The Blog Doctor.

Blogger and Wordpress on same Domain.

You can have a Blogger blogspot blog and a Wordpress blog on the same domain. This will enable you to have the best of both worlds. The minimal cost is ten dollars for Blogger plus fifteen dollars for Wordpress (not including hosting).

To illustrate this I bought a domain name and hosting on
BLUEHOST.COM...............

WHAT IS A DOMAIN?

A domain is a group of computers on the Internet with a common ending like .com, .edu, .info, .net etc. Since DOT COM (.com) endings sound impressive it is best to choose them. I chose to go for a .com domain. You can go for whatever you wish .net, .info etc depending on availability.

WHAT IS A DOMAIN NAME?

A domain name is the part before the DOT com/net/info/edu/gov... You can buy a domain name from any authorized domain name dealer provided it is available. If available it can come as cheap as $7 to $10. Most hosting providers like Bluehost.com offer it free if purchased along with a hosting plan. With Bluehost you can even pay usig Paypal. I chose Vintip as the domain name. You can choose whatever you want after checking to see if it is available. It is best to choose a keyword based domain name for search engine optimization purposes.

You can also buy a domain name through Blogger for $10. You get :

For $10 only, one year domain registration.

Free Private domain registration.

Domain Manager

Google Services auto configured

Free Email, calendar, instant messaging, web pages and more.

WHAT IS A URL/ADDRESS?

Once you buy the domain name you have an address : http://www.example.com. Here 'example' is the domain name and '.com' the domain. Now that you have an address it is time to create a blog in it. My new address became http://www.vintip.com.

CREATE WORDPRESS BLOG

Login to your hosting provider after selecting and buying a hosting plan. On the Control Panel (cPanel) you will usually be provided with a single click Wordpress install script. On Bluehost.com click the Simple Scripts link under Software/Services section on the cPanel. Then click on Wordpress under Blogs. Lastly click the Install Now button. Under Install Options choose the latest stable version and choose to install it on your domain at http:/www.example.com. Click the options to create an Admin login and to generate database and check the legal information and click Complete button to install Wordpress.

(Different hosting providers will have different options.)

Your Wordpress blog will be created at your domain 'example.com'. My wordpress blog is located at Vintip.com. If you want to have FREE HOSTING create blog at Wordpress.com and then use domain mapping (see below).

WHAT IS A SUBDOMAIN?

A subdomain is a method of dividing your site into sections. For example our domain (example.com) can be divided into http://music.example.com, http://politics.example.com, http://films.example.com. You can make any number of subdomains according to your interests. In above example music, politics and films are subdomains of example.com. If you have three different blogspot blogs on each of the above topics you can redirect them to the respective subdomains. They will continue to be hosted at Blogger but will now have a new address ending in DOT COM without the BLOGSPOT.COM in the url.

Photo by Skyseeker.

CREATE SUBDOMAINS

To create a subdomain login to your domain name provider. If it is bluehost.com click Subdomains link under Domains section on the cPanel. On next screen type in a subdomain name and click Create button. Repeat to create as many subdomains as you want. I create a subdomain 'seo' for my blogspot blog. My subdomain is http://seo.vintip.com

CONFIGURE SUBDOMAINS FOR BLOGGER

After creating the subdomain it is time to change the CNAME settings for it. This has to be done to redirect a Blogspot blog to your subdomain. For Bluehost all DNS changes will need to be done through a Bluehost Technician. For this they have provided a Live Chat facility on their home page. You have to give the address of your subdomain created in above section (music.example.com) and ask them to change the CNAME to ghs.google.com. Once record is changed it takes about 1-4 hours to propagate through the DNS servers.

