What is a Blogging Platform?
A blogging platform is a web-based tool that enables bloggers to set up a website to quickly post blogs on the Internet. Any person with an internet-enabled device can read your blog posts.
Now that you know about all of the options available to you, it’s time to finalize the perfect blog management tool for your needs. Assess your options against the following checklist:
Keynotes Before Choosing A Blogging Platform
Value for your money – ensure that your chosen service is going to deliver precisely what you need. This means easy-to-use blog software, with all of the bells and whistles you need for success.
Types of solutions available – explore the different solutions that are designed to support you, the blogger. Use these to build a truly unique blog. Options typically include free blog sites, self-hosted platforms, and premium blog site builders.
Ease of use – some platforms offer quite the learning curve that can discourage new bloggers. You need a simple building tool that doesn’t require any technical skills, design, or marketing expertise.
Features – you might not need all of the features at the start, but make sure that the best blog platform of your choice lets you customize or modify your website if needed. If you would like some third-party tools to be integrated, check if they are available.
Blog management – if needed, you’ll have to access the back-end or admin area to update your blog, make any changes, and fix the layout. It is crucial to make sure that this area is available, manageable, and easy-to-navigate.
Rules and restrictions – before you pay for software, read through the ‘Terms of Usage’ so that you can be sure that you aren’t breaking any rules with the way that you’ll be using it.
The information we will provide below should be sufficient for you to research and locate the best blogging site for a financial blog.
What Are Best Platforms You Should Use For A Site
Table Of Contents
1. Wordpress
2. Blogger
3. Wix
4. Squarespace
5. Weebly
6. Tumblr
1. Wordpress
Launched in 2005, WordPress.com is a turnkey content management system (CMS) built on the open-source WordPress.org software.
In any given month, over 409 million people will view more than 21 billion pages on WordPress.com’s network of blogs. Back in September 2018, more than 70 million posts were published and over 52 million blog comments were written. In The Nutshell, Wordpress is popular. Creating and managing a blog on WordPress will likely require more maintenance than other platforms, but it will provide the extensibility and content management features publishers and other businesses need to create a complex blog.
WordPress was originally created as a blogging platform. Though it has evolved into a multi-purpose content management system, it still has many features and themes for blogging.
Pros of Wordpress
WordPress enables you to not only purchase a custom domain and download one of 1m+ themes specifically designed for blogs — it also lets you add social media buttons, forms, affiliate links, and other features via plugins.
The customization options are virtually limitless with the 59,000+ free plugins available.
WordPress Cons
You will have to make sure your theme and plugins are compatible and up-to-date. Otherwise, they can disrupt the user experience or break your site. Other maintenance tasks like finding and fixing broken links, updating the core software, and optimizing your database will also be your responsibility. This can be difficult for site owners who don't have the time or technical expertise to regularly maintain their site.
Note: Word Press is expensive when you are creating a financial website as compared to blogger.
2. Blogger
Blogger is a free platform designed by google for newbie bloggers. While it lacks many content management features, Blogger is more feature-rich than most free blogging platforms. For that reason, Blogger is perfect for individuals looking to create financial blogs as a hobby or to make some extra cash.
Blogger Pros
The biggest advantage of Blogger is how easy it is to create and customize a relatively basic blog.
Important: Your Site ranks higher on blogger plus you can easily switch to wordpress very easily
To get started, you just need to create an account with Google, select a template, and get publishing. You can purchase a custom domain, optimize your SEO settings, connect your blog to Google Analytics, optimize your posts with Adsense, and even edit the HTML and CSS of your site — but you won't be able to do much beyond that.
Blogger Cons
To get a better sense of the platform's limitations, you can compare Blogger vs WordPress or another CMS. With Blogger, you can't install plugins to extend the functionality of your site. You can't create different content types, like portfolio pages. And you can't change the default display of your content from reverse-chronological order to, say, your most popular posts.
In short, if you need the content management features and customization options of a CMS, then look into alternatives to Blogger.
Blogger is the perfect platform for starting a blog as a beginner.
3. Wix
Wix is a popular ecommerce or blogging platform for beginners who are looking for hosting and blogging tools in one place and who prioritize speed and design over functionality.
Wix Pros
With Wix, you have two options for creating your blog. Using the Wix Editor, you can start by selecting from over 800 pre-designed templates that any blogger can use, whether you own a retail business or run a food review website. Or you can start from scratch if you know HTML and CSS. Using Wix Artificial Design Intelligence, on the other hand, you can fill out a quick questionnaire and have a blog created for you.
