If you have any intension at all of working online then the first essential you WILL need is a blog.
Why?
Well the blog is the hub of your online activities a focal point for your customers and readers to catch up with you and your activities, special offers. And most importantly free advice (such as this).
The blog also acts as capture machine for subscribers e-mail addresses so that you can inform them when new content has been added. Did you notice the optin box and the newsletter list when this blog loaded?
There are a number of different blogging platforms which have there own advantages and disadvantages.
Free from Google is Blogger, I have used Blogger for product review sites such as John Thornhill’s One Month Mentor Training. Blogger blogs are very easy to setup and easy to use and can be customised and monetised. They are mostly used for personal blogs and many of the Blogger blogs are exactly that.
The great advantage is that Blogger is free. The big disadvantage is that you do not own the blog so Google could remove it at any point with absolutely no comeback. You will loose at the content you have posted and all the hard work will be to no avail.
The real biggy is WordPress there are literally thousands of themes, plugins apps and widgets that you can use to customise WordPress, so no two sites will be exactly the same. At WordPress.com you can claim a free blog and take advantage the problem is that the blog will always have .wordpress.com as part of the URL.
There are some excellent examples of free blogs you can check out on the home page of WordPress.com, again this blog can be pulled at any time and you will have to start again.
The best all round solution to building your own brand or business is to have your own hosting and install your own WordPress blog on it. This has massive advantages over the free solutions.
- You can choose your unique URL to reflect your business or brand, this website uses WordPress and although it is starting to look dated I can change this very easily by updating the theme, adding plugins and widgets to make the visitor experience a good one.
- I own the blog.
- It has my name in the URL not blogspot or WordPress which of the two looks the most professional?
WordPress is very easy to setup and customise, there are lots of guides and tutorials available on the internet. But this can be very confusing if it is the first time you have installed and used WordPress. You could pay some one to do it all for you, or there are many excellent products on how to use WordPress most of which come with a heavy price tag.
Wouldn’t it be great if there were a product that could show you how to do all of this for just a few bucks. Well there is, so here’s the skinny of it I just came across something that you will want to check out quick before the price goes up drastically.
It is WordPress blog building at its finest by a guy Lane Bowers who’s been in the trenches learning what it’s like to build blogs for perfect results every time. More informaion HERE.
Take a look at just one of Lane’s blog video training reviews; Lane takes on more of the role of what you would expect a good friend to be like if you asked him to help you get started on creating your own WordPress blog.
It is as if he asked you to pull up a chair at his desk and he was walking you through what he does daily to continue growing his Blog.
He keeps it very basic and assumes that you have had no prior knowledge before he begins teaching you. If you are new to Internet Marketing then this would be an excellent starting point for you, as his Course continues teaching he includes items such as how to add a Gravatars to your Posts, changing the Header and the Site’s Background, setting up email accounts, etc. etc.
All in all, a very good WordPress Course! Highly recommended Rob…
Hi Rob,
Excellent points here about free vs. paid.
I have several blogger blogs and like you said, they are free and easy to use but when you want to get away from the .blogspot extension and move on most people do choose the wrong wordpress version. Having your own domain name is important with any business, not just blogs so this course you have presented looks like the perfect start out for anyone looking to make the transition.
I know when I first heard of wordpress many years ago, I had no idea what it was, let alone how to get it going. I was just told to install it, but they didn’t even show me…needless to say, I never did it. Since taking the Forward to Marketing course a few years ago I seem to be quite knowledgeable about WordPress and if I hadn’t taken that course I probably still would have not known much about it.
I like the versatility of the platform – it can be used as a straight blog or an actual website, love it 🙂
Have a GREAT week, Rob!
Linda
Thank you for the advice Rob, there is certainly a lot of conflicting information to be found through search engines regarding blogs. This puts many people off and as you say, Blogger is probably the easier choice that people make in the first instance. However, it does seem to be WordPress that offers the most versatility, with this in mind a step by step straight forward guide is always welcome.
Hi Linda,
thanks for dropping by, I used too hate WordPress but have grown to like it more due to its versitility and the improvements made by the development team. I am now coonsidering moveing all my websites over to WP.
Rob
Hi Julia,
blogger is a great way to make a start with blogging and Google loves it (they should they own it).
WordPress has more versitility but comes with costs if you decide to host your own domain.
Rob
Hi Robert
When I was first thinking of starting in this business I set up a couple of blogs on Blogger and WordPress .com both of which like you say are free, they gave me a way of seeing what I could do but once I started in earnest the only way I wanted to go was have my own hosting and installing a WordPress blog.
Now I just love WordPress and it is so easy to get your blog set up and comes with so much support that I could not imagine using anything else!
Have a great day
Pauline
Hi Robert,
Thankyou for such an informative article. I wanted to work online and I first made my blog on blogger.com and I was very successful in launching and progressing my blog and by the time I understand how I could make money from it and now I think that it was a great step by me to make a blog because its really essential if you want to work online.
You are right, Rob. To make a blog is the first step if you want to work online and blogger.com is very easy to use at first stage and also work online from home is not very easy, you have to give your time and energy then a blog could give fruits of your sowed seeds.
By creating a blog for your business, it allows your customers to contact you. They don’t have to be put on hold, or wait for office hours to call you. All of the info about your company should be found on your blog, so customers who have any questions or want to find out more about your business can easily do so.
Additionally, a blog is one of the best ways to update customers on new products or services being offered. You can also respond to customer inquiries quickly and more efficiently, and you can gain valuable feedback from your readership while using that feedback to make improvements and build a better business, as well as business relationships, with your client base
Spot on John, you nailed it on the head here!
Rob
Hi rob,
blogging on a business is a great idea and also It Costs Less than You Think, through blogging you can save more money because you can market it through internet and as for today,we are living in high tech technology, the world of internet.