Advantages/Differences of Buying Your Own Domain and Web Hosting for WordPress

Published February 2, 2012 | By AJ

Question:

Hi. So I have had a free WordPress Blog (WordPress.com) for about a year now. I have a solid amount of traffic so I wanted to start monetizing from it through advertisements with google adsense. So I know that you don’t have the rights to do that with the free blog.

So do I need to buy the domain or switch to WordPress.org? And do I need to pay for a Web Host to do this? What is the difference between all of this? And is it necessary to buy the domain in order to place ads on my blog?

Basically what is the difference between buying your domain and switching to WordPress.org with a web host? Do you need a Web host when you just buy the domain? And how difficult is this to do? Are there any other suggestions in how I can add advertisements to my blog? Thanks in advance.

Answer:

About WordPress.org. You don’t technically switch to “WordPress.org”. It’s actually called a self-hosted WordPress blog. All you need is a domain name and a good WordPress host. BTW, you don’t get that from WordPress.org, either. Here’s how to do it.

Get a Domain Name

I personally prefer to buy my own domain names because I like owning them as that gives me complete control of them. It also makes it easy to switch web hosts, if need be. I use NameCheap because they’re sooo frickin cheap and I get free privacy protection from spammers. It’s like buying a car. A Ford is a Ford no matter which dealer you buy it from, so why not buy it from the dealer with less markup? Same thing with domain names. Use this NameCheap coupon code for the best deal.

You can optionally accept the free domain name offer when you buy a web hosting account, but then you don’t own the name, the host does.

Get Web Hosting

You want web hosting with a 1-click script installer for EASY WordPress installations. You’ll find the script installers in the web hosting control panel in the Software or Scripting section. Some of the popular script installers are Fantastico, SimpleScripts, Softaculous and QuickScripts. There is no WordPress software to upload because it’s already there. You just tell it which domain you want to install it on.

For WordPress hosting, my #1 pick is WebHostingHub because WordPress runs blazing fast on their servers. I have a Hub account and I’m totally pleased with it. They have cPanel control panel and the Fantastico 1-click script installer.

My #2 pick is iPage. They use the vDeck control panel and the SimpleScripts script installer. You can’t go wrong with their anytime money back guarantee.

My #3 pick is WebHostingPad. Super cheap economy hosting and the price you pay when you sign up is locked in forever. They use cPanel with Softaculous. It has over 250 scripts.

Linking Your Domain Name to Your Hosting

If you accepted the free domain name offer from the web host you can skip this part. But if you bought web hosting you’ll need to link your domain name to your hosting account. When you sign up for hosting they’ll give you 2-3 nameservers. They look like this: ns1.thewebhostsname.com and ns2.thewebhostsname.com. Replace “thewebhostsname” with the name they give you.

You’ll login to your NameCheap account
Go to My Account: Manage Domains.
Click on your domain name.
In the menu on the left click on ‘Transfer DNS to Webhost’.
Click the radio button for ‘Specify Custom DNS Servers ( Your own DNS Servers )’
Now enter the nameservers the host gave you click the Save Changes button.

It will take about 20 minutes to up to a couple of hours for the change to propagate. Just keep typing your domain name in the browser to see if the default home page comes up. When it does,

Login to your web hosting control panel.
Locate the File Manager
In the root of your domain, find the default.html file. It might also be called index.html. Now delete it. If you don’t delete it, it’s going to cause problems and your blog won’t load.

Install WordPress

To install WordPress,

Login to your web hosting control panel
Scroll to the Software or Scripting section (depends on which control panel it is)
Locate the script installer and click on it.
In the Blog section you’ll find the WordPress installer.
Click on it and follow the easy steps to install WordPress.

Putting Adsense on Your Site

Do you know anything about Adsense besides putting ads on your site, getting clicks and getting paid for them? First off, you need to have a decent amount of GOOD content in order to get approved. Once approved you can put the ads on any of your sites, but they want to make sure their advertisers’ and your visitors are getting a good web experience. Many people never get their sites approved for Adsense because their content is so thin. Learn how to build sites the right way so you get approved and actually make some decent money with it. Click here to get the authority niche marketing course I got. It’s a TOTAL blueprint.

Bob’s your uncle.