by robg1
9 replies
I have a blog that was created a year ago using a basic wordpress theme. I have now decided to update that blog using a premium theme which has a different style layout.

My question is, how do I go about updating my blog with little or no disruption to the current traffic?

Thanks
Rob
#wordpress
  • Profile picture of the author mosthost
    Changing themes won't disrupt traffic. Just make sure you add your visitor tracking code to your new blog so you don't give yourself a heart attack.
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  • Profile picture of the author Gec
    Theme changing is instant. It's the tweaking that will take you a while, but that won't "disrupt" traffic either. The site will be available all the time, it will just look a bit different as you tweak it.
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  • Profile picture of the author robg1
    Thanks for the replies.

    I was thinking that changing the style of layout would mean having to spend hours setting everything right again, but from your replies, that doesn't seem to be the case.
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    • Profile picture of the author Breakinglink
      The answers above are correct. Depending on how much you change the layout it may mess with some of your usability but traffic should remain the same.
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  • Profile picture of the author UMS
    Another approach is to clone your current site to a test blog, apply the changes and when you are happy everything is looking as you want it, clone the test site back to your live site.

    I've used that approach on lots of different WP sites. It minimises the cutover time.
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    • Profile picture of the author MyiMall
      Originally Posted by UMS View Post

      Another approach is to clone your current site to a test blog, apply the changes and when you are happy everything is looking as you want it, clone the test site back to your live site.
      I agree with Peter - it's always a good idea to test the new theme with the plugins you've installed. They don't always play well with all themes. Also - if you had any customization done for you, you're probably going to lose that.

      Do you have FTP access so you can create a test blog? It's a lot easier to create a new installation of Wordpress, then upload the files from your current blog than it is to recreate the current blog. You would do the same in reverse after you test the new theme (if you have to do any tweaking, that is). If you install the new theme on the test site and everything looks fine without any tweaking, you won't have to do anything other than install it on your live site.

      Good luck!
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  • Profile picture of the author CurtisSWN
    Don't worry about that, any down time will be minimal.
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  • Profile picture of the author charlesmurphy
    Like others said it shouldn't effect traffic. Try doing it late at night as well in case you're worried about your traffic.
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  • Profile picture of the author wordpressmania
    I will not suggest you to upload the new theme at this moment before creating a backup of total website including database... You said you site is older so adding a new premium theme can create some problem so having a backyp will help you to restore your site easily without losing anything...

    Hope this helps...

    P.S. Changing a theme only create problem with homepage and blog page normally.... If your current theme shows blogs at the home page you may need to do the following thing after installing new theme...

    Go to setting >> Reading >> Select a page nemed "XYZ" as Font Page
    You also need go to the "XYZ" page edit panel to select a page template named like something blog page...It is easy, is not it?
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