Wednesday 24 April 2013

Try WordPress On Free Web Hosting

MOST IMPORTANT NOTE: I DO NOT RECOMMEND ANYONE TO START A WORDPRESS BLOG WITH FREE HOSTING. ANY FREE WEB HOSTING MUST BE USED FOR ONLY EXPERIMENTING PURPOSE.

That is because there are too many risks of hosting a WordPress.org blog on free hosting. More information below.

In the previous article we were discussing about starting a blog with some little investments like a domain name and a web hosting. Then we discussed about the 3 best web hosting providers for a WordPress blog.
Free WordPress Web Hosting
Image credit: Staurt Miles/FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Now if you are hesitating a bit before investing in a web hosting plan, then you can use a free web host to try WordPress for free. You can also get a free sub-domain from these sites to point your WordPress blog to. And after trying out the basics of WordPress, you can get a web hosting plan and host your new site with it.

Before having a look at these free web hosting providers, let us have a look at the disadvantages and risks with free web hosting.

Risks and Disadvantages of using a Free Web Host

  • Very low disk space.
  • Low bandwidth.
  • No support team with most of the free web hosts.
  • No guarantee of uptime and even your whole blog! (Even if they say so).
  • Your blog may be deleted any time! (Even if they guarantee your safety. I have the proof myself because my test blog was automatically deleted after few weeks without my concern!)
  • Forced advertisement on some free web hosting sites.
So that is why I don't recommend anyone to trust these free web hosting providers for their commercial blog.

Free Web Hosting Providers

Here I will mention 3 of the best free web hosting providers for hosting a WordPress blog. These web hosts are chosen on the basis of web space, bandwidth and other features along with their nature of forcing advertisements or not.

1. Byet Host

For my test blog, I used Byet Host and I was able to install WordPress very easily on it. Also I found the uptime to be very decent.

Some of the main features of Byet Host are:
  • 1000 MB Disk Space
  • FTP account and File Manager
  • Control Panel
  • MySQL databases & PHP Support
  • Free tech support
  • Addon domain, Parked Domains, Sub-Domains
  • Free Community Access (Forums)
  • Clustered Servers
  • No forced ads.
More info here.

2. 000WebHost

000WebHost is actually a very famous free web hosting provider. This web host has been providing free hosting options since the last 2 years.

Some of the main features of 000WebHost are:
  • 1500 MB Disk Space
  • 3 GB data transfer
  • 99% uptime
  • Automated weekly backups
  • Autoinstaller for 10 scripts including WordPress.org
  • PHP with MySQL database support
  • cPanel Control Panel
  • No forced ads.
More info here.

3. 100WebSpace

100WebSpace.com provides two basically free plans. One with forced ads and other without ads that cost $0.99/month.

Some of the main features of 100WebSpace are:
  • 100 MB Disk Space
  • 3 GB data transfer
  • 24/7 Customer support
  • 1 domain and 10 sub-domains supported
  • FrontPage extensions support
  • MySQL database with 5MB storage
More info here.

Beware!

Once again, I would like to remind you all that you SHOULD NEVER go for free web hosting if you are serious about your blog.

Use any of these free web hosts to experiment and get the feel of WordPress and then go for paid WordPress hosting.

What do you say about them?

Do comment and let us know!

Tuesday 23 April 2013

Top 3 Web Hosting Providers For Your WordPress Blog

Best Web Hosting For WordPress Blog
After getting a domain name, the next requirement to start a perfect blog is to get a perfect web hosting plan. Choosing the perfect web host can be a difficult task because today, there are lots of web hosting providers with their lots of unique features and different plans.

But here, we have made this task easier for you by finding the best web hosting for your blog.

This article is specially for those who are looking for the best web hosting provider for a WordPress.org blog but overall the below mentioned web hosts are very suitable for hosting any blog.

So let us get to the top 3 web hosting providers for your WordPress blog!

3. Web Hosting Hub

Best Web Hosting For WordPress Blog
Web Hosting Hub is preferred as a very suitable web host for hosting any type of blog, not just a WordPress blog. This web hosting provider gets the 3rd spot in this list.

Some of the main features of Web Hosting Hub are:
  • Unlimited Disk Space 
  • Unlimited Bandwidth 
  • Unlimited Websites 
  • Free Domain Registration or Transfer
  • Free Blogging Software
  • Free Premium Website Builder
  • Easy-to-Use Control Panel
  • 24/7 Top U.S. Technical Support
  • 90 Day Full Money Back Guarantee
  • Unlimited MYSQL Databases
Pricing: $4.95/month.

