Are you a WordPress.com user or WordPress.org? Yes, these are two different WordPress platforms that are often beginner-confused.
So, this post is going to be different from what we usually do on Aspiring Blog. We want to share our experience of having a self-hosted WordPress site. Why do we migrate to a self-hosted website and what changes do we see after that.
If you are going to start a new blog or a WordPress website then this post might be crucial for you. Having said that let’s jump right into our little story.
A year ago I thought to start a blog to share my thinking & perspective with the world. And for the first time, I heard about WordPress as the best blogging platform out there. I downloaded the WordPress mobile application, built a free website with a free plan, and started writing.
later, I was accompanied by my friend on this blogging journey. After writing around 12 posts in 3 months we realized that it was actually not going the way we wanted to. I mean something was missing.
First of all, our website name was just a subdomain of WordPress.com which of course didn’t feel good.
The only traffic we were getting was from WordPress itself (from other WordPress users) and somewhat from social media where we shared our posts. But the biggest flaw I saw was with the customization features which are very limited with the free plan and literally used by everyone. So, you can’t even make your site unique and stand out in the crowd.
WordPress.com doesn’t allow you to sell ad space. It runs free ads on all free websites, but that doesn’t make any difference because you’ll not earn even a single penny from it.
Although Google indexed our site as WordPress.com promised. If you are on WordPress Free Plan and your site isn’t showing up on Google yet then here’s what WordPress Happiness Engineers have to say about site indexation-
After seeing all these flaws we dig a little deeper into WordPress.com hosting service. We found out they have five plans to offer which there’s only 1 free plan and the rest are paid including Personal, Premium, Business, and E-commerce plans.
I cannot say much about WordPress.com paid plans because I haven’t used them yet. But I thoroughly read about them before making a decision to go self-hosted.
WordPress.com says, all your major limitations will be overcome when you switch to their paid plans. Here are the other benefits of WordPress paid plans.
Keeping all this in mind we conclude that all paid plans are offering really advanced and amazing features. But we still found out various flaws like it still won’t give you much control over your site. They can delete your site anytime if they feel you’re violating their terms & policies. Monetization options are very limited.
And, most importantly it still doesn’t feel like ownership.
But you’ll surely have big support from the WordPress team with every aspect as they are providing their hosting service. If you are blogging just for fun or as a student then the free plan might suit you. But if you want to take your content or business to new heights then you need to consider everything.
Reading more about WordPress.com I found WordPress.org, the real WordPress.
WordPress.org is an open software free for all. Here you just need to buy a domain and need a hosting provider company.
Unlike WordPress.com it gives you much freedom and control over your site. This is the main reason why we migrated to a self-hosted blogging website.
Moreover, it becomes somewhere necessary after some weird glitches which you may have also noticed in your WordPress.com account. Like banning users to follow or comment on other posts. Although they’re just concerned about spamming even the genuine users are getting affected.
Therefore we dropped our previous website built on WordPress.com and built a new one with WordPress.org. Moving away from WordPress.com was a bit chaotic and complicated for us. However the WordPress support team helped us.
We exported our previous posts and followers to our brand-new website. But for the stats, we needed a Jetpack (offered by Automattic) plugin installed on our new website and contacted the WordPress support team to migrate them too. Here’s what the WordPress support team has to say about your old site’s stats if you are moving away from WordPress.com to a WordPress self-hosted site i.e. WordPress.org.
When you choose the self-hosted website you need a domain and hosting. The process of finding the right hosting provider company can be time-consuming, so we’ll make it very simple for you by giving you the best recommendation.
We use Bluehost for all our hosting needs. We really have a good experience with them. And moreover, it is recommended by WordPress.org itself. It offers a free domain (for 1st year), a free SSL certificate, and a free premium Cloudflare CDN. You are just one click away from installing WordPress.
