Google vs Wordpress

[thestrangebrew1]

I'm thinking of starting a small business and looking into building a site and buying my domain. Was curious as far as site development which was better. I'm a complete noob to all of this, and gave wordpress a shot last night. I liked it, fairly easy to use and create content and will be trying out Google blog over the weekend. Just curious if anyone has experience with either of these that can share tips or ideas on the best way to get the site started.

 

[El Guaraguao]

Wordpress and Google go hand in hand.

 

[xanis]

I'm thinking of starting a small business and looking into building a site and buying my domain. Was curious as far as site development which was better. I'm a complete noob to all of this, and gave wordpress a shot last night. I liked it, fairly easy to use and create content and will be trying out Google blog over the weekend. Just curious if anyone has experience with either of these that can share tips or ideas on the best way to get the site started.

I've done a bit of work with WordPress. I've never worked with Google Blogs, but from a customization and freedom standpoint, you're almost certainly better off with WordPress. There are a ton of free and premium templates that you can use if design and development isn't your forte, and there's a lot of good documentation and community support behind it as well. WP also can function like a CMS, so you could build a whole site on it (in addition to a blog).

 

[Texashiker]

Wordpress.com does not like its site being used for-profit. There is a wordpress.com VIP account for sites like foxnews and other for-profit organizations.

Blogger is profit friendly.

 

[thestrangebrew1]

One thing I noticed off the bat was the domain pricing. WP was $18/yr for a .com vs Google which was $8/yr with all of Google's products integrated. That seemed like a good deal especially with the integration of gmail/calendar and their other apps. Although I don't use many of them. I guess the first thing to do would be to buy the domain and host then start tinkering with WP more.

 

[xanis]

One thing I noticed off the bat was the domain pricing. WP was $18/yr for a .com vs Google which was $8/yr with all of Google's products integrated. That seemed like a good deal especially with the integration of gmail/calendar and their other apps. Although I don't use many of them. I guess the first thing to do would be to buy the domain and host then start tinkering with WP more.

You don't have to spend $18/month for a WP host; WordPress is stupidly easy to install and most web hosts worth their salt will have a Fantastico script or something for it. There's also a bunch of extensions for Google apps, so you could integrate it fairly well.

 

[thestrangebrew1]

Which host would you guys recommend? I read in other threads here to avoid 1&1(?). hostgator seems to be pretty good and vivi(?).

 

[Blackjack200]

Don't go with Vivi, he doesn't offer unlimited space/traffic.

Seriously though, he has a good reputation here and I'd use him in a heartbeat. He might even give an AT discount.

 

[thestrangebrew1]

Don't go with Vivi, he doesn't offer unlimited space/traffic.

Seriously though, he has a good reputation here and I'd use him in a heartbeat. He might even give an AT discount.

Yea I was thinking I may go with him. I'll have to check it out tonight when I get home from work. This is all new to me and I'm excited about learning this stuff!

 

[Homerboy]

if its for a business why would you not use something like citymax.com or 1and1 where they cater to businesses with all the tools you would need including shopping carts etc?

 

[thestrangebrew1]

if its for a business why would you not use something like citymax.com or 1and1 where they cater to businesses with all the tools you would need including shopping carts etc?

Well it's not a business where I'd be selling products. I'm just creating a website for people to check out my services, an ad basically. I'm still in the idea phase as far as interaction with the site, but mainly it'll be about the services I provide vs. a product.

This is an on the side venture, outside of my 9-5, so I don't expect a lot of work or income off of this. Just a small pc repair outfit I'll be doing on the side, but I figured a website would have an extra touch of professionalism that most of the craigslist ads in the area don't have. These ads are mostly spam anyways and don't even have the same area code as where I'm located. I'd basically be the only shop in town, but in an area that's 70% on wellfare so I know business won't be exactly booming. Besides, I figured this would be a great opportunity to learn how to build and maintain a website.

 

[Blackjack200]

Do me a favor and give updates in this thread. I'm thinking about doing something like this for my dad's business.

 

[thestrangebrew1]

Will do. They'll probably be few and far between as I still have a lot to learn and I'm taking my time getting things running.

 

[bigrash]

Go with wordpress.

 

[xanis]

Well it's not a business where I'd be selling products. I'm just creating a website for people to check out my services, an ad basically. I'm still in the idea phase as far as interaction with the site, but mainly it'll be about the services I provide vs. a product.

This is an on the side venture, outside of my 9-5, so I don't expect a lot of work or income off of this. Just a small pc repair outfit I'll be doing on the side, but I figured a website would have an extra touch of professionalism that most of the craigslist ads in the area don't have. These ads are mostly spam anyways and don't even have the same area code as where I'm located. I'd basically be the only shop in town, but in an area that's 70% on wellfare so I know business won't be exactly booming. Besides, I figured this would be a great opportunity to learn how to build and maintain a website.

If you're not planning on having anything advanced like a shopping cart or user accounts, you might want to consider doing the main site in straight HTML/CSS (no CMS) and then doing a separate blog, if you want it. The learning curve would be a little lower for you.

Otherwise, WP is a solid choice. I'm an Interactive Designer and I do a fair amount of front-end work; PM me if you have any specific questions and I'll try to help.

 

[thestrangebrew1]

If you're not planning on having anything advanced like a shopping cart or user accounts, you might want to consider doing the main site in straight HTML/CSS (no CMS) and then doing a separate blog, if you want it. The learning curve would be a little lower for you.

Otherwise, WP is a solid choice. I'm an Interactive Designer and I do a fair amount of front-end work; PM me if you have any specific questions and I'll try to help.

Awesome thanks. I'll probably hit you up as I move along with this endeavor.