Blogging for Profit, Getting a Domain Name and Hosting.
Let’s say that by now, you know what niche you want and you have picked out some keywords. Now it is time to start your blog. This usually means buying a domain name and then hosting for it. A domain name will cost about $10 for a .com and hosting will cost anything from $4 upwards.
If you haven’t got any money to spare, you’re not obliged to buy a domain name of your own. You can use a free blogging platform such as Blogger. Don’t use Wordpress.com because they don’t like advertising/marketing. It is against their Terms of Service to publish affiliate links and your links will be disabled. Many Blogger blogs are high ranking money makers.
But think about it this way –using a free blog is like renting a house whereas having your own domain name is like owning your own home. When you rent somewhere, you have to get permission to do anything to it like decorating or changing the bathroom. You pay the rent to the landlord and you can be expelled at any time.
When you own your own home, you can make all the changes you like to it. You are in charge. Your own home is an investment and eventually becomes an asset.
In the same way that the landlord has control over your rented place, so the folks at Blogger have control over your blog. They can shut it down at any time (and they do) and that will be the end of your hard work. I’ll leave it with you. Perhaps you could practise on a free blog and buy your own domain later.
For registering a domain name, two of the most popular companies seem to be GoDaddy and NameCheap. I recommend that you buy a .com as this is good for SEO reasons. Google likes .coms and they sound professional. They are more expensive. The .infos are usually much cheaper, but they do not rank well.
It is important to choose a domain name that has your main keyword phrase in the URL, for example: www.ghostwritingbysarah.com. If that domain name is taken (it is), you need to adapt it. Play around with it. For instance, you can add a word or you can use hyphens between some of the words. However, Google doesn’t seem to like hyphened domain names so much.
Now you need hosting. Godaddy and Namecheap also offer hosting services. Two other hosting companies that are popular are Hostgator and Host4Profit. Hostgator is probably the easiest to use and you can have multiple domain names on one account. It is also less expensive and uses cpanel. Host4Profit is different, but when you need support they always answer rapidly. I started with Host4Profit when I first began working online, as part of a plugin profit package and course. This blog is hosted there.
Whatever domain name provider and hosting company you choose, your blog will soon be up and running. Just follow the guides given to you by your service providers.
