Skip to main content

How To Move From Blogger To Wordpress Without Losing Traffic

migrate from blogger to WordPress


Moving from blogger to WordPress without losing traffic have been one very big challenge bloggers encounter while trying to step up to another phase in their blogging career.

Sometimes we realize how much we need to take control and total ownership of our blog and wish to move from being hosted to being self hosted but the major problem of this decision is coming to terms with the fact that you might lose a good percentage of your traffic due to changes that may occur mainly in your URL...

 Apparently, transferring your posts from blogger to wordpress is not a big deal and the move has become so easy; thanks to the consistent updates by WordPress.Losing traffic after transfer is obviously a very big deal especially to bloggers having so many posts which can encourage manual set up for redirection...
Note; To make your migration easy, I you must have had a custom domain attached to your blogger blog. This process will not work for you and the transfer will be tedious if you do not have your custom domain already attached.


DIY Migrating from Blogger To Wordpress
The major goal of anyone moving to WordPress from blogger is to retain posts permalinks, probably pages as well in order to avoid losing traffic and Google ranking.

STEP I
Moving your Domain From Blogger To wordpress
 I believe you have already set up your WordPress blog and moved your domain from blogger to your new wordpress site. But if you haven't, make the move and installation.

Guide; To move your domain to WordPress, switch over to publishing with your .blogspot.com domain, then head over to your domain registrar and set your domain nameserver to point to your new hosting account.


STEP II
Setting UpYour WordPress Blog
After switching your domain, through your hosting account install WordPress to work with your domain.

Guide; To set up your WordPress blog, login to your hosting cpanel which I assume you should have access to by now and install WordPress with the one click installer tool as provided by your host. This post will guide you on how to Start a WordPress blog with Bluehost 
Now That you have made the basic move, it's time to make the major move without losing traffic.


STEP III
 Structuring WordPress Permalink to look like Blogger's
migrate from blogger to WordPress 

 After installing your WordPress, login to your admin Dashboard and navigate to settings  >> Permalinks: select custom structure then paste the following below in the text space and save.

/%year%/%monthnum%/%postname%.html

This is done in order to adapt to your previous blogger blog's permalinks.

NOTE; Please don't miss out adding the .html as it is very important since blogger includes it at the end of their permalinks but WordPress doesn't.



STEP IV
Moving your blog posts, image, categories s, labels and pages to your new blog.

migrate from blogger to WordPress
  1. In order to move your blog posts, images and comments to wordpress, you need to download them by logging into to your blogger blog dashboard. Click on Settings >> Others then find and click on back up content; your posts, images and comments will be downloaded; you should take note of the file name which is in xml formant. You are ready to make your move.
  2. Head over to wordpress, login and navigate to Tools >> import options then select blogger : click on Install Plugin to install the importer plugin and activate after installation,.
  3. Run the Importer plugin you just installed and choose file then click on upload file and import. All your posts, images and comments from your Blogger will start importing into WordPress.
  4. Incase importer stops the process prematurely, click on Continue; you may need to keep clicking on it, until you are asked to Set Authors. This shows that importation is successful thus your blogger.com blog is now imported.

Note: WordPress Importer do not import your categories and pages from Blogger.com blog; but this can be done manually.
In order to redirect your labels and pages to your new WordPress blog categories and pages, I suggest you search, the plugin "Redirection", install and activate then click on tools, the newly installed plugin is placed under your tools... 
Run the Redirection plugin and add your blogger page url and new wordpress page url as seen below;



You can use the formant above to redirect your blogger labels to your WordPress categories after placing your Posts under different categories...




Changing blogger blog Feed URL to WordPress Feed url



If you use feedburner, login into your feedburnder account, select Your blog's feed account then click on "EDIT FEED DETAILS", then replace your blogger blog feed URL with your new WordPress feed URL.

Secondary Blogger to WordPress Redirection
To avoid 404 error, although I did not try this on my newly redirected blog, you can do this in order to set up redirection on two levels, which is actually advisable.

