Most self-proclaimed SEO experts will tell you that in order for people to take your blog “seriously,” you need to invest in your own domain.
I agree to a certain extent, but if you have killer viral content, you’ll build a following even if your URL is along the lines of IIlIlIIIlIlIIIlIlIIIIlIlIIl.wordpress.com.1 Still, don’t assume that you’re the exception to the rule or you could end up very unhappy with the result.
So let’s say you’ve decided that you want your own domain. What’s next? Well, you have two options:
1. Shared Web Hosting
You can go with this cheap solution, which I do, and get a cheap, shared server. My pick of this category is BlueHost, which runs all of my servers off the same account. Benefits include no bandwidth restrictions, their servers/bandwidth is capable of surviving diggs/reddits/stumbles without much of a problem, one-click installation of most popular software packages (including WordPress), good customer service, and it’s cheap. I pay about $140 per year for 4 blogs.
Here’s the major downside. I mentioned that I run 4 servers off one account, right? Well, there are over 100 people running their blogs on the same server. While the blog performance only suffers minimally, the real danger is from Google. Here are some things to consider:
- If one of these domains is a spam domain and marked by Google as such, you could find yourself having difficulty getting indexed since Google assumes you’re somehow affiliated.
- For similar reasons, if you run multiple blogs, you’re going to get less of an effect from linking your high PageRank blogs to your new blogs on the same server.
However, I’m a fairly good example that good results can be had even using the cheap solution. While you can’t normally check prior to subscribing (though maybe you can if you get a nice chat rep) if you have the domain name of a website on the same server, you can use this tool to find other domains on the same server.
2. Run A Dedicated Server
Here’s the more expensive, but all-around better route. You’ll have way more control over your servers by using a dedicated server, and none of the drawbacks illustrated above. You also tend to get much better hardware with dedicated servers, thus resulting in quicker load times and hopefully less maintenance.
While I haven’t used a dedicated server in a while, one service that I always hear mentioned by pro bloggers is InMotion — no setup fees, nice hardware, allegedly good customer service, and ~$40/month sounds like a good deal to me.
If InMotion isn’t your thing, here’s a post from cnet discussing their picks for dedicated servers.
In the end, whichever way you decide to go is probably a step up from your current situation if you’re “leasing” domain space right now.
- See, e.g., http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/ [↩]
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
So you are saying that the great deal I found where I am hosting all 3 of my domains for $2/month might have a down side? Shoot! Guess my econ professor was right.
This seems like a chicken or the egg problem for me. I am unwilling to spend more money on a host until I get a bigger readership for my blog, but may be unable to get a bigger readership if my page rank is stuck at 0…
I thought the hard part about a blog was supposed to be constantly finding time to write!
Yeah, it’s something of a legitimate Catch 22. You don’t really *need* a dedicated server, and you probably can’t afford one, until you have a lot of readers. But by that time, you’ve apparently done okay with shared web hosting.
Still, if you’re independently wealthy unlike me, dedicated is clearly the way to go.
I wondered what was the best or easiest hosting platform to use. I have used quite a lot of dedicated servers, linux, windows using both apache and iis but at the moment I am liking the Dreamhost system. For web developers who need to cut costs and time this is a must. If anyone has a better solution please let me know.
Also in your opinion what do you think is better i.e. a Virtual server, dedicated or using cloud which I think is the same as virtual.