There's a war going on in
the blogosphere, and it has
nothing to do with
bloggers dissing each other
on their respective
websites. The war is about
control of the blogosphere
by several great, many
good, and tons of terrible
blogging platforms. The
average newbie now has
"too many" options to
choose from, and the
battle for blogging
supremacy is hotter than
ever.
At my website and blogs,
I'm always asked the
question "Is WordPress
better than Blogger?". The
answer, of course, is "Yes".
But to really understand
why, it's important to look
at both blogging platforms
side-by-side and see which
one you really need.
You also need to
understand that there are
different versions of
WordPress, the earliest now
termed as "WordPress" at
WordPress.org, and the
hosted version similar to
Blogger now termed
"WordPress.com" which is
of course available at
WordPress.com.
For Part 1 of this article, we
look only at the self-
hosted version of
WordPress. Here's the
comparison scale:
1) Ease of Set-up And Use
Yes, it's much easier to set-
up a blog with
Blogspot.com and get your
own Bloggger account. You
can be done in 10 minutes
flat. Once you're set-up
you can start posting
immediately. If you want to
add a designer's touch to
your blog, there are also
tons of blogger templates
available for free.
Installing WordPress
however can be a major
headache if you don't
know what you're doing.
Since you're going to host
it on your own account,
you'll need to download
the installation files,
upload them to your
server, set-up a database,
and run the configuration
script.
However, if you know
which hosting account to
get, you can choose one
with Cpanel included. With
Cpanel, you can do a one-
click installation, upgrade
and removal of your
WordPress platform. There
are tons of different
hosting plans to choose
from, so get one that fits
your needs.
2) Customization &
Advanced Use
Blogger doesn't allow
categories. You can't sort
your articles into different
focuses, unless you know
how to hack the platform.
With WordPress, not only
can you add categories, you
can also display each
category differently on
your main page. In fact
with the correct plugins
you can even turn your
WordPress into a magazine-
like portal.
Publishing with Blogger can
be a pain in the ass. It can
take forever to post
articles, especially if you're
making changes to the
entire website. With
WordPress, publishing is
much faster, although if
you load your system with
all kinds of bells and
whistles it can be just as
frustrating.
With a Blogger account,
you can get additional
features like "Shout Boxes"
that improve interaction on
your site. You can also get
pretty themes and nifty
little tools that you can
add to the core template
files. However, that's as far
as you can go with Blogger.
With WordPress however,
the sky is the limit. As
cliche as that may sound,
not only can you get
themes, additional
"plugins" and advanced
tools, you can also extend
WordPress to far beyond
just a blogging platform.
The talk today is about
using WordPress as a
complete, user-friendly
Content Management
System or CMS. Unlike
complicated predecessors
like PHPPostNuke, B2,
Mambo or even Joomla,
WordPress is user friendly.
Plus, the availability of
source codes in this open-
source system coupled with
a strong community makes
it possible to use WordPress
as an article management
system, classifieds system,
direct-selling site and even
a paid membership site.
4) Copyrights and
Ownership of Content
I started with Blogger and I
won't say that it's bad. But
after a while I started to
get frustrated with Blogger,
and here's why: Google
Owns Your Content
Google has the authority to
shut down your account
without warning if they
don't like what you're
blogging about. You don't
have absolute control over
your own blog. With
WordPress, you own the
domain name and the blog
is hosted on your own
account. You have full
control over your content.
With the self-hosted
version of WordPress (not
WordPress.com), you're
free to write about
anything you want, and use
the software in any way
you want. Yes, Blogger
allows you to publish to
your own domain, but they
still own the database that
holds your content! Don't
forget that!
5) Search Engine
Optimization and Traffic
There's this propaganda
that since Google owns
Blogger, they tend to favor
Blogger accounts. I won't
say that this is illogical, but
from my experience, there's
no such favoritism.
I've heard as many stories
of getting indexed fast and
ranking high in search
engines from both
WordPress and Blogger
users. As long as the
content is good, the spiders
will come.
When you post in Blogger,
you can only "ping" a
limited amount of sites,
whereas with WordPress on
your own domain you can
ping as many blog
directories as you want,
and start getting more
traffic.
As a conclusion, I would say
that WordPress is only
slightly ahead in terms of
optimization for search
engines, and building large
amounts of traffic.
6) Money-Making Potential
There's no doubt that it's
easier to get started with
Google Adsense if you have
a Blogger account. In fact
you can now apply for
Adsense from within a
Blogger account. Not
entirely surprising
considering the fact that
both are owned by the
same company.
With WordPress, it can get
tricky. The default
installation is not enough.
You'll need a couple of
plugins and even a better
theme to really maximize
the Adsense potential.
However, this seems to be
getting easier and there's
even "Adsense revenue
sharing" plugins around
that allow you to share ad
revenue with other
contributors and writers for
your blog.
When you start using
WordPress to build your
Adsense websites, you'll
soon discover what I mean.
It's something you need to
experience for yourself. I
can tell you one thing
though - when you go
WordPress, you don't go
back.
Gobala Krishnan is a micro-
niche specialist that
coaches Internet marketers
to cash in on profitable
markets using Wordpress
and affiliate marketing
tactics. Get started now by
getting a copy of his best-
selling Super Affiliate
Blogger guide.
Article Source: http://
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