Migrating CMS... best practice, any services do this?

by thedog

Posted: 12 years ago 4 replies

PROGRAMMING

Hi guys, I'm working on a website at the mo, around 8 year old site.

I did a redesign using their crappy cms, and would like to migrate to wordpress.

This is the best article on the subject, How To Avoid SEO Disaster During a Website Redesign – Top Marketer Concerns | Search Engine Journal

Seems like a huge task.... I'm sure I can handle it, but maybe it's better to just use some service... does anyone have any recommendations or advice.

Cheers

#cms #migrating #practice #services

mlab 12 years ago

It's tedious..but here is how I approach conversions - not complete but should give you an idea...

FIRST PART - BUILD OUT NEW SITE FOUNDATION
Install new site platform (wordpress)
Configure WP Settings
Install and configure any extensions (functionality)
Set up menu<s>
Create Pages for menu<s> (Home/Privacy/Contact Us, etc..) - and attach them
Select and Install Theme - Configure and customize theme
Create Categories in WP

SECOND PART - OLD SITE CONTENT
Collect (convert if possible/necessary or just copy and paste text
Add images

If you need to maintain your former site's exact structure and URL's - it is doable..not hard, but tedious. Just do a few hours a day until you finish.

Keep your original site live until your new site looks ready - the actual 'switch' has another to-do list.

Good luck!
- Thanks
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jaasmit 12 years ago

You can convert that easily into wordpress.
In order to that you have make some psd files and convert them to html or wordpress.
- Thanks
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Alastair McDermott

12 years ago

Make sure you have everything backed up, twice or more. Pull down a flat HTML version of the site too if possible.

If you want to maintain all rankings then try and change as little as possible, and do it in baby steps over a couple of months. E.g. if you need to change hosting do that either first or last.

When moving CMS, try and make the new HTML template and URL structure the same as the old ones. Leave it a few weeks to settle and then update the look and feel, a couple weeks after that change the URL structure. Map the old URLs to new with .htaccess 301 redirects.

One option, if they have a lot of old content that you don't want to migrate and you're certain they will never want to edit, is upload flat HTML versions of those pages, and just keep the newer content in the CMS. This has implications for site search and editing so be sure you're making the right decision.

HTH, PM if you need assistance.