Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I`m think about starting a blog.  Any of you bloggers out there have any advice on where to start?  Should I use a site like blogspot or livejournal, or do something custom?  What other options are there?

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Oleg Issers | StartupNation.com Web Team

50% of computer programming is trial and error. The other 50% is copy and paste.

First you need a topic.
A good topic.
A purpose.

And then you need to admit that it`s a whole lot of work.

And then go with Typepad or Wordpress (Wordpress.org not Wordpress.com).

Unless it`s personal and you don`t care about "features" ... then sure, go with blogspot or livejournal.

There`s a million other considerations but really you should state the purpose before I go off rambling.
Try Blogging for Beginners.

I`d suggest that a "topic" isn`t really useful. Write an editorial if you have a topic. Instead, and what seems to be missing from many blogs, you should list what it is about your way of thinking about things that`s different and might be interesting to other people.

Rush Limbaugh often says that his radio show is not based on the topic of the day. It`s not "topic driven." Instead, it`s "event driven." He doesn`t have guests on the show to talk about a particular topic. Rather, he looks at the overall context of a set of events, and brings his own particular analysis and humor to those events.

Startup Nation isn`t about a topic. It`s about the overall *event* of becoming an entrepreneur, running your own business, and making whole-life changes.

So if you`re going to write a blog, what`s your particular "style" of discussing life? What sort of overall events do you want to focus your writing on?

The topic is sports commentary.

The purprose, hmm... Haven`t really thought of one yet.  It`s just a hobby thing for now, though I eventually plan on adding features and turning it into a bigger site; a blog seems like a good starting point.

Wordpress.com is just a hosted implementation of the Wordpress software, correct?  What are the benefits of a stand-alone implementation over a hosted one?

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Oleg Issers | StartupNation.com Web Team

50% of computer programming is trial and error. The other 50% is copy and paste.

:-) So it`s more about the technology and doing cool stuff with Web tools?

Wordpress.com sucks.

I could write you a list of pros and cons, but really it just sucks. Watered down version of the real (free) thing. They talk about the differences here.

Go with an install from WordPress.org.

It`s not necessarily "topical" but your blog does need focus. There was a really good article on this ... I sent it to Rich but I can`t find it now. Maybe he can find the link. The gist is this: if you don`t have a focus, you won`t have readers.

Nope, it will be sports commentary, more specifically mixed martial arts & UFC.  Nothing to do with web tools or technology.

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Oleg Issers | StartupNation.com Web Team

50% of computer programming is trial and error. The other 50% is copy and paste.

I am using Terapad (www.terapad.com) for my blogs. Not sure how to compare it with the other services out there, but so far, I like it. Their email support replies, usually, within 24 hours or less.
They have integration with PayPal, although I have not used it yet, so I cannot comment on it.
They have a great way to keep your things organized: you can create folders for images (and sub-folders, if necessary), sound, etc.

Some problems: they have very few templates available. They do not support more than one category for each topic (but you can use tags).

Good luck.


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Andre Costa DaCosta Chocolates, LLC www.DaCostaChocolates.com

I`m still undecided on whether to go with a hosted solution or a standalone one.  I am leaning towards hosted at this point.  I want something that can be set up quickly, and it also seems like hosted blogs have the benefit of additional visibility from the parent site.  If I want to add features in the future, I can always move to a stand-alone website later.

Wordpress.com actually seems nice!  I will look into Terapad.com as well, thanks for the pointer Andy.  I already ruled out Blogger.com (formerly Blogspot), as soon as I realized that it requires a Google account...

 

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Oleg Issers | StartupNation.com Web Team

50% of computer programming is trial and error. The other 50% is copy and paste.

I`m a big fan of WordPress. It`s easy to customize, has the Pages feature which allows you to create pages that aren`t part of your blog and lots of plugins to extend the functionality.

Hosting your own wordpress installation allows you to customize more. There are many more options for plugins and themes that wordpress.com will give you. Also, if you have yourownname.com you have to pay to point it to your wordpress.com blog. Why do that when you can have your own site?

Good luck!