Currently the standard platform for blogging and small business marketing is WordPress. The software platform (Linux Operating System, Apache Web Server, MySQL Database Server, PHP Programming Language) is free, as in open source not beer. This allows the servers to be installed, run, or rented as a service cheaply. You can run multiple web sites on a single server. This could bring costs down even more.

One of my favorite topics for WordPress administration is themes and plugins that allow you to bring as much of your needs to be run from your WordPress site as opposed to using a service that charges a monthly or yearly fee. This allows your to run your site and services exactly, or as close as possible, like you want to. Using the service from a vendor imposes those sometimes restrictive “Terms of Servers” and rules that everyone, Everyone, EVERYONE! hates to read.

Favorites

My favorite plug-ins for Internet marketing are:

• Pretty Links Pro (short links)
• IMSC Rapid Mailer (email marketing)
• IMSC ProfitBuilder (squeeze pages).

Benefits

They allow me to house and control aspects of marketing so that I don't run into afoul of third (3rd) party services preferred procedures and recommendations. Most of them allow me to better control the quality of service and costs.

One of the best benefits is that as long as you don’t get your Internet domain added to a spam list you can add these services without being filtered by the many blocking programs and plug-ins that exist. Your ad conversions, income, and profits are the product of your work with less effects of factors that you can't control or monitor.

The Downside

The downside is that you have to do a lot more work.

• You have to insure that you brand and sites don't upset the Spamming Gods. One bad post or third party campaign can wreck all of the hard work. It could take months to fix the issue.
• If you used a shared web host for your site and email then another client of that service may do something to have that Internet address blacklisted.
• If your site or service is down for service then all of the affected services will be down as well. Remember to always secure, backup, and review your systems on a regular basis.