Video Blog Platform

[Cora Devries]

Bloggingplatforms make it easy for people to share their thoughts and ideas with the world, connect with others who share similar interests, and promote an open dialogue and exchange of ideas. These platforms can also be a useful tool for marketing and branding as strong blogs can reach a large audience and build a loyal following. Here are the best blogging platforms available today. Find the best solution for your needs and budget.

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WordPress is also a very popular platform, so there are thousands of resources available online to help you set up and use your blog. With its endless customization options comes the requirement for some level of coding knowledge, or the ability to follow a technical tutorial. This is because WordPress operates on a codebase that you can manipulate to make your blog look and work the way you want.

WordPress is a free, open-source platform, so there is no membership fee to use it. However, users must purchase web hosting from a third-party provider, such as Bluehost or IONOS in order to make a website available live. Generally, web hosting is affordable, with most providers starting around $5 to $10 per month. Additionally, users will also need to buy a domain name, an SSL certificate and any additional plugins or tools.

Wix is ideal for bloggers who want a simple, easy-to-use platform with drag-and-drop functionality and beginner-friendly SEO tools that help you rank in organic search. Wix is, first and foremost, a website builder and not a blogging platform. What this means for users is that it is scalable. So, if down the line you decide to sell digital downloads or physical goods, you can easily do so. In contrast, some traditional blogging platforms are not even capable of processing transactions.

What I have always liked most about Wix, which makes it stand out most from other all-in-one website builders, is that it has a true drag-and-drop site editor. This allows you to move elements (i.e., text, images, videos, etc.) anywhere on the page, as opposed to site builders that employ content blocks that limit elements to certain locations on the page.

Outside of design, I also find that Wix has one of the more comprehensive SEO tools out of the top website builders. While most offer very basic SEO features, Wix goes a bit deeper to help you better understand how to position your posts for visibility in search.

Wix has a number of built-in SEO and marketing tools to help businesses get found in search and get in front of readers and potential customers. Unlike many of the top website builders that offer the bare minimum in terms of SEO tools, Wix takes it a step further with a comprehensive on-page SEO checklist that walks users through all of the key steps they can take to help rank their blog in search. It also has an SEO assistant tool to give suggestions on how to improve ranking in search, which is available with certain plans.

As mentioned above, Weebly is a very user-friendly website builder that requires zero web design experience or coding knowledge. Personally, I find it to be one of the easiest website builders in the market, largely due to its simplicity and intuitive interface. The process of setting up a Weebly site is as simple as selecting a prebuilt template from its free template library, customizing the template, connecting your domain and pushing publish.

Weebly offers a free forever plan as well as low-cost premium plans. In my opinion, its free plan is not suitable for professional use as it displays Square ads and does not allow users to connect their own domain name. However, it does give users a good way of building their blog without having to pay for a subscription.

As an open-source, community-driven platform, Drupal stands out for its vast ecosystem of developers who contribute to it and its expansive community forum. It boasts a large selection of modules, which are similar to WordPress plugins in that they enable you to add new features or functionality to your Drupal site or blog. In return, Drupal is not only very flexible, but it is also highly scalable, making it a good choice for those looking to grow their blog.

Squarespace is a website builder and hosting platform that allows users to easily create websites with a blog without any coding knowledge or web design experience. Users get a drag-and-drop interface, award-winning templates and 24/7 customer support. Squarespace is known for its sleek designs, easy-to-use platform and plans that include everything you need to build and launch a professional website or blog.

As an all-in-one website builder, Squarespace offers just about everything you need to build a blog, business website or online store, with features such as an integrated shopping cart, product pages, payment processing and more. However, where it really shines is in its modern templates that are notoriously sleek, and dare I say, expensive-looking. Another area where Squarespace stands out is in its availability of built-in sales and marketing tools that help businesses better connect with their audiences and keep readers coming back.

However, it does offer competitively priced plans that include everything you need to build a site, including web hosting, templates, a domain name, an SSL certificate and more. Plans start at $16 per month with annual billing for a business website or blog and increase to $23 per month with annual billing for an e-commerce site.

Content Hub stands out not only for its comprehensive CMS but also for its robust suite of sales and marketing tools, such as Sales Hub and Marketing Hub. These offerings can help businesses generate qualified leads, convert leads into sales and more effectively build a loyal reader base. In terms of the Content Hub, it is a robust CMS with numerous tools, such as forms, landing pages and commerce tools.

