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Improvements for WordPress Blog

  1. expressjr
    Member

    Hello,

    First, here is the link to my wordpress blog: http://expressjr.wordpress.com

    I am really with wordpress but I would like to improve my blog and make it more professional and more good looking to attract more readers.

    What are your suggestions ? I am searching for some simple improvements that would make some difference

    I think moving to a .com instead of wordpress.com would be a good idea but, what is the best way to do this ? through wordpress ? through external hosts ? what are the advantages and disadvantages of each ?

    Sincerely,

    ExpressJR

    The blog I need help with is expressjr.wordpress.com.

  2. timethief
    Member

    Purchasing a domain and domain mapping instructions are found here > http://en.support.wordpress.com/domain-mapping/
    12 step blog evaluation > http://onecoolsitebloggingtips.com/2011/01/28/12-step-blog-evaluation/
    The Learn WordPress.com tutorial is divided into progressive levels and presented as a series: http://learn.wordpress.com/

  3. expressjr
    Member

    Thanks for your answer,

    However, I am not talking about how to purchase a domain. I am asking if it is a good idea and what is better between purchasing a domain with wordpress or with another external host like for example GoDaddy

  4. timethief
    Member

    If you are serious about blogging, if you intend to use a blog in any commercial way and/or to create a professional reputation, then whether or not you decide to have a free hosted blog at WordPress.com or hire a web host and self host a WordPress.org blog, I recommend purchasing a domain as early as possible. This is because blogs on subdomains like wordpress.com lack the credibility that those on their own domains have, and a domain name tends to give your website an aura of respectability. Having your own domain means provides increased opportunities to:
    build your own unique brand, online presence, and reputation; assist your followers (readers, clients and customers) to recall and locate your site very easily.

    The pros and cons of being free hosted by wordpress.com or self hosting wordpress.org software are summed up very well in WordPress.com vs. WordPress.org. http://support.wordpress.com/com-vs-org/

    If you are an experienced WordPress.com software user, and have the skill sets required to set up and manage your own self hosted WordPress.org install then the instructions for making the move are easy to follow. But if you are not skilled at WordPress.com blogging, and also lack the skill sets required to self host your own WordPress.org install then acquiring those skills first is recommended.

    Here at WordPress.com Staff does for us what we must do ourselves on a WordPress.org install. When you have a WordPress.org install you are responsible for all upgrades, installations, backups and troubleshooting. If you install a theme or a plugin that negatively affects your blog, then you have to figure out what went wrong and fix it. Sometimes it is a conflict with another plugin, sometimes is it is just a poorly written plugin. For self-hosting figure an average monthly total cost (including cost of a domain name) of about $10 to $25 generally, but that all depends on storage and bandwidth requirements.

  5. expressjr
    Member

    Okay, thanks a lot !

    I checked your blog by the way and I really liked it =) I just followed you on twitter to stay updated about your posts !

    I think for the time being I will just purchase a domain without moving to WordPress.org. Maybe i'll move to .org later !

  6. timethief
    Member

    Now lets deal with traffic and SEO and the myth that moving to a WordPress.org install will increase both. Hogwash! The SEO is excellent here at WordPress.com where our blogs are part of a huge blogging community on a blogging platform that has high PageRank. Some of that Google juice flows to our blogs simply because they are a part of the WordPress.com community and our posts are all entered into the WordPress.com tagging pages under the categories and tags we assign to them.

    When one moves blog content to a WordPress.org install that all disappears. All those links to your blog from the WordPress.com global tagging pages are gone because your blog is no longer part of the WordPress.com community. You now have a stand alone install and it takes at least 6 months to build up your blog and PageRank again.

    Now let's deal with the traffic myth. 'Build it and they will come' is not applicable to blogs. Blogging is both competitive and cooperative. The bottom line is there is no such thing as passive blog promotion. If you have a blog then you need to work your butt off promoting it throughout social networks. This relationship building takes time and is built on reciprocity. All of us need to develop social networking strategy for blog promotion and integrate a time management plan into it.
    http://onecoolsitebloggingtips.com/2009/01/15/twenty-five-steps-to-increase-blog-traffic/

    In reality if your WordPress.com blog does not currently attract 1,000 – 1,500 unique visitors every day, and your traffic stats do not demonstrate a growth trend, then it’s unlikely that you will much more than covering web hosting costs. Moving from WordPress.com to WordPress.org means you will have added responsibilities so don’t hurry into self hosting thinking you will be handsomely paid for the effort.

  7. expressjr
    Member

    Wow that's interesting =)

    Thanks for your help !

  8. timethief
    Member

    I beginning to feel like a broken record on this subject. :D You're welcome.

  9. timethief
    Member

    BTW I flagged this thread so our Moderators will move it to the Off-Topic Forum. If you click "member" under your username here in any forum thread you can locate all the threads you have posted to. http://en.forums.wordpress.com/profile/expressjr

  10. expressjr
    Member

    I still have a last question:

    I would like to change the theme of my blog and I checked all the proposed wordpress themes and none of them really interested me. Is there any other solution ?

  11. timethief
    Member

    The only "other solution" is to purchase an annually renewable CSS upgrade and do the editing work yourself. http://en.support.wordpress.com/custom-css/

    Please let me be frank. While it is important to have clean theme that has intuitive navigation, a pleasing appearance that appeals to all demographic groups and loads very quickly, do be aware that returning readers do not come back to blogs simply to view themes. The content must be the draw and that's where the majority of your time and attention must be focused.

    There are over 100 free themes here and what you have to determine for yourself is where your time, energy, and money are best spent in terms of converting casual visitors into regular readers and subscribers. What will bring in traffic and increase comments? What will increase your regular readers and subscribers? Will your time and energy investment into theme tweaking come anywhere near producing a traffic flow to your blog that investing the same amount of time and energy into content creation, sussing out your competition learning, and applying SEO to your content and images? Will your time and energy be better spent on content creation, blog promotion, social networking, commenting on other blogs and relationship building?

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