As an internet marketer, I am asked all the time, “What is the difference between blog and website?” In my experience as an internet marketer, believe me when I say,”I have tried it all!” I have built websites using Xsitpro, Artisteer, Kompozer, and WordPress. I have built websites with Xsitepro, but installed a WordPress blog attached to it. I have built WordPress themes using Artisteer, and have loved the ease of use. But what really is the difference between a blog and a website?
When I first heard the word “Blog” it kind of worried me. I thought it was a place to share all my intimate thoughts, my personal life, and something that I needed to write in every single day. But I soon found out that a blog is just a way to keep the content easily updated. A place you can log in, write your content, hit publish, and continue with your day. You don’t really need
to know any coding, any programming, or any real techy language. If you have created a document using Microsoft Word or Open Office, then you can create a blog post, it really is that easy.
In my opinion, a blog IS a website. Anything that is online, in my opinion is a website. A forum is a website, a sales page is a website, social network sites like Twitter, Google Plus and Facebook are all websites, anything that is hosted on a server and is accessible via the internet is a website.
There are some small differences between a regular website and a blog. I am going to outline just a few small distinctions between a blog and website.
Simple Difference Between Blog and Website
First of all, when you publish updated content on a blog, we call them “Posts.” A post is the main reason we call it a blog, because a post is something that can be done daily, hourly, etc. The post function is the main difference between a blog and website. The post usually appear in a journal style that is dated in order and will list the authors name. Regular html websites are what we call “static” sites that have good information, but usually do not change all that much. Posts help to keep the information fresh and new.
Another way a blog is different than a website is the commenting feature that a blog has. A blog encourages its readers to leave comments about the content, just like I encourage you to comment below this article. Regular websites that are not updated do not typically offer comment areas or user interaction. These types of websites are more like online brochures, just an online display case.
You will find that most blogs are organized into categories. Categories allow for the structure of the blog to be really organized. If you are adding posts to your blog everyday, it is wise to use categories to keep everything in order. Categories also help to organize how old the information is. You can organize your categories by month so that your readers can refer back to old posts to compare information.
One final difference between blog and website would be the ability to actually “Join” the blog. WordPress offers a variety of roles that you can get access to so you can contribute. You can be a member, an administrator, an author, etc. You can actually subscribe to a blog and get updates via RSS feeds when the information has been updated. With so many places to get information online, having the ability to subscribe to a blog and get instant updates is a great way to maintain repeat readers.
As I have explained earlier, there are both blogs and websites, but they do have some small differences. How you decide on what to use for you or a local business really depends on what you are going to use the site for. There is a whole discussion we can have on the kinds of plugins available for WordPress Blogs and all the functions a blog has, but that is for another time. I hope I answered some of your questions on the difference between blog and website.
