#12 Web Hosting Forum & Blog Software
Now that your site is in progress and starting to come together I will talk about some of the software options there are.
Blog Software
When it comes to selecting blogging software there is only really one choice – WordPress. It is free to use this great system & it’s capabilities go beyond many of it’s competitors. WordPress allows you easily implement plug-ins as well as install & modify theme templates easily. When creating your blog using WordPress I suggest installing it manually. Try to make sure that it matches the design of your main site and includes your logo. WordPress can be installed manually.
After your blog has been installed you might want to read up on securing your blog – 10 Useful WordPress Security Tweaks
Forum Software
There are many options for forum software. Free options are phpBB and SMF.
http://www.simplemachines.org/
http://www.phpbb.com/
MyBB is another forum solution that you may consider. It is free and has some professional templates available. http://www.mybboard.net/
For your hosting site I recommend that you invest in vBulletin (http://www.vbulletin.com/). This has many add-ons that can be installed however it does have a high license fee. Despite this there are many advantages to this software and it is well worth the investment.
Tip: Marketing is key is web hosting, so if you get vBulletin then I also recommend the following plug-in > http://www.vbseo.com/ This changes the URLs of the forum and makes them search engine friendly which can make all the difference. Having a forum setup to enables your forum users to create custom content containing URLs that you have not have thought of.
