5 reasons why wordpress is better than blogger
I was planning on writing this for a while as there are a few reasons why I think WordPress blogs are better for both the readers and authors of blogs, compared to the Google Blogger service, but seeing as Huw over at FFB40 had a few issues with his Blogger blog the other day it seemed to bring the issues to the forefront of my mind once again. There are some pretty obvious differences why WordPress is better than Blogger when you first navigate to or create your own self-hosted WordPress blog, such as the amount of different themes on offer and plug ins, but I will try to go a little deeper than that on why those things actually benefit you as a reader or blog owner 1:
1. individuality
With the amount of free themes WordPress has to offer it’s really not that hard to pick a nice looking one that no one else has chosen. You can also make styling edits yourself just by learning some basic CSS to tweak anything you don’t like. Or if you really want to get badass you could restyle a whole theme or even write your own theme from scratch! Indeed you may not even realise you are on a WordPress powered website when you first navigate to it! From what I gather on Blogger you can choose rudimentary things such as background colours and put your own header pictures in etc, but customisation of look and feel is pretty minimal.
The bottom line benefit for blog owners of this is obvious, if you stand out from the crowd people will more likely remember your site, it’s easier to build your brand, and you will get more traffic. As a reader, the benefits may be more subtle but personally I prefer to look at the owners interpretation of what they think their blog should look like and it gives me a sense of their personality.
2. customisation
I guess this links strongly into point but now we are talking about the nuts and bolts of your blog rather than the look of it. Again it’s obvious to us folk already using WordPress but until you sign up I don’t think you realise how many plug in options you have available to you. It can be a little daunting at first but once you get your head around it they provide so many more usability features, SEO features, email subscription features, widgets, and literally thousands of things you couldn’t even possibly imagine before you sign up to WordPress. And again if you think of some feature that you can’t find in an existing plugin, you can write one yourself in PHP, one of the easiest programming languages to get started with (IMHO), which you could even make some money out of one day!
The possibilities really are endless with WordPress, you can even add e-commerce plug ins and start selling stuff directly from your blog, so you are really future-proofing yourself to any business ideas that might arise out of your blogging activities!
3. autonomy
Not only does the big G 2 own your content if you write on a blogger powered blog, but as we have seen they can also limit your advertising options as in the case of Huw @ FFB40. I’m not saying that no WordPress based blog has ever been banned from serving google ads, but even if that were to happen you could still serve any other ads from the myriad of ad serving companies out there if you wished to do so. Blogger will not allow this!
4. engagement
When I say engagement I am really referring to the comments and subscribe sections. There is little scope to customise the reader engagement options on Blogger from what I can tell. For example on WordPress you can have a tick box to sign up to the blog email at the same time as leaving your comment, which will surely convert more people into blog subscriptions.
But what reaaaaally grates me about Blogger blogs is that it is a pain to follow comments. If you want to get a conversation going on a comments thread it is not great for following. I have while researching this article, just learned that you can actually follow the thread if you sign in with and comment with a google account, but if I do that then the link on my username goes to my Blogger profile and not the URL for my blog, which is one annoying step . I am not saying I am only writing comments to get a link back to my blog but it is a nice little bonus for taking the time to write a thoughtful and engaging comment I think. So now I am stuck with choosing between a direct link to my blog (Name/URL option) or being able to follow comments (google account option).
With WordPress you don’t have all of that hassle, you can just leave a decent looking comment with a link back to your blog, and sign up to the comments thread using the “Notify me of follow-up comments by email” tick box. Simples!
*Quick Side Note: If you own a WordPress blog and do not have the “Notify me of follow-up comments by email” option showing what the hell are you playing at? Do you not want people to engage with your blog!? As you can probably tell this enrages me greatly. If you didn’t know, there are plug ins that facilitate this but it is even included in the Jet Pack plug in which should come with most installs of Wordpress nowadays anyway.
5. commitment
This isn’t really a feature of WordPress itself but I think by committing to buying a hosting package and domain name you are leaving yourself open to advantage of the sunk costs fallacy us humans show. In other words, now that you’ve have paid the money for hosting you are much more likely to commit to your blog and keep writing than if the costs to entry were minimal or zero. It’s part of the reason why people sign up to the gym and pay money, because they think having paid the money it will make them go! Obviously this does not always work but if you are mildly motivated anyway to write a blog I think committing to it by paying a bit of money will only help increase that motivation!
blogger positives
To keep this article somewhat balanced, let’s not forget Blogger does have some large positives as well:
- It’s FREE!!!
- It’s non hassle, you can just sign up and start writing
- It’s good if you don’t know whether you can commit to writing consistently (although in which case I have to ask, why even bother?)
- It’s great for personal blogs, e.g. if you are travelling and your family want to read what you’ve been up to
- It’s hosted by Google so will be uber stable, compared to taking your chances with an independent hosting service – Zyma I am looking at you
- I am guessing there are probably a few more than that, let me know in the comments why you love Blogger!
conclusions
There are so many benefits and options to hosting your own WordPress site over blog for anyone who is serious about growing an audience and reaching as many people as possible, as well as if you ever want to monetise your blog.
