Today I want to tell you about the three scary choices I made for this website.
You see, after a long time I just wanted to do something different and see how that would work out, so I changed 3 things for Hummerbie.com
The last one is effective as of today, so check it out on-line.
Change nr. 1 : Moving to a different Hostingprovider
If you have ever changed hosting provider, you know it's scary. You could loose your complete website, including all your search engine rankings.
So choosing the right one, that could even help you move, is a big step. A step that you should not take lightly!
Read reviews for possible candidates on as much different sites as you can. Then decide on the one that “feels” good and fits your budget. I know we all would love the have the money to go to WPEngine.com, but the reality for me is that it's currently not an option.
I my case I moved to Siteground.com. Main reason was the fact that they offered PHP 7 before all other providers did. I just wanted to see how WordPress would perform on that platform.
The move I did myself by first creating a new install via the Siteground scripts, which works simple and effective, giving me the control I wanted for a secure setup.
And no, they don't work with Mojo Marketplace like Hostgator, Bluehost and Justhost now use and which I really, really don't like.
After the install I did the import of the database, copied the images and set the dns servers to the Siteground ones via my Namecheap.com account.
I copied the images and plugins files and was good to go.
It worked brilliantly! And shortly after my move Siteground was listed on WordPress.org Hosting page, which is a good sign.
Next option to implement was the use of the free https license that Siteground offers, which should be good for Google search engine optimization.
I used the https options on several other sites that are now hosting under my siteground account. On one occasion I had a problem getting that option correct for Google. One ticket to Siteground support was enough to get in corrected within the hour…a great experience compared to others I had in the past.
Change Nr. 2 : Cleaning Out Old Posts
Because I want to focus on a different topics I decided to clean out a truck load of posts and moved them to Pathos-Seo.com where they would be a much better fit.
The first couple of day's I kept an eye on my 404 errors and put in redirection links to refer possible visitors to the new home of those old posts.
Of course a move like that resulted in a drop of visitors to an all time low, but most of that traffic went to Pathos Seo as expected.
So now I can concentrate on my renewed focus and write more on WordPress, SEO and related topics, with an occasional personal post like this one.
Change nr. 3 : Changing Site Layout
I did some changes to the layout of Hummerbie in the past, but not as big as this one…
My Theme of choice is now a child theme of the Genesis Framework from StudioPress.com, the No Sidebar Pro Theme.
This theme is very, very clean and minimalist in it's options from a layout perspective.
With just three widget area's and two menu locations it limit's the options to place extra information menu's, widget's like Categories, Recent post and also banners.
For me an extra challenge to get all the informational links to navigate in place. So in the menu menu under the Blog page I now placed the different categories I want to use.
Conclusion: I think it's a good step forward for me and hopefully for you as site visitors as well, you are always my main concern. I want to give you the information you are looking for in a good, easy to digest manner with a great user experience.
Please let me know I the comments below what you think of these changes and any recommendations to further improve are of course welcome!
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