Website vs. Blog

[cipl123]

Hello,

Blogs can run into many pages and websites can be successful with just one or two pages.

With a website you can add pages later but unless you use a separate menu as an include page you will have to edit each page as you add more pages.

With a blog the pages are sorted in reverse date order so the older pages could disappear into obscurity after a while.

In regards to indexing we can't say exactly without any strong experience because its totally depends on search engine.

[morestar]

Yes... the main disadvantage, is that in some instances it might be recognizable as a blog rather than a company website. Perhaps it is the difference between showing up at an interview with a suit and tie, versus torn jeans and a t-shirt. That being said, I've seen some great "blogs" which don't really present themselves as such, and I have seen some great websites, which just are not blogs.

I'm managing several professional service sites that are blog'd and doing great in the search engines, impressively. I wouldn't say the positive results are a result of the site being a blog but I don't believe there's a ranking factor that operates off a yes:no value.

Wordpress is a CMS, and that's probably the best advantage especially because it offers thousands of plugins that contribute to search and social success - plug-n-play most of the times too!

They are both indexed the same way (as in each page is html so both are indexed), but a blog is designed to push new content forward first, and in some cases increase the speed at which content get's indexed. They should if written properly to standards achieve the same or similar rankings.

Sure every page on the internet is indexed the same way (and wow to the 'same way' responses) but Wordpress has a built in function that Pings any number of sites you set it to ping once a post/page is created or updated. This means that a Wordpress site has a greater advantage of being crawled quicker by any number of web services.

Blogs are good for journalists, and publishers. But in some instances they may not be suitable for things like classifieds, or Q&A websites, or directories, community based, or social style websites, or even commerce websites.

There really is no limit to what you can do with Wordpress especially with the right Plugins/Themes. I've seen successful Wordpress sites with all the above you mentioned doing well, great.

From the perspective of the project design goals, there are real advantages and disadvantages to choosing any format over the other.

Tell me some disadvantages that stand out strongly against the advantages, please.

Lets be honest here, how many website launches have you come across that look exactly like the last website you were just at, and what kind of impression did it make on you?

Everyone of the many client sites I manage are powered by Wordpress with complete custom themes.

That being said, for some companies, they may have no interest in blogging, so making sure it is formatted in a way that the website doesn't look abandoned might be in your interests. A blog that isn't fresh, might leave the wrong impression... jmo...

All that needs to be done is create the page, create the main nav to those pages, create a template at website.com/blog and ensure the template pics up the blog posts. This can be done by copying the loop in index.php. Now all blog posts will go to website.com/blog and a link to Our Blog from the home page will do.

I've even setup a loop in index.php/hope.php to pick up the latest blog as a snippet...(fresh content).

[MrGamm]

There really is no limit to what you can do with Wordpress especially with the right Plugins/Themes. I've seen successful Wordpress sites with all the above you mentioned doing well, great.

I've seen wordpress websites never make it to the index at all. Not sure why, but seeing as it is a wordpress, it could be alot, like malware, or a broken plug-in, or maybe it is even a template that got caught up in a spam filter.

That being said, the most successful website I ever worked on was custom and it is a probably a good thing because the overhead of all that blog software probably really would have increased their bills.

[MrGamm]

I'm managing several professional service sites that are blog'd and doing great in the search engines, impressively. I wouldn't say the positive results are a result of the site being a blog but I don't believe there's a ranking factor that operates off a yes:no value.

Just to continue this... and I doubt it is a result of anything you have done. It's the content creators who that. If you need a blog, blogger.com, wordpress.com and tumblr.com all offer customizations and there is no cost, and there are very successful blogs running on those platforms. The only professional successful wordpress websites I've really seen are the Wordpress VIPS. Which is neither .org or a .com really.

Tell me some disadvantages that stand out strongly against the advantages, please.

Craigslist, lets say if it were a blog... it would probably suck for classifieds.

Now lets say, perez hilton, because I think that is a blog and one of the more populars ones, lets say it was formatted like craigslist. It would probably be confusing.

Lets say Future Shop was a blog... it would suck.

Lets say a forum was a blog... like this one right here in web pro world... it would suck.

Lets say Facebook or Google or Orkut or YoutTube, or StackOverflow/Quora or Bing/Google/Yahoo or anything that is not a blog, it would probably suck.

There really is no limit to what you can do with Wordpress especially with the right Plugins/Themes. I've seen successful Wordpress sites with all the above you mentioned doing well, great.

And what are the limitations with a website? Are they fundamentally different than a blog and limited as to what they can do? Maybe reddit should be a blog? Maybe Twitter and Facebook should be a blog?

Shit my dad says was a twitter page, now its a Television show. How many bloggers have done that?

Everyone of the many client sites I manage are powered by Wordpress with complete custom themes.

Yeah, and they are paying too much when they can get the same thing from wordpress.com, blogger.com or tumblr.com for free.

I don't know... it's just not everything in the world revolves around online opinion columns and daily journals. So a catch all solution to a problem doesn't exist is just too shill for me. That is the way I see it. Wordpress.com is clearly winning anyways.

[MrGamm]

Whoops couldn't edit... I mean unless you count tumblr.com and twitter.com as blogs, then they are clearly winning. People want free, not to be hosted for something they can get for free.

All this wordpress talk is just insane, it's like pet rocks. Here is what you are up against... http://en.support.wordpress.com/com-vs-org/

[stellaex]

i guess my question is: are blog pages indexed the same way as web pages?

will a site created in, let's say, wordpress with a main page and a bunch of posts achieve the same search position as a static site with the same information written in html with individual pages.

basically, is there any real disadvantage/advantage to making a whole site in blog format?

Both the blogs and website are indexed with in the same way with in the search engine. But in getting a fresh blog indexed with in a search engine is far more easier than a getting a fresh website because of the fact that the content with on the blog keeps getting updated regularly.....

[aditd]

i guess my question is: are blog pages indexed the same way as web pages?

will a site created in, let's say, wordpress with a main page and a bunch of posts achieve the same search position as a static site with the same information written in html with individual pages.

basically, is there any real disadvantage/advantage to making a whole site in blog format?

Actually you can rank much better and faster with wordpress rather then with a normal site. I would see only advantages for using a wordpress site.

[williamc]

Actually you can rank much better and faster with wordpress rather then with a normal site.

HorsePuckey

Wordpress outputs plain html/xhtml the same as any other CMS or just plain html. There is no inherent ranking benefits in the least. What there is, is laziness on the part of some webmasters who code regular html pages in not doing everything they could that wordpress does normally. But that in itself is not something that only wordpress does.

[LD]

I will prefer both because Blog is easy for beginners and web site is best for expert.

Honestly Milton,you are posting all sorts of "fluff" all over the forums today. There's little thought or value to all your posts I've come across so far. If you don't have anything of real value to help the OP, try and resist posting for count. Most "fluff" posts are moderated quite efficiently, negating one's post count in the process.

[deepsand]

Honestly Milton,you are posting all sorts of "fluff" all over the forums today. There's little thought or value to all your posts I've come across so far. If you don't have anything of real value to help the OP, try and resist posting for count. Most "fluff" posts are moderated quite efficiently, negating one's post count in the process.

6 of 11 down; 5 to go.