Your own domain and hosting is the real deal and I think the only was to go if you're serious.

No one takes free hosted domains serious.

And to add to that, its only less than 10 bucks for a domain nowadays...

Anyone can get a domain easily

I have a website that's 2 years old but practically don't update the contents. Is it a good idea to convert it into a blog so that I can add contents easily? I'm not techie enough to know about uploading through ftp etc.. Your suggestions please.

That is probably not a bad idea and if you already have a domain and hosting, it wouldn't be too expensive to get someone to help you convert to say wordpress, which is fairly easy to use even for a non tech person.
Just make sure you have all the content and then add it to the blog platform once its up and running.

You can install a nice theme and find plug ins for wordpress and if you are willing to spend a little time browsing around and testing things, it's not that hard I don't think.

You can sign up at wordpress and play around with a free hosted blog from them for a while to see if you think you can handle it, before making a decision

I half agree with this statement.

I don't think owning the domain changes your ability to rank whatsoever. The true benefit to owning your own domain is that you have total control over the construction of the site and what can be placed on it.

That being said, I do agree with the linkwheel statement. I often use sites like squidoo and blogger as my "tier one" backlink sites since they have decent PR "weight" to them and many times, as a result, I'll end up with multiple top rankings because they rank as well as my main blog.

Yes, I do have my own domain & hosting. Just another query....is building an autoblog worthwhile because I heard of Google Panda which targets automated contents in a big way?

Thanks very much for your suggestions.

WordPress is bigger, better, more bad tail, etc. However ... I wanted something with no maintenance, zero worry, reflinks allowed, etc. Which is why I migrated from WordPress to Google's blogpost a few months ago. It has been a bliss for personal usage. However if you are blogging to make money? Blogpost will be a b*tch. And WordPress rules.

It is a good thing to use your own blog if you are looking to do something serious. However, if you are just doing it for fun, you are probably better off with a free blog.

probably? Highly inaccurate statement. But thanks for your contribution.

Here is one you may want to look at. You can use it free or you can choose to pay the $25 and get trained on the blogging system and SEO and everything else about the internet for that matter. I just started and it works really well - I don't even know what I am doing:)

Edit: Hijack

There is a 30 video that will answer everything you need to know:)

This post has been edited by SNOW66: Oct 27 2012, 06:20 PM

At first practice free blogging from WordPress and blogspot sites. Excel yourself in writing skill and gaining enough knowledge about the topic you are starting by. Then go for paid hosting. Once you start you will gain confidence, and can earn enough money though it. Google is needy for unique contents, due to the penguin attack these days. Websites are getting penalized. So blog writing,uploading, earning is no doubt a great work!
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I started out in blogger but later on moved to wordpress. Wordpress has a very friendly interface and awesome plug-ins which makes blogging more fun and easy however if you only plan to blog for personal reasons then I don't think wordpress is necessary.
Wordpress is perfect for professional business websites and blogger can be enough for a personal blog IMO. Both can be free so I won't mention anything about price or whatsoever.