ELT World News

When many of us TEFL teachers take the plunge and start blogging, we tend first of all to go for a free blog hosting provider. This, of course, is an alternative for those of us who have no budget to buy our own domain and / or a web hosting space. I started out ELT World in this way and had my blog happily running along on said free blog server. As many of you who blog know, you can monetize your blog in numerous ways, installing adsense being the most common, but also by selling links or for paid reviews. This latter option, however, breaks the terms of service of many free blogware providers who state that I can not monetize my blog if using their free service.

Most of us start out blogging for fun, but if you already have a clear vision about your blog and its future, you might want to consider having your own domain name and hosting space. Domain names and web hosting are really cheap now, surprisingly so when you start looking into it, so you don’t need a lot of money to start your own blog. So, the question is… where should you look to buy a domain and hosting?

Naturally, in this day and age there are loads of local web hosting providers near you, wherever you are in the world. In the past I’d have said that choosing a web host near you was a priority as you’d be looking for low cost phone calls or any other non-internet communication when you need to contact the provider. Pickaweb, a UK Web Hosting company, has been providing a web hosting service since 2000. Although they are based in UK, they serve customers worldwide. So, if you have no problem with geographical distance, then you should consider using their reasonably priced services, especially as they offer 24/7 support to all customers.

After buying your domain name and hosting and the service is active, the next step is to install a blog engine such as wordpress. If this sounds daunting, don’t worry, as the Pickaweb web hosting provider offers assistance. Once your blog is ready, you can join the TEFL blogging community.