Blog on website or stand alone?

Hi, I searched but I did not see anything that matched exactly what I am needing to know. The company I work for has a ecommerce website but no blog. We are interested in starting a blog. Would it be better to have the blog on the ecommerce website or have it a stand alone blog?

Any advantages to either one?

Thanks.

I have the same question. Is it better to host a blog through wordpress on the site itself like blog.something.com or is it better to just host off of wordpress (something.wordpress.com)? Which is better in terms of SEO as well as marketing? Would hosting off of your own site make it look like a marketing ploy? Would hosting at wordpress make it more difficult to get a strong/large audience?

Thanks.

My question is a little different. I believe (and I may be wrong) but if you were to have www.theNameOfYourBlog.wordpress.com, it would not look as professional as it is obviously hosted by worpress. My question is should I get a separate domain name for the blog or should I make it off the main domain name as in www.MainSite.com/blog? Which one would be better form a SEO standpoint?

In either case, you should be able to choose the keywords you want in the wordpress or blogger (for example) url and that will help by itself. In my opinion, the blog should be separate from the main site, and link back and forth.

Having it be at one of those blog sites may not seem professional, but if it comes up in a search, and thanks to the popularity of those sites it will be more likely to do so, people will be looking for your content, not turning their nose up at who is hosting your blog.