I have been using Blogger which is also called Blogspot to run my computer and electronics blog at pctutorial.info . It has been great. I have been very happy with how simple, reliable, affordable, and customizable Blogspot is for the last few years I have been using it. Blogspot would one of the top few free blog hosting hosts I will recommend to people.
However, Blogspot sometimes look less professional compared to a self-hosted WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, or HTML website which you host yourself. But, Blogspot lets you use Adsense, Amazon Affiliates, Infolinks, Adbrite, and other types of ads on your site to make money.
But, I would not use Blogspot as my first choice to sell any product since Ebay, CafePress, Craigslist, ClickBank, a self-hosted online store, or Amazon Marketplace looks more professional and trustworthy in my opinion.
The best part of using Blogger is you can use your own domain name while having your blog hosted on Blogspot which is owned by Google. Since Blogspot is owned by Google, Google makes it easy for you to add Google Adsense ads into your template for your Blogspot website. Adsense is an advertising network owned by Google which let publishers earn money by displaying advertising.
Google also made it easy for you to search for Amazon Affiliate products for Amazon Affiliates with a built-in Amazon Affiliates search engine which let you easily post affiliate product links on your post and pages.
If you put in the effort, and make a great blog or website with Blogspot, you can make a decent amount of money.
The editor on Blogspot is very easy to use. It is similar to other Blog, WYSIWYG editors, and content management system post editors. Unlike other editors, the Blogspot editor also have auto-save, and when you are ready you click publish. You can also add tags to your posts.
Editing, changing the Blogspot template is also very easy to do since it is drag, and drop. Plus, it is also very easy to add and remove plug-ins on your template, but there are not as many plug-ins for Blogspot compared to WordPress, Joomla, or Drupal.
Blogspot hosting have been pretty reliable for me. My blog have never went down or experience slowness in my experience. However, you should read the “Terms of service” for Blogspot since Blogspot may delete your blog without warning if you break a rule. Be sure to backup your Blogspot blog whenever you write new content for your blog. I also like I do not have to update the actual CMS software like website which are using WordPress, Joomla, or Drupal.
I also do not have to worry about using too much bandwidth like paid or free web hosting which tends to disable or shutdown your website temporarily if you use too much band width.It is also very easy to back up my HTML template and posts for WordPress.
However, with Blogspot, you can’t do as much with your website compared to WordPress, and Joomla which you can use to make a social network, article directory, or other type of interactive page. I also think if you plan on selling your own products and services, using Blogspot would not be the best choice for you. You are better off using Joomla, OS Commerce, and other types of CMS or online shopping CMS software to sell your goods since you have more control over your own website and how it looks and accept payment.
If you plan on making money from private ads which you sell for a certain price, you should host your own blog or website since some buyers might feel Blogspot does not look as professional as someone or a company who host and runs his own blog like TechCrunch, Mashable, etc. Although, TechCrunch uses WordPress.com VIP service which is not free, but allows ads. The free membership for WordPress.com does not allow ads.
Blogspot also have a social aspect to it, you can follow/subscribe to other Blogspot blogs easily by using the Blogspot toolbar on the top of the page on member’s Blogspot blogs. It is also easy to post comments on other members blogs.
In summary, Blogspot is one of the best free blog hosting websites for someone who wants a simple blog for expressing themselves without knowing any html, mySQL, or other web standards, or want to make a few extra dollars from Google Adsense, Affiliate programs and Amazon Affiliate Program. You can also use your Blogspot blog to advertise your latest auction on Ebay, or your latest website you made.
Blogspot is also good for YouTube, and Picasa users for sharing their videos and photos since getting views by just posting on YouTube can be hard, but using a blog to promote your videos and photos can help out if you have a large following on Blogspot.
The main reason I like Blogger more then other free web host is that Google allows me to post my Adsense, Amazon Affiliate links, and other types of ads, so I can make money without buying a web hosting subscription, and I can use the money I save to buy a domain like example.com to make my blog look more professional .It is great that Blogspot users can choose to put ads for money or not have ads on their blog.
