The Best Blogging Sites in 2017

© March Oyinki 2017

Blogging has become one of the most effective digital marketing channels, and the most used by digital marketers. It is unique for its ability to integrate other forms of digital marketing and for  providing a multi-channel environment for video marketing, email marketing, content marketing, affiliate marketing and others.

The digital marketing industry has been a dynamic one, and to keep up with the trends requires constant upgrade of your knowledge of the industry, initiating group conversations and participating in the discussions that ensues.  It is also necessary to form alliances and collaborations with leading industry professionals. Blogging has provided an effective platform for social interaction and engagement.

In the digital marketing social index, blogs have contributed tremendously in terms of revenue earnings and content marketing. Blogging sites have provided a free platform that has supported some of the most successful bloggers all around the world, and thereby helping to shape the digital marketing industry and making it what it is today. The top bloggers in the world earn between $2.5m to $14m annually, and Huffington tops the chart with $14 million, followed by Engadget with $5.5 million and Mozi $4.2 million in second and third place respective.

It is necessary that one conducts a thorough research and compare details from various ranking sites at arriving at the list of five best blogging sites in 2017. I have considered certain key rating factors, such as revenue earnings, subscribers, page views and current rankings in arriving at this conclusion. The result of this research is to provide the relevant guidance to support decision making as they develop a digital marketing strategy.

Blogging, being one of the main components of the digital marketing mix, it is important that digital marketers and bloggers have access to current information about the right and most effective marketing channels they can include in their selections. There are many great blogging sites which have both free and paid options, and often times bloggers and marketers just go for the one their hearts follow, or they consider ease of use in making a choice.  

Google Compare, proved to be a veritable tool and provided all the relevant details required to arrive at the top five blogging sites in the last 12 months. The chart below shows the interest over time by region, which is the Google Search Interest index for the last 12 months.




Leading the pack of top blogging sites are Ghost in first place, following by WordPress in distant second, while new blogging site, as the most popular in all the regions of the world. Google Search global popularity index shows Ghost has taking over the lead with a wide margin, leaving  WordPress, one of the most popular blogging sites in second place in all the regions of the world, recording a clear lead in Australia, Africa, Europe, United States and Blogger, Wix and Flickr came third, fourth and fifth places respectively. The emergence of Ghost, a relatively Asia.

Ghost has become so successful in a short time because of some of the features it provide. Apart from being a lot like WordPress, Ghost also provide users the ability to take greater control of the layout and templates of their website, and one of such feature is the split screen editor, which provide users with live preview on the right while working on the left pane. Additionally, it provides support for multiple users to collaborate and work as a team on your blog. This feature offers a better and more advanced blogging experience than most other blogging sites.

WordPress, Blogger, Wix, Flickr all have large followings and are unique in many ways but the global blogging trends tell a different story. When you look at the indicators and analytics, you see an entirely different picture that provides a clear decision path other than sentiment and favoritism. One particularly interest finding is the most popular blogging sites by region, and contrary to popular expectations, the regions with the highest interest in blogs is not the United States or India, but the Philippines.