Video transcript.

So you’re thinking of starting a new blog and people keep saying different things, some are saying you should start free, some are saying you should invest money and buy a domain, hosting etc…so what’s the truth? Let’s find out in this video.

So, I’ve been a blogger for the last 10plus years and here’s my experience.

I started for free on blogger.com – which is Google’s own product. The reason I chose blogger is because it was easy to get started with. It was free. The first few months were easy. There were couple of visitors on the blog and everything was good. But as my traffic grew, I began to realize the mistake I made. Blogger had lot of restrictions. I didn’t have my own domain so it was difficult for people to remember the website. It was difficult for me to share the website. There were a lot of restrictions on search engine optimization features and I was stuck. Because now, I had already written some articles and I wanted to move to a fresh blog with my won domain name, etc. I ultimately migrated to my own domain manikarthik.com but the damage was already done. I lost a lot of traffic and it took me many months to rebuild that last traffic.

Why am I saying this?

Well, many people ask me if they should invest money into blogging when they start. By investing, like should they buy their own domain name, should they buy their own host OR should they start free with Blogger or WordPress?

My answer to that is, feel free to do what is comfortable for you, but don’t make the mistake I made.

Because there are free services out there, don’t think that those are the best. If you are serious about blogging, you need a good platform that allows you to grow and have all the controls for yourself. The free platforms are great places to start with, but if you are seriously putting in efforts to grow the blog and make money out of it, you will outgrow them.

So, what I suggest is that avoid the mistake I made, and start with a paid blogging service. It only costs around 300 – 500 Rupees anyways to get your own domain. And blog hosting packages are so cheap these days. I’ve mentioned some of the best and cheap blog hosting packages in the description below. Do check them out!

But if you are new to blogging and want to learn it, then I would suggest getting a free blog. And in that, I would suggest WordPress instead of Blogger. WordPress is more popular and gives you ways to upgrade automatically from the free blog, whenever you want to. Blogger, on the other hand, is a dead product from Google and it’s not recommended.

So if you were to buy a domain name today from GoDaddy, it would cost you around 500 Rupees for one year. There’s a discount link in the description, please check it out for the latest discount offer. And for the hosting it would cost you under Rs.250 per month for the cheapest plan. I think these are great starting points for a fresher to blogging. Because if you invest around Rs. 250 per month, it would only help you to do better afterward. Once you start making money from the blog, it will easily prove to be worth the investment.

So in effect, I’d say invest minimal if you are really serious about making money from blogging. Around Rs.500 to start with. There is also a psychological trick that works here. Those who invest money already, will be serious with the efforts and would never let go, without achieving success. Others, usually get demotivated and will let go. Don’t be that person.

But, if you want to learn the techniques of blogging then start with a free blog on WordPress, the link is in the description. And once you have learned the techniques and methodology, upgrade to a paid plan later. On WordPress, it is so much more easier to do it.

I hope that answers the question. If you’re learning about blogging and making money working from home, do check out my other videos, there are plenty in the playlists you see here.

If you liked the video, you know what to do. Please like, share and subscribe to my channel. And if you have any questions, please post in the comments section. I’d be happy to help you.

This is Mani Karthik signing off.