It’s one of the easiest, cheapest things you can do to improve your blog: Get your own domain name.
If you have a free blog account, or use free hosting, your blog name will be something like ‘MyBlog.blogspot.com’ or ‘My Blog.Wordpress.com’. For around $10 a year you could have a domain that is simply ‘MyBlog.com’. Why? It looks better, it helps your blog to stand out, it’s quicker & easier for visitors to type and presents a better appearance to search engines, and more crucially, potential readers. Whether you like it or not, other people’s perceptions are their reality. If they think all Blogger blogs are rubbish, they may judge your blog by it’s URL and not even visit your site - it happens.
It’s extremely easy to register a domain - simply visit a registrar website, choose an available domain, register, pay and that’s it. Your blog host can tell you the address of their ‘nameservers’ which you point the domain to, via your registrar and you can either keep or re-direct your old URL. I used 123-reg.co.uk as a registrar and my Thermalblog.co.uk address cost me approx $20 for 2 years, while Blog-Op was $40, also for 2 years. I’ve read (although not used) that GoDaddy is one of the more popular registrars in the states.
On Blogger? Well, you can now get your own domain name, and point it to your .blogspot address. Full instructions on Blogger.
2 users commented in " Get Your Own Domain Name "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackI agree - your own domain name is a must, especially when you’re just starting to build your brand. While there are some big name bloggers with hosted blogs (eg. wordpress.com and typepad) they are usually bloggers that have built their brand offline or by being first to market.
Hi Flee, many thanks for all your comments.
I agree, it’s so cheap & easy, it really should be one of the first things you do if you harbour any thought of growing a blog.
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