Blogging

Last week, we talked about how to go about getting a domain for your blog. Whatever blogging platform you are using, a custom domain is always a good idea, and you can easily use the domain whether you are using Blogger, WordPress.com, or WordPress.org. Using a custom domain applies to all three of those blogging platforms.

Choosing and buying web hosting, on the other hand, would only apply to self-hosted WordPress blogs. The reason being is that if you are using Blogger or WordPress.com, your blog is being hosted by either Blogger or WordPress for free. Free hosting is great, but there are definitely limitations to what you can do when your blog is being hosted free of charge. For example, with WordPress.com you only have a select number of themes in which to choose from for your design, and you don’t have the ability to add plugins for ultra cool functionality.

Enter self-hosted WordPress. With a self-hosted WordPress blog, you would purchase a hosting package from a number of different web hosts – some of the most popular and reputable being:

HostGator

Inmotion

Bluehost

I personally use HostGator for the four websites that I need hosting for. I’ve had a wonderful experience with HostGator, and they’re customer service is excellent plus they just keep getting better and better at what they do and the services that they offer – making my life easier as a designer. But the other two web hosts, Inmotion and Bluehost are in the top ten list of great web hosts as well, so, you probably can’t go wrong with them either. 🙂

The way you’d purchase hosting for your soon-to-be or future self-hosted WordPress blog, would be to visit the sites of a few different hosts, go through their plans, examine what you need (i.e. hosting for only one domain or multiple domains); read reviews, and then purchase the right plan for your blog or blogs. And don’t worry if you don’t purchase the “right” plan on the first shot. You may purchase a plan to host only one domain and if you find that you’d actually like to be able to host more than one blog as you become more fabulous and expand your influence in the blogosphere, you can just upgrade later on.

Here are a few more tips to consider and help you along in the process:

1. When you are starting to compare plans, keep a notebook handy to jot down prices and features.

2. You can save money by not doing the monthly plan and instead paying all at once for say 2yrs. of hosting. I like doing the lump sum to save money and not have to think about it every month. Set it and forget it, anyone?

3. Write down everything. Write down the plan you chose, how much you paid, and don’t forget to write down your passwords, too.

4. Once you purchase a plan, you will have access to your specific control panel – also sometimes called a cPanel – bookmark it!

5. Choose a password for your cPanel (Control Panel) that’s different from the login and password to your WordPress blog.

6. Watch the tutorials or hire a designer (like me :-)) to get WordPress set up for you because if you don’t know what you are doing, you may become frustrated and want to bang your head against the nearest wall.

If you have any more questions about hosting, I’d be happy to answer them. I know when I first started blogging, I had NO idea what hosting was, much less how to go about setting it up and using it.

Okay, we’ve talked about where to start when you are thinking about starting a blog, and we’ve talked about the differences between Blogger & WordPress. Now it’s time to talk about the next most important thing to do when you have made your decision about which Blogging platform you want to go with….choosing and buying a domain.

To start off,  if you are asking yourself what in the world a domain is, I’ll explain. A domain is essentially your web site address. For example, the domain name for this blog is www.thesensiblemom.com. Your domain would be something like www.yourwebsitename.com or .net or .org, etc…..

It’s pretty easy to understand, and once you have the understanding of what a domain is, you need to know where to find out if the domain you want for your site is available and where you can purchase it from. There are plenty of domain registrars out there, but here’s small list to get you started in your search:

Network Solutions (I’ve used them before and was pretty happy.)

GoDaddy (I currently use godaddy for all of my domains – 5 total.)

Namecheap

To find out if the domain you want is available, I suggest doing a search for it in a search engine or typing it directly into the address bar of your browser. Don’t search for it directly on the domain registrar until you are ready to buy. This is because domains seem to have a way of disappearing when you search for them directly on the domain registrar’s website – this is what I’ve read at least. Once you know that the domain name you want is available, go ahead and purchase it from a domain registrar.

If you’ve never purchased a domain before, it might surprise you that the cost is relatively cheap. I pay betwen $8-$12 a year for each of my domains, and I always make sure to use a coupon code! 😉 The process to purchase a domain on these sites is pretty straightforward. Although, I’ve noticed that it can be a bit confusing on godaddy.com because of all the “extra” stuff they give you the option to add on. Simply click “No Thanks” to all of the extras.

And that’s it. Once you get through that process, you will own use of a domain for typically 1 year. After that, if you still want to keep that domain, you’ll simply renew it with the domain registrar.

Next week, I will talk about web hosting. Once you have web hosting set up, then you can log into your account with the domain registrar you’ve chosen and change the nameservers for your domain to the nameservers given to you by your web host. That way your domain will point to the server where your fabulous new blog or website is hosted.

If anyone has any specific questions about this process, I’d be happy to answer them in the comments section. Also, if you have purchased your own domain, I’d love to know which domain registrar you use and your experience with them so far. 🙂