Step 1: You need to redirect Blogger visitors to your new WordPress blog, to ensure that they get redirected to the post they came to read.
first thing first, login to your blogger account and click on Theme (formerly template) then revert to Classic theme. After reverting, click on " EDIT HTML",  delete the entire html then paste the code below... Be sure replace yourBlogURL.com with your blog url.
 <head>
  <title><$BlogPageTitle$></title>
   <script>
    <MainOrArchivePage>
    window.location.href="http://yourblogURL.com/"
    </MainOrArchivePage>
    <Blogger>
     <ItemPage>
     window.location.href="http://yourblogURL.com/?blogger=<$BlogItemPermalinkURL$>"
     </ItemPage>
    </Blogger>
   </script>
   <MainPage>
   <link rel="canonical"href="http://yourblogURL.com/" />
   </MainPage>
   <Blogger>
    <ItemPage>
    <link rel="canonical"href="http://yourblogURL.com/?blogger=<$BlogItemPermalinkURL$>" />
    </ItemPage>
   </Blogger>
 </head>
 <body>
  <MainOrArchivePage>
   <h1><ahref="http://yourblogURL.com/"><$BlogTitle$></a></h1>
  </MainOrArchivePage>
  <Blogger>
   <ItemPage>
    <h1><ahref="http://yourblogURL.com/?blogger=<$BlogItemPermalinkURL$>"><$BlogItemTitle$></a></h1>
    <$BlogItemBody$>
   </ItemPage>
  </Blogger>
 </body>
</html>
Then save your template.


Setup redirection on your WordPress site so that users are redirected as stated above. Goto Appearance >> Editor, then look for functions.php then paste the code below after every other code, and save.
function blogger_query_vars_filter( $vars ) {
  $vars[] = "blogger";
  return $vars;
}
add_filter('query_vars', 'blogger_query_vars_filter');
function blogger_template_redirect() {
  global $wp_query;
  $blogger = $wp_query->query_vars['blogger'];
  if ( isset ( $blogger ) ) {
    wp_redirect( get_wordpress_url ( $blogger ) , 301 );
    exit;
  }
}
add_action( 'template_redirect', 'blogger_template_redirect' );
function get_wordpress_url($blogger) {
  if ( preg_match('@^(?:https?://)?([^/] )(.*)@i', $blogger, $url_parts) ) {
    $query = new WP_Query (
      array ( "meta_key" => "blogger_permalink", "meta_value" => $url_parts[2] ) );
    if ($query->have_posts()) {
      $query->the_post();
      $url = get_permalink();
    }
    wp_reset_postdata();
  }
  return $url ? $url : home_url();
}
The code above creates a 301 redirection from blogger to WordPress. You've successfully MIGRATED FROM BLOGGER TO WORDPRESS, Without fear of losing traffic... In case you need help, you can contact me.

Comments

  1. thanks a lot for this......it will be very useful for me

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Earn While you Save With Alat.ng

If you've always wanted to save up for the future, but didn't take actions for reasons best known to you, now is the time to reconsider your thoughts and take actions, because there is a digital bank known as ALAT waiting to be utilized. What Is A Digital Bank? According to Avoka.com; "Digital banking is the digitization (or moving online) of all the traditional banking activities and programs that historically were only available to customers when physically inside of a bank branch." What is ALAT? ALAT is a digital bank, the first if its kind in Nigeria! It is an innovation of Wema Bank Nigeria, developed to give you easy access to saving your funds and doing other bank transactions without being physically present at the bank.  With Alat digital bank, you can open a savings account using your phone number and Bank Verification Number (BVN) as well as other documents that you will be prompted to upload during the registration process. It’s simple, convenient, reliabl...

Beautify Your Blogspot Blog With TESH, A Premium Premade Blogger Template

If you've been looking for a stylish template for your blogger blog, then you'll definitely love the look and feel of "Tesh", a classic, chic, as well as black and white premade blogger template, suitable for personal, fashion, lifestyle bloggers as well as other bloggers. Tesh is not only classic but responsive and has been built to beautify your blog's view... If you've been looking for a minimalist blogger template that isn't heavy but lightweight, then tesh is perfect just for you... No fuss, she's worth your thoughts and utilization. Note: This is a blogger template, it wouldn't work on WordPress, tumblr or any other platform but blogger. Demo - http://www.tesh-demo.blogspot.com Features of Tesh ~ Responsive layout ~ Auto read more button ~ Breadcrumbs in post page ~ Related posts widget ~ Classic share buttons ~ Stylish about me widget ~ Beautiful labels design ~ Numbered page navigation ...

Just Another Way To Save With A Piggybank

While growing up, I wished for a piggybank, despite having access to numerous saving boxes. Trust me, I always thought a piggy bank would be great and advanced than a square box! At least it wasn't our conventional DIY savings method. But then, what if my dream had come true, maybe not at the time I wanted it but sometime later? I'd probably save and get to destroy my bank! Piggybank is a generic English term used to denote the earliest means of storage of money, using a hollow ceramic statue of a pig. Well, did you ever use a savings box and wished for a Piggy bank? It's probably time to stop being archaic and get digital because, there's a Piggy bank in town who's gone so digital. About piggybank.ng In a brief note, Piggybank.ng is a Nigerian Financial Technology (Fintech) startup which run a hassle free online savings scheme. Piggybank if granted access to a user's bank account will make periodic deductions for the purpose of saving towards a target. This inn...