After you've picked or created your template, or had one selected for you with Wix ADI, you can begin writing and editing posts on desktop or mobile, embed Wix's stock photos and videos or your own media, and organize them into topics.
Once you're done writing, you can configure your SEO settings to boost your organic reach, push your content to your subscribers with Wix's email tool, and share them through your social media accounts. You can further foster a sense of community among your readers by letting them become members.
Wix Cons
While Wix is more versatile than other hosted website builders, it lacks customization options and content management features, particularly when comparing Wix vs WordPress or another CMS.
For example, to add more advanced elements to the page, like music or maps, you’ll have to add HTML code. This process can be intimidating for beginners, particularly when compared to the ease of installing plugins on WordPress. It's post editor also isn't drag-and-drop, which might frustrate some bloggers.
Squarespace is an ideal blogging platform for businesses and individuals creating image-rich content. With Squarespace's award-winning designer templates and integrations with Getty Images, Unsplash, and Google AMP, you can create visual content that's engaging and shareable.
Squarespace Pros
While Squarespace only offers about 140+ templates, they are all mobile-optimized and fully customizable so you can create a blog that looks the way you want it to. Once you've designed your pages, you can use Squarespace’s blogging and SEO tools to create and optimize your content.
Finally, after publishing your blog posts, you can connect your social media accounts to easily promote them. Then use the built-in analytics tool to learn where your traffic is coming from, what your visitors are looking for, and how they’re interacting with your content.
Squarespace Cons
Squarespace offers even more features, from audio files support to newsletter signup forms, but ultimately it's limited in functionality. That's because it supports less than 30 extensions, so you're mostly limited to the features Squarespace provides out-of-the-box.
Since they lack some feature that bloggers needs — like an auto-save feature, for example — Squarespace is not the ideal platform for everyone.
5. Weebly
Weebly is another popular blogging platform for bloggers that want everything they need to launch a blog in one place, including website building tools, templates, and hosting. More specifically, Weebly is best suited for creating blogs with lots of content but more basic functionality. Weebly Pros
Weebly is affordable and easy to use like Wix, but differentiates itself in multiple ways. The editor supports drag-and-drop functionality for both posts and pages, for example. You can create more complex layouts by adding elements like forms and image galleries as well. You can also add more sub-levels to your navigation menus, which allows you to organize larger amounts of content.
All Weebly templates are also mobile-optimized, which means you won't have to do any additional editing or rearranging for mobile.
Weebly Cons
While Weebly offers more functionality than most website builders, it does lack flexibility when compared to WordPress or another CMS. For example, you can’t drag and drop elements anywhere on your posts and pages or edit parts of the underlying source code. These restrictions do make Weebly easier to learn and use than most platforms, but they can frustrate more advanced users.
There's also been some pain points since Weebly was acquired by the ecommerce company Square. A prime example: users who select that they want to create a website will see the standard Weebly editor, whereas users who select that they want to create a website with an online store will see a completely different editor called the Square Online Builder.
6. Tumblr
Tumblr is another platform that can be used to create a profitable blogging niche
Tumblr appeals to personal bloggers and brands alike. While bloggers might be able to use this as their only platform, brands tend to use it as one platform among many to show their personality.
Tumblr Pros
Tumblr combines the power of blogging and social networking in one highly-visual publishing platform.
Tumblr offers everything you need to create a professional-looking site. You can select from hundreds of free and premium themes and add multiple pages, sidebars, social sharing buttons, comment sections, and more. You can also buy a custom domain name from a domain name registrar rather than use the free subdomain: yourusername.tumblr.com. If you have HTML coding skills, you can further customize your site.
When you’re satisfied with your site's design, you can start creating and publishing multimedia post types. Featuring photos, GIFs, links, chat dialogue, audio files, and video in your content makes it more engaging, memorable, and shareable.
Since other users can easily like, reply, and re-blog your posts on their Tumblr as well as their other social accounts, right from their dashboard, this is an excellent platform for engaging and fostering an online community.
Tumblr Cons
There are restrictions on the site that can frustrate users. For example, you can only schedule (or "queue") 50 posts in a day, which might limit your ability to plan and execute a long-term content strategy. You can also only upload videos under 100MB and in MP4 format and only track 20 tags at a time. Furthermore, your site can be suspended at any time if you’re found in violation of Tumblr’s community guidelines.
