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.
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.
Read some tips on choosing a domain name for your blog.
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!
