What is the best blogging platform in your aspect? The answers will be a variant. Some people will say WordPress is the king, whereas others will vote for Blogger, Tumblr, TypePad, and so forth. However, there are other platforms too which most people are not aware of. Check out the 7 Best Blogging Platforms That You Rarely Know.
5+ 2 Best Blogging Platforms That You Rarely Know
I wouldn’t prefer something you choose excluding your taste, no matter what it is. You should give a bit more importance to your interest. Because you will be blogging, not the people ideally.
I admire popular items that have gotten popular because they have something valuable. Though, the newcomers or less popular items are not less valuable.
Today I’m going to share 5+2 Best Blogging Platforms That You Rarely Know.
Jekyll
Jekyll is a static site generator by GitHub’s co-owner, Tom Preston-Werner.
It’s written in Ruby and processes content using Markdown and Liquid templates that can be served from any server including Apache and Nginx.
Are you fed up using dynamic content? Time to say goodbye.
You can use Jekyll to generate a fully static website and host them on GitHub repositories. According to the founder, it is simple, static, and blog-aware.
Pros:
- An open-source platform.
- Clean and minimal user interface.
- Content-focused platform.
- Free hosting with Github.
- Easy to read and write using Markdown.
- Supports custom domain.
Cons:
- Build with Ruby. This might be new to you.
- Limited theme and plugin resources.
- Supports only third-party comments.
What I particularly like:
- Damn easy to modify. All you need is a basic knowledge of Liquid and you will make it your way.
- GitHub is fast and more secure than any other free platform. You will feel safe with them.
- Google loves HTML websites. Jekyll will make you a full static HTML website.
Cost: Free
Postach.io
Postach.io is a free content publishing platform, based on the note-taking app “Evernote”. Gavin Vickery and Shawn Adrian are the gems (Co-Founders) behind this service.
Do you know what, it is not a blogging platform, but works no less. It’s a notebook you write from the Evernote app and sync online.
It supports google analytics, Disqus, custom domain, social sharing, markdown, and some other important features as normal blogs do.
Postach.io has been integrated with Evernote and Dropbox, while they are working for Google Docs, Word, and One Note compatibility.
To be honest, it could be a very new experience for bloggers.
Pros:
- Lightweight and quick blogging solution.
- Distraction-free writing with Evernote.
- The Evernote client is available on all OS.
Cons:
- Less customizing functionality.
- Limited themes and resources.
- It doesn’t have many blog features.
Why I particularly like:
- A unique style of blogging, one out of hundreds.
- It works more like an online notebook.
- A perfect solution for travel bloggers. They can keep blogging on the go using any device.
Cost: Free. The premium plan starts at $5/month.
Ghost
Ghost is a beautiful, customizable, and open-source platform, founded by John O’Nolan, the former representative of the WordPress UX team.
Its potential is to be simple, and elegant but more powerful.
John thought WordPress can move away from its position because of its complexity. So he oaths to produce something that can be called a simplified version of WordPress.
Eventually, his idea resulted in Ghost on 19 September 2013.
It’s a non-profit publication, open to all. You can customize, distribute, develop, or do anything you want without any legal restriction.
It’s altogether a spontaneous content management system with full customization.
Pros:
- A new style of online publishing.
- Minimal functionality for better understanding.
- Works flawlessly without having any coding experience.
- It offers a dashboard that makes sense.
- Supports the multi-author system.
- Easy content and archive management.
- Has a resourceful marketplace.
- Responsive and mobile-friendly web application.
Cons:
- No comment system by default needs third-party programs.
- The marketplace is low but growing rapidly.
- Coded in Node.js, might look new to many of you.
- You need to pay if you want to host them.
What I particularly like:
- Ghost is built with Node.js (a server-side javascript engine) and it’s super fast compared to any other platform.
- Cloudflare is powering the Ghost PRO network for improved security and performance.
- The post editor is very interesting, like a split tester. It’s two columned; you will write on the left and the preview will be showed up on the right box.
Cost: Free if downloaded. Ghost Pro starts from $10/month.
Wix
Wix is a quick and easy solution for publishers who want to go online right away.
It’s a cloud-based company, that offers to create HTML5 and mobile-friendly websites for free.
