Helen K. Black 
If you’re something like me, when I first installed my weblog about a yr ago, I had NO CLUE where to start. Should I use Blogger, Blog spot, WordPress, or any of the one hundred different blog structures that can be available?
After a variety of research, guidelines, and assistance from others (it’s the “Network” a part of network advertising), I found out that I better go along with installing WordPress for my weblog. For those who are not familiar with WordPress, it’s a blog platform that offers you a pre-constructed weblog website online at no cost. But in case you REALLY need to boost up your blog advertising and marketing – you actually need to get a self-hosted WordPress weblog and your own personal area. And I’m going to enter more details why right here on the list. As any clever marketer realizes – go away the hard stuff to the experts. So this is why I outsourced my blog set-up (which protected the graphics, RSS feeds, subject, and connection to all of my social networking websites) to the professionals.
Here are my Top 5 Reasons to Use WordPress on your blog:
1. Google Loves WordPress – If you’re using a weblog for your advertising strategies, you are in all likelihood interested in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – at least a bit. If you are into search engine optimization, you then need and want Google giving your website “some love.” Now, I should cross on and on and on and on and ON approximately search engine optimization, but the concept is that you want Google ranking your web page higher than your competition for any given keyword. Well, for anything motive, Google loves WordPress. Period. The game, set, fit! You want a WordPress blog in case you are in search engine marketing strategies.
Yes, you may use different blog websites and still get the right ranking. However, you generally should work more difficult to get the same quantity of “love” from Google as your competition. If you have already got a unique blog and are to this point that it might hurt you more than helping you, stay with it and MAKE IT WORK. But AT LEAST have it self-hosted – which leads me to my next factor.
2. Self-hosted – I have this in my pinnacle 5 motives, nicely, for an amazing motive. (Oh, a guy, I’m witty!) You can use the free WordPress model and haven’t any troubles and make that just right for you just nice. But you may run into a few problems, the biggest of which is that your weblog will be right here in the future and go the following. If you’ve got a self-hosted WordPress blog, no person can contact it. It’s yours. Yes, you are paying a small month-to-month hosting charge (generally around $5.00 or less), but it’s WELL really worth its cost considering the notion that you may lose your blog otherwise.
On top of getting your blog self-hosted – I would additionally endorse getting a domain call that is unique to you. Mine is manifest. It seems loads extra professional than the ordinary website online URL that WordPress offers your website. Having your area forwarded is crucial for branding YOU in this industry.
3. WordPress Design Themes – Now, do you need the familiar WordPress Theme that comes with WordPress or a custom-designed one this is unique only to you? The default WordPress topic is best if you’re setting up a weblog to have a blog. BUT, since you’re in this industry to make cash and emblem you, I recommend a designed custom theme. There are many folks who layout custom WordPress Themes that you can, without difficulty, upload for your area to trade the appearance and sense of your WordPress internet site. Some of the WP Themes are paid versions. However, most of them are loose.
There are extra than 1000 subject matters loaded at once into the WordPress from which you could pick, although you are not confined to simply the themes loaded into the WordPress website. Since I outsourced my blog’s design and experience, my designer and I talked backward and forwarded for a week or as a way to grind out the info on what I wanted. The theme I chose may be very SEO pleasant (“Monezine” topic), but there are many others to pick from, which include “Flexibility” or “Thesis.”
4. Plug-ins – This is my favorite. Plugins are what soups-up your weblog and convert it from a 1992 Ford Taurus right into a 2010 Chevy Camaro. The right plug-in can save you time, make you money, and make your task a WHOLE lot simpler. In reality, I think I’ll make my next publish on particular plug-ins so that you can see a number of the cash-making ones you NEED to have to your blog (So ensure to Sign-up to get my weblog updates thru electronic mail so you can get the next one).
Just like with the WordPress Themes, if there’s a specific feature you want your weblog to perform, there are programmers out there who’ve created WordPress Plugins to be able to make your job A LOT less difficult. There are thousands of WordPress Plugins at the WordPress.Org website (WordPress.Org/expand/plugins/ ), free and an ever-developing amount not in the WordPress database. It would help if you moved to look for them. When you find a Plugin you need, click “Install” on that particular plugin page, and it will robotically download, unzip, and add it to the proper Plugin listing for your blog. After it completed its ad, without a doubt, visit the back office area of your blog to “activate” the plugin.
Five. WordPress capability – Now, I do not want to lose you here on this one, so I’ll hold it easily. WordPress is an HTML primarily based blog platform. The reason I love this is that it allows you to do SOOOOOOO plenty greater on your blog. When you are growing a put-up, you can feature motion pictures, photographs, pix, links, and audio, all in HTML format. The cool thing is, when you create posts, you may create them in a What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) layout – that means that what you see on the screen is what your readers will see. Or you may do HTML formatting – all with a click on of the mouse and flip-flop backward and forward.
