I have a fairly simple piece of advice: If you chose to use Blogger as your blogging platform, do not purchase your domain through Blogger/Google (unless of course you know that you will never, ever, be moving that domain in the future). Should I explain more? Okay...
It is true, Google makes it very easy to map a custom domain name to a Blogger blog. They even setup Google Apps for Domains for you. So what is not to like? The process for moving the domain to a different host and or registrar has got to be the worst registrar move I have ever seen, and I have lived through some hellish registrar moves (I am looking at you iPower).
It is true, Google makes it very easy to map a custom domain name to a Blogger blog. They even setup Google Apps for Domains for you. So what is not to like? The process for moving the domain to a different host and or registrar has got to be the worst registrar move I have ever seen, and I have lived through some hellish registrar moves (I am looking at you iPower).
In the infinite wisdom </sarcasm> of a past Sports Editor at BG News, bgnewssports.com was purchased for our then Blogger-based Sports Blog. Blogger (Google now, of course) uses GoDaddy, but its not normal GoDaddy, it is a co-branded GoDaddy. So moving registrars from pseudo GoDaddy to GoDaddy is just like any other registrar transfer from hell.
Before I go further. Purchase your domain name yourself. I would even recommend GoDaddy! Just do it yourself. It is easy to change A, CNAME and MX records, or, it is easy enough to find someone who can help you out. You know the saying If you want something done right, do it yourself - that applies here.
Even with all the login information for the Google account, Blogger account, Google Apps account, Google GoDaddy account, and Domains By Proxy account (sorry, not kidding) given to me by our past Sports Editor, this process still took months.
First I imported the Blogger site. That went smooth. Then I payed for the transfer of the domain into our Student Publications GoDaddy account. The process for verification and acceptance of the transfer took about 3 months, thanks in part to Domains By Proxy I am sure. But now the domain is hosted on our dedicated box, Movable Type is setup to manage multiple domains, and now, finally, bgnewssports.com is where our Sports Blog lives, once again, after many months hiatus on our main network domain.
It is really nice to be back to using that domain. This is my warning: Never purchase a domain name through Blogger.
Before I go further. Purchase your domain name yourself. I would even recommend GoDaddy! Just do it yourself. It is easy to change A, CNAME and MX records, or, it is easy enough to find someone who can help you out. You know the saying If you want something done right, do it yourself - that applies here.
Even with all the login information for the Google account, Blogger account, Google Apps account, Google GoDaddy account, and Domains By Proxy account (sorry, not kidding) given to me by our past Sports Editor, this process still took months.
First I imported the Blogger site. That went smooth. Then I payed for the transfer of the domain into our Student Publications GoDaddy account. The process for verification and acceptance of the transfer took about 3 months, thanks in part to Domains By Proxy I am sure. But now the domain is hosted on our dedicated box, Movable Type is setup to manage multiple domains, and now, finally, bgnewssports.com is where our Sports Blog lives, once again, after many months hiatus on our main network domain.
It is really nice to be back to using that domain. This is my warning: Never purchase a domain name through Blogger.
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