Tips for Retaining Traffic after Migrating your blogger to WordPress

SEO is basic! Perfect post titles could be also inevitable same as the many incredible things that are practically unachievable when running a popular blog on the blogger CMS (blogspot) platform.
For you to have moved to a self hosted wordpress CMS platform on it’s own is a total consonance to my own personal view and opinion on the blogger blogs.
I am the kinda guy that will never argue on which of this two platform (blogger vs wordpress) is better ‘cos there is no point needed to prove to even a simpleton that self hosted wordpress blog is better and more esteemed than the traditional blogger blogs.
Here is my personal verdict on blogger.com CMS powered blogs

Blogger blogs (both blogspot ones and those on custom domain names) without any exemption is just too archaic, too traditional, too Orthodox and complex for any likely popular or famous blogger to go with it.

Now you have agreed with my view on blogger blogs right?
Okay! you want to move your blog over to wordpress right?

Even if you have already moved, you need reconsider the steps you took while moving and check if they concur fully with my nine tips below, else you might be losing valuable backlinks, traffic and those social love rendered to you by friends and audience.

This 9 best SEO practices for retaining your blog traffic, backlinks and facebook likes, tweets and other sharing counts will help every one who moved or want to move from blogger hosted blog to a self hosted wordpress own.
Let’s get the 9 tips rolling by diving it into two major parts;
Part One
Core Practices: If retaining your blog traffic (alexa rank), social like and shares, individual post and pages pagerank , page authority and external backlinks is of any importance to you then you will have no reason ignoring this part I termed core practices.
#1.

Tell Google to Stop Crawling / Indexing Your Blogger (blogspot) Blog

This is a very important action to take after moving your blog away from blogger, continuous crawling and indexing  of your old blog can lead to both blogs disappearing to oblivion since google hates seeing duplicate contents as much as we hate copy and paste bloggers.
You can achieve this by using the Meta-robot tag “NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW” . Google and every other search engines out there will stop indexing or following your blog immediately they see the tag.
Here is how to implement the “NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW” robot-meta tag on your blogger blog ==> log in to your dashboard and click on Templates ==> Edit Html and locate as seen in the image below:
Just below the tag copy and paste this code

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1

Click on Save Template.
#2.

Tell Visitors to Update their Bookmarks Automatically

No doubts many will still have your old blogger (blogspot or subdomain) address saved in their various browsers and needs be notified you have upgraded to a superior platform without you posting about it.
This is how to achieve that,
Locate the tag from template=> edit html  following the picture and instruction above    ==> copy and paste this code just below it

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1	http://obasimvilla.com

"/>Save template.
Code Interpretation: The code will automatically redirect all hits from your old blog to your new blog url after 5 seconds, you can increase the time by changing the “5″ with any value of your choice or replace the 5 with “0″ if you  want them redirected immediately. Don’t forget to change http://obasimvilla.com with your new blog address.
Also see : Wrapping google adsense around ur post body without attracting a ban
#3.

Change your WordPress Current Permalink to look like that of Blogger

Just like when an insane man is treated newly he will still possess some of the characteristics of a mad man, this is how it is after moving away from blogger  to wordpress.
The stigma that characterize the move is making sure that your new url structure (permalink) appears same as your old ones, so as to preserve those backlinks and pagerank.

To achieve this you need ==> log in to your wordpress admin dashboard ==> go to settings ==> permalinks ==> choose the “Custom Structure” and enter the following text values

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

into the box provided ==> hit the “save  changes” button after that.
Also see: google adsense placed Twice Inline in wordpress without a plugin: How to
#4.

Transfer your intense debate Comments from blogger to WordPress

This is important mainly ‘cos blogger doesn’t store your comments after switching to intense debate comment system. Luckily the developers over there at intense debate has come up with a clear guide and a wordpress plugin that makes migrating your comments from blogger to wordpress so easy and smooth.
#5.