Visit Web Host Site: Web Hosting Hub

2. Bluehost

Best Web Hosting For WordPress Blog
Even WordPress.org recommends Bluehost for hosting a WordPress blog. It is because of its perfect features and reliability that this web host gets the 2nd spot in this list.

Some of the awesome features provided by Bluehost are:
  • Unlimited Domain Hosting
  • Unlimited GB Hosting Space
  • Unlimited GB File Transfer
  • Unlimited E-mail Accounts
  • Free Domain
  • Free Site Builder with templates
  • Secure Shell, SSL, FTP, Statistics
  • CGI, Ruby (RoR), Perl, PHP, MySQL
  • $100 Google Advertising Offer
  • 24/7 Phone, Chat & Email Support
Pricing: $4.95/month.

Visit Web Host Site: Bluehost

1. Hostgator

Best Web Hosting For WordPress Blog
Hostgator is the most famous and most preferred web hosting provider when it comes to hosting a WordPress Blog. Ask any fellow WordPress blogger and he will suggest you to buy web hosting from Hostgator.

Hostgator has an awesome support team who are always ready to help you. With cPanel, you can install WordPress easily on Hostgator and during almost every festive season, you can get huge discounts by Hostgator.

Some of the features of this best web hosting company are:
  • Unlimited Disk Space
  • Unlimited Bandwidth
  • Free Site Builder 
  • Easy Control Panel
  • 1-Click Script Installs
  • 4,500 Free Website Templates
  • 99.9% Uptime Guarantee
  • 45 Day Money Back Guarantee
  • 24/7/365 Technical Support
  • $100 Google AdWords Offer
All this at a price of $3.96/month. 

And you can also get a 25% discount on your purchased package by using this coupon during signing up - "bloggingpanoramasave25" (without qoutes).

Visit Host Site: Hostgator

Note that all the prices mentioned in this article were noted at the time of editing and are liable to change any time.

Affiliate Disclosure: Some of the above provided links are affiliate links. It means that if you purchase the service by following this link, then I would receive a commission for it. No extra costs will be charged to you however!

Image credit: anankkml/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Starting A Perfect Blog With Little Investment

This article is a part of "How To Start A Blog" series of tutorials.

In the previous articles of this series, we had discussed about starting a blog with zero investment, i.e. starting a completely free blog. Now if you are reading this article, then most probably you have a small or large budget with you to invest in your blog, to start your blog more professionally.

Start A Perfect Blog

Earlier in our discussion, we had come to the conclusion that Blogger and WordPress.org are the two best blogging platforms to start a blog.

With both these blogging platforms, you can start a perfect blog with little investment.

Let us consider the investments one by one.

A Domain Name

To start a professional blog, you would need a domain name. A domain name is the web address of your blog. Eg- bloggingpanorama.com . This is how a visitor may enter your blog.

If we talk about Blogger, then it has the option to use a free sub-domain with your blog. But if you are looking for a more professional start, then you MUST buy a domain name for your blog. While buying a domain name for a WordPress.org blog is compulsory.


Remember! The domain name suggests your blog, so choose wisely! And after choosing a domain name according to your blog's topic, go ahead and register it through any of the best domain registrars.

A Web Hosting Plan

Web hosting is a kind of storage facility that lets you store things on the Internet. If you are creating a website or a blog, then you need such web space to store your blog's contents like images, videos, themes, your blog posts and everything else.

In case of blogger, there is no need to buy a hosting plan because Google provides free hosting to blogs hosted on Blogger.

In case of WordPress.org, you need to purchase a web hosting plan for your blog. Don't worry about this. Read this article about the 3 best web hosting providers for your WordPress.org blog.

Also, if you want to try out how a WordPress.org blog works without spending money on web hosting, then for you, here is an article about a method to try WordPress.org for free.

Now after discussing about the investments, let us continue with starting a blog with Blogger and WordPress.org

Starting A Blog With Blogger

Starting a blog with Blogger (also called Blogspot) with these little investments is as simple as starting a free blogger blog. And actually it is the first step itself!

First of all, even if you have bought a domain name for your blog, you will have to create a blogger blog with a free sub-domain and then redirect your blogger blog to the newly bought custom domain.

Starting A Blog With WordPress.org

WordPress.org is in some cases, an even more preferred blogging platform than Blogger. Though not as easy to set-up, WordPress.org is a very user-friendly platform that lets you do many powerful things with your blog with just a click of your mouse.

With WordPress.org, you get a huge list of plugins and themes that you can't find in Blogger. One can say that WordPress.org is a professional blogging platform.

