Step 1: Free Blog or Your Own Domain Your first decision as a blogger is to decide whether you are going to use a free blogging service or set up and manage your own domain. Free services The advantages of the free services are: no cost, very quick to start, very little technical knowledge needed and you can try out blogging with very little risk. The disadvantages are your blog's name will be linked to the free blogging service, which will put off some potential visitors; there are more restrictions on a free blog; you are at the mercy of changes in ownership, changes in rules of the service.  You could also have your blog blocked or removed  if you somehow or other upset the company. Your own domain Your own domain gives you much more control over your blog.   You will have your own domain name, which allows you to brand your content, and even yourself.  There are no real restrictions on plugins and themes that you use.  In addition you can use a developer/programmer to customize the site even further. You will need to learn some basic technology, but you do not need to go into too much technical detail.  You will need to buy and manage the domain and the hosting. Recommendations If you just want to try your hand at blogging, you can start with one of the free blogging services, like WordPress. If you decide that you want to transfer your content later on to your own domain then it is relatively easy to do so. However, if you want to start a serious Continue Reading

Overview WordPress Permalinks allow you to make your blog’s URLs, (webpage address), to have a more readable layout, which is helpful both to your visitors and to search engines. This is one of the things you should do, ideally before you start writing posts, as part of the process of setting up your blog. The Permalink process The process of converting the post name, the category or author’s name involves  sanitising, using the WordPress team’s word or changing the text into a more web friendly version. So the blog post title – say ‘What is a blog?’ is converted as follows: Original text:  What is a blog? all text is turned into lower case:  what is a blog? all spaces between words are converted into dashes: what-is-a-blog? everything that is not a number or character is removed : what-is-a-blog So in the standard WordPress installation my article ‘What is a blog?’ will have the following URL:   blogbasics.com/?p=13 Using Permalinks I can change the URL of the post to just the the post name blogbasics.com/what-is-a-blog  or to include the category blogbasics.com/start-up/what-is-a-blog or to include the post id, category and post name    blogbasics.com/13/start-up/what-is-a-blog Why the post number? It makes sure that the post is unique and it helps WordPress get to the post details a lot, lot faster in its database. WARNING: Changing the Permalinks structure means that the post appears to be in a Continue Reading

Introduction As WordPress develops it gains more of the features of an advanced content management system.  Already it is relatively easy for a developer to trun the home page into a magazine format or to add links to specialised sections in the sidebar. WordPress already has the facilities for multi-users where people may have the right to edit and others may only have to right to submit articles, which need to be checked and approved before being displayed in public. It's also possible to turn sections of the blog into a members' only area, with protected information only available to those who have paid a fee or have a particular password. But WordPress is still  mostly a blogging system.  To add complex membership areas, to add shopping carts, to build complicated relationships with chunks of data - say linking a football team. with its position in a league and then linking the team players and goal scorers would be difficult, if not impossible, within the WordPress structure. You need to use a content management system which will allow these more complicated data links, but also has a built in blogging system, that may or may not pull in pieces of data from these complicated relationships. The two leading content management systems The following two systems are both free, open source systems that can be used on small and corporate, (which in the jargon are called enterprise), systems.  They are both more difficult to use and learn then WordPress and you will need Continue Reading

  Introduction When blogging was developing there were a lot of competing blogging packages, some free, such as Wordpress, and some premium packages, Movable Type, MT, becoming the market leader. MT was particularly liked by those established in the print media.  Individual journalists, magazines and newspapers used MT as their online presence. In those days MT was a superior product to the competing, free, open source, blogging software programs. Being commercial it had a very good support service, it was very straightforward for a professional web designer to develop a customised theme and one of MT's greatest strengths was that its platform allowed editors to control teams of writers. MT can also be used to develop a static website or a static website, but with a blog attached.  In the second case the layout of the static section and the blog section would be the same. Blogging today Today for the average blogger the free package WordPress has virtually all the benefits of MT with the exception of paid support.  However, it is very easy to find a freelancer to develop and support your blogging website. WordPress also has the advantage in terms of variety of themes, plug-ins and a massive free support community. There is a free version of MT, which will allow you to experiment with the package. But it will have quite a few limitations and you will find that you will need to upgrade to a paid version. A good reason to use MT I Continue Reading

  Introduction A blog is a way for you to publish your thoughts and ideas on the internet.  Once on the web your thoughts can be read by potentially billions of people.  People will find their way to your blog through search engines, links and recommendations on other websites, reviews and even from social media, such as Twitter and Facebook. Before you start blogging you have to consider the following: How are you going to blog? What are you going to write about? What are your long term intentions with the blog? How are you going to blog? There are two free methods of developing a blog and four alternative premium methods of blogging. The majority of blogs being set up today use one of the free methods. The two free methods of blogging Free blogging sites: such as the WordPress.com and Blogger websites.  Good if you want to try out blogging with a longer term intention of upgrading. Own your own domain and use free blogging software: You do need to organise hosting and then use their free blogging software. This is the option I recommend to most bloggers. (Why you should use a cPanel hosting company) The four premium methods of blogging Using a premium blogging package: such as Moveable Type.  Usually the blog owner has to buy the domain and pay for hosting. Using an integrated support service: such as Sitesell, which manages the technical side of blogging and provides a lot of support and training for someone Continue Reading

Introduction: Blogging is an easy way to place your viewpoint on the internet.  You login and you type, maybe add an image or two, press a key and wow in seconds your work is on the web and can be read by potentially millions of people throughout the world. Many write a personal blog telling the story of their lives: their family life; their fight with an addiction; their battle with cancer; their life as a policeman or doctor or teacher or sex worker; people talk of their personal life; their political life; their view of politics; their view of religion or their love affair with computing, gadgets or cars. The small business owner, the freelancer, the web designer, the person with something to sell, the big corporation, the news columnist, the technology producer, the campaigner, the charity all use the blog to increase the number of visitors to their website, boost awareness of their interests and to communicate with their potential clients, customers, followers, subscribers and friends. So what is a blog? In a nutshell a blog is a software system that allows someone to quickly and easily write an article, called a post, which can then be published onto the web.  Traditionally blogs post their posts consecutively in reverse order, so that the most recent post is displayed on the front  page. The blogging software packages managing the users’ text, images, videos and sounds are growing more and more sophisticated.  They allow the writer to promote their blog, Continue Reading