CHECK SUBDOMAIN CNAME

To check whether it has been done open a command prompt window on PC after 6 hours of changing it. At the prompt type :

ping music.example.com

Replace 'music' and 'example' with your own subdomain and domain names and press Enter key. You should get this type of response :

Pinging ghs.l.google.com [72.14.235.121] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 72.14.235.121: bytes=32 time=311ms TTL=241
Reply from 72.14.235.121: bytes=32 time=307ms TTL=241
Reply from 72.14.235.121: bytes=32 time=308ms TTL=241
Reply from 72.14.235.121: bytes=32 time=306ms TTL=241

Ping statistics for 72.14.235.121:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 306ms, Maximum = 311ms, Average = 308ms

This means the change has been successfull.

REDIRECTING BLOGSPOT TO SUBDOMAIN

Once the subdomain has been set up it is time to redirect your blogspot blog to the subdomain. Login at Blogger.com. Click Settings link under your blog title on Dashboard. Click Publishing subtab. On Publishing subtab click Switch to Custom Domains link. Under Buy a Domain Name click "Switch to Advanced Settings' link. In Your Domain text box type in your subdomain :

music.example.com

Type in the Word Verification and click Save Settings button. To check click on View Blog link at the top. Your blog will open with your new domain in the address bar. You can check my blog http://seoblogadsense.blogspot.com has been redirected to http://seo.vintip.com/

So now I have a Wordpress blog at http://www.vintip.com/
and a Blogspot blog at http://seo.vintip.com

WHAT IS HOSTING

Web hosting is where you purchase space on a web server to provide physical space for your site files. I have purchased a hosting plan at Bluehost.com. My Blogspot Blog is hosted at Blogger for free and redirected to my subdomain using Custom Domains feature. My Wordpress blog is hosted at Bluehost. If you want a free Wordpress hosting you can create a blog at Wordpress.com and redirect it using their Domain Mapping feature.

REDIRECTING WORDPRESS.COM TO SUBDOMAIN

If you want to save on hosting costs create a Wordpress blog at Wordpress.com and then redirect it to your domain using their Domain Mapping feature. It will cost $20/year to purchase and map the domain to your blog.

ADVANTAGES

Simple domain name eg Vintip.com. Easy to remember for readers.

No blogspot/wordpress in domain name.

Your blogs still hosted for free at Blogger/Wordpress.

Put multiple blogspot blogs on a single domain using multiple subdomains.

Increase Blog Traffic.

Consolidate multiple blogs under one site.

Cheap as no hosting costs.

Can still use Layouts Templates. (FTP blogs have to use Classic Templates.)

For any blog changes/updating login at Blogger.com and use Blogger Dashboard.

No worries about blog security/bandwidth/space as it is still managed by Blogger.

Enjoy!

Moving from Sub-domain to your own Domain | Views and Reviews.

Blogger and Wordpress.com both offer free blogging platforms with one caveat : your blog is on a subdomain like http://MYBLOG.blogspot.com and http://MYBLOG.wordpress.com. This becomes a disadvantage for the serious professional blogger who would like his blog to be on http://www.MYBLOG.com.

Blogger offers Custom Domains facility where you can host your blog on Google for free and only have to incur the cost of a Domain Name. However, for professional bloggers this is not enough and they wish to host their blog on independant web hosting to have total control over it. Many bloggers start out on blogspot and then shift to outside hosting. This is a comparison of methods used by two prominent bloggers and the advantages and disadvantages of each method...............

BLOGGER CUSTOM DOMAINS

BLOGGER TO WORDPRESS

This method was used by David at Sciencetext.com :

1. Choose a domain Name and register it (and Hosting if you want to host the blog outside Blogger).

2. Load up Wordpress in your domain. (Ignore this step if you are hosting at Blogger - Custom Domains).

3. Backup Blogger Template, Backup Blog and Backup Page Source as a precaution and a fallback measure to ensure peace of mind.