Beg Dr Fix to come to your Rescue

Luckily a kind enough developer has come up with a PHP code that will effortlessly correct your wordpress permalinks to look exactly like it was on blogger correcting those error 404 messages you get when visiting your blog post from search result immediately after moving to wordpress. Even after applying the custom code format I gave you above you still need run this code to fix up stuff for you.
Here is how to run dr fix

Log in to your cpanel by visiting your siteurl.com/cpanel or  siteurl.com:2082 (though most hosting providers like godaddy will require you to log in from your account manager)
==> From the cpanel window locate “File manger” and locate “New file” as seen in the image above
==> In the “File name”   enter drfix.php as seen above click on “create new file”
==> Right click on the file you have just created and tap on edit
==> copy the following codes below and paste in the open window

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1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

require_once('wp-load.php'); $res = $wpdb->get_results("SELECT post_id, meta_value FROM $wpdb->postmeta WHERE meta_key = 'blogger_permalink'"); $wpdb->print_error(); foreach ($res as $row){ $slug = explode("/",$row->meta_value); $slug = explode(".",$slug[3]); $wpdb->query("UPDATE $wpdb->posts SET post_name ='" . $slug[0] . "' WHERE ID = $row->post_id"); $wpdb->print_error(); } echo "DONE"; ?>

Save and close window. N/B. you can paste this code in a blank notepad and save it as drfix.php then upload it to your blog root directory
==> Visit your blog again in this format http://myblogurl.com/drfix.php
=> Once you get the message “Done” your blogger to wordpress migration woes is now over, you can start enjoying your life as a matured blogger.
Also see: Placing Google adsense side by side in genesis with no Plugin : How to
#6.

Redirect your post Label Links to WordPress category links

This is just as simple as the next one below it,
all you need do is
==> locate “file manager” from your cpanel
==> tick the box with “Show Hidden Files (dotfiles)” and hit “Go” to launch
==> Locate “.htaccess” right click on it and choose “code edit” or “edit”
==> copy and paste this codes in it above “# BEGIN WordPress” leaving a single line space

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#Redirect archives RewriteRule ^([0-9]{4})_([0-9]{1,2})_([0-9]{1,2})_archive.html$ $1/$2/ [L,R=301] #Redirect labels/categories RewriteRule ^search/label/(.*)$ category/$1/ [L,R=301]

==> Save and proceed to the next step below before exiting the window
#7

Redirect your Blogger Post and Comments Feed to WordPress own

==> Following the guide above leave a single line after that and post this code beneath it

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#ATOM Feeds RewriteRule atom.xml feed/atom/ [L,R=301] RewriteRule feeds/posts/default feed/atom/ [L,R=301] #RSS FEEDS RewriteRule feeds/posts/default?alt=rss feed/ [L,R=301] RewriteRule rss.xml feed/ [L,R=301] #Comments Feed RewriteRule /feeds/comments/default comments/feed/ [L,R=301] RewriteRule /feeds/comments/default?alt=rss comments/feed/ [L,R=301]

Note that this point 7 is only necessary if you have not been using feedburner as your default service for handling post and comments feeds while still on the blogger platform.
Part Two
Extended Practices:  This is the second part of our 9 tips for retaining traffic, social media likes, audience and backlinks, as already stated above you are free to ignore this part as it isn’t included in the part we termed core practices.
#8.

Blog about it

Surprises are great, isn’t it?
Your loyal readers might be wowed at first visit after seeing your brand new look, they will be piled up with may questions in their minds such as; where the hell is that archaic & awful comment form and the likes, this is one of the reasons you might be tempted to tell them about your migration.
Telling them about your migration might also increase your traffic as most of the faithful ones among them will force their social media fans and friends to take note of the new development in your blog, most of them will go as far as linking to it in their blog post or even blogging about it (if you are that popular). Rajesh Namase  of techlila.com  did write something catchy about the genesis framework the week he moved up there same as Brian Gardner of briangardner.com.
#9.

Get Back the Money You Spent for Migration

This might sound funny, but you ‘ve gat to agree with me that it is the real truth. Not even in the dreamland will you spot any blogger from amongst the top 100 bloggers in the world using blogger CMS (blogspot) for their post publishing, not even in the top 200 from my own point of view.
Lack of funds for running a traffic intensive blog is one thing that has prevented many from moving to the self hosted wordpress blogging platform, many even complain of the likely extra payment for premium caching plugins and Content Delivery Network (CDN) system for their blogs  to be the main discouraging factor.
This is why you can hardly see any top blogger using the blogger CMS for their blog except in most third (3rd) world countries.
Now that you have taken the bold step of buying a host, paying a designer and other services that requires money, don’t you think it is the right time to get back your money?
Well getting back your money is so easy, start by referring a close friend to your new host for up to $70 and above per referral for arvixe hosting or even more for other hosting providers.
You can also promote other products relating to migration such as Maxcdn, premium plugins and themes.