Here is a tutorial on installing WordPress: How To Setup A WordPress Blog

Over to You!

Which is the first blog you spent some money on? Wasn't it a great experience?

Do share it with me and our going-to-be-blogger friends!

Thursday 18 April 2013

Creating A WordPress.com Blog In 2 Minutes

This article is a part of "How to Start a Blog" series.

In the previous article, we had discussed about two of the most preferred blogging platforms for creating a free blog - Blogger and WordPress.com

If you have chosen to start your free blog with WordPress.com, then for you, this is an article that helps you create a WordPress.com blog in just 2 minutes.
Create a WordPress.com Blog

So let's get started!

Step 1 - Creating a WordPress.com Account


Visit WordPress.com and click on 'Get Started' to sign-up for an account. You will be asked your email-id, choose a username that is available and if you want, then you can choose a domain name for your new WordPress.com here itself.

Create a WordPress.com Blog

And if you want to skip choosing a blog address, then just click on 'signup for just a username' on the right side of the screen, next to the 'Blog Address' field.

After all the details are entered properly, click on 'Signup'.

All this takes only 1 minute.

Step 2 - Confirming the Account and Starting Your WordPress.com Blog


A confirmation link would be sent to your email-id that you used to sign-up for the WordPress.com account.

Follow the link to confirm your account.

Congrats! Now just login to your newly created WordPress.com account and you are ready to create your WordPress.com blogs!

If you didn't enter a blog address at the time of sign-up, then you can start creating your own blogs, by clicking on the 'Create a New Blog' link in the 'My Blogs' tab.

Create a WordPress.com Blog

Here, you will have to choose a blog address and choose a nice name for your blog. Tips for choosing a blog address are similar to the tips to choose a domain name for eg - keep it small and clean, easy to remember, related to your topic, etc.

Now at the bottom of the form, you would find 3 different plans to choose from. Here, we are discussing about creating a completely free WordPress.com blog, so choose the 'Basic' plan, which is completely free.

Now click on Signup and you are done! All this in just 1 minute...

Congrats!

You are done with creating your first WordPress.com blog! And that too within 2 minutes! ( If your internet speed favors you ;) )

So how was it?

Did the article help you? Would you like to share about your blog here?

Fell free to comment and share your views!

And happy blogging...

And do check out my "How to Start a Blog" series if you are planning out your first ever blog.

Wednesday 17 April 2013

Creating A Blogger (Blogspot) Blog in 3 Minutes

This article is a part of "How to Start a Blog" series.

In the previous article, we had discussed about two of the most preferred blogging platforms for creating a free blog - Blogger and WordPress.com

If you have chosen to start your free blog with Blogger, then for you, this is an article that helps you create a Blogger (Blogspot) blog in just 3 minutes.
Create A Blogger Blog

So lets get started!

Step 1 - Creating a Google Account


Don't worry, it is nothing like a bank account or anything tricky. 

Most of you would already be having an account created by now. Even if you had signed-up for gmail, it means that you have created a Google account that can be used with Blogger too. In this case, skip this step.

If you have never created a Google account, then just go to Blogger.com and click on Sign-up. Fill in the required details and your account would be ready in 1 minute.

Step 2 - Creating a Blogger Profile


Again a simple step.

Just login to Blogger.com with your newly created email id and password. After signing in for the first time, you would get a screen similar to below:

Create A Blogger Blog

This screen lets you decide whether you want to create a Google+ profile or use a limited blogger profile for your blogs. A profile here, is similar to any social networking profile like Facebook or Twitter. It would contain a short bio about you and would contain your photo so that people can know about the author (you) of your blogs.

I recommend anyone to create a Google+ profile here, because it takes just 1 minute and it works as a great platform for sharing your blog and blog articles. You will realize about the importance of Google+ as you continue your blogging career.

Step 3 - Creating The Blog...


OK. So now all the necessary formalities of sign-up are completed and you can start creating your own blogs now.

Create A Blogger Blog

The screenshot above shows the first page that you would run into after logging in. Find the 'New Blog' button on the left side of the screen and click on it.

Create A Blogger Blog

This will open a screen as shown above.

Here, you will have to fill the name of your going-to-be blog and choose a suitable sub-domain for it that is available. The sub-domain along with the '.blogspot.com' would be the web address for your blog. Eg - sampletestblog11.blogspot.com is my chosen web address (screenshot). Tips for choosing a sub-domain would be similar to the tips to choose a domain name for eg - keep it small and clean, easy to remember, related to your topic, etc.

