Blogwise Review

Blogwise is a blog directory similar to other sites that have been reviewed here such as Blogcatalog.

The main page of Blogwise displays Recently Updated Blogs. Since these change so quickly and so often, I am wondering whether this is ultimately useful to users.

The main page also displays Blogs by Country, Blogs by Keyword, and Recent Additions.

Recent Additions is a short list of blogs that have been recently added to the Blogwise directory.

Blogs by Country categorizes the blogs by country. Though neat, this is initially cumbersome. Listing only 7 blogs per page, with a country like the USA having 23000 blogs listed, wading through them is inefficient. There needs to be a way to perform a search only within a certain country. Blogwise provides this functionality. Clicking on a countries name brings up the initial list of blogs with a search box up top. The search box contains a filter “country:“. The id is a number that corresponds to the country. Typing in search terms after that filter will find that search term ONLY within the that country category.

Blogs by Keyword is overwhelming to say the least. I don’t know if it is helpful. It is easier to search for a keyword via the search box, then browse through the alphabetical listing.

The main use of the site is to search for blogs. The search results screen is very clean and easy to read. The results include a thumbnail screenshot of the blog, Blog Name, a one sentence description, the date the blog was last updated, and a link to the blogwise info page about that blog. The description section is not as verbose as Blogcatalog’s. However, Blogwise stands out with the last updated date. This is very helpful in determining whether a blog is still active. In fact, search results are ordered by updated date. Most recently updated blogs appear first.

It takes from 7-14 days for a submitted blog to be included within the Blogwise directory. Though the waiting period is long, it is still worth it.