4. Next you will need to create a CNAME record for your domain with the DNS, associating your domain with ghs.google.com using the methods shown here. The propagation of your domain name over the Internet could take several days so be patient. Check that this has happened by pinging it like this from a command prompt DOS window :

ping www.MYBLOG.com

You should get the following reply :

Pinging ghs.l.google.com [64.233.179.121] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 64.233.179.121: bytes=32 time=94ms TTL=242
Reply from 64.233.179.121: bytes=32 time=92ms TTL=242
Reply from 64.233.179.121: bytes=32 time=94ms TTL=242
Reply from 64.233.179.121: bytes=32 time=94ms TTL=242

Ping statistics for 64.233.179.121:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 92ms, Maximum = 94ms, Average = 93ms

Chuck has a wonderful post on this here.

5. Use Import function in Wordpress and import all posts and comments from your Bloger blog. (Ignore if you are hosting at Blogger).

6. Login at Blogger.com and go to Settings----->Publishing in the blog you are redirecting. Click Switch to "Custom Domain” (Point your own registered domain name to your blog) and enter the URL for your imported Wordpress blog and save.

Your BlogSpot address will only redirect to that domain if it does not have "www" at the beginning. i.e. both xxxxx.blogspot.com and www.xxxxx.blogspot.com will display the blog correctly, but only the former will appear with your custom domain name.

7. Test in browser by entering your blogspot address and it should redirect to your new Wordpress blog. Test the redirect with this tool : http://www.seologic.com/webmaster-tools/url-redirect.php

ADVANTAGES : Google Page Rank and Backlinks maintained but took some time. SEO maintained with a 301 redirect.

DISADVANTAGE : New Technorati Rank. To maintain your permalink structure you will have to use this hack.

DIGITAL INSPIRATION METHOD

BLOGGER AND WORDPRESS

Amit of Digital Inspiration used this method :

1. New web domain registered through Google Apps. Dreamhost signed up for hosting.

2. Wordpress loaded on new site. New template created for the site as an exact replica of the blogspot site.

3. Steps taken to attract Google Juice to new site :

a) New Profile Page created at Googlepages and linked to Profile link on blogspot blog.

b) New Site Search Page created with a Google Custom Search Engine at Googlepages and linked to search box on blogspot blog.

c) MyBlogLog trackig code added to blogspot blog.

4. New posts created on the new site. Feedburner feed was modified to point to the Wordpress feed.

5. No importing and redirecting of posts. Blogspot site continues to be maintained while Wordpress site attracts new advertisers.

6. FINAL RESULT : Two sites. One with blogspot subdomain and one independently hosted Wordpress blog linked by a common search engine and brand name.

ADVANTAGE : Both sites maintained to have the best of both worlds. New site gets Google Juice from old site. Technorati Rank of old site maintained. Technorati Rank of new site gets a boost up due to association with the old site. Since Blogger is free there is more logic in continuing your old site and associating it with your new site. This method also avoids all the complications involved in redirecting your posts.

The Ultimate Blogger Wordpress Comparison Guide.

Beginners to blogging are attracted to the two platforms : Blogger and Wordpress as both are free. They are however confused as to which one to choose? To help them I have compiled a feature by feature comparison of the two blogging platforms. This is not to decide which is superior but to provide a comparison so that bloggers with different needs may choose between them............

BLOGGER V/S WORDPRESS

I have not included wordpress.org since that is a software which you have to install and hence is different from Blogger and Wordpress.com where all the work is done for you behind the scenes.

The fourth column "What It Means" explains the significance of each difference in the features of both. You will have to scroll the spreadsheet horizontally to see it.

You can make your decision based on what features you require. I have refrained from giving 'points' or a total 'score' as that is not the point of this exercise. Both have their pros and cons and I only wish beginners to make an informed decision before stepping into the blogging world.

GOOGLE TRENDS COMPARISON

Here is a comparison in Google Trends for the terms 'Blogger' and 'Wordpress'. See picture below : Click picture to enlarge :

Note that Wordpress started at rock Bottom in 2003 and has managed to cut in front of Blogger by early 2007. On the other hand when we compare 'blogger.com' and 'wordpress.com' this is what we get :