February 25, 2011
Free WordPress Blogs Vs Self-Hosted WordPress Blogs: A Comparison
This is a question I get all the time and many bloggers undoubtedly get all the time.
Should I start a free blog or a hosted blog?
The free WordPress blog you would get by signing up for an account at WordPress.com. Your username would become your blog name, so for example if I got a user name “howdoyoustartablog” my URL would be howdoyoustartablog.wordpress.com
The self-hosted WordPress blog would be on your own domain on your own site you would install the WordPress software on. The WordPress software would then be the blogging system that manage the content of your website. These days, installation is quite easy with most hosting companies. Most use push button software such as Fantastico Deluxe or Simple Scripts to install Wordprses. Check out my website and watch a free video and watch before your eyes as I set up a blog and post to my blog all in about 10 minutes.
So on to the question at hand: which is better for you, the free WordPress blog or the self hosted WordPress installation?
FREE WORDPRESS BLOG PLUSSES AND MINUSES
PLUS free to setup
PLUS installation is easy (done by WordPress the company)
PLUS maintenance free (setup, upgrades, spam control, backups, security)
PLUS servers are reliable (hosted by servers at WordPress.com )
PLUS with a blog as part of the WordPress community there may be an additional traffic boost from the WordPress community
MINUS a free WordPress blog does not allow you to update or upload a non-Wordpress provided theme
MINUS cannot edit any of the php code (useful for adding additional features from third parties)
MINUS cannot upload any WordPress plugins from third parties. There is a huge WordPress plugin community
MINUS cannot monetize with ads. In fact, WordPress will probably put their own ads on your blog.
MINUS Site will be a WordPress brand
MINUS no content .ownership. Blog is still a WordPress site .
SELF HOSTED WORDPRESS BLOG PLUSSES AND MINUSES
PLUS can upload custom made and third party WordPress themes. There are thousands of third party themes you can choose from or you can make a custom one.
PLUS can change php code if desired
PLUS can add plugins! The WordPress and PHP development community is huge and you can get a plugin for just about anything including security, backups, marketing, and traffic generation
PLUS your own ads allowed, better control of monetization
PLUS since this is hosted by your paid hosting account, this allows you to choose your own domain name instead of having “WordPress.com” as the domain
PLUS ftp access to your site
MINUS you need to set up yourself (though most hosting providers provide push button installation through “Fantastico Deluxe” or “Simple Scripts”. Plus my free video walks you through this process.
MINUS cost to setup. Domain name and hosting fees can be $5 to $15 a month total.
MINUS site maintenance such as spam control, security, and backups, are all done by you. So you will need to spend some time getting familiar with WordPress and how to back up and restore an installation
MINUS do your research because you need to find some reliable servers. Though these days most hosting companies to stay competitive provide some good uptime guarantees.
In summary, the WordPress free blog is appropriate for some people. I wouldn’t suggest the paid hosted solution if you don’t need it. I would say a free WordPress blog is good for the purpose of straight blogging like it used to be. However, these days many people are looking to also make money online. If that’s the case, there are ways to do this still with a free WordPress blog, but the hosted WordPress installation provides you with a lot more you can do from a functionality standpoint which includes the various ways to monetize your site.
That is why in most situations, I recommend a self-hosted paid blog.
I hope this has been helpful. And please do contact me if you have any questions or post them here on the blog. And if you are thinking about starting a blog, check out my free video which walks you through the simple setup of a hosted blog in about 10 minutes with a hostmonster account.
Want to learn more about starting a blog with WordPress? Come by Emil Yau’s site How Do You Start A Blog and watch his video as he creates and posts to a new WordPress blog in less than 10 minutes right in front of your eyes.
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