Wordpress - Changing Theme Concerns

[mattsgame]

Good afternoon everyone.

I am about to go through a whole new face lift as I am sick of looking at my theme and think it could be a lot better for my visitors. I have held up on adding anymore content atm as I have a few concerns.

I have done a lot of reading on how to change themes and everything associated with it. The concerns I have are will my link structure stay in tact? Will my plugins still work? During the transition will my site drop in the serps and ... so many more I won't list them all

The theme I am going to use will change a lot of things in the backend as well which means my reviews and everything will get a spruce up but will need to be altered quite a bit.

I have a few ideas on how to do it all and to make sure its done properly, most of them are very time consuming though.

I guess what I am asking is does anyone have an easy way to switch themes and the backend without losing my serps and without to many hassles? I am sure some of you have done a complete change to a site or 2.

Thanks for your time,
Matt

 

[Guard Dog]

With WP, I have never done so much that I would lose SERPS.... typically the permalink structure remained the same regardless of theme shifting. I'm not sure you have to worry about that unless you plan on changing that permalink structure?

 

[mattsgame]

Not changing any link structures if I can help it. My main concern I guess is how many hours I will have to spend getting each page looking the way I want after I change themes as the whole page structure is going to change. Then there is the plugins I use, will they work with the new theme, will I have to migrate everything to another plugin or the ones provided with theme etc. I am almost putting myself off doing it ha, but I am over the one I am using and don't feel its very visitor friendly.

 

[Guard Dog]

ah. I got you. Here is what I have done:

Create:

test.mywebsite.com

Duplicate the database and change the configuration file

Now... test on the new subdomain prior to going live... write down any steps taken to 'fix' that may have to be taken on the current instance of the site. Then upgrade.

 

[Guard Dog]

Yes.. I know.. you must be thinking.... thank you captain obvious

 

[mattsgame]

ah. I got you. Here is what