You might already be using free blogging platforms to accomplish part or all of your online objectives, which is fantastic. After all, having a presence online is preferable to having none at all.
In the short and medium-term, “outsourcing” your content hosting to a free platform appears to be a viable option. Who wants to deal with technological difficulties when all you want to do is write, share content, and establish your authority in a lucrative niche market?
However, from a business standpoint, not hosting your own content on a platform that you own and manage might have serious consequences. If you want to establish a genuine internet business, you’ll need to host your own blog so you can have complete control over it.
Important: If you plan to utilize your website for commercial purposes, free hosting providers should be avoided.
The good news is that, in these days of fierce competition, it’s not extremely costly to host your own website, and you can do it for as little as $10 to $15 a month. In fact, web hosting firms frequently run specials up to 50% off or offer packages where you can pay for an entire year in advance, lowering the cost of hosting to less than $10 per month.
Though the attraction of “free” is apparent, there are several important reasons why you should maintain your own WordPress blog on your own web hosting account rather than using a free blogging service.
1. Customize Your Own Domain Name
Whether for business or solely social reasons, branding is an important aspect of developing a website and blog. Unfortunately, even if your blog has a fantastic name, it’s difficult to stand out on free platforms like Blogger.com, which have millions of users and blog articles.
That’s because your domain name will include the branding of the free platform you’re using in addition to the name of your blog. So, instead of “example.com,” your site would be “example.blogger.com,” or whatever the name of the free platform is.
Consider what would happen if a prominent corporation, such as Amazon.com, utilized Amazon.wordpress.com or Amazon.blogger.com as its web address. This appears to be amateurish, unprofessional, and low-cost. What kind of reputable organization can’t afford their own domain name, after all? Your internet business is no exception. You must have your own branded domain name to present a professional image.
No matter how much time and effort you put into developing good material and making a free blog appealing, the harsh reality is that you are primarily advertising the platform, not yourself or your brand. This is especially true if you must compromise on your preferred address name because your first selections are frequently taken.
Another major issue is that when you host your website on someone else’s platform, they have complete control over your site and can take it down at any time for any reason; more on this later.
2. You are the sole owner of your blog.
The blog on a free platform isn’t truly your blog at all. Because, while your wonderful material is (ideally) associated with you, the real proprietors of the site are the underlying firm (Google, WordPress, Medium, etc.). Because you have no control over the site, you risk losing your readers if you decide to switch to another free platform (or eventually to your own domain).
When you decide to migrate your own domain to another web server, all of the work you put into getting your site indexed in the search engines so that it ranks well goes to waste. To get your new site indexed so that it appears in internet search results, you’ll have to start from scratch.
In many circumstances, moving your blog from a free platform to your own hosting account will require a significant amount of manual labor. It’s not possible to just copy and paste your previous site onto a new one. Consider having hundreds of pages of content, photographs, videos, and other media. You’ll have to transfer everything manually, page by page, image by image, and so on.
When you own your own blog hosting account, you don’t have to worry about losing your established Google rankings and traffic if you switch web designers, web hosting providers, or make any other changes to your online business because you keep the website and domain name. Moving your own blog to a different web server is also simple.
3. Owning a blog is quite inexpensive.
You don’t have to be concerned about excessive prices prohibiting you from hosting your own blog, as stated at the beginning of this post. You’ll be all set by installing good (and frequently free) blogging software and acquiring your own domain name. A monthly budget of $10 to $15 should be plenty.
Do you think you should start your own blog? If that’s the case, the WordPress platform is the way to go, as it’s been tried and tested on millions of websites around the world. Other solutions exist, but if this is your first step into hosting, WordPress will be a breeze.
WordPress is one of the most popular solutions on the internet, so you can hire a lot of individuals to do basic and custom WordPress work, and practically all third-party services interface with it. It’s a logical option.
In a nutshell, you can get started with a WordPress blog by following the steps below:
B. Look for a Web Host for Your Blog
Most web host providers now allow you to easily (and for free) install WordPress on your site with just a few clicks. This allows people with minimal technical skills to get their content posted quickly and easily.
Some hosting firms also provide website builders that are simple to use, have adjustable designs or themes, and feature low-cost free domain and hosting options.
A more conventional design, which allows for more creative alternatives, is available to more experienced and/or technically-minded customers. You may discover more about the various hosting options here.
Best Web Hosting Services
C. Install WordPress
The specifics of installing WordPress are beyond the scope of this article. When talking about WordPress, keep in mind that there are two versions. Both offer templates and tools to help you design your site, however, WordPress.com requires you to have a subdomain, such as Myblog.Wordpress.com, in order to use it for free. You can, however, use your own domain that does not contain WordPress for a nominal monthly (paid annually) charge. Your website will be hosted on the WordPress.com platform in any case. WordPress.org provides many tools, but you must provide your own hosting. This takes a little more effort and understanding, but it has fewer restrictions.
Learn more about the differences between WordPress.org and WordPress.com, as well as the benefits and drawbacks of each.
The fundamental approach for setting up a website using your own hosting and WordPress.org tools is outlined below:
- Verify that your site server allows you to install WordPress (most web hosts do).
- Install WordPress from your hosting account (most web hosts have a simple interface that allows you to do this with just a few clicks)
- Choose a theme for your WordPress website (there are many free options to choose from)
- Start adding content and pages to your website.
As previously stated, if you don’t want to deal with technology, you can always outsource the entire setup and design of your website to someone on a freelance site like Upwork.
The crucial caution here is to make sure that you, not a paid web consultant, purchase your domain name and hosting account so that you, not the person to whom you are outsourcing your website work, are the owner of everything.
If your partnership ends for whatever reason, your hired web developer may keep the password to your hosting service and your website, leaving you with nothing to show for your time and money and no access to your site.
You’ll want to start driving website traffic to it, creating your email list, and making money with your new blog once it’s up and running.