While Content Hub is pretty user-friendly, one issue I have with it is that it does not offer any themes that are designed for those creating a blog. Instead, it offers themes with built-in blog pages, which may not be the ideal solution for everyone. Otherwise, it offers a modern and intuitive site editor that makes it pretty easy to customize its themes.

HubSpot offers a free plan for up to five users. It uniquely allows users to connect a custom domain, which is unheard of for a free plan. It also allows users to house up to 100 products for those selling online, has a blog import feature for those that are looking to move an existing blog to Content Hub, accelerated mobile pages (AMP) for faster load times, and more, making it a very robust free plan. It also offers premium plans starting at $15 per month and include additional features, such as dynamic themes, memberships and personalized pages for each visitor.

Bloggers can sign up for Medium for free to create a blog on Medium. However, those who want to earn money from views will need to buy the Medium Member membership for a small price of $5 per month. This also gives members access to members-only stories, offline reading, connecting a custom domain and more, making it a good value for price.

There are a few main features to look for that will help you narrow your search. For example, the availability of templates and themes that suit your niche; the ability to connect a custom domain name; SEO; monetization opportunities; analytics; scalability and the availability of support.

Another key consideration when choosing a platform to build your blog is ease of use. While there are many code-free platforms that claim to be beginner-friendly, some are more beginner-friendly than others. On top of that, some are also more customizable, offer higher quality templates that require fewer customizations (and therefore less time) and are more versatile with more features and integrations.

We recommend Content Hub by HubSpot or Medium. Content Hub offers adaptive testing, which helps businesses create and test different versions of their web pages to see which performs best. Medium is best for businesses that want to share their stories and ideas with a wider audience.

You have a few options for posting a blog for free. You can set up a blog under a free subdomain such as those offered in free Wix, Weebly or WordPress.com plans. You can also open an account on a social media platform, such as LinkedIn or Medium, set up a profile, then publish your blog post using its publishing tools.

There are several differences between WordPress.com and WordPress.org. The main difference is that WordPress.com is fully hosted while WordPress.org is self-hosted. For more information, check out our complete breakdown of WordPress.com vs. WordPress.org.

Kelly Main is a Marketing Editor and Writer specializing in digital marketing, online advertising and web design and development. Before joining the team, she was a Content Producer at Fit Small Business where she served as an editor and strategist covering small business marketing content. She is a former Google Tech Entrepreneur and she holds an MSc in International Marketing from Edinburgh Napier University. Additionally, she is a Columnist at Inc. Magazine.

Melissa spent 17 years investing in couples, families and businesses as the owner of a wildly successful photography company, running and speaking at conferences and retreats for female entrepreneurs and coaching female founders through mindset support to help them lead with confidence and joy in their own businesses. She started her journey in entrepreneurship while putting herself through college and has mastered the art of elongating client journeys by building relationships that her clients want to be in and stay a part of.

With over 35 years of combined experience, Melissa Pepin teamed up with Corry Frazier to create The Business Reboot for entrepreneurs, a business coaching hub for small business owners looking to grow, scale and/or pivot. They know a thing or two about shifting seasons as female business owners in their 40s. From starting and growing thriving businesses, raising babies, moving a bazillion times and enduring dramatic shifts in their entrepreneurial journeys, they have paved a way for success on their own terms. They have built businesses that reflect strong leadership and even stronger relationships and know how to help make that possible for other entrepreneurs too. From day one, they built their businesses around their personal lives, not the other way around. The result? Businesses that could navigate and sustain the changing seasons of life. So much so that while most were closing their doors, 2021 was the most successful year of business for both of their individual businesses.

They have made guest appearances on podcasts such as Stronger Business, The Ultimate Blog podcast and Motherhood Anthology. They sold out their first mastermind for $30,000 and have taught workshops for The Cheetah Company, Crystal Coast Women in Business, and have been speakers and panel members for The Stronger Business Summit. Individually Melissa and Corry have graced stages and platforms for Pursuit Community, Rising Tide Society, Motherhood Anthology, M5 Entrepreneurs (5 Marys Ranch), The Jennifer Allwood Show and Spark Media Concepts.

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