If you have bought a domain name and want to set-up this blog on your custom domain, then also you will have to choose a sub-domain temporarily. And after setting up the blog, you can move your blogger blog to custom domain.

Choose a theme template for your blog (You can change or edit the theme anytime in future) and click on 'Create blog!'

Congrats!

You have created your Blogger blog! And that too within 3 minutes...( If your internet speed favors you ;) )

Now look at the screenshot below:

Create A Blogger Blog

You would get such a screen after successfully creating your Blogger Blog.

Now you can write blog posts on it, edit its template, settings and everything else. Your blog is now ready!

To see how your newly created Blogger blog looks like, just click on the 'View Blog' button shown in the right side of the screen or type your blog's web address on your internet browser's address bar.

So how was it?


Did the article help you? Would you like to share about your blog here?

Fell free to comment and share your views!

And happy blogging...

And do have a look at my "How to Start a Blog" section if you are planning out your first ever blog.

Sunday 14 April 2013

Blogger vs WordPress.com - Think Before Starting A Free Blog

Blogger and WordPress.com are the two most well known blogging platforms for starting a free blog.

Both of them have their pros and cons and also many differences. If you are planning to start your first ever blog, then there are chances that you are not completely aware of the various blogging platforms you can choose from. 

In this case, to choose the best blogging platform, you need to consider the pros and cons of each platform and according to your needs...Choose the best one.
The Best - Blogger vs WordPress.com
Image Credit - Stuart Miles/FreeDigitalPhotos.net
In the previous article (here), we were discussing about starting a completely free blog, where I mentioned about Blogger and WordPress.com as the most famous free blogging platforms. Both these platforms solve the basic necessity of building a blog - i.e. domain and hosting, by providing free sub-domains and free web space.

Note that we are not discussing about WordPress.org here. WordPress.org is almost completely different that WordPress.com though both of them work on the same core system. To start a blog on WordPress.org, you need to buy both a domain as well as hosting yourself.

Here, we are going to discuss about WordPress.com and Blogger only.

Both these blogging platforms have a huge list of differences which you MUST consider before choosing the best one for yourself.

Let us have a look at the general pros and cons of each of them first.

1. Blogger

BloggerBlogger is a widely used and completely free blogging platform by Google. It provides a free sub-domain of its site, eg. xyz.blogspot.com as well as truly unlimited web space on its own server.

Pros: 

1. Easy to setup and maintain.

2. Truly unconditional unlimited web space.

3. Free sub-domain.

4. No Third Party (or even Google) Ads run on your blog for their profit against your will.

5. 1 GB free images hosting with Picassa which can be extended at a minimal cost. No limit of web space for blog posts though.

6. Can customize your template (blog theme), add new HTML codes and create your own theme without any restriction.

7. Can run HTML as well as Javascript codes on your blog, thus enables use of Google Adsense and other advertising services.

8. Almost 0% chances of your blog getting hacked.

9. Huge collection of free themes available online to give your blog a new fresh look.

10. In-built stats counter to check traffic to your blog. Also Google Analytics (another better traffic stats indicator) can be installed.

Cons:

1. Editing the template requires knowledge of HTML.

2. Psychological effect - Now a days, more and more spam bloggers prefer 'blogger' platform because of its ease of use and so the first look of a blogger blog hosted on free sub-domain raises the impression of spam. 

This effect can easily be removed by buying a domain and shifting your blogger blog to that custom domain. Anyways, talking about starting a blog with zero expense...people prefer the name xyz.wordpress.com than xyz.blogspot.com

3. SEO, i.e. Search Engine Optimization is a term used for the methods used to improve a blog's ranking in search engine result pages. 

No need to worry about this new term yet! 

I am just saying that SEO is a bit more difficult in Blogger than WordPress.com or I must say that it is difficult if you are lazy. Because WordPress.com provides some features for automatic SEO while some of these features are absent in Blogger.

But once you learn the basics of SEO, you can easily optimize your blogger site with little effort.

2. WordPress.com

WordPressWordPress.com is another almost free blogging platform by Automattic. WordPress.com also provides free sub-domain. eg xyz.wordpress.com and a limited amount of free web space.


Pros:

1. Easy to setup and maintain.

2. Free sub-domain.

3. 3GB free web space that includes space for your blog posts as well as images.

4. Easier, direct and automatic SEO compared to Blogger.

5. Highly secure system with very rare chances of getting hacked.

Cons:

1. Did you notice that I have underlined the word 'almost' in the first paragraph about WordPress.com? That is because most of its features are free up-to a limit and also, there are some extra features which are not compulsory, are available by paying some annual price.

