One of the most common questions we get from new business owners is whether it is best to host their blog on their own site or on a blog hosting site like WordPress. We typically recommend that business owners host their own blogs, since the cost is low and control is entirely in the hands of the author. However, there are some instances when hosting on a free blogging site makes sense.

When Free is Right

If your budget is tight and you are worried about the learning curve, utilizing a free blogging service may be the right choice for you. WordPress and Blogger are two free hosting services you may consider. Of course, the downside of free hosting is the lack of control. Not only are you stuck with the non-customizable URL, you don’t have complete control of your own content. For a business, having control and security are essential. More on this below.

What’s the Deal with WordPress

As a platform, wordpress has many advantages. It’s customizable, easy to navigate, and has a large community of people sharing tips, troubleshooting tricks and free templates. The problem with hosting a WordPress site on their free service is that they can enforce their “non-commercial-use” policy at a moment’s notice. This means if you use your blog to advertise your own products or include affiliate links, you run the risk of losing your content. The good news is that WordPress is available for free to host on your own site. This means you can take advantage of all the perks of a WordPress site without worrying about the WordPress police. You’ll need your own hosting account for this, but you can often include a WordPress blog on your existing hosting plan. We offer this here at TurnKey.

What is Your Existing Web Presence?

Do you already have a business website? Do you have a presence on the social networks? If your business is already somewhat established online, it’s probably best to host your blog on your own website. The main reason for this is your URL. When you host on your own site, your blog shares the same URL as the rest of your website. This is good for branding and it keeps customers from getting confused. It also means that your blog’s content will help your entire site’s SEO profile. The search engines will index your blog posts as new content, and this will make your site pop up higher in search results.

Do You Already Have Hosting?

If you already have hosting for your website, chances are good you’ll be able to add a blogging platform at no extra charge. If you have a bare-bones hosting plan, you may need to upgrade, but the cost will only increase by a few dollars a month.

Worried About the Learning Curve?

Don’t be. Not only are these platforms designed to be user-friendly, many hosts offer one-click installation. This means you don’t have to know anything at all about how the technology works to start using it.

Learn More

We offer hosting plans specifically tailored to the blogger. If you’re feeling nervous about setting up your first blog, this is a great place to start.

http://www.turnkeyinternet.net/blog-hosting/

Anyone with a blog faces this conundrum at one time or another. Some people start out with a free blogging service like typepad or blogger, and, as they grow their audience, decide they need their own property. Others start out managing their own blog and get mired in the wordpress updates or spam and bail for a free, fully managed option. Before leaping right in, there are several items to consider when deciding which arrangement is right for you.

What are your Goals?

Are you planning on world domination or is your blog primarily for your friends and family? If you’re aspirations are modest, there is no reason to invest your time and money into a privately hosted blog. On the other hand, if you have loftier goals and think  you might, one day, want to become a pundit or amass a million followers, hosting your own property could pay dividends.

Design

Are you a designer? Does it matter to you to have your blog look just so? With free blogs, you have severely limited options design-wise. You can pick colors and templates, but you can’t go much beyond that. If you want to design your blog from the ground up, a privately hosted blog is right for you.

Maintenance

How good are you at computers? Do you understand how to configure a database? Do you understand PHP, blog software installation stuff or server-side configurations? None of this is particularly difficult, and it is very possible to learn it all with a little elbow grease. But, if you haven’t got the time, or don’t want to be bothered, a free blog is the best choice.

Branding

Generally, a blog with its own memorable domain name is much more brandable than a free blog domain (that includes .typepad or .wordpress within the URL). A private domain projects a professional image and sticks in people’s minds. Name your blog something clever to really capitalize on the memory factor. If you have big dreams, think about the promotional materials and business cards you may use in the future. Your own domain will look smashing on both.

Making Money

If your blog is popular, you can sell ads and make money, regardless of what format your blog happens to be in. Arguably, advertisers may be more inclined to take you seriously with your own domain name, but numbers talk. If you have the traffic, they’ll be interested.

Ready to Get Started?

If you’ve decided on hosting your own blog with your own domain name, look no further than TurnKey Website.

These days blogging is a ubiquitous tool for businesses, but it isn’t always easy to get started. Many free platforms don’t offer the ability to use your own domain name, leaving you to give out amateurish addresses to business clients, while do-it-yourself programs present a steep learning curve without much in the way of style. With TurnKey Blog Hosting, we are fulfilling this obvious need by providing a ready-made blogging solution that is adaptable, robust and professional. As a blogger myself, I know how frustrating it can be to find a platform that meets my two most basic and important needs: good looks, works.

Functionality

TurnKey Blog Hosting offers incredible functionality with quick, customizable templates that are sleek and easy to use. You can use your own domain name so your clients will see your blog as an integral part of your company’s identity and brand. Set up takes about 90 seconds, and you can fully customize your blog to match your existing website. Choose from hundreds of templates and themes, migrate content easily from other blogging platforms like Blogger, Typepad and Livejournal and enjoy complete administrative control for managing access and permissions. TurnKey Blog Hosting also offers state-of-the-art SPAM filters to prevent junk from clogging up your comments. On top of all that, you can monitor your site’s statistics with our webstats program, and take advantage of email via your blog hosting account.

SEO

The other critical element of a successful blog is search engine optimization (SEO). With the constantly changing SEO rules (thanks, Google), optimizing your blog can be a full-time job. Thankfully for all of us, WordPress offers many wonderful plugins and add-ons for automating the optimization process. If you were managing your own blog hosting, you would need to configure your wordpress to integrate these tools, keeping up with security updates, patches and alerts. With TurnKey Blog Hosting we do all of this for you. We have researched the best plugins for SEO to drive the maximum amount of traffic possible to your blog. With our optimized configuration, your blog will be poised to ensnare each and every spidery Google tendril.

What TurnKey Does for You

Our goal is always to provide easy, ready-made “turnkey” solutions that don’t require any technical expertise on the part of our clients. At the same time, all of our products are enterprise-class, professional, sleek, and top-of-the-line. We always try to put ourselves in the position of our business clients. We ask ourselves: “if I were a small business owner looking for an affordable, easy, professional solution, what would work best for me?” When it comes to blogging, TurnKey Blog Hosting is our answer to that question, and we couldn’t be happier with the result. We hope you will try it out for yourself and explore the many ways a TurnKey Blog can enhance the image of your business while driving traffic to your website.

Learn more!