Your Own Domain VS .WordPress.com?
So a big question a lot of people face when they first start blogging is how to set up their blog. Should it be self hosted on your own domain or can you get away with just having a .wordpress.com domain?
What’s the difference?
A WordPress.com blog a is a free blog that you set up. Its all hosted by wordpress themselves. To have a blog on your own domain you need to buy the domain (about $10), get it hosted (from about $7/month) and then upload the wordpress platform (most hosts will do this automatically for you). WordPress.com blogs are a limited version of the self hosted wordpress available at wordpress.org and give you a domain name like yourblog.wordpress.com
So which do you choose?
WordPress.com
Pros:
Free!
Quick and easy to set up
Requires almost no technical knowledge
Posibility to gain traffic through WordPress “Blogs of the Day” or Blogger search bar (very limited traffic in my experience).
WordPress handles backups
Cons:
Cant upload plugins (this is a major).
Limited to the standard themes (70+ themes and growing… slowly)
Can’t run adsense => can’t make money with adsense
Can’t edit your theme or any other part of the blog.
Your Own Domain (wordpress.org)
Pros:
Can upload plugins
Thousands of themes to choose from online (free and paid)
Complete control of your theme.
Can run adsense and profit from your blog
More professional on your own theme.
Can add it to your existing website (eg yourwebsite.com/blog)
Great community
Cons
Costs
More technical to set up
You need to handle backups yourself
Traffic spikes might cause your hosting to crash (5 Things You Should Know About Making The Digg Front Page)
My 10 Cents
I used a free platform for a grand total of 1 week before I realised I couldn’t make any changes to my theme or add plugins so I made the switch. I think owning your own domain has value and looks less amateur than the free blogs plus I wanted to run adsense. To be honest it took me a while to learn how to set up my blog an get it working as I like (heck I am still changing things) but I think there’s good value in having your own domain.
If your not very technical and you want your own domain I recommend you either ask a friend to help or pay someone to set it up for you. However if you like learning and want to have a go it’s not too tricky to figure it out and a good learning experience.
Stay tuned and I’ll put together a guide that covers the whole process See below for a free guide to get you through the whole process, you may want to download it now and save it for later.
What do you think.
Are free blogs a good place to start and then move on?
Should you set up your own domain from day one?
Or can your survive on a free blog forever?
Leave a comment with your thoughts.
Great article, while the Adsense is the biggest issues that would encourage me to swap away from the Free version, there are a few points that need to consider.
* Do you use OpenID
* Do you have good existing backlinks
* Do you have the bandwidth to support spikes of hundreds of visitors within minutes.
* Do you want to keep all your eggs in one basket (if you sell your domain/hosting fails)
.-= David´s last blog ..SEO Services Australia =-.
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I just started a blog last month, and I have been thinking about this very question all week! Thanks for outlining the pros and cons.
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@David
Good points, if you have an existing blog you need to think about the costs of switching. BTW Problogger has a great article on switching from wordpress.com to wordpress.org How To – Move From WordPress.com To WordPress.org
@Bekki
Go Self Hosted! ha
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Exactly what has been on my mind recently! I’ve been using wordpress for a couple years, with a free blog and just recently started another one for which I bought the domain, because I did not want anyone else to get the name. Now, I am trying to decide if it’s worth it to buy the domain for my personal blog, after seeing the title used elsewhere. I agree that it looks a bit more professional, and would like to learn more about the tech side, but don’t think I can handle the backup issue. Did not think about the adsense part, but that is a bonus.
.-= janflora´s last blog ..Fiction Friday: Remembering =-.
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Tim Scullin Reply:
September 15th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
@Janflora Check out the wordpress backup plugin, makes it pretty easy. Anyone know of a backup service? Paid-for or free..
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I started blogging on Blogger.com in 2005 and in June, 2009 exported it to WordPress.com
I actually do miss (some) things about Blogger – you can edit those templates, include some plugins, add analytics and put AdSense in your blog all on the free site. Overall, I like WordPress better, but miss those bits of Blogger flexibility.
Still, I’ve stayed on a free site. Yep, I could buy my primary domain name and host it myself, but as long as I’m working full time tech support, that’s not a very attractive option. I’d rather tinker with content than format or backups or software upgrades. Maybe after a year or so on the free site, I’ll decide I want more flexibility. For now, point-it-and-shoot works just fine.
.-= Pat Steer (Gaelen)´s last blog ..Pickle Jam: Home-canned Giardiniera =-.
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Squarespace is a great middle-ground option that might cost a little bit more, but edit existing templates is so simple or if you’re a CSS wiz you can start from scratch. Plus they track tons of web metrics and have some cool integrated features.
I realize I sound like an ad-bot, but they’re really good (I use them for my site).