Blogspot can be a great source for having another website like Squidoo, Hubpages, and eHow to earn money. But, since Blogspot is owned by Google, you get to keep 100% of the money you earned from Adsense since Adsense is also owned by Google meaning you get your regular share of revenue you earned from Adsense ads on websites which are hosted on your own web host, but without the expense of paying for web hosting.
What is most important when using a Blogspot or any blogging service is you should backup your database of posts, articles, pages and pictures on a regular basis, so if your blog gets hacked, deleted by accident or intentionally, you can still restore your blog from backups.
Also, make sure to backup your themes, template files, and plug-ins if you used a unique theme, or plugins on your website.
interesting to read and rather useful article. thanks for sharing
I use wordpress for my blog, and there are many many plugins for wordpress to insert google adsense into your posts and site.
Also, wordpress has many plugins to crosspost and share your content with social networking sites like facebook, linkedin, twitter, etc. etc.
In the past I have used blogger aswell, but now I am completely into wordpress!
Cheers,
~ Rick
Hi Umask, I agree the plug-ins are what make WordPress totally worth it. I still use Blogger as a casual blog site like Tumblr since I still have some readers on my old Blogspot blog according to FeedBurner, so I don’t want to abandon my audience.
Plus, Blogger seems more chilled and relaxing feeling when I use it since it has a more casual feeling to it compared to WordPress which is more Professional and work feeling like Joomla, Drupal, etc.
This is a good read and a good review of those platforms. Blog Spot was my first website, but I did not build another and instead have moved to WordPress and Joomla. Thanks
When I learned how to use most of the features of WordPress, I stopped using Blogspot, Joomla, and Drupal on a daily basis.
I feel it is “a lot” more easy to customize and tweak WordPress with third party plug-ins, and themes. Plus, WordPress is so easy to update to the latest version compared to Joomla and Drupal. I found Joomla and Drupal to have a slightly confusing control panel/Back end compared to WordPress. I can also insert my own custom HTML, php, and JavaScript codes, widgets in the WordPress Sidebar, header, footer, and posts more easily by using WordPress Built-in Theme editor.
WordPress is my favorite Blog/CMS program which I use on a daily basis.
Agree with you, most of us used free host including me but when we do something different its look more elegant. I created my site using blogspot but i change it into minisite layout.
Cool looking Blogspot page, Muhd. It reminds me of a E-book selling page for ClickBank products. Your template would be good for people who are starting out with E-book or digital products marketing, but do not have a lot of money for a reliable web hosts for marketing their digital products.
It would be cool if someone made a way for turning a blogspot blog into a free E-commerce store for selling goods online like eBay.
I think most of us got our start using free hosting. When I was a teen, I used Geocities free hosting to learn about the basics of web design back in the 90s. Now, these days people use Tumblr, Wordpress.com, Blogspot, and Livejournal to host their blogs and websites.
I agree Blogspot is a decent free service, but I too prefer Wordpress. I also agree that Adsense is very profitable and is no wonder why when the search terms and coding drive traffic to your site. Keep up the good work.
Thanks for the information. Found some useful tips. I am totally new in blogging world, so whatever comes my way is a gain for me.
No problem, Prachi, Good luck blogging!
Nice post,
I’m planning to create a website, and I was wondering which platform I’m going to use whether WordPress or Joomla. But I think Blogger is the most easiest to use but hard to modify to suit to your professional need for Content Management System. So for me it really depends to the tech capacity of the author.
Blogger is simplest to use, and it is starting to be very easy to custumize since it now has a visual editor, and tons of free templates and add-ons for it for you to install.
I recommend WordPress because it has a lot of cool custom themes which are easy to modify like DIYThemes’s Thesis theme which I am using on this blog right now. StudioPress Genesis theme is also pretty good since it supports child themes which you can buy from Studio Press.
Joomla is better for Static websites like a website for a store, and office while WordPress is better for blogs, but can be used for static sites as well, but you need to change the front page to a static page instead of a blog.
Drupal is also worth checking out since it is also very custumizable, and has a huge community of users.
If you know some HTML, CSS, and know how to make templates, or use Artisteer which is a visual template maker, you can easily make your own themes for Blogger, Drupal, Joomla, Drupal, and other CMS platforms.
Informative article. Thanks for the sharing.