A Few Pointers For Being Taken More Seriously As A Blogger Part 1

The past few days I’ve been slowly reading the book Blog Blazers: 40 Top Bloggers Share Their Secrets (author: Stephane Grenier) which I won over at Derek Semmler’s blog and there is one point I would have to agree with in regards to being a serious blogger: Don’t rely on blog hosting services such as WordPress.com, Blogger, TypePad. Don’t get me wrong, there are some really good Blogger or WordPress.com sites out there and their authors are taken seriously but they are far and few. I have always found that to take it to the next level and be taken more seriously you need to look at being self-hosted.

So what does it take to become a more serious blogger and have people regard you as a blogger? Hopefully I can shed some light on the subject. I do consider myself a blogger though it definitely isn’t my full-time job. Perhaps one day I can blog full-time, wouldn’t that be cool?

Own Your Own Domain Name.

This is probably the most important requirement if you want people to take you more serious in regards to being a blogger. Domains are relatively cheap and can be bought within 5 minutes, the hard part is coming up with a name that is not already registered. For starters try registering your www.<FULL NAME>.com. Chances are it probably is not taken, though then again if your full name is fairly common it might be. Domain names are usually around the price of a cup of coffee at your favorite local coffee shop. I’ve paid as little as $5 for a domain, you just have to look for deals. Typically I find that a domain will cost you about $8 per year.  Yes you do save more if you register it for a longer period but your initial upfront cost will be a bit higher.

If you are going to niche blog (blog about a particular topic you are experienced in) then you might want to think about various keywords pertaining to that niche topic and use that as a domain name. Though in this day and age I am sure it will be hard to find good keywords to use in domains.

Just remember don’t make your domain name too long so people have a hard time typing it out or have the chance of spelling it wrong.

Find Yourself A Good Web Host.

Flickr Photo by Russ Garrett

Since you are going to be buying your own domain name you will need to find yourself a good web host. There are hundreds of thousands of webhosts out there. If you want a recommendation and are on a tight budget I would recommend looking at Bluefur.com. They have a web hosting package (Mini Unix) where you can pay less than $6/month for your very own spot of the Internet. Just be sure to use the Promotional Code: dynamicshark to receive 15% off their services. That’s what I did!

Which Blogging Platform or Engine To Use.

There are a few blogging platforms currently on the market and they can be free, though I (and others like me) will highly recommend you choose WordPress. WordPress.org is the self-hosted version of WordPress.com. Self-hosted means you need your own webhost to host the WordPress platform files. It is not as scary as you might think.

Not only can you set up WordPress in about 5 minutes (once you have your own webhost and domain name) but with the largest user community for a blogging platform there are many available plugins or add-ons which can add even more functionality to the already fairly full-featured blogging platform.

WordPress also allows you to choose from hundreds of free themes, or if you want to go with the more professional or unique look there are may WordPress theme designers out there as well. There are also semi-unique themes in which you can purchase for a small amount of money too. Semi-unique means that other people might have it but since you are paying a bit of money for it it will be less common. With 71 Million blogs out there or so, paying for a theme is not a bad way of going if you want to be a bit more unique and stand out from the crowd.

If you are worried about loosing your content, you can move all your old posts into your new WordPress self-hosted site with not too much trouble. You will at least have your posts and comments intact. Though you will start with a 0 PR (pagerank) in the eyes of the Search Engines. Normally you can do a 301 Redirect (this tells the Search Engines you’ve moved) but normally you do not get that option with shared hosted blog services.

In fact I can help you make the move from shared blog hosting with services such as WordPress.com, Blogger to your own self-hosted blog. If you are interesting be sure to get in touch with me via my Contact form, or even via Twitter.

Why Self-Hosted?

Alright so you’re asking yourself what is so great about being self-hosted? You don’t have to pay for monthly web hosting fees, or yearly domain renewals when you are on a shared blog service right?  Things just work too (most of the time).

Well being self-hosted allows to to take blogging to the next level. You can add a much more unique look and feel  to your blog. I also mentioned you can use plugins or add-ons right? Plugins (or sometimes called add-ons) allow you to add more functionality to the already full-featured blogging platform of WordPress. If it natively does not do it, I am sure there is a plugin out there to do it for you, if not I know people (like myself) who are able to code up the plugin to your needs.

If setup is correctly done, seldom do things break down. If they do they can be linked back usually to a badly coded plugin, or issues with your webhost. I have yet to experience any issues with my blogs (yes I do run more than 1) and all of them are running WordPress with various themes and plugins.

Are you looking to perhaps monetize your website? You know make some extra income? Most shared blog hosts will not allow you to monetize your site. You also have more customization in regards to advertisements and placement with a self-hosted blog.

What do I like (or love) about having a self-hosted blog? It’s mine! I’m not part of a company’s subdomain and I don’t have to follow their hosting rules. I follow my own rules, my own path and I do what I what, when I want to my blog. Since I am paying someone to host my site, if something goes wrong I have a better chance of it being fixed/corrected if they want my money, shared-hosted sites don’t care because they are not making money off of you. Right?

Being self-hosted is also part of the ‘branding’ process for yourself and your blog. I find it easier to tell someone I run www.tyleringram.com as opposed to a site like onyxdragun.wordpress.com. It is a similar rant of mine about people who conduct business via email with services such as Hotmail, or Yahoo. It just doesn’t look professional, especially if you are trying to be taken seriously and you do not own your own domain.

Domain names are cheap!

Now You’re Heading In The Right Direction.

So now that I have hope to have left you with some more information about being self-hosted and being seen as a more serious blogger, what could be next? Well the next part is to think about are some of the other aspects of your newly self-hosted site such as Themes, RSS Feeds and the more popular topic these days of Social Networking with such services as Twitter.

So stay tuned for the Part 2 of A Few Pointers For Being Taken More Seriously As A Blogger