People might think hosting is expensive but I went for the bargain basement iPage $1.99/month (affiliate link 3) deal and I have to say I have had no complaints in nearly two years of hosting this blog. It works great with WordPress and despite not getting the fastest page load times (hey, you get what you pay for!) it is easily good enough for small to medium sized blog like this one, and has survived some moderate traffic spikes when articles have been featured on Monevator, Rockstar Finance, and the Simple Dollar. You can obviously always upgrade the bandwidth and pay more as your blog grows in readership!
*iPage often even have $1/month deals they email me so you could just sit tight and keep an eye out for one of those promotions. That would be £7.78 for a years worth of hosting! Remember you will also have to pay a yearly fee for the domain name registration as well which is normally between £10-£20/year.
So the cost is trivial, the final blocker from using WordPress over Blogger is that you’ve already set up a blogger blog and are worried about the technicalities of transferring it over. Well it turns out that transferring your blog from Blogger to WordPress even seems quite easy if you follow a simple guide such as this one – so now you know my fellow blogger bloggers there is no excuse 4 😉
That’s all folks! I will sign off with one final question to both fellow bloggers and readers, which is…
Do you prefer using/reading WordPress or Blogger blogs and why?!
Notes:
- Disclaimer: I have never used Blogger so I am making assumptions about a lot of Blogger features based on what I’ve seen on hundreds of Blogger based blogs out there. If you feel I have done Blogger an major injustice anywhere in this article please point it out and I will update it to reflect that! ↩
- Google, in case anyone didn’t know Google owns the blogger service ↩
- This page contains affiliate links, each one is brought to your attention with the cryptic denotation ‘(affiliate link)’. You know what one of those is right!? No…!?! OK well it’s fairly basic… If you click on, sign up through or buy anything via these links I may receive a small fee, which will help to support theFIREstarter blog. The key thing is that it will not cost you anything extra to use these links, although don’t go clicking on them willy nilly just because it may help me! If you think you will find the product/service useful and do click through, then a sincere “thank you” for your support. ↩
- As an aside, if anyone needs any help on doing that give me a shout! ↩
Hey man, thanks for the mention. I totally agree with everything you said of course, after having moved my site from blogger to wordpress, which is how the whole debacle with Zyma got started in the first place. One of the main advantages I have found with wordpress, is the ease with which one can interlink between your articles. Blogger makes that really difficult, but with wordpress you can just create a link anywhere you want and type in something from the article you want to link to, and it finds your article! This also applies to linking new pages, which is a lot LOT easier in wordpress than in blogger.
Lesson learned – choose a good, cheap host. Not a bad, cheap host like I had the misfortune to do. Choose one that is WordPress friendly. The FIREStarter has spoken!
No probs!
Ah… see I didn’t even know that one about the posts linking! Thanks for pointing it out. It is very easy to link to old posts in WP that’s certain!
Haha, love that last line, I might adopt it as a catchphrase 🙂
Hi TFS,
Thanks for writing a post just for me. I feel very special!
My thoughts prior to reading this post were in line with your points 1-3. Have you seen the Blog ‘Done By 40’. It looks like we’ve ripped each other off on name and design. BTW, he’s been Blogging much longer than I have so it looks like I’ve copied him. I would like an individual looking site, much like yourself.
The control aspect didn’t bother me before but it does now. When you’re new to Blogging you don’t know all the options that are available to you. The more time you spend on other Blogs and learn about the process you get to see the great options out there.
I hadn’t considered your point 4 and 5. You make a valid point on the comment follow up. I had thought about the set up costs, but wasn’t aware how low they were. When I set the Blog up initially, I was tracking expenses for the first time, so I didn’t feel like I could justify paying for something (with a nicer look and more options) over a basic format that was free and did a good enough job.
I would still recommend Blogger to People starting out like me. I just feel I’m at the stage where I’m ready to make the switch. I’m just waiting to get a batch of time where I can make the change. I’m not desperate to change, but I know that I’m going to at some stage. My priority this year is still releasing books and making more money. The Blogging switch should help me make more money in the future but that’s not the main reason for me.
Thanks again for the write up. It’s confirmed my thoughts on the whole thing. I appreciate the links to my site too!
Have a great weekend!
Huw
Haha no worries Huw! I should have put a password protection on it so only you could read it 🙂
I read Done by 40 regularly and really like it. It is clearly a blogger blog but let’s get one thing straight, content is king! There is no way I would not read a blog just because it didn’t look quite as funky as another website. There are plenty of ridiculously popular blogs out there on free platforms such as Seth Godin: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/
If you are a good writer and do some networking then you will get an audience. I just think with WordPress you are giving yourself that extra 10% that might help you grow an audience and keep them, or at least make it easier for them to, come back.