2. 3GB of web space, which can be extended at a cost starting from $20/year.

3. You cannot modify the CSS used on your blog, thus disabling you from making changes to the design of your blog.

4. You cannot add any plugin or HTML/Javascript code to your blog. Thus no Adsense, no Analytics. Though advertisement can be enabled if your blog receives more than 25000 traffic/month by using a feature called Ad control where you have to share 50% of your income to it.

5. Third party ads seldom run on your blog by WordPress.com for their profit. Disabling these ads require a feature costing $29.97/year

6. Can't use your own theme. You have to choose a theme from the list of about 200 themes provided by WordPress.com itself. Not a large problem though.

Conclusion For Blogger vs WordPress.com

If you are just looking for the best platform for building a small blog without any big future idea for it, then both Blogger and WordPress.com can offer you the basic platform to start your blog.

If you have some future ideas of building a larger blog with an eye on monetizing it, go for Blogger.

And if you are looking for a more professional blog with large scale ideas...then consider investing some money on your blog and avoid a free sub-domain. In this case, remove WordPress.com completely from your mind and think about only Blogger and WordPress.org. 

Over to you!

Planning to start a blog on any of these two blogging platforms?

Which one did you decide? Blogger or WordPress.com?

Do comment and let us know.

And do remind me if I missed something in this article, OK?

Happy Blogging!

Friday 12 April 2013

How To Start A Completely Free Blog At Zero Cost

This article is a part of the "How To Start A Blog" series of tutorials. 

If you’re reading this article than most probably you’re on your way towards starting your own blog. I had mentioned in the earlier article that you can create a blog either by investing a little amount of money or even at zero cost. 

This article deals with starting a completely free blog i.e. at zero expense.

Free

There are many blogging platforms that will let you create a blog without any charges. Two such blogging platforms that are used worldwide and are most famous are Blogger and Wordpress.com 

(Note- there are two different versions of WordPress namely Wordpress.com and Wordpress.org out of which Wordpress.com is a completely free one. Creating a Wordpress.org blog requires a little investment about which more information will be available in my upcoming articles.) 

The Basic Idea Behind “Free” Blog 

You would be wondering how these two blogging platforms our completely free, wouldn't you ? 

So here is the basic funda behind these two platforms. By now you would be familiar that creating a blog or a website requires two things- a domain and a hosting

Blogger and Wordpress.com offer a free sub-domain of their sites blogspot.com and wordpress.com respectively. That is why blogs created on these sites have a web address like xyz.blogspot.com or xyz.wordpress.com 

So this solves the problem of getting a domain. Now the only thing that you need is hosting. 

And yes, let me make it clear that getting a sub-domain from these sites is not a compulsory choice because you can also buy a domain name yourself and use it with blogger and wordpress.com but as far as this article is concerned we’re talking about creating a blog at zero expense. So getting yourself a sub-domain from these sites is the best choice. 

Also be sure not to fall in the scams related to free sub-domain registrars. 

The second thing needed is hosting and fortunately both blogger and wordpress.com offer free hosting on their own servers. 

Benefits Of Starting A Completely Free Blog 

If you’re completely new to blogging then it would be better to try out your newly learned basics on a free blog. I don't want to make you worry but it is a simple truth that most of the bloggers fail to get any success with their first blogs. I don't want any of my readers who are going to be bloggers to quit blogging with a loss. 

And that is why I recommend every new blogger to first of all experiment with a free Blogger or Wordpress.com blog. 

And that is what actually even I did. I started my first blog on the Blogger platform on their free sub-domain. And eventually when my blog started making money, I purchased a domain name for it. 

Disadvantages Of Starting A Free Blog On Free Sub-domain

The only disadvantage that I've noticed with a free sub-domain is that people don’t take you seriously. People think that you are not serious about your blog. 

Unless you buy yourself a domain name for your blog, people recognize your blog as just another free Blogger or Wordpress.com blog and not as some author’s blog. You do not get your own brand, your own identity unless you buy at least a domain name for your blog. 

But still I recommend trying out an experiment blog on either Blogger or Wordpress.com platform. Just to get the primary practical knowledge and experience about blogging. And once you gain confidence and think that you can maintain your own blog, just go for spending some money for the blog. 

So far in this article we have discussed about platforms for starting a free blog, its merits and demerits. 

Now let us move on to creating a completely free blog. 

But wait! Which free blogging platform should you use? Confused? 

