Picking a Blogging Platform

I've had three people ask me in the past 24 hours how to get started with blogging. There are so many resources that it's overwhelming!

If you're TOTALLY new, I suggest first taking a gander at this Blogging 101 slideshare presentation.

OK, so you know what blogging's all about. You want to get started, but you don't know which blogging platform to pick.

The two most popular free blogging platforms are WordPress.com and Google's Blogger.com. I've been using Blogger for the past couple of years and I absolutely love it! But I'd been hearing a lot about WordPress, so just recently I started a new blog about QA Management on that platform so I could compare the two. I know that TypePad is popular as well, but you only get a free trial and then would need to upgrade, whereas WordPress.com and Blogger are completely free. I'm all about free stuff, especially when you're learning and these two platforms have all the bells and whistles to keep you happily blogging for years! I really can't believe that they're free!

As for which to choose? My preference is Blogger, but I've only been using WordPress for a week, so it could be that I just haven't gotten used to it yet. This comparison chart does a good job of showing the differences. However, one thing I can't find with WordPress is an up-to-date tutorial! I found a site with a very comprehensive set of tutorials about Blogger, though. I watched the first two videos and found them very informative. And it looks like the full set of 118 videos is free (did I mention I like free stuff?)

One other really nice thing about these popular blogging platforms is that many other social sites automatically integrate with them. So, for example, you can easily share content from your blog on sites like Twitter, FaceBook, and LinkedIn. You can also, very easily share content from other sites, like YouTube and SlideShare on your blog. If you have a custom blog, it's often not as easy to integrate.

With these popular platforms it's also very easy to add these cool "widgets" or "gadgets" as they're called. Those are the little applications you see on the sidebar -- the stuff to the right on this blog. I just added "Things to Ponder" for example.

My advice is get yourself a blogger account and just get your feet wet! If you want to blog for business, there's a lot more to learn. But for now, let blogger be your sandbox and get out and play!