Changing from WP.com to a hosted blog — do I have this right?

  • katsy283 · Member ·

    I’m thinking about moving my blog (http://womantowomancbe.wordpress.com) off of WP.com onto GoDaddy or another similar site, so that I can put advertising on it. Currently, I get about 10-15,000 hits per month, so I figure that any revenue I get will cover the costs incurred, and hopefully more. Before I make the leap, though, I want to make sure that I have everything straight, and understand everything involved.

    I will need to get the website set up on an external hosting site, download the WP software, and export my blog to my computer and then import it to the new site. This will set my blog stats back to zero, and I will have to build it back up from scratch, right? Some of my posts are currently highly rated on search engines for certain keywords — what happens with them? I will lose the rating, and have to build it back up, right? Can I automatically redirect from the current (highly-rated) post on my WP.com blog to the new website, so that when someone clicks on the post it will redirect to the new site? Or should I “hide” my current blog from search engines, so that the new site will get the “fresh” hits? Another problem is that I have *lots* of links from one of my posts to other of my posts, and I don’t want to have to go through and manually change the links — will the links automatically update when I export/import them?

    Is there anything else I’m missing? Anything else I should consider? Thanks!

    The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)

  • raincoaster · Member ·

    Yes, although depending which stats counter you use, you can sometimes set a starting count for it. Like, if you’ve got 100000 hits now and move, you might be able to set certain counters at 100000 to start. Not all of them.

    You will drop in the search engine rankings, no question. They estimate it takes 4 months to regain your standing but my experience is while you get your pagerank back that soon or faster, you never subsequently have the “juice” you did. I used to be able to post and see myself on the first two pages of Google. That hasn’t happened for a VERY long time.

    I would recommend you set your site here to a static front page with a brief explanation,eg We Have Moved HERE and a link to the new site.

    Unfortunately, I’m too stoned on cold medicine to remember the solution for domain mapping, hopefully someone will come in and help.

  • timethief · Member ·

    You may not like my advice but I do know whereof I speak. Purchasing a domain, domain mapping and hiring a web host intstalling a theme and plugins, and importing your data into the new site are the last steps in this process – not the first.

    The first step is to explore all the income streams (advertising and affiliate schemes) and create a viable business plan for your new blog. http://onecoolsitebloggingtips.com/2009/01/22/twenty-income-streams-for-bloggers/

    If you intend to use it, t’s important to understand how Google Adsense works and exactly what the policies are. My experience is if your blog does not have 1,000 to 1,500 unique visitors each and every day then moving will be premature. The reality is that bloggers who do not blog 5 days weekly, and publish high quality unique content, simply do not draw enough enough traffic to glean enough ad clickers to make the move worth while. Google does not even cut a check until your blog earns $100. US.

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