Free vs. Paid Blog

You can monetize and earn money from free blogs but a lot of people have done that and suddenly found that their blog has been closed down and their income disappears. You have more control over your own webspace and domain and that's where your money sites should be.

I use free blogs to test things and for backlinks for my money sites, nothing more.

Really. Do these people still use free blogging like blogspot. I keep reading that you can lose your work all with the click of a button by Google. If this is true then why would anyone invest all their time and energy into something like Blogspot?

I'd recommend having a domain and blog hosting that
you control and own 100%.

With a 'free' blog like Blogger or from WordPress.com,
they are in control of your content and can shut your
site down if they think you've violated their Terms of
Service.

You can get a domain for less that $10 per year and
hosting for less than $5 per month. And it puts you
in the driving seat of your own business.

Don't be cheap in business - it can be very expensive
in the long run.

Dedicated to mutual success,

Shaun

Okay, thanks guys - I think you have clarified it for me.
I didn't want to colour anyone's opinion by stating why I was asking, so your replies have been very helpful.

I asked because I am really broke. I have already got a few hosted domains which I have been 'learning' (accidentally! lol) on. But as I learn about the mistakes I have been making I find that those sites no longer serve me.. A couple may work but the sheer amount of work is beyond me -although one may sell wel if I flip it...

Anyway, I digress. I had in mind trying out any new sites on Blogger to see if they picked up any traffic or sales, and then if i found i had got it right in regards a niche I connected with and the correct ways to drive traffic and build a list then I would move it to a paid platform.

I didn't want to try it out only to find that it would have been impossible to monetise/earn from a free site at all in the first place, and that my efforts had been a waste of time.

Thanks for your replies, they have been very helpful!
Dave

It's very precarious and unreliable.

Many Warriors have lost blogs there, with and without domain-names.

This thread, if you read it carefully enough, will tell you all you need to know: http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...y-website.html

No, it doesn't mean that.

First, it's never wise to register a domain-name where you're hosting the site, anyway: it's important to keep those two roles separate (as many here have learned to their cost).

Secondly, having a domain-name on it, rather than a Blogspot subdomain, doesn't exempt you from the (highly changeable) terms of service, nor from Blogger's idiosyncratic and inconsistent interpretations of them.

It makes little sense not to be in control of your own website.

You still need hosting.

It doesn't matter whether it's free or paid hosting. What matters is that it's reliable and secure hosting without loopy terms of service, and that you own and contol the site on it.

Blogspot, Squidoo and HubPages are unsafe and unwise, for hosting - NOT because they're free, but because of their unacceptable terms of service.

There's perfectly adequate free hosting available at places like Byethost and 000WebHost, for those who want free hosting.

More flexibility with a "paid" blog.. in terms of monetization options and site design...

Remember that you always get what you pay for. Free blogs have their place and paid blogs have there place as well. From the responses of the people here in this thread, I believe that has been stated correctly.

But the bottom line is the purpose of having blogs in the first place. If you're testing responsive to a niche then personally I would go the free blog route to a certain point then when it is validated that people are interested then upgrade to a paid blog.

In fact I found a relevant link that will give you more information on this as well.

http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...ng-domain.html