Why should I host my blog on a custom domain?

Answer 1

It is true that many blogging services such as Blogger and Wordpress have very flexible facilities for creating and hosting your blog. Which means you can customise your site to look as you want it to and have your own rss feeds as well,which they provide for you. But some people want more than this,that is some people have business blogs and others blog just for fun. But even those people who blog for fun not money want to be taken more seriously and have control over their blog. Hosting on your own domain gives you this as 1,you own your blog not Blogger or Wordpress, which means they cannot take it away from you. Although this does not happen with Blogger or Wordpress.2,You also may get better rank in the search engines as they take a site hosted on your own domain more seriously than a subdomain such as www.yoursite.blogspot.com,your address will become some thing like www.yoursite.com instead for example,in fact you can choose any address you like as long as it is available. There are many ways to get a custom web address for your blog but the easiest way is through Blogger and it is the cheapest. First create a blog with Blogger by following the easy to understand instucions on the page.Once you get your address which will be some thing like www.yoursite.blogspot.com,go to settings and look for publishing setting and select "custom domain" type in your chosen web address,for example www.yourblog.com or you can choose.net or .biz if you want to,then check if this is available. Then you will be asked to fill in your deatails such as email address and credit card details. The domain is purchased through Google at around $10 US dollars a year and renewed each year unless you tell them otherwise. Then Blogger sets the rest up and does all of the hosting for you,so you are still hosted on Blogger but under YOUR domain name. You will also get your own free Google apps account in which you get your own custom email address,with your site name.This is the best way to host on your own custom domain as you don't have to do the complicated things such as map your domain to your blog and set up DNS settings,which is also hard. Your domain name for your blog is purchased through Google but hosted by a third part company such as Go Daddy or E,Norm and you could buy your domain directly through them. But then you will have to do all of the mapping and settings yourself and if you are a beginer on the web. It is best to just set up your blog with a company like Blogger then buy your domain through them,as they set everything up for you. Also if you descide at any time in the future that you no longer want to host on a custom domain you can just switch back to blogspot.com using the settings tab on your blog settings. So if you want a custom domain, getting it through Blogger, which is really cheap is the best way to go and there are also other companies that you can create a website with. That will also host your site for you without you having to do the settings yourself the same way that Blogger does. Bear in mind that if You choose Wordpress to host your domain,there, you have to do all of the mapping and settings yourself do not do this for you. But Wordpress is a good option for those people who are more advanced with the web and know how to do their own settings.