Themes and blogs, I’ve been keeping track of useful web site resources, especially themes, at my new Blinklist account. Since I’m using my del.icio.us account to track theology resources, I opened Blinklist for all other items of interest, particularly web design stuff.

Originally posted on inamirrordimly.com

When choosing a theme, it is crucial to find a lay out that supports your content. Clutter is the enemy, so choose wisely.

In the case of this blog I wanted readers to have the option of reading through the content or utilizing the side bars. It’s as if the site is divided in two. Some may only want to browse my links, while others will only want to look over the posts.

For inamirrordimly.com, my blog on theology and whatever else happens around our Vermont home, I wanted to content to be at center stage. The sidebar is there, but almost everything on the sidebar revolves around the content. Links and resources are on other pages.

On yet another blog, swvermont.com, I chose a clean three column theme that provides a host of resources, links, and navigation options. The key to this site in my estimation is what visitors see when the first arrive. Therefore I’ve place my categories and search box at the top. That enables them to quickly find what they want.

Take some time to evaluate the lay out options out there and compare them to the kind of content you plan on publishing. A good lay out should put your best content in the reader’s line of vision.

ProBlogger Darren Rowse adds some qualifiers.

The bottom line for me is that each blogger must determine the goal and audience of his/her blog. For example, a more specialized blog such as cooking, history, or theology may only require weekly posts. Tech, politics, and news may be a different story.

blog

Technorati Tags: blog

“In a bid to attract new members and shed their persistently Luddite image, churches across the country are embracing technology and Web sites like MySpace. Blogs and podcasts have become part of religious leaders’ communications with congregants, and photo-sharing sites like Flickr are increasingly used to depict a fun-loving, casually-dressed community of churchgoers.”

The whole article.

While many non-profits are loath to add another item on their “to do” lists, this is such an important area. Non-profits must learn to communicate with today’s upcoming generations in their media formats of choice. Blogs and web-based applications are the future. A good example of a web accessible non-profit is The Well.

blog, church, non-profit

Technorati Tags: blog, church, non-profit

Todd also has the usual list of programs, including Bloglines and Firefox (two programs that I cannot imagine life without), but give his list a look. You may find a gem that has escaped your notice.

While there are a number of reasons why this is a good thing, the number one reason for myself is that I’ll waste an entire morning reading the news at bloglines or from my google home page. The wireless card just sits on the table with a little sticky note stating the time I’m allowed to insert it. I can then post furiously without the temptation to read my mail, other blogs, or the news.

While many say that Ecto is the best program, Ecto also costs $20. While this is not steep for a program that does everything but write the post for you, I’m very satisfied with w.bloggar and have found that it is very easy to use.

The best part is that it keeps all of my blog passwords stored so I don’t ever have to log in. I should also note that it provides a lot features that basic blog editors simply do not have. Simple file uploads, font colors, various heading settings, and other font options make it really useful when customizing a post. It was a little tricky to set up Wordpress with w.bloggar, but a quick visit to the forums at their web site cleared it all up.

technorati tags: w.bloggar, ecto

Free
Wordpress
Blogger

Perfect for beginners
1. Typepad: you have to pay a few bucks a month, but nobody makes it easier to put a nice looking blog together.
2. Wordpress: a close second. There’s a little less versitility in the templates and you need to know some basic html to post book lists and other images to your link lists.
3. Blogger: I was surprised to see how many people use Blogger and still Blogger does not have an optional interface for posting links. While they make it easy to write up the html yourself, I would think that it’s fairly easy to make two ways of adding links such as wordpress.

Free and Versatile
Blogger: while wordpress gives you quite a bit for free and Typepad will give you all the features you could want if you’re willing to shell out $15 a month, Blogger lets you customize their templates completely. My Blogger site has been revamped in some major ways and I have yet to exhaust the options. You need to know how html colors work and have additional html knowledge, but they make it as easy as they can.
If I Had Only One Blog . . .
If I had only one blog, I would probably host it with Yahoo and then run it on wordpress. I use wordpress on this site and find that I can easily edit the format of the blog while using simple features to add links and other content to the site. It is the best of both worlds.

The pro plan for Typepad is nice, but it doesn’t quite compare in my book. I think that Typepad has a sharp blog product that is easy and fun to use, but who wants to pay so much when you can get a bunch more with wordpress. Perhaps it’s a draw, but I have to put my money on wordpress for now.

Blogger is fun to use if you want a free blog that can be fully customized, but you have to know quite a bit of html in order to make it of much use.

It looks very attractive at this point, but I need to take it for a test drive first. You can get an idea of what it does by looking at some blogs they list: East Central Elementary School, Amnesty International USA, and Platform 27. Click here for a full list of Platform 27’s features.

Technorati Tags:blog, community, 21publish

And personal blogging aside, organizations can also use Blogger to make some very nice web sites. Jordon Cooper, whose blog I peruse daily, has a nice clean blog design that utilizes Blogger. He recommends a series of blogs/web sites by Pernell Goodyear. There’s his wife’s site, his church’s site, and his church’s blog.

I’ll have to start up my own blogger site in order to give it a review, but the price is right so far as I can see and it’s possible to customize it quite a bit.

Technorati Tags: blogger

Though the title is somewhat provocative, the subject material is essential for every business, especially non-profits to consider. Non-profits cannot afford to miss out on blogs. Since they rely so heavily on relationships, service, and donations, there is no such thing as too much trust or too much communication.

Technorati Tags: naked+conversations, blogging

I have had a Typepad blog since April of last year, while the Wordpress thing is new to me as of this year. Though I could say a lot in comparison, here’s the short cut to my point: Wordpress takes a little bit of time to learn and requires even a minimal knowledge of html code, but it’s free. Typepad is really easy to use and makes buidling links and editing your content really easy. The down side is that the extra convenience costs you $6 a month.

The thing is that both programs allow you to do basically the same things in their most basic versions. So if you can spend a little bit of time messing around with what works and what doesn’t, Wordpress is for you. In addition, you can use Wordpress for free if you don’t mind buying a domain name and having it hosted. You pay a little bit more, but then you have an incredible amoung of flexibility that equals the Typepad Pro option.

More to come, but that’s a start.