The internet these days is just full of blogs masquerading as websites. A blog that looks like a website? What happened to websites?
The difference between the two used to be quite distinct. Traditionally a blog had a journal type layout. People posted their thoughts or news and it was displayed within  a single column. Each new post appeared just above the previous post with dates displayed beside them. As the month passed the posts automatically became archived on the right or left hand side of the main column. A website however was structured into a number of columns and headings that directed traffic to various locations within the site.
A blog layout was standard for a number of years whereas websites differed by design and depth. In fact, when I first looked into the best software to design various sites, using a blog was not an option because of its standard format. I would use Joomla or Drupal instead, content management systems with greater functionality. Fast forward to 2012 and I have switched from Drupal and Joomla to WordPress. Quite simply, blog layouts had caught up over the past four years and are now the better option.
Blogs are so much easier to use and don't require hours spent on coding and layout. There is a bonanza of templates freely available or you can buy an exclusive design. This relieves content providers of programming and layout issues allowing them to concentrate upon their writing. Also, a lot of plugins and widgets have been designed in the interim, creating many more options for page design.
I would encourage anyone wanting an online business presence to investigate the blogging platform. You can adjust a blog easily and there is plenty of support available through forums. If you want free hosting you can sign up for a WordPress, Blogger or Typepad account (there are many others but these are the main three), choose a template, write a post and publish it straight away.
If you do choose a free blog you can use whatever name you want but it will have the blogging provider extension automatically added. However, you can choose to host your blog on a server for a small fee and and have your own domain name.
Is web design software a thing of the past? Probably not - there is always going to be big, data driven sites. Ecommerce sites like Amazon and eBay need the database driven functionality of specific web software - a blog would be unable to track the large amount of data passing through each day. However, for smaller businesses and content providers, a blog is all you need.
To get started there are a number of tutorials available on YouTube or the blogging provider will have guides and helpful videos. Blogger has a slightly easier interface than WordPress for those who are new to blogging and want to start with something simple. The key is to investigate all your options before committing to an online presence.
This article is sponsored by medical case study.
No comments:
Post a Comment