Yep nothing wrong with testing the waters on the free platforms with a view to making a switch later on! Just more hassle down the line that’s all really.
Glad to hear that the Kindle book making is going well, I have just seen that you’ve posted a few more times on what you are doing with that, off to check it out now!
Cheers and you too!
I think you missed the #1 reason not to use blogger – which is
Own your own domain – for control, for freedom and the ability to fire firms that give bad service
and above all register it with a firm that does just domain names- never register your domain name with your web host. Web hosting is a low-rent operation and it’s easy to fall out with a hosting firm or for them to go bust. If you own the domain name then it’s a simple clickety-click to shift your web host to another.
The default setting with Blogger is to use a subset of google’s blogspot domain though it is theoretically possible to use it with your own domain.
Ownership is all – and it’s in the name. Which is why it’s worth paying for separately. Take no freebies, no one-year come-hither offers etc.
How do I know this – in the 1990s I paid a bunch of London scumbags – hello Netalia Internet, now defunct – £600 and the lost value of a colo server to buy out a domain name that I wanted to take elsewhere. It was a straightforward ransom – and ever since then I registered domains with specialised firms and never any web host I was using.
Oh and, er, I will investigate the “Notify me of follow-up comments by email” thing 😉 Nice rant!
I am not 100% of what exactly constitutes ownership but I am sure you can own your own domain but still use free hosting on blogger, for example Mr Zombie: http://www.thefinancezombie.com/
Ah… just saw that you’ve already mentioned that 🙂
Good point on buying a domain from a separate entity from your hosting company. I don’t think I did this unfortunately as had a blog a while back that I did that and it seemed really confusing to even get the thing set up, so opted for the easy set up route!
That’s pretty scary about the ransom fee. I would like to think I’ve chosen a very large and stable (and not dodgy) company in iPage but I guess you never know until push comes to shove.
Haha – sorry about that, wasn’t aimed at anyone in particular, there are loads of blogs out there without that option. I am sure I have made many school boy errors on here so open to suggestions for improvements obviously.
Cheers ermine!
It was only when Huw flagged up the issue he had with his ads and I looked into the cost of domain names and webhosting that I really considered making the switch myself.
Thus far, I’ve been pretty happy with Blogger, it’s not great but it’s free.
It was only when M mentioned the ownership and control thing as I had no idea that my content didn’t ‘belong’ to me, which made me seriously considering switching.
Some great advice from M on finding a good webhost and from Ermine on registering a domain name separately.
Like Huw, I couldn’t justify paying for something that I could get for free but I guess my online side hustles can go towards webhosting costs and hopefully, I’ll get some ads on there so it’ll pay for itself.
Time will be a factor as I know I will spend a lot of time tweaking the design and look of the new blog, especially as there are so many different available templates to choose from.
Great post TFS – thanks. I probably didn’t need more convincing but I think this will spur me into action to make the first step, like secure ‘quietlysaving.com’ for starters!
The content thing is a bit wierd, I mean what are they ever going to do with it?!
It is easy to get overwhelmed by the options available in WP – you just have to make a choice and stick with it I think. It’s the old Paradox of choice at play again: http://thefirestarter.co.uk/four-modern-day-paradoxes-human-construct/
Get that domain secured ASAP! It could be worth a lot of money one day 😉
Cool post, and a timely one. I have been thinking about going elsewhere, but laziness has stopped me.
I think your comments about blogger are spot on, it’s good to start out on, but it is limited. And they own your content, I guess the price you pay for it being free.
@Ermine (or anyone!)- It’s here where I get a bit confused. So you register your domain name with one company, the registrar. Happy days. Then set up your hosting with another. If the hosting company goes under. What happens to your content? Can that not just disappear with them?
Mr Z
@MrZombie
> What happens to your content? Can that not just disappear with them?
of course. That’s why you either back up – wordpress is a bit of a git to back up because your database and content are separate, though plugins like updraft can help there.
But being able to control where your domain points gives you freedom from being held to ransom, freedom from being misrepresented by the guys you fell out with and control of your email – you can use a different mailexchanger to the one provied by your host. Losing control of the email to a domain can make it harder to move it if your web host registered it and manages your email.
Eeep. I really need to start backing this place up.
The only back ups I have are for content which is I just stored them in email form.
Thanks for the reminder and I will check out updraft.
I would never consider using the email address attached to this domain, too much bother, I just set up a new gmail account instead as I looooove gmail 🙂
I’m not Greg but it took 2 seconds to find your full name and address mate. I’ll email you rather than post on here, it’s not a flaw in Blogger. :o)
Hi Andy T – This came through on the wrong post I think which was a bit wierd. Anyway thanks for the email I will look out for it and reply.
Cheers!
D’oh, that would make sense. I guess it is a bit more admin to make sure your content is backed up (making as assumption that blogger/google never goes under I guess…)
It’s something I mean to do after, yet another, exam in May. But I was just going to use the same provider, so thanks for helping me not to make a rookie mistake!