making money from internet

Should you host your blog yourself or pay someone to host it? It doesn’t matter if you’re a newbie or a veteran this question always comes up when creating a new blog. Usually someone new to blogging would gravitate to hosting a blog themselves or get a free blog and as time goes by with experience they begin to ponder maybe paid blog hosting isn’t so bad after all. So what is better?

To answer this question, let’s first look at how a blog is created. Just like creating web pages, first, you need a software or script that will take your entries, format it and publish it to the web. The second component of a blog, is the web space, where the software should publish to, a home for the blog pages.

Knowing this information, let’s review the different ways to host a blog:

Full blog host.

This is where the blogging system or software is provided for you and your blog is also published to a web space provided by the host. Blogger, SquareSpace and Typepad fall into this category. It’s very much like creating a website with a site builder.

Hosted blog software but published elsewhere

This is where the blog software is provided for you but the blog pages are published to another website or web host altogether. By doing this, the software acts as a publishing system like FrontPage except it creates nicely formatted blogs. Blogger is probably the most well known for this. Yes Blogger can do both. Publish to their host or to yours. As a comparison, this is like using FrontPage to publish your website.

Blog software and blog are hosted on your web server

This is where you would install the blog script (software) on your web server – it can be any web hosting account. And when you publish, the blog itself resides on your web server also. To draw a parallel, this technique is like buying web hosting and then installing a content management system on it to help you build web pages.

If you’re new to building web pages or have built sites using site builders then you might want to go with a fully hosted blog. These hosts do all the nitty gritty for you and there’s very little technical stuff you need to know. If you can point and click, you can build a blog with a full blog host.

Having said that, just because you’re seasoned at building web pages doesn’t mean full blog hosts won’t work for you. In fact, if you have many blogs this becomes very appealing since you won’t have to worry about upgrading the blog script, people exploiting the script, making plug-ins work or what happens when your web host decides to disable part of your blog functions because there is a security hole. All you do is concentrate on blogging. After a while, blogging becomes more important than maintaining your blog and that’s the way it should be.

Next up, hosted software but blog is published to your website. This seems to be the best of both worlds. At time of writing, Blogger is one of the best ways to do this but because of its popularity often, you find the system too slow to publish or completely down just when you have a hot idea to share. The idea is good but you’ll also be depending on someone else’s availability to publish your blog. It’s much like using a friend’s computer to build your web pages and you know how that can go.

Finally, you have the option to use scripts. This is also a very popular method. The flexibility it allows is very liberating because you can mould the blog anyway you want. You can even get a programmer to create custom plug-ins or customize the whole blogging system the way you want it. In short, you can do pretty much anything you want.

The down side, you need at the very basic, some knowledge of HTML or publishing web pages. Also the burden of upgrading, troubleshooting and maintaining the script is on you. If you have one or two blogs it’s not so bad but once you start having more, it can be quite tedious. You also have to consider all the other responsibilities of maintaining the script as mentioned earlier.

Armed with this information, you should be able to figure out which one is for you. If you’re still undecided, think of how you would do it if you’re creating a regular website. Chances are your choice method for publishing a website is also the best method for you to create a blog.


About The Author: Lynette Chandler helps entreprenuers start blogging and make the most of their blogs. Get a free video how to set up your blog at http://www.BloggingStarterPack.com

-Margaret Stead

OR Why you should publish a blog now instead of a web site or standalone newsletter?

If there is a vital piece of advice you should take when contemplating your ‘Web platform,’ it is to use the words that
your visitor might use, in the title of your site. (Your URL.)

(Resist the temptation to call it by your name: www.kevinsmith.info because unless you are ALREADY famous, then NOBODY will
find your site by themselves, ever.)

The other trouble with choosing domains or addresses with ‘KEYWORDS’ is that you will find almost invariably, that the
minute you have chosen one (and PAID for it) - is likely to be the minute you can think of a ‘better’ one! (That is
probably why I have forty or fifty domainnames hanging around spare at GREAT expense!)

So it makes sense to use blogging software to create multiple blogs with multiple names with your multiple keywords in
them. This way if you make the wrong initial choice you can easily and cheaply switch your emphasis to ANOTHER blog. JUST
like that. What’s astounding is when you have thoroughly settled on your blogging address you can OVERLAY a traditional
domain name, becoming indistinguishable from a normal web site!

Possessing a web site has become something of a status symbol in business. But casual visitors rarely know the difference
between a web site and a blog. It is only when you get into the ranks of the IT world do you find people who can RECOGNIZE
a blog when they see one.

Many admiring commentators even PREFER blogs to web sites because of their INTERACTIVE ability and informal nature. Large
companies are increasingly using blogs to stay in touch with their customers, particularly CEOs A good example of a CEO
blog would be ‘Jonathan’s Blog’

Jonathan Schwartz puts it very well in the November 2005 issue of the Harvard Business Review:

“But it's riskier NOT to have a blog. Remember when, not long ago, CEOs would ask their assistants to print out their e-
mails for them, and they'd dictate responses to be typewritten and sent via snail mail? Where are those leaders now? (The
last of my contacts of that breed just retired.)" In ten years, most of us will communicate directly with customers,
employees, and the broader business community through blogs.

For EXECUTIVES, having a blog is not going to be a matter of choice, any more than using e-mail is today. If you're not
part of the conversation, others will speak on your behalf-and I'm not talking about your employees.” Full Article only by
subscription to HBR.

So the decision whether to have or a web site or a blog is a ‘NO-BRAINER’ for me. As well as being cheap, cheerful and
endlessly adaptable, blogs are beginning to get the RESPECT they deserve.

Newsletters (or e-zines) are still a great way to keep in touch even with just a small list of people – but they are
subject to the vagaries and fashions of the Internet GATEKEEPERS. Until recently there was a joke that was ‘going the
rounds’ amongst marketers that went something like this: ‘What do you get at the end of the year with a mailing list of
200,000?

Answer: 100,000. (Not such a ‘good’ joke, anymore.) I know, from personal experience (My newsletter is regularly read by
15,000 plus readers) that delivering e-newsletters, reliably, has become something of a nightmare. Even Alexandria K Brown,
the e-Zine Queen, now has a BLOG!

When my newsletter was inadvertently ‘bounced’, by an ‘Abuse Team’, (average age: seventeen) for containing the word
‘Hair.’ I knew it was time to look at alternative ways of keeping in touch. Blogs are PERFECT for keeping in touch with
your staff, colleagues and customers.

About the Author:
Known as 'Tom Peters Meets Reader's Digest', Margaret teaches five simple secrets of Business Blogging and Executive
Coaching, that help people just like YOU - Master New Media & Stay Connected. Enjoy her monthly blog-letter - Career Coach
http://www.careersnet.co.uk/career-change-free-prize-draw/ AND you might WIN a PRIZE!