Then just read this article – Blogger vs Wordpress.com 

After reading this article about Blogger and Wordpress.com, let us move on to starting a free blog on either platforms. 

If you have decided to go with Blogger, then read this tutorial for creating a Blogger blog.

If you have decided to go with WordPress.com, then read this tutorial for creating a WordPress.com blog.

What Do You Say? 

Have you ever started a blog on the free sub-domains on blogger or wordpress.com? How was your experience? Do comment and share your views with me and our going-to-be-blogger friends.. 

And feel free to ask any question arising in your mind. Your suggestions are also welcome…

Thursday 11 April 2013

Top 3 Reliable And Affordable Domain Registrars

My previous article dealt with some tips to consider before buying a domain name. Now that you have chosen the perfect domain name for your blog you would be looking for the perfect domain registrar.

Domain Registration

A domain registrar is a company that lets you buy and register a domain name. All such domain registrars charge a certain fixed amount of money for registering the domain for you. A domain is registered on a "per year" scale. You can register a domain for 1 or 2 years or even 10 years. Even if you register a domain for only 1 year, you can renew your registration for next years anytime from the same domain registrar which also costs a certain charge on a "per year" scale.

I hope this clears the concept.

Also read about the scams related to free domain registrations. Don't fall for these scams!

So now without wasting time, let me introduce you to the 3 most well known, reliable and at the same time affordable domain registrars.

The domain prices are subject to change very frequently and some of these 3 registrars mentioned below are famous for providing festive discounts throughout the year :) Thus mentioning the domain prices today would be useless for tomorrow. So I have not mentioned the current prices for registering domains through these registrar sites. But I assure you all that these 3 registrars are the most affordable and reliable ones.

1. Godaddy

Godaddy
Personally I prefer Godaddy the most. All my domains are registered through Godaddy and they have never provided me any chance for complaining.

Also there are many Godaddy promo codes available throughout the net that gift you with great discounts of upto even 80%.

Godaddy also offers other paid services like SSL certificate, WhoIsGuard and many more. All these services are optional but one can consider buying them if they can afford a few extra dollars per year. Godaddy is considered the largest domain registrar for present.

Check out domains by Godaddy here.

2. Name.com

Name.com
Name.com is another reliable domain registrar that has been in this field from several years.

Name.com also provides extra services like SSL certificate,etc at an extra cost. This registrar can be considered as another affordable one.

3. Namecheap.com

Namecheap
As the name suggests, Namecheap is a real expert in providing domains at comparatively low price. At the time of writing, Namecheap provided registrations of .com domain for just $3.95 (This figure is subject to change anytime) while the above two cost about $9-10 for the same.

Along with the cheap price, Namecheap is also a reliable domain registrar used by many people out there. Namecheap also provides services like SSL certificate, WhoIsGuard, etc.

What do you say about these registrars?

How many of you have registered a domain before? Did you register it from any of these registrar sites or from some other site not mentioned here?

Do let us know your experience with your domain registrar and share your views with us!

Image credit- Stuart Miles/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

9 Tips to Choose The Best Domain Name

This article is a part of the "How to Start a Blog" set of tutorials for beginners.

Choosing the perfect domain name is the first and most important step in pro blogging. And getting your hands on the best available domain is a very difficult task. Today, with millions of websites online, it becomes very hard to get the domain name you like.

finding domain
I would suggest anyone to buy a domain from godaddy.com because of the following reasons:
  • Cheapest domain name registration
  • Promo coupons and discounts
  • Easy to set up CNAME records for Blogger
  • Good customer support
These reasons are enough I guess? You can always get a promo coupon by doing a Google search for them. These promo coupons let you buy your .com/.net/.org or any other domain at a much cheaper price. When I registered Blogging Panorama, I got it for $2.95 only.

And one line of recommendation from my side: NEVER go for free subdomains like .co.cc or .tk. If you are serious about your blog, then buy a domain and as I said earlier, you can get one for as low as $2.95 (by using Godaddy promo coupons)

