More Wordpress Discoveries

Trying to use WordPress, (is it Wordpress or WordPress anyway?) I've also noticed that it doesn't offer access to HTML control over the templates like Blogger does. So even though they have more templates to choose from, you don't have much control over their use. Not with the free version, anyway. And keeping in step with my usual strategy of using whatever free or inexpensive alternatives there are for whatever I'm trying to do, that would mean that's what I'm using.

So one of the problems this causes is that I can't install the code for the totally free web statistics program I've been using. (StatCounter.com) Wordpress does offer their own blog stats page, so maybe this isn't all that crucial, but I do miss not being able to use StatCounter. I've seen some techno-geek types who seem to know how to do everything saying there are ways to insert it as a text item on the page somewhere, but even then the referral information still can't be tracked - just total hits.

So even though many people seem to prefer Wordpress over Blogger, I can't say I do myself. My plan is to promote affiliate products and generate Google AdSense income, and WordPress seems to frown on using their blogs to do either. So there just doesn't seem to be any good reason for me to use it. The only possible one being the 3rd party plug-ins you can use with it to allow Google AdSense ads to be displayed. There's at least one I've read about that offers a "sandbox" feature that allows you to see the actual ads that will display in advance. I'd love to be able to do that! So that's probably the only reason I'm giving WordPress a try for at least one blog.

And one more thing I've find out...you can't really totally delete a WordPress blog once it's been created. You can delete your own work on it, but the name you choose can never be re-used again - it's permanently unavailable from then on. (Even to the one who created it.) Seems awfully final, doesn't it? I have enough trouble making decisions like what to name my blogs without knowing that it can NEVER be used again once it's used and deleted. I wonder if Blogger treats blog names the same way?

So maybe it would be worthwhile to go out and try to create every good blog name you can think of just to tie them up and possibly be able to sell/transfer them to others in the future? (I wonder if WordPress "allows" that?!)

John

Experimenting With Wordpress

I hear so much discussion about which blog site people like to use more, Blogger or Wordpress. I've been using Blogger so far, so I thought I'd try Wordpress for my next project since so many people seem to prefer it. I've got to say though, I don't know if it's because I started out with Blogger first or not, but I find Wordpress pretty hard to figure out. It's got some nice looking templates and maybe a few more features, but I definitely find it harder to figure out how to accomplish what I want to with it. And there's very little help along the way...you just have to grind through and figure out how to do what you need to do by trial and error until you figure it out. Plus, you can't insert Google AdSense ads without downloading some sort of a plug-in first, and I don't believe they even allow you to post affiliate links. So if you're totally new at blogging, in my own humble opinion, I would still recommend Blogger myself. Hopefully they'll get their own bugs worked out before long, too.

I did stick with using Wordpress long enough to create a little blog just to try it out, so I need to start promoting it and get some inbound links set up for it. I'd like to see if I can at least duplicate the modest success I had with the Baby Alive blog this past Christmas season. But I still need to figure out how to deal with that plug-in that's required just to get the AdSense ads posted to it.