Blog platform: Which one to choose to succeed in your blog project?

You want create your blog, but don't know what tool you turn to to create it?

Welcome to one of the biggest articles in Addict Blog.

In this one, I will do everything I can to introduce you to the best blogging platforms that are, presenting you the most relevant to my taste.

We will also review their advantages and disadvantages.

Here is the list of blog platforms that I can recommend and that we will see in this article:

1. WordPress (self-hosted)
2. Joomla!
3. Medium
4. Blogger
5. Bloggi
6. Ghost

But let's start with the base.

Autohosted blog or Platform?

If you start blogging, you may not understand what I'm talking about.

Let me explain.

What's a self-hosted blog?

A self-hosted blog is a blog that YOU host on a web hosting. You have full powers. You're 100% the owner.

What is a Blogging platform?

It is usually a site on which you will be able to create an account and your blog. Everything will be hosted on the platform, which is an undeniable asset when what we are looking for is simplicity.

That being said, you do not own your blog and these solutions are often quite expensive and restrictive.

So, what do you choose between these two possibilities?

Well, I'd say that depends on your goal as a blogger.

Are you planning to do your main business? => Self-hosted solution

Do you only want to publish your writings, without any particular purposes if it is not to exchange with others? Platform

Homeless CMS

Let's start an overview of the self-hosted CMS (content system).

Choose one of these solutions if you want to become a professional blogger.

You will see that some will be easier to use than others.

Whatever the solution I am talking about in this chapter, they are viable. All are designed for serious projects.

WordPress.org

How could we talk about blogging without talking about WordPress ? ?

WordPress is THE CMS blogging par excellence. I think I can say it without going too far: it's the best. No one other than him will offer you as many possibilities.

Here are some nice figures about him:

• 40% OF ALL Sites of the world WordPress
• It crushes all competing CMS with more than 60% PDM
• It has been downloaded more than 1.8 billion times
• PlayStation blog is created with WordPress
• The Blog NASA Also, like many others!
• Automation, the parent company of WordPress , is valued at more d$1 billion

Source: https://displaywp.com/

Impressive... But let me now explain why you should choose this tool.

For starters, WordPress is open source. Which means that everyone is free to use it as he wants, and this, free of charge. This is not the case with WordPress.com.

It is maintained by the community on a voluntary basis. Passionate people, there are around the project so 😀

But what makes WordPress so great, that's all its ecosystem. There are tons and tons of themes and extensions allowing anyone to add features without having to code any line of code.

Its main strengths and potential are:

• Add Ad to generate revenue
• Selling products Physical and Digital
• Optimize Natural SEO
• Customize blog as we hear – everything is customizable according to the theme
• It belongs to you 100%, like all the self-hosted solutions presented in this article (and it's important!)

You understand, if you seriously plan to start as a blogger or blogger, you have every interest in opting for a self-hosted WordPress. You won't be disappointed.

Benefits	Disadvantages
Easy grip once installed	Customizations can be a little blurry for a beginner
Low cost, just a domain name and hosting	But you need to know how to install (which is very easy)
Huge possibilities, crazy ecosystem
Huge community, it will not be difficult to find help

Joomla!

Joomla is a CMS, as well as WordPress.

Much less popular than its competitor, it remains no less interesting.

In practice, the possibilities are more or less the same, although its ecosystem is not so expanded.

To have had to learn to use Joomla when I was training at Ionos, I found it less easy to exploit than WordPress. If you are a perfect neophyte then, expect to have to devote some time to it before mastering the tool as it should.

Benefits	Disadvantages
Taking control relatively less easy than WordPress	Customizations can be a little blurry for a beginner
Low cost, just a domain name and hosting	But you need to know how to install (which is very easy)
Many possibilities
The Joomla community exists but is not as present as that of WordPress. You can find people to exchange with.

Ghost

Ghost is not very well known in France. And because it is not very accessible for neophytes.

Just to install on your accommodation, you will need to know a minimum in development. Just to use an SSH terminal. Did I lose you??

There is indeed a package at 29$ per month which allows you to benefit from their platform, but, I don't find it very interesting for us bloggers. There is much better to do with these 348$ Year.

Anyway, it's a very interesting CMS compatible with many services to make your business grow.

I'll run a test soon.

Autonomous platforms

WordPress.com, the most popular blog platform

WordPress.comThis is the number one blogging platform in the world.

It allows anyone to create a free blog and start publishing their articles.

However, it imposes certain restrictions and not least.

If it is possible to create a blog free of charge, you will have to pay close to 25€ per month to have access to all the features a professional blogger needs.

Add premium themes to customize as you want your blog, add add features, add ad to monetize your blog, etc... All this will only be accessible to you if you opt for a Business subscription.

You must be aware of this from the start.

It's nice to start and get into the bath without paying a cent, but, you might feel quickly (and it won't be just an impression) limited.

Benefits	Disadvantages
Easy grip	Customizations can be a little blurry for a beginner
Free formula available...	...but obligation to pay 25€ per month to exploit WordPress well
	Even if we pay, we're limited.

Blogger

Although aging, Blogger Today, we are still able to create attractive blogs, 100% free of charge.

Here, no subscription. You create an account using your Google account, you choose the name of your blog and then a theme. And that's it. Your blog is online ready to welcome your articles.

Benefits	Disadvantages
Pretty easy grip	Personalizations not really accessible to everyone
100% free	Functional integrations more complex than other solutions
Allows you to link your domain name for free in order to avoid having yourblog.blogspot.com as your address	Most of the resources created by the community date back years. Hard to get help if you encounter a problem.