It was founded in 2006 by Avishai Abrahami and his co-founders.
What’s new in it? Suppose, this is your first day at blogging, and you do not know about it. You need to go live with a blog. Here, in this case, you can choose Wix.
It will take not more than 5-10 minutes to make a live blog with professional design.
Don’t you have money to invest? You shouldn’t worry, they will host your site and provide support almost like premium.
Pros:
- Easy to go online.
- It has the app market for enhanced functionality
- Has basic SEO options by default.
- Provides free hosting service.
- Offers mobile site editor.
Cons:
- Not open source. So you can’t modify it.
- Limited themes and plugins.
- The free version will show Wix’s advertisement.
What I particularly like:
- The drag-and-drop facility. You don’t need coding knowledge. All you will need is to drag elements and drop them into your website.
- Provides 100s of templates according to your need. Just one click is required to get started.
- Usually, none but they have their own support center where you can get priority support.
Cost: Free. The premium plan starts at $5.95/month.
Medium
Medium is a content-focused platform, founded by Twitter’s co-founders, Evan Williams and Biz Stone in 2012.
Their focus was to provide Twitter users with an easy way to share longer stories. So this is it.
It’s a dwelling place for people to meet, connect and share stories that matter. A perfect solution where writers can dive in and build a popular blog.
Pros:
- A simple, content-based platform.
- A large community of active users.
- The expanded version of Twitter to share long stories.
Cons:
- No direct monetization options.
- You will write under your Medium profile.
- You won’t get a separate website.
- Lacks customization.
- What I particularly like:
Lots of audiences. Medium has acquired 165 million active users. You have chances to get promoted in front of them.
• Lets you build your own audiences. By writing to them, you can gain more fans.
• Opportunity to create a popular writing portfolio. You can deploy it as your work profile.
Cost: Free.
Quora Blogs
Quora is intentionally a Q&A site but has also developed into a blog of influences.
It was co-founded by Adam D’Angelo and Charlie Cheever, two former Facebook employees.
The editorial team will keep peeking on Quora to find useful stories and promote them to the main blog.
This is not much that as a blogging platform but looks very similar. Quora will showcase top stories in front of their blog audiences.
Pros:
- Quality content-based blog.
- A strong and engaging community.
- Clean and user-friendly interface.
Cons:
- Lacks the feeling of a personal blog.
- No separate site on a domain or sub-domain.
- Customization is not in your hands.
What I particularly like:
- You can be a writing superstar. The most active writer gets 1+ million annual views on average.
- Chances to grow thousands of followers who love to read your writings.
- It offers you to attract more customers to your business or website.
Cost: Free
LinkedIn Pulse
LinkedIn is a professional social network, that lets influences write stories on LinkedIn Pulse (also known as LinkedIn Today).
It was initially limited to invited members, but now it has been announced as open to all.
No doubt, if you love LinkedIn, you would love to increase your profile reach.
Showing up your face in LinkedIn Pulse, you can attract more people that will pay visits to your professional profile.
Pros:
- Huge community, consisting of hundreds of millions of users and counting.
- Open to all LinkedIn users.
- A chance to drive Linkedin networking to a new level.
Cons:
- This is not an open-source platform.
- You are limited within your profile.
- No direct money-making opportunities.
What I particularly like:
- You will be exposed in front of large audiences, mostly targeted.
- Social and seoSEOnefits you never imagined.
- Public blogging system. More like guest blogging on the social platform.
Cost: Free
Final Words
That’s all about the 5+ 2 Best Blogging Platforms That You Rarely Know. Sigh! Don’t they make you confused?
It is to be because of the availability. Hundreds of platforms are available online and we need to choose one suitably.
These seven platforms are fit and unfit in many cases. I’m writing down the following seven points that help you realize whom they are recommended for:
- Jekyll is recommended for those who want a fully static website.
- Postach.io is recommended for those who travel all the time.
- Ghost is recommended for those who want the simplest version of WordPress.
- Wix is recommended for those who want to go online in no time.
- Medium is recommended for those who want to share long Twitter stories.
- Quora is recommended for those who want to get in front of large audiences.
- LinkedIn is recommended for those who want to get more profile reach.
These sound interesting, right? I will be grateful if you share your rare but favorite publishing platform in the comments.