Also read: Top 3 Affordable Domain Registrars

While looking for the best available domain name, always consider these 9 tips:
  1. Keep the domain name related to your blog's niche. And avoid using your own name as domain name unless you site would be a personal blog or you are going to share personal success stories. Though there are good examples of blogs with domain name the same as the name of their owners like ZacJohnson.com. But you should consider your blog's niche more than your own name.
  2. Do check if the name you are interested in buying is a trademark of any existing company. You should never do a mistake of registering a domain name which contains any commercial company's trademark in it. They may register a complaint against your registration and it can lead to the end of your domain. For example you cannot use 'WordPress' in your domain name because it is against their permission. Also you can't use any offensive word from any language in your domain name.
  3. Try to keep your domain name understandable and short. I give more preference to 'understandable' than 'short' because it is more important that your visitors remember your site's address than they remember a random phrase like 'mpvr.com' and even if your domain name is 10-15 characters long but it is understandable and related to your blog's content, the search engines won't mind the long domain name.
  4. AVOID exact keyword match domain because they are getting penalized by Google thanks to their latest algorithm updates.
  5. Check if a similar name is already on the first page of Google. For example if you are thinking about the name 'TechyPC' then do a search for the words techy and PC. Suppose if there is a site with a name 'TechyGuy' or something very near to your interested name, then drop the idea. You won't want to compete with the other site to get on top of Google from the very first day of your registration.
  6. Look for the domain name that matches your site's name like bloggingpanorama.com for 'Blogging Panorama'. Though there are some blogs who have different site name and domain name. One of them is Digital Inspiration (labnol.org)
  7. Give more preference to .com/.net/.org than to .info/.co/.us/.uk/.in or any other country-TLD. Country TLDs are not good for global SEO as they tend to target only a specific geographic region.
  8. Buying an old domain can be benefitial in some cases. Old domains have are more trusted by Google and can rank easier with all those ready made backlinks and traffic. Though today, the meaning of SEO is changing and it doesn't matter very much, but still it can be a little benefit. But be sure to check that the domain was used for the right purposes and was not blacklisted or banned from Adsense.
  9. Check the existing PR and Alexa Rank of the domain if you are buying an old domain. Also check Internet Archive to find out how the domain was used earlier.
So these were my 9 tips to choosing the best domain name. Do you have any more suggestions? Do comment and let me know.

Image credit: Digitalart/FreeDigitalPhotos.net

This article is a part of the "How to Start a Blog" set of tutorials. Do read the remaining parts :)

Wednesday 10 April 2013

How To Start A Blog - Beginner's Guide

Hello and welcome potential future bloggers!

Did you by any chance hear about blogging from anywhere? Maybe some of your friends are bloggers? Maybe you read about blogging and how you can earn a living by working online. And maybe you want to start blogging too? And so you searched about how you can start your own blog and this is how you reached here!

How to Start a Blog

Confused about what is blogging?

Let me give you an example, this article that you are reading just now belongs to a blog, ie Blogging Panorama and I am a blogger :)

What is a Blog?

In simple language, a blog (or Weblog) is some kind of website; basically a kind of journal that is regularly updated. And the person who blogs is called a blogger.

At a blog, a blogger writes about some topic; it can be anything like technology, cooking, sports or anything that comes to your mind. People who come to your blog are called visitors.

This is the basic introduction to this huge world of blogging. Below is a short set of points that would let you understand more on what you would be doing if you create your blog:

  • You will choose a name and a design.
  • You will be writing about your favourite topic.
  • People will come to your blog.
  • People will read what you have written.
  • You will get "famous" if people like what you read :)
  • You will get a chance to earn money online from your blog if you get many visitors to your blog!
I hope this was enough to clear the basic concept.

Recently I got many requests from my friends to teach them how to make a blog. So I decided to add a "beginner's guide" section to my blog. Here I will be posting articles related to starting a blog.

I have already written some articles that a going-to-be-blogger MUST read before starting a blogging life. You can find a link to those posts and many other important posts further in this article.

Articles You MUST Read Before Starting A Blog

How To Start A Blog

Here are some of the hand picked, very important articles you must read before creating a blog. You should know what you will have to face (and also enjoy) during your blogging life.

And if you have some extra dollars to spend for your future blogging career, then I recommend you to get a copy of "31 Days To Build A Better Blog - Darren Rowse". Darren Rowse is a great name in the field of blogging and is a real expert.

This book may be of great help and guidance while starting your own blogging career.

So now have you decided to start a blog? Then go ahead and read these important posts and tutorials:

Starting A Blog - First Step - Choosing The Best Niche

A 'Niche' means a range of topics.

For your blog, choosing the best and most appropriate topic is the most necessary and crucial step. Because it is the topic that would run your blog. An ideal niche is something you are an expert in, and can share many interesting posts about. Don't choose a topic just because you have seen many great blogs about it and you think you can copy their success.

Even a completely different niche can work great. You would have noticed that most of the blogs today cover either tech or blogging niche. But that doesn't mean that a blog about food or travel can't get success. A blog runs the best when its owner is well versed with the topic it covers.

I can't offer even a single tip for choosing the proper niche other than this - Just start a blog on the topic that you think you know more than most of the people in this world.

