After reading that excellent article in ProBlogger archives I thought it was best to share some critical information, as we understand it with my boomer mind about some of the common blogging platforms beginner and intermediate boomer bloggers may or may not already know about.
What is WordPress.com?
Wordpress.com is a FREE hosted blogging platform. It is built on the Worpress.org software (Which will be discussed in a future post). T he very important thing to remember is that if you have a domain name in this platform it will always have suffix “*.wordpress.com”.
For example I have a couple of blogs that I have set up to stay in touch with workshop participants after a training session has been completed. I find it a great advantage to have a place I can post pictures, PowerPoint slides, and word documents.
My most recent site is preventionpresenters.wordpress.com. I am using this site to maintain helpful presentation skills tips and issues for people who are doing health prevention presentations. The site is open to the web and easy to upload pictures and handouts from past presentations I have conducted.
This works well if you do not want to use a list service. However, always check with clients who are on networks to insure that they have not blocked wordpress.com. There are a few of my list participants who are blocked from using it. However, more are blocked using blogger.com than using wordpress.com.
As a result I maintain the list service and will repeat information on the blog with the bonus of adding pictures and other goodies with the widgets available and uploads you can do so easy with this powerful and easy blog platform.
Pros
1. It’s FREE AND EASY
2. You do not have to find a hosting service or set up the WordPress software on your own.
3. WordPress will take care of the blog set up, backup, security and upgrades. Thus, you do not need to have any technical knowledge.
4. You can
5. You can put up to 50 mgs of photos, powerPoints , etc.
6. You can post videos from YouTube, Google, and VodPod(beta)
7. They have one of the most boomer-friendly help documentation I have ever read.
Cons
1. You are not able, at this writing, to monetize your wordpress.com blog.
2. You don’t have many themes to choose from for your blog
3. Your blog url will always contains the *.wordpress.com suffix. i.e, preventionspeakers.wordpress.com
So if you want to quickly create a blog and you are not concerned about putting adsense ads on it wordpress can work for you. I strongly suggest however that since you must use the wordpress.com suffix that your create links for folks to click on rather than verbalizing the name to someone and expecting them to remember.
Also, we feel that you can still monetize your blog with affiliate reviews if you include the links in the post. We have not talked about affiliate marketing yet but look out for it in the future.
What are your thoughts and experience?
The Old School Team