.-= Gary´s last blog ..The darker side of online crowds =-.
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I realized how powerful the “fully hosted” WordPress platform was when I moved my sister’s small real estate website from my own server to my outsourced server that auto-installs WordPress on demand. Within a few days, her already well SEO built site soared to top positions on Google for searches that previously had her on page 3. Since then, I’ve been recommending to all my clients to use the “full hosted domain” version of WordPress either for their main site or a closely related supplemental site.
Dave Keys – Web Design
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Tim Scullin Reply:
September 16th, 2009 at 10:32 am
That’s another good reason to set up on wordpress, great SEO structure.
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Tim,
great post! I use wordpress on my own domain and its great and it isn’t that difficult to setup
David
.-= David Stillwagon´s last blog ..What is Melatonin? =-.
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I have started my blog a couple of month ago with wordress.com. It is perfect to begin and understand the blog world. Now I am preparing to move to my own domain name. I already have my name and my hosting. I am ready to install WordPress. Wish me good luck.
.-= Denis Francois Gravel (PRESENTability)´s last blog ..Audience will not understand your numbers =-.
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Tim Scullin Reply:
September 16th, 2009 at 2:20 pm
Good Luck!
Check out the post installation tips in the Setting Up WordPress guide.
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Very good article. I think wordpress.com is a nice tutorial for the real thing.
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I started out on blogger because it was easy and at the time I did not know better. After my blog took off I was able to get http://www.tacogirl.com and do a wordpress site and I highly recommend going that route from the get go. So much more flexibility and options available.
.-= tacogirl´s last blog ..New Improved tacogirl =-.
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I’m thinking of migrating from free wordpress to the self-hosted version but right now I want to focus on building up my content. Thanks for all of the advice and support and of course the free guide ;-) I think it is so nice of you to respond to my tweets!
.-= Ileane´s last blog ..Twitter meets Buzzom =-.
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Started with a free blog service and switched to a own domain for most of the possibilities you mention here. Got fed up with the limitations of free services but mostly for having to put up with any quirks the service I was using came up with. Own space = own saying = own freedom! Important to me.
Only downside was having to invest time in learning how to deal with this new gained ‘freedom’.
Now going to check out that guide you offer… I’m curious to what it says… I might learn something new… … always good to keep learning… :) Thanks for it in advance!
.-= Marisol Risakotta/ImgSensors´s last blog ..Underneath the Blue Sky =-.
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There is obviously a lot to know about this. There are some good points here. :)
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A slowly progression from free to self-hosted is my choice for the future. But first I want to concentrate on content, audience and web writing technique. A clear vision of what you want and where you want to get is fundamental before embarking in a more professional job.
.-= Margherita´s last blog ..SingulierS: gli accessori di tessuto di Nadia Dafri =-.
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As Dave Keys mentions, SEO is a HUGE reason not to host on WordPress.com. If you’re going to be using your blog as a revenue generator, there really isn’t any other choice than to host it on your own. Fortunately, the investment really isn’t all that big and is totally worth it if you’re looking to build a revenue stream out of your blog, or even to get more easily found by people seeking out the topic about which you’re writing.
Thanks for the informative post, I appreciate it!
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Tim, I just found your site. Thanks for all the good info.
I just started my blog on wordpress.com and have hit the wall on customization as you shared. I paid for hosting a few years ago but couldn’t get past all the “Geek-inese” of the CPanel. And the service had lousy tutorials. Which company, if you know, has the best support/tutorials?
I am looking forward to digging into your site some more. Thanks again.
Tom Kaye
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I’m thinking of migrating from free wordpress to the self-hosted version but right now I want to focus on building up my content.
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It is also easy to backup and transfer all your websites from one server to another server if you have cPanel installed’.’
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What company is the best Domain Registrar? i’ve heard that Godaddy and Moniker are the best.:;`
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Great and helpful post. I have a wordpress on my own domain. But I also have a blogger account and love the ease at following blogs and how you can see how many followers a people has. Is there anyway you can have a followers section on your own domain name hosting a wordpress? Thanks
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I haven’t read all the comments, so sorry if this is a repeat… but…
Then there’s the third option, which I am considering. Using wordpress.com for it’s ease of use (the limited features may actually prevent me from wasting too much time on our site!), but mapping it to our own domain for 10 bucks a year. Again, can’t run Adsense… but I’m not sure that would be appropriate for a design company anyway. The bigger issue, is that I can’t have FTP access. We like that for backups and transferring large files to clients, etc.
So then I looked at adding another 5 euro charge and taking our host up on the offer of subdomains. Then we could map wordpress to one of the subdomains, and maintain FTP at the main site. What do people think? Is this stupid? Should I just jump into WordPress.org? I know I will love it, but that’s the problem… I do have other work to do! :)
-Mariana
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