YOUR GUIDE TO THE TOP HOME IMPROVEMENT WEBSITES (Part 1)
How does one know which are the good DIY Home Improvement sites? There are hundreds of sites on the Internet offering home improvement advice, tips and instructions for the do-it-yourselfer. As a service to our customers and followers, Mr. Speedy Plumbing is providing a consumer guide to the top-rated home improvement-DIY sites on the Internet.
One of the criteria we use to rate DIY/Home Improvement sites is their Page Rank. Page Rank is a value from 1 to 9 that tells you how important a page is on the web. Google recognizes that when one page links to another page, it is basically casting a vote for that page. Google also figures that the more votes a page receives, the more important is that page.
Note: the importance of the page that is casting the vote determines how important the vote itself is. This means that a link (a vote) from CNN is worth much more than a link from a directory in India or China. Incidentally, the “Page” in Page Rank derives from its creator – Google founder Larry Page.
We also rank sites by the amount of interaction and involvement the site has with social media – Twitter followers, Facebook likes, Google+ followers and Pinterest followers.
Here are the top DIY-Home Improvement sites on the Internet: each has a Page Rank of 5 or better, and huge social media involvement. We hope you find these reviews useful.
THE TOP HOME IMPROVEMENT/DIY SITES – TODAY: THE TOP 5
With a PageRank of 7, this is one of the top DIY-Home Improvement sites on the Internet. The site offers an incredible range of tips on everything from kitchens and bathrooms to exterior and landscape remodeling. Recent articles featured include “Our Favorite Cottage Kitchens”, “How to Build a Columned Room Divider”, “How to Divide Overgrown Perennials” and “How Can I Estimate my Home’s Value?” Their current featured galleries include “10 Secrets of Cottage Style”, “13 Big Ideas for Small Bathrooms”, “How to Fix a Furniture Finish”, “10 Ways to Build A Better Chicken Coop”, and “A Seaside Cottage Looks Small, Lives Large”. The site has 55,000 followers on Twitter, 384,000 Likes on Facebook, and 556,000 followers on Pinterest. Huffington Post rates this site in the top 10 DIY sites.
2. Houzz
This site has a Page Rank of 6, and is also listed by Huffington Post as one of the top ten DIY sites. Houzz bills itself as “The New Way to Design Your Home”. The site’s Home page has links to inside articles on Remodeling, Kitchens, Flowers, and Decorating. On this website, the do-it-yourselfer will find articles like “Bathroom Workbook: The Right Height for Your Sinks, Mirrors and More”, “Room of the Day: Colorful Living Room Hums With New Energy”, “5 Questions to Ask Before Installing a Barn Door”, and “Kitchen of the Week: Brick, Wood and Clean White Lines”. The site has 141,000 followers on Twitter, almost 819,000 Likes on Facebook, and 309,000 Google+ followers with over 24 million views.
3. Dwell
If you visit Dwell today, you will find a huge number of articles and advice on home improvement. In “Rooms We Love”, you will find articles on courtyards, modern bathroom innovation, bedroom design ideas and tiled bathrooms. In “Products and Furniture” you’ll find articles on textiles, technology, locks and chandeliers. In their “How-To” section, there are articles link “The Complete Guide to Designing with Color”, “How to Build a Design Collection”, and “How to Shop for Wallpaper”. Their “Green” department features articles including “The Future of Gardening: Drought-Resistant Plants”, “How to Make Your Garden Water-Free”, and “The most Impressive green Homes in Chicago”.
This site is listed as a top home improvement site by Huffington Post and other sites. It has a Page Rank of 6, 192,000 Facebook likes, 270,000 followers on Google + with 2.8 million views, and almost 77,000 followers on Pinterest. Please note: though the site has over 500,000 followers on Twitter, the link from their site to their Twitter account leads you back to a page inside their website, not to Twitter.
4. REMODELISTA
Another of the leading DIY sites on the web, Remodelista sells home furnishing and remodeling supplies, and provides tons of advice on how to do things yourself. The company sells products and fixtures for kitchens, bathrooms, dining rooms, living rooms, bedrooms, offices, outdoor spaces, and children’s rooms, and has hundreds of how-to articles and advice about each of these departments. Their Home page currently provides articles on subjects that include earthquake preparedness, doormats, office makeovers, where to locate electrical outlets, storage options, fabrics, bed frames, desks for small spaces, wall-mounted wire baskets, organizing a closet, and hundreds more.
Remodelista has a Page rank of 6, with 92,000 Facebook likes, and almost 41,000 followers on Twitter.
5. HGTV
The online presence for Home & Garden Television, this site also owns “HGTVRemodels”, “HGTVGardens”, “HGTV’s Front Door”, and the “DIYNetwork”. Although all these sites are about home improvement and gardening, the DIYNetwork is the one for the do-it-yourselfer. The DIYNetwork front page has links to articles on bathrooms, gardening, landscaping, cleaning, and painting. Their “Shortlist” of featured articles this week has items including “4 Media-Room Makerovers, Hollywood Style”, 19 Kitchen Cabinet Storage Solutions”, 14 Low-Care Plants for Easy Landscaping”, “14 Tips for Fertilizing Your Yard”, “Great Kitchen Floor Plans”, and “17 Clever Ideas for Small baths”.
The site has a Page rank of 5, with 353,000 Twitter followers, 15.5 million views on Google+, and over 3 million Facebook likes.
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