I Followed The Yellow Brick Road + A Giveaway

This is the story of my I’m-moving-to-WordPress adventure. It’s a bit long so you can actually skip through all the rambling and go straight to the mighty Rafflecopter! I say, woot.

After months and months of  contemplating and research, I finally transferred this blog from Blogger to WordPress! All together now, YAYYYYYY. And I did it all by myself, too, because I’m a cheapskate and, well, I really wanted to learn to do it myself. I have more than one blog that I want to transfer so I figured I should learn all about it.

Why Move to WordPress

Why did I move? Because so many people were doing it. Seriously, I saw the yellow brick road and followed it. Okay, that doesn’t really make sense, but I didn’t move just to join the bandwagon. Those who moved to WordPress had good reason and so did I. My blog was getting older and bigger and I wanted more control over it. I got scared by all the “Blogger deleted my blog” stories. I was also looking to make my blog look more professional since I wanted to improve my online presence (for work and everything). I was on Blogger for ages and never encountered any major problem, but I knew that it was high time I moved to the WordPress platform.

Preparing for the move and buying hosting

I already bought a custom domain for this blog from GoDaddy a few years ago so all I needed to get was hosting. I spent a lot of time researching and reading about hosting companies. I went to my favorite blogs and sites and found out what hosting company they used or recommended. I really spent so much time thinking about it. I ended up buying a 3-month plan with GoDaddy. I know that there are so many mixed reviews of GoDaddy hosting, but they seem to work for some of the sites I actually follow, that’s why I went with them.

Initially, I contacted Shannon of Twilight Sleep to help me with everything. She offers incredibly reasonable hosting plans and transfer services. I wasn’t sure about doing the migration myself and when I read about how she helped Oh Chrys! with the whole move, I became very interested in her services. Eventually I decided to do everything myself, but I would still recommend her services to those who are thinking about moving to WordPress and are on a budget. :)

*The GoDaddy link is an affiliate link, but has no additional cost to you if you use it. :)

The Actual Migration

I used several tutorials to do the transfer. I referred to posts by MamaBlogga, Parajunkee, Hip Chick’s Guide, and Beautifully Invisible. They basically say the same thing so you can actually just use one. I was just feeling crazy paranoid and just had to make sure I was doing what I was supposed to do.

The transfer took a few days because I wasn’t able to transfer my content right away after the WordPress installation. I was waiting for an email that I didn’t realize I already had. Dummy moment. Anyway, I also had to fix stuff with my domain before I could log on to my WordPress dashboard. Had to do with nameservers and DNS settings blah blah. I had to email GoDaddy support and it cost me a day or so. It was fine because I didn’t want to rush anything. After I fixed all that domain crap, I followed the tutorials above to a T and finally got my new WordPress blog working. Yay moment right there.

I tried a few templates before settling on a free responsive theme that I saw on DesignRazzi. I’m loving it right now.

The Learning Curve

I’m already familiar with the WordPress platform because I use it for work and I’ve had an account on the free WordPress for some time now. I’m also a pretty fast learner so it wasn’t hard for me to transition. I’m still learning as I go, but at least I have the basics down. Plus the worldwide web is chockfull of tips and tutorials so I’m pretty much having a good time learning. I’m also having a blast just experimenting with my template. It really is muy fun, folks, and I can’t wait to learn how to create my own themes soon.

Stuff I read that helped me with the migration

These links below are da bomb, yo. You can find everything from these links. By everything I mean reasons why you should move to WordPress, what to think about or do before you do anything, how to actually do it, potential issues you may encounter, and more. I had to read up a lot since I was doing the transfer myself and I wanted to make sure I didn’t f**ck everything up. :P

• Nosegraze – All about moving from Blogger to WordPress
• DesignRazzi – 225+ Free Responsive WordPress Themes
• MamaBlogga – The Easiest Way to Migrate from a Custom Domain on Blogger to WordPress
• Parajunkee – Picture Pages! Transferring from WordPress Made Easy
• Hip Chick’s Guide – Moving from Blogger to WordPress; Blogger WordPress Migration
• Beautifully Invisible – Part One: So You Want to Leave Blogger for WordPress
• John Saddington Blog – Migrate from Blogger (Blogspot) to WordPress without Losing SEO, Links
• Radiant Shadows – From Blogger to WordPress

Giveaway

I guess it’s kind of tradition to celebrate moving to WordPress with a giveaway, so here you go! Enter using the Rafflecopter.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

This giveaway is open to anyone as long as you can receive Amazon gifts, if The Book Depository ships for free to your country, or if you have a PayPal account. Giveaway ends October 4th. :)

Just a little note about the photo: It’s a snapshot of my “work desk” in the studio apartment where I live with my sister. I basically work on the dining table. Hah. I got my mug of coffee and I included the family photo that we keep on the table and the currently-busted flower lamp. The box of pastel (bread with yummy filling) is evidence of my trip to my hometown Cagayan de Oro over the last few days.