Good morning !
This is officially the first post being written AND published since i’ve jumped the fence and got my own domain and became self-host :3 So this is what we will be conversing today.
First, there may be different reasons why someone would wanna get self-hosted. Which honestly would differ from blogger to blogger; some will be for the “making money” option, some may be for the freedom, or just to be “successful”… or many other reasons that I cannot think of right now.
Personally, it has been something I was thinking for quite a while; what was the most attractive to me has been the availability of plug-ins. The one I wanted the most was of course “CommentLuv” ! Many in our community is using that one and it’s just a nice way to help blog hopping and returning comments, by allowing commenters to include one of their recent posts.
Different bloggers also have different opinions on when is the best time to go self-hosting.. Some prefer to start blogging being self-host so you can learn all at once, some prefer to do a lot of research, while some others like me just go head onto it and bam!
Is it the best one? most probably not, if we are being honest.. but it’s how I’ve been doing EVERYTHING so far 😂 yep, even the more permanent things like my tattoos and piercing. If I give things too much of a thought, my anxiety gets the override and I might not even end up doing it – and to be fair, I don’t know what I could’ve had researched.. All I needed to know was the different prices and what they offered between the companies, so I could pick one.
The most important thing to me is passion. This of course costs money, inflating with every options you wanna get. So it’s important that you know it’s something you love, and won’t wanna quit after a period. From there on, I think any blogs needs constant works; from graphics to getting better writing, etc. The switch however need more work in term of fixing the links everywhere and such. Aswell as being used to the new plug-ins, format and customizations you can do now.
The ONE thing i’m not so fond of the switching though, is how everything still link to the old one. So you gotta go back and fix what’s in your post but also Goodreads, Netgalley, and everywhere you’ve put your link into. That’s the most tedious part, with fidgetting with the settings and figure your way out; as WordPress don’t do it for you anymore. You also have to put it out there that the new blog is going, many being unaware. So all the followers you gained, you lose them for a period. I’d thought all would just apply to the same blog – but nope! A new blog was created instead, which caused me anxiety for a while.. That was one thing I should’ve read about.
What’s your thoughts on Self-Hosting?
What is the must-haves and basics in your opinion?
What would you say is the best time to do the switch?
Ooooo yes, fixing everything is THE hardest part and frankly, moving from blogger to self-hosted caused me to lose all of my followers from GFC, though I did redirect. It’s definitely a learning jump and there is SO MUCH information, it’s a bit overwhelming, haha, and to ease my anxiety, I chose managed wordpress rather than completely self-host and have to worry about the backing up and maintenance, which I don’t really have time for unfortunately (but also despite being expensive, I suppose it’s worth it because I was running in circles).
Congratulations on going self-hosted!
As I was already on wordpress, I feel like it might be less of a learning curve for me VS someone from blogger or wix per exemple.. as youd need to learn the while site completely.
Oh yeah! By all means if you have the funds and you can spare it for the website, then it’s definately a good investment for sure ! Less of a headache for you.
Thank you xx
was it fairly straight forward to relink/gainyour followers? 🙂
Actually yeah! I pressed a button and it imported all over – what i didn’t think of though, was to remove like/comment/share on the old one 😂
For bloglovin’ it took me a while more to figure how to transfer though hahah
I started out self-hosted with Port Jericho. I have a WordPress blog- the Biblioanthropologist, tied to PJ. I disliked the lack of customisation options. PJ was supposed to be an author website at first, but it turned more into a book blog. I find the yearly fees well worth the investment.
Oh absolutely! Iknow the WP.org vs .com should have more customization options on the free one..
Oooh, congrats on going self-hosted!! I’ve been thinking about it for a while, but I’ve got a lot of personal stuff coming up in the next two months, so it’ll be later in the year for me if I do decide to go down this path. CommentLuv is such a great tool as well!!
Thank you!! Yep, that’s the thing I was eyeing the most 😂🙈
A little tip, once you do and find ready to start using the new site.. remove the comments/like/share of the old one. I only thought of it AFTER someone shared a post on the free WP one 🤦🏽♀️