Medium

Medium is a platform on which anyone can publish what they want (or almost what they want).

Personally, I love Medium. He was a subscriber for a while.

The stories we can find there are just great. Whatever you're looking for, you'll probably find it on Medium. The authors are often full of benevolence and really want to help and share.

It is an excellent platform for anyone who simply wants to publish his writings and share them with the world without taking the lead with technique.

Here no custom domain name and no hosting to manage.

Only you and your writings. And that's what I love. simplicity.

But there's a shock.

Medium is mainly used in Anglo-Saxons.

Frenchies... It must be admitted that It's dead..

Anyway, it doesn't stop anyone from publishing on it. I myself started publishing my first « True » articles on Medium.

Benefits	Disadvantages
Easy to handle	Paying, 5$ per month
Your articles will be very pleasant to read	Little possibility of customization and adding functionality. You can only publish your articles and retrieve emails. Nothing more.
	No way to have your own domain name. You will have to settle for your username.

Be aware, however, that Medium is a paying platform that will ask you 5$ per month if you use it regularly. Which is relatively affordable to me in view of the platform.

Bloggi

Bloggi is a little news.

Its objective is simple: facilitate the creation of a blog.

There's no shit here. You create an account, and you create your blog.

You'll have nothing to do but publish your articles.

If you want to link your domain name, bloggi will ask you 5$ per month.

Benefits	Disadvantages
Easy to handle	No comment area at the moment (planned)
Free formula...	...but without custom domain
Very simplistic, Bloggi allows to create blog articles very pleasant to read	Platform only in English for the moment

Is Wix good for blogging?

Wix has a lot of debate.

From Webmasters, bloggers and SEO.

I personally find that this is not a bad tool. But we need to know how to use it and to know its limits.

It should be noted that Wix is primarily a site creation tool. He is not specialized in creating a blog. Just like WordPress is first a blog creation tool before being a site creation tool.

However, it is quite possible to create a blog with Wix. I myself created one in early 2020, a test story.

Nothing serious about this attempt, but I wanted to find out about the tool.

As a blogging enthusiast, I need test everything that existsYou understand.?

I found the experience pleasant. It is possible to achieve pretty things.

Now many experts in natural SEO do not see Wix with a good eye. According to many of them, it will be more difficult to refer to a Wix site rather than a WordPress for example.

This would be due in particular to a number oftechnical aspects.

So, do I think Wix might be interesting? Yes, but be careful about your possibilities of referencing.

Benefits	Disadvantages
Easy to handle
Free formula...	...but without custom domain and with ads for Wix
Less expensive than its competitors	No access to its site source code, export impossible
Lots of native features	We're really locked up at home.
Possible to do very pretty things quite easily	More difficulties to refer to (according to experts)

How much on average does a blog cost?

Wonder how much a blog actually costs?

Well know that this will not cost you much in reality, unless you opt for a stand-alone platform.

For a self-hosted blog, you will need to have a number of elements:

• A domain name: between 5€ and 15€ per year
• Web hosting: between 20€ and 100€ per year, according to its quality (yes, no need for large accommodation when it starts)
• Why not a premium theme to get a blog with a mouth: between 40€ and 70€

A blog can only cost us 65€ If we decided to play it saver. And that's true.

This is very little beside the prices of the standalone WordPress platform and its 300€ per year per blog in addition to its limitations.

So you have every interest in choosing your own accommodation hosting all your possible blogs. Clearly more profitable.

If you want to go further, I wrote an article about the real cost of a blog: How much does a blog cost?

What to choose when you start blogging?

If you are new to blogging and therefore have no technical knowledge, I recommend you turn to a standalone platform.

Although self-hosted solutions are not inaccessible, you will need to play with a domain name and web hosting. Then install the CMS you want to use to finally create your entire blog.

That's not necessarily what I recommend to beginners. Especially as often, when we start in something, it is impossible for us to know whether we really like it or not.

So start slowly and create your first blog via a platform.

Personally, if I started from scratch in blogging, I would start again as I did: publish my first articles on Medium.

This will make sure that I really like to write and that I am capable of it. Once I gained confidence in myself, I started to create pleeeeeees from blogs. Some under my name and some completely anonymous (some are real bunkers).

Anyway, you understood the reasoning.

No matter what the platform is, as long as it allows you to launch.

I think it's best to start slowly and make sure to love it rather than throw everything in a big pump to finally realize that it doesn't fit you at all...

It could save you a lot of time and money.

That says be careful not to lock yourself on the platform.

Once you have the certainty that blogging you really like and that's what you want to do seriously, then take the time to create your blog yourself via one of the self-hosted solutions I cited above.

If you do not do it or too late, it will be difficult for you to get rid of it and you will forever be forced to comply with their rules and restrictions.

Also at risk of losing all your positions on Google because your URLs will have changed with your new domain name. And that's really a shame.

Conclusion, what you need to remember

If I had to summarize this article with a smart list, here is it:

• Self-hosted solutions are priority for a serious blog project
• It costs much cheaper than to go through a platform
• Platforms are to be preferred if you are a neophyte total in blogging and don't know yet if it's something you really like. It is then a question of testing.
• In this case, once your wish to blogging is validatedquickly turn to a self-hosted solution (WordPress, Joomla, Ghost...) to save time and money.
• The best tool as a blogger: WordPress, for its Dantec ecosystem and its increased accessibility compared to other solutions

There. In any case, I hope that this article will help you to see more clearly what choice is required in your case.