Wordpress, Blogspot, or DIY: What is the Best Way to Start a Blog?

I need to start a blog with the intention of grabbing traffic to make money (what else?). I want to be able to eventually sell advertisments, Google AdSense and such. The subject will be nothing illegal or edgy (no guns, porn, etc).

I have three options: use Blogspot, use Wordpress, or use a custom blog software written in ASP.NET.

I'm really new when it comes to this, but in terms of traffic, what are the differences? I've always been more comfortable with my own code. But if I look at Blogspot or Wordpress, can anyone tell me if there are advantages, disadvantages, or restrictions I need to know about?

 

Use WP but hosted, so you have full control of everything in the future! Best advice i can give. You decide witch templates and plugins you need and you can hook up ads with OpenX hosted by them any way you like.

//A

 

I agree with him. You should use Wordpress on your own host and domain. By using Wordpress you can use all kinds of various plugins rather than having to write your own. Furthermore, Wordpress is familiar to lots of internet users and as such would be easiest for your viewers and commenters.

 

I'll hitch my wagon to the "use Wordpress" train. It's free to download and completely customizable. There are thousands of free templates available to download and customize however you want them. If you use the self hosted Wordpress (instead of using the Wordpress servers) you can put up whatever kind of advertising you want and you don't have to deal with an annoying mydomainname.blogspot.com or mydomainname.wordpress.com URL, which can make your site seem less credible.

Good luck!

 

Hosted WP is the most powerful and easiest to use.

 

There is this site for handmade sellers called etsy.com and they ask this question like almost everyday.. funny since most of them still have a crappy blogspot blog. Having a hosted wp blog is not only fun but will allow you to make more money plus you do posting in advance without any extra scripts. With wp you can make a number of great sites.. such as a membership site giving you recurring income or even a review site.. with blogspot.. not going to happen! GOOD LUCK

 

You should go with Hosted WordPress. It is free and can be downloaded from wordpress.org

 

I like blogspot.com than wordpress.com. On blogspot, we can customise templates, and put adsense code on my blog


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I have the same idea with all people above. I 'd rather Blogspot.com than wordpress.com because blogspot.com has much more traffic.

 

Wordpress is really bloated. If you have enough skill to custom code your own CMS and then add anything that you actually need in it, that would be better, though it's your choice.

between wordpress and blogspot, wordpress is defiantely the choice though, as long as it's hosted. You dont want domain.blogspot.com or domain.wordpress.com

Regards,
Nick

 

What do you mean by blogspot.com has more traffic If your blog is optimized enough you can drive traffic from wordpress.com too. but wordpress.com doesn't let you use own ads in blogs.
So, for monetization purpose you should use either self-hosted Wordpress or blogspot( if you don't want to host it yourself).

 

Use wordpress coz there are many advantage such as many plugin,template.
Other than traffic,you should increase your PR so that you can sell link at your site to earn $$$.

 

newbie like me find blogspot easy to manage. more codes with wordpress and some i don't understand.

 

I'd vouch for Wordpress as well. It's easy to customize, there is a lot of support available, and a lot of plugins. It's very flexible. Also, Wordpress seems really well optimized for search engines, which is helpful.

 

Agreed. WP is more google friendly but WP platform itself won't bring the traffic where content is the king and you have to optimize the site for keywords and other blog promotion methods

 

Despite what the above think, there's nothing better than your own creation.

However, if you want to start right away you can use WP as a temporary solution then copy content over to your own CMS and delete WP.

 

Regardless of which software, definitely put the blog on your own domain under /blog (so you leave your home page free for other things). Blogs set up on Wordpress or Blogspot sites would be your secondary blogs. But focus on your primary blog and get it going first.

 

I like the idea of hosting the blog myself, so between Wordpress and Blogspot, Wordpress appears to be a better solution.

Although, after downloading Wordpress and examining the code, I have to agree with Hades - the code does appear to be bloated.

Can anyone tell me if Wordpress or Blogspot automatically creates links to/from other blogs of the same type?

And, I'm a little hazy as to the business model of Wordpress - why free? Do people sell plug-ins?

 

I personally prefer to host my own WP blog just because that's what I'm used to, but I would suggest that Blogger.com might get you traffic quicker and easier. It's Google's service so it just seems logical it'd get listed more quickly, rise in the SE rankings quicker, etc. I could always be wrong, but it's been my personal experience that the blogger.com blogs I've put up go up in ranking faster than my hosted WP blogs. And if you don't want it to look cheesy you can always buy yourself a .com and then re-direct it to your free blog. Just a thought..

I'd still go with WP just because I'm used to it, personally.

 

Does hosted blogspot allow for placement of Google AdSense?