Now it’s been 8 months for us to have a self-hosted website with WordPress.org. Within these months we noticed major changes. Although it will take some more time to clearly see the benefits. But still, there are some noticeable changes:-
This is the biggest change we are seeing with our posts and pages. We are getting traffic not only from WordPress or social media but from search engines too which are considered to be organic traffic. Here’s the screenshot of our performance in Google search results in the last 3 months-
Honestly, we haven’t been into SEO much before. However, our limited knowledge of writing SEO content and some amazing plugins like Yoast SEO help us boost our SEO efforts.
Due to this some of our posts are now ranking pretty well in search engines like Google, Bing, Baidu, etc.
If you are thinking of earning from your online content then comparatively WordPress.org has better monetization options. It allows you to join advertising programs like Google Adsense or any other third-party services. You can sell ad space and can also join affiliate programs.
WordPress.org allows you to upload custom themes. You can customize and modify your website design that suit your work. You can add any free or paid plugins. It gives you a much-advanced feature to build your site more unique than everybody else.
It is one of the biggest advantages of having a self-hosted website. You own your website. You are in full control. No one can raise a question against your website unless you are doing something illegal.
We are able to track our performance more accurately with powerful tracking tools like Google Analytics. The best thing is you don’t need any developer to embed code. MonsterInsights plugin makes it effortless to properly connect your website with Google Analytics.
Along with Google Analytics, you can also use the Jetpack Plugin to look for your stats, visitors, popular posts, and security features (If you have connected your site to the Jetpack Plugin).
Moving out of WordPress.com hasn’t affected our previous capabilities. We still have the facilities that WordPress.com users have, through Jetpack Plugin. Jetpack is offered by Automattic, the people behind WordPress.com.
We are able to connect with the WordPress community because we believe WordPress is the best community we have. We really like reading other perceptions and thinking.
As I said, you have to buy a domain and need web hosting which will obviously cost you. Thankfully, Bluehost offers a free domain for the first year.
As it is said – With great powers comes great responsibilities. Here are some challenges that you’ll face after opting for a self-hosted WordPress website:-
Surely, you have a lot of work to do. Once your website goes self-hosted your responsibilities become much bigger. I’m telling you this so you already get prepared if you are migrating to WordPress.org. But remember, Toughest climbs always lead to the best views. So, keep blogging and let the wisdom be shared.
If you are using any of the paid plans of WordPress.com or using a self-hosted WordPress.org website, we would like to know your experience with that and why you chose to go with that. Drop your views here in the comment section.
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View Comments
I am using the the paid web hosting option by http://www.wordpress.com and although it is a little expensive, some of the features that I use are helping me get a good visibility. I have to be truly honest, being a content writer, I have not been able to give too much time to my own website. but the support team at WordPress is awesome and they help out with any type of glitch, however, silly it may seem. I used GSuite for email hosting and it is beginning to look pretty handy for now. Will keep this post in mind if I come up with any other interesting details about my usage. All the best with your website. I really enjoy reading your blogs.
Yes I heard paid plans are bit expensive but have some advanced features. I haven't used them yet but we would love to know more about it. We hope other's experience will help people to take right step.
We're glad you find this post interesting. Best wishes.
That’s really informative
I'm glad it's informative to you.
Interesting post with useful information. Since I am writing only for my happiness and have no plans of reaping monetary benefits from it, I find it okay to use the free service.
All the best to you!
I assume it's not just for monetary. It's about taking your thinking and skills to all new heights. Who knows our perceptions might be the new thinking of this new world .That's it.
But I agree that if you are doing it out of happiness or as a hobby, then Free plan offers the best.
All the best to you too. Happy blogging.
I heard that once you go self hosted your content will not be visible in this "readers" feed also all the stats you earned till now will be over ???
Not really. WordPress team will help you transfer your stats. But you “may” loose your likes and comments.
And yes content from Self-hosted sites works a bit different in readers with that of WordPress.com, but it’s a lie that it won’t appear on readers section, as long as you connected to your WordPress.com account.
(I mentioned these things too in this post)
Interesting and informative
I'm glad you find this informative. Thankyou.
