Starting Your Own Blog – Part 2
Posted by: Jakki
In Part 1 we looked at how blogs started and the benefits to business in having a blog.
Now it’s easy to get bogged down in the idea that blogs are for geeks and people who just want to talk about their hobby all day and their readers to leave feedback and comment on what they’ve written.
In Part 2 we are going to look at when a blog is not a blog (except it is!), different types of blogs and how to set up a WordPress blog in 10 minutes or less.
When is a blog not a blog?
Now blogs are in fact websites, so get used to thinking of your blog in that way and it takes all the geeky – ness out of it. If you are new to all of this and want to get your business online, setting up a blog is the easiest way to do it. You can then customise it and in no time at all it will look like what you may traditionally be thinking of as a website (when it is in fact still a blog).
A lot of websites are static because they are difficult to update without knowledge of the computer language they are written in. This is not good because:
a) the search engines favour websites that are being continually updated with content
b) it’s not something the small business owner can easily do themselves and why would you want to anyway when you can use a blogging platform that is easy to setup and use and has so much functionality built into it that the search engines love it?
Different Types of Blogs
The software used to create blogs are known as blogging platforms (it helps to know the terminology.)
There are three main blogging platforms:
WordPress is the most popular and we find the easiest to use. Having said that, like anything, you do need to learn how it works. WordPress is free and easy to setup from your web hosting account and customise to your own particular taste.
This website was created using WordPress and then customised to our requirements.
Also because you own the domain name and you have it hosted from your own hosting account you are in control of it, you’ll see why this is important when we talk about the next two kinds of blogs.
In the meantime we have created a video showing you how to set up your wordpress blog direct from your hosting account in less than ten minutes, just scroll down to the end of this post and click on the play button.
Blogger is also a free blogging platform that is owned by Google. It is also easy to setup and could be a good way to get started. It offers lots of different styles of website to choose from and is fairly easy to setup. The biggest disadvantage of Blogger websites, in our opinion is that you do not own it. Google can suddenly take a dislike to your website, for no apparent reason, and delete it. Can you imagine putting in lots of work to get it set up, you have regular traffic and you are making money and then overnight that stops because Google decide they don’t like it?
You could have a play around with it and see what you think, but in the long term you need to own your own website on your own web host.
For an example of a Blogger website click here
Typepad is a paid for blogging platform, although it does have a free trial so that you can see if you like it or not. In this instance you can have your own domain name or you can choose a name that ends in .typepad.com so for example www.flowersbycharlotte.typepad.com.
We do know of people that swear by Typepad and we know a very nice lady who will build a Typepad blog for you. Prices start at $8.95 per month at the time of writing. Again Typepad do have control over your website although not in the same way as Google do with Blogger, they are not likely to cancel your account.
For an example of a Typepad website click here
So we suggest that you have a look at these three platforms and see which you prefer.
Tutorials
1. First of all you need to change the nameservers at your domain registrar:
Click here for more information and video instructions >>>>
2. Click The Link Below To Learn How To Install A WordPress Blog In Ten Minutes Or Less
Please note that the video shows an installation of wordpress which may not be the current version but the method for installing wordpress is the same
In Part 3 of Starting Your Own Blog we look at the importance of changing the username and password on your WordPress blog
Click Here For Part 3 >>>>>>>
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