Blogs and vlogs are two very powerful tools for communication and contact with potential customers. All large companies have a blog or a vlog (or both) to promote their products and businesses. There are a lot of people who write great blogs or record great vlogs and make a living from them.
The quality and theme of a blog or a vlog are up to you. If you want to become a blogger or vlogger and you are not sure what is more suitable for you, keep reading.
Blog
A blog is a form of website that contains content in the form of text and images. It can be edited by one person or a group of people with the same goal and the same sphere of interest. Almost all major websites have their own blog where they share the latest information related to their business.
In addition to corporations, a blog is also used by individuals who want to present themselves, their ideas, work, and knowledge to a wider audience on the Internet. A blog is usually chosen by individuals who have a penchant for writing and written expression. The topics on the blog are different and depend on the author himself.
The potential for making money from a blog is very high, and it’s usually about selling ad space and making money from AdSense. Of course, to start making money, your blog needs to become well known and well visited.
Here are some examples of excellent blogs from big companies:
Dell IT blog. It looks like an IT magazine with the latest news, but they also talk about their latest achievements on the blog, advertise products, and have excellent communication with current and future customers.
Think with Google. A blog with many different topics and interests. Blog traffic is very high since there are interesting articles for everyone.
PlayStation.Blog. This Blog needs no special explanation since we’ve all heard of the PlayStation. Great posts interesting to visitors, reviews, and the latest product information make this blog interesting for everyone.
Starting a blog
You don’t necessarily have to have your own hosting and domain to create a blog and create your own website, you can use some of the free services, and the most popular is blogger.com.
If you still want to have your own portal that you will completely edit yourself, the most popular tools are:
WordPress.org. The creators of the most popular blogging software, WordPress. You can create your own blog, but you must have your own hosting and domain. You also have hundreds of free WordPress themes as well as plugins with which you can charge for content or create your membership website.
WordPress.com. This is not the same company as WordPress.org. Here you can get a basic hosting package for free, and you can also buy some other premium options.
Tumblr.com. Tumblr is a free service where you will get your subdomain in the format https://yourblog.tumblr.com. If you have your premium domain, you can link it to your Tumblr account. The advantage of this service is that it has built-in components for interaction with other social networks.
Vlog
Unlike a blog, a vlog means “Video log.” This means that the content is exclusively video material, without text, images, and other things that characterize a blog. It can be shorter or longer video material with different topics such as travel videos, presentations of the latest technological devices, promotion of one’s own business through video, etc.
Most of the videos are posted on services like YouTube, Dailymotion, and so on. A vlog can be a great way to make money, as shown in the examples below. These vloggers earn tens of millions of dollars a year by recording videos.
PewdiePie – a vlogger with over 110 million subscribers. His role is dedicated to video games. He spends a lot of time presenting games and commenting on videos that go viral.
Kids Diana Show – almost 80 million subscribers. They started shooting a video of unpacking children’s toys.
If you want to become a serious vlogger, you will not be able to achieve this without an initial investment that can be large. To make a quality video, every vlogger must have a good camera, a good microphone, good lighting, video editing software, and, if necessary, other auxiliary items such as stabilizers, additional lighting, tripods, and similar things.
Also, there are several online services with which you can become a vlogger without having a camera. These services work on the principle of capturing screen content so that you can make how-to videos. One such service is Screencast-O-Matic.
Key Differences Between a blog and a vlog
- A blog contains text, images, and similar content, while a vlog is used for videos.
- A blog is most often hosted on one of the CMS systems, such as WordPress, while a vlog is usually posted on YouTube or similar services.
- A blog is cheap to maintain. In most cases, the only costs are the purchase of hosting and domain. To record a quality vlog, you need to buy a good camera and have a very good microphone. You will hardly achieve this only with the help of a cell phone.
- Lately, vlogs are much more popular than blogs. The most common reason is the popularity of the platform on which the content is published, and that is, in most cases, YouTube. Other platforms that vloggers most often use to place their videos are: Facebook, Instagram, and Insta live, Flickr, Twitch ILR, Vimeo, Dailymotion, Patreon.
Which one to choose?
Whether you want to become a blogger or a vlogger, you must first have a plan for what you want to write about or what you want to record. If your content is not interesting and does not attract enough visitors, all your efforts are in vain.
Today, there are many quality bloggers and vloggers, and you have to offer something very interesting to gain the trust of the audience and people who come back to your content. First impressions must be good for people to come back and share your content on social media. Idea and creativity are crucial in creating a quality vlog as well as a blog.
Creating vlogs is more expensive. The initial investments are higher, but today it is much more popular than a blog. As already mentioned, a vlog requires a camera, microphone, and lighting, and that equipment can cost a lot.
Creating a blog is not that expensive. You just need hosting, a domain, and a sense of writing interesting articles. When your blog becomes popular, consider a billing scheme and create a good business plan to monetize your website.