🙏🙏🙏
🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏
I'm pleased to see that you've made the switch and that it's working for you. I look at it differently than I used to. I've never got much traffic from other WordPress users but I'm more than happy with the search engine hits. Like you, I'm not into SEO much, but I think it helps
It's good to see traffic from search engines, it's the hits we earned. I'm happy for you actually.
And Thankyou for taking your time reading this.
Interesting.
Are the people who have given likes on this post, people who are on WP.com? Did you 'bring them over' because of installing Jetpack?
Yes, Jetpack allows you to use some features of Wordpress.com users (as long as you connected with your WordPress.com account)
I suggest you to read more about it and contact support team for additional information.
I am totally saving this post to a special folder so I can refer back to it in the future when/if I ever decide to get out of WordPress.com. Very thorough breakdown and very informative and helpful. Thanks ! ! !
You're Welcome!
I'm glad this blog was helpful to you.
Very helpful thank you! Hoping to make the jump over early in the new year. Merry Christmas!
You're Welcome.
Merry Christmas and best wishes for New year. God Bless.
Good for you. I started out with the free plan and moved to a paid business plan with a small e-shop through WordPress. I know just enough to get myself in trouble on the computer and can't even begin to contemplate migrating to another self-hosted site. Happy New Year and continued success with the updated blog site.
Thankyou Monika ma'am. Happy New year to you too.
I know how chaotic all this to run an e-commerce website. But anyway I hope for your success this year.
Thankyou.
Yes e-commerce sites are a whole other ball of wax. 😝 Many thanks.
Actually, I'm learning these American Idioms 'whole other ball of wax'.
It's new to me, so thankyou for writing this. 😅
👍🏻
? that's some interesting points there
I'm using the .com site on here & I
haven't seen where I could get a "free"
site on here, as a matter of fact I've
been seeing where they are showing
where it's costing 48$ for a PERSONAL
site & 18$ for a word press domain.
48$ a year isn't too bad & 18$ for the
domain I can't complain about either
but I do think for those who can't
afford to pay for a site like this is
good for those just starting out.
Yes. We found that having a self-hosted site is much better rather than buying a plan from wordpress itself.
Although it's easy for those who aren't that tech savvy and just starting out.
Hope you find the right site and right plan for all your need.
I like how my word press site is set up
I don't mind paying the price for it I
didn't think I would when I 1st started.
When I 1st got on here it was more
than I was ready to deal with at the
time & I just let it sit there till 1 day
I just made my mind up & did it.
You're right.
Setting up wordpress at first is kind of exhausting, but once you set in its work so smooth.
yea it was a little more than I was use to
when I 1st got into it cause I didn't know
how all the tools & gadgets worked & I
wasn't hip on things I'm not too sure of.
But I'm learning more & more & not so
scared to try new things like I was when
I 1st started on here, but I'm learning.
This happens to all of us when we start something new. But good to hear you are in the process of learning and I assumed you’ve learned so many things by now.
Just remember everything takes time. Just do your best. Happy blogging 😀🙌
Thank you, does my site -page look any different since I redone it ?
Yes, its quite different now since I last visited. I really liked the first message you put it on your home page. It's what everyone's want 'a company'.
I would suggest you to add some image kind of thing along with the text.
As I can see there are only text on that. Although the message is beautifully written.
Hope you'll have amazing crowd on your blog.👍
"add some image kind" I was thinking about
what image would work with it, if you have
any ideas I'd love to hear them.
So you do see a difference ? 👍 awesome
thank you for letting me know that & for
your help on here, much application.
It depends. I assume as far as I know about your site. It should be something positive, something that bring smile to someone's face when they visit it.
Something like that.
You know more than me.
So, good luck with that
Thank You, I think I found 1 that may work
how do I know more than you? ha ha ha I
know nothing when it comes to designing.
Haha! I think no one is perfect in Designing, it's just like the trial and errors.
And moreover, one thing looks good to you might not necessarily look good to others.
But you do know more about your site and vision then anybody else. That's what I meant here.
Well I guess you got me there on both sides
but thank you for being there & honest.
Haha!
Anytime. 🙌