Designing and Incorporating a Blog with Divi

All websites need an active blog. Did you know a website without an active blog is a website without the voice of the business and there’s no communication? Don’t keep the blog silent.

A log time ago in 1990… (17 years) when websites first started having a blog was a luxury. This would have to be added by a developer and was expensive. WordPress started out as a blogging platform in 2003. With the option to set the home page as a static page and not the blog page websites started to be created and the blog page was included in the website. From that time on we had a website that included a blog.

WordPress has the added function of creating a stand alone Blog. To do this go to the Theme Customizer area and select Homepage settings. You’re setting the Home page as the blog posts.

Blog posts are in chronological order with the most recent post on top of the list. A stand alone Blog will have all the posts on the Homepage.

Creating blog posts generates fresh content and there is a better chance for your blog to be found especially if you’re writing about updated information or a change in service. The Internet is like a library, it’s full of organized information about different subjects. Your published Blog post will exist on the Web and this enables someone searching for the topic to find the article.

The Hompage of the website is set to a Static Page. The Blog is a page that is added to the website and is put into the Main Navigation Menu. It doesn’t have to be in the Main Menu but this depends on the style and layout of the website. 

The Blog page will show all the published Blog posts with the most recent one on the top. In the Divi Theme the Blog Module pulls in the posts in the categories selected in the settings inside the Blog module.

Blog Page layout with Divi Blog Extended Plugin

Create a new page and name it Blog. You can name it Articles but we’re used to the word Blog which means articles. On this page you will pull in the blog post using the Blog Module. The most recent post will be listed on top. The Blog Module has the option include categories in the display.

The Blog Page should be designed simply without too many decorative trimmings. The title of the blog post should be the main attraction and the special effects secondary. A good practice is not to override a simple layout. The purpose of having a blog is to get the articles read.

 The built in Divi Blog Module works fine but it has some limitations. You can only do two layouts, fullwidth or grid mode.

The Divi Blog Extended plugin has more options to layout the blog posts on the blog page.

The Blog Page has articles in the blog category. WordPress has the option to create categories for the blog posts. Information is easier to find when it’s arranged acording to the subject or category.

Even though we might not think about this we visit a website and appreciate the arrangement of the categories instead of searching through all the titles of the blog posts listed in the general cateogry of blog.

Three Categories

Website Journey
WordPress
Divi

The three categories, Website Journey, WordPress, and Divi, have their own page which functions like a blog page but isn’t titled blog. The page title is the category. 

The Scout Page Layout was developed by Divi Extended the developers of Divi Blog Extras and Divi Blog Extended plugins. This is my affiliate link. I use these plugins on my websites and refer them to cleints. They are well made, updated regularly, don’t require code, and are easy to use.

Everyone relies on the Internet to get information. To cut through the noise of misinformation the blog post needs a clean layout. This means minimum popups, or mid article advertisements.

When you want to give people information about something especially if it relates to your business practice the blog post content has to deliver. In three seconds the visitor looking at the blog content decides whether they should read it or not. If there’s too much work for the reader they skip out and go somewhere else.

One problem that has emerged is too many links in one sentence. The blog post is an informative piece of information and should be interesting to read.

Here is an example: The latest news on website building predicts an increase in website integration with email services.

All these links take you to another blog post. The result is disruptive reading. Attention is distracted by the links. The links are ‘stuffed’ into the sentence. Instead of worrying about the effect on the search engine, your content should be directed to the reader.

The Divi Blog Extended Module is used to set create a section on the blog page to bring in other posts in a specific category.

You will see this on websites with the heading: You Might Like.

The layout of these blog posts pulled in is a different style. It is pleasing and interesting to look at. It could assist the visitor to read more information.

Notice how few distractions there are on this blog post. This is necessary. Otherwise your reader will become irritated and stop reading the article you took so much time to write. 

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