The Next Steps...

This whole set of tutorials would be divided into various parts which would cover all the topics related to starting a blog. Primarily this tutorial will be divided into two parts for the first few posts. One for those who are willing to start a blog at completely zero cost and second for those who are willing to invest a bit in their blog.

Links to all the parts of this tutorial are available below.

Note- If you are interested in building a blog with zero investment then skip the domain registration part and jump to the article about starting a free blog.

Part 1. Getting A Domain Name

Unless you use a free sub-domain (more information below); the first step to start a blog is - choosing a domain name for it and buying it. A domain name is the web address (URL) you choose for your blog. Eg- www.bloggingpanorama.com

For free blogging services like Blogger and WordPress.com, you can skip buying a domain and use one of the free sub-domains they provide you. More details about free sub-domains and domains will be included in the upcoming post "Starting a free blog".

So coming back to domain names, here is a post that will help you in deciding a great domain for your blog: 9 Tips to Choose The Best Domain Name

After choosing the perfect domain name, it is time to register it. There are lots of domain registrars available on the net but finding a reliable and really affordable one is necessary.

Fortunately there is no need for you to wander here and there to find the best one :) You can find the best ones here: Top 3 Affordable Domain Registrars

Part 2. Starting A Free Blog (Zero investment)

Starting a completely free blog is the best way to start a blogging career because this makes your blogging career risk free and loss free. Though it has its own merits and demerits as well.

For those who want to start their first blog at zero expense; hoping that you have skipped the domain part (part 1); here is the article about creating a free blog: How To Start A Completely Free Blog At Zero Cost

For those who are willing to spend a few dollars to give their blog a more professional start, skip this part and jump to Part 3 about Blogging with little investment.

Part 3. Starting A Blog With Little Investment

If you have some extra dollars to spend on your blog, then you would be more interested in starting a professional blog right from the start.

In this case, read this article: Starting A Perfect Blog With Little Investment

The investments needed are - a domain name and a web hosting. All the information regarding them can be found in the above mentioned article.

Part 4.1 Started A Blog? Now What To Do?

Phew! So now that you have created your first ever blog, you would be wondering.. what's next?

There are a lot of things associated with a blog other than just writing blog posts. You would be wondering how to write posts? How to bring visitors to my blog? And many other things, right?

Don't worry. You will grasp everything in a short time.

Read this to-do list that will guide you on what to do after you have started your first ever blog.

Part 4.2. Basic knowledge about Blogging skills

After reading the to-do list, get ready to read the top secret recipe for blogging like a pro

These are the skills and requirement you should read to learn about professional blogging and how you can become a professional blogger too.

Part 4.3. Promoting Your Blog and Driving Traffic (Visitors) To It

After you have written a few posts at your blog, you would be waiting for some visitors to read them, right? But maybe after few days of waiting you find no-one visiting your blog..

If you are struggling to drive traffic to your blog, then here is my guide to bring the first visitors to your blog!

It all starts with promoting your blog.. Read the whole 3 step ladder I used to build traffic for this blog here: Publicizing Your Blog And Driving Traffic To It.

Part 5. Learning Search Engine Optimization and Driving Traffic From Search Engines

Once you have succeeded in bringing the first few visitors to your new blog, your next target would be to bring lots of visitors from search engines.

But bringing traffic from search engines is not that easy...Though it not difficult either!

All you need to do is optimize your blog and blog posts for those search engines, i.e. you must practice SEO!

SEO is a completely new word for you, isn't it?

Don't worry. Just read this post where all your SEO related questions are answered: What is SEO?

Got the idea about SEO? After that you should start implementing SEO in your posts and also you should focus on optimizing your blog for search engines.

When you start getting familiar with SEO, you would be able to understand this most important factor on which the whole idea of SEO is established - i.e. Keyword Research.

So now your need for starting traffic and search engine optimization is over!

Now after you start getting some decent daily visitors and start building a solid readership, you would be interested in earning some money from your blog, isn't it?

This is not the end! There are many more important posts yet to come. A list of upcoming post:

Upcoming posts:

  • Making money from blog - A Basic Concept
  • Google Adsense Approval Process
  • Basic knowledge about affiliate marketing
  • ...And many more to come...
So stay subscribed to this blog to get the latest updates and posts about starting a blog directly to your inbox!

Now its your turn!

Are you planning to start a blog? Decided? Determined? Or have any questions in your mind? Feel free to comment and ask your questions here. You can also share your ideas about starting a blog here.

So do comment and participate here!