When to give up Blogger? | Bloggers Lair | Yakezie Forums

Back when I was previously using blogger, back when it was still called blogspot, I don't think there was the ability to transfer the blog to your own domain name.  Perhaps that has changed.  Can anyone confirm this?

Building up a blog is a lot of work.  You have to be prepared to put in a lot of time and effort before you see any profit.  By now you should be able to see if it's something that you are willing to put that kind of effort into.  To make money online, you usually do need to spend some money.  So if you decide you are serious about it, I do recommend taking the plunge.

One thing I noticed on your blog is that you are targeting very competitive keywords.  You might stand a better chance of getting traffic to those pages by targeting less common phrases. 

Also, you may want to upgrade to a better blog theme.  It is tough to develop a following with such a basic theme.  While the content is more important, people still prefer a blog that is visually appealing. 

If your goal is to make money, I would move to paid hosting as soon as possible.

If you stick with free hosting until you start making money then move, you would lose your page rank and all the other blog ranks. That's what I thought anyway.

At least buy the domain name right away, that's not too expensive.

I use weebly. It's very inexpensive and easy to use. I now figure how to get 100% adsense revenue which I didn't before. WP is great from what I hear and know but I just don't have the time being that all I do is creation related. 

Just a correction on what I said earlier, I forgot that blogger does have the option to use a custom url.  So technically you could get your own domain name and stay on blogger.  The problem is that there are a lot of other limitations.  With your own domain on your own hosting account, you are free to install whatever programs you want and change any of your code. 

From what I'm reading you still cannot do a proper 301 redirect from a blogspot address to a new web host.  People are resorting to meta refresh redirects which are not search engine friendly.  Blogger help actually says to just place a link to your new domain.

So if you have decided to commit to blogging long term, move to your own domain as soon as you can.  Otherwise, you will be wasting your time and will only be able to recover the content, but none of the link building.  If you really cannot afford hosting, there are some free hosts with more flexibility than blogger.  They're not a good long term solution, but might suit your situation.

Making money with blogging is a marathon. It takes time and effort and for a while all your income (if you get any) will be invested right back in your blog. I do not think that there are any short-cuts.

If you aim to make this long-term commitment, get your own URL and paid hosting. The URL is the real estate you invest in. Make sure it is your own. Hosting can be the only major expense. 

Poor Student said:

Hey everybody. Right now I have not made a penny from blogging, but my goal is to eventually make a decent amount of side money from it. Right now I do not even have the minimal amount of capital to get a domain name or a hosting site. I am using Google Blogger right now. I want to know if when you guys started did you pay for your sites right away or wait until you had a substantial amount of traffic already so you knew you would be able to cover the costs? If my goal is to make some money from my blog would I be better to take a bit of a leap of faith and spring for the price of my own site, or would I be better to wait until I have a loyal following to ake sure I am not throwing money down the drain?

Tyler- 

I would AT LEAST purchase the domain name for your site. It will cost at most $10 for the year. You can continue using the blogger platform for free and when it comes time to switch to wordpress, you won't lose any Alexa Ranking or PageRank you've already built up. 

On you site you mentioned a goal of investing the entire tax refund you're expecting this year. Why not use this money to invest in yourself and your blog? I bet your blog could pay out more than $200/year in "dividends." 

Just my 2 cents..

I started my blog on blogger, transferred to wordpress, and now I'm self hosted. Wordpress is a huge improvement from blogger even in it's free form, but you can buy a domain from wordpress for like $18/year. I'd recommend buying the domain – it's worth it :)

Modest Money said:

@Funancials: I don't think he'll be able to switch to wordpress from blogger.  Without a proper 301 redirect, he isn't likely to retain any PR or Alexa rankings.

Didn't know this…When I switched from Tumblr to Wordpress, I was able to keep everything (except the comments). I assumed Tumblr and Blogger were similar..

Here's my $.02.

1) Learn how to write. I haven't been to your site, but if you buy a blog and have nothing to offer traffic, you're screwing yourself. I read 15 blogs a day and most are pretty good. If you can't write you don't stand a chance.

2) Buy a domain ASAP if your goal is to do this long term. First, that money hanging over your head will force you to work hard. Second, you'll "own" your space. Install shag carpeting if you want; it's yours. Nobody can tell you what to do.

I'm far from a successful blogger, but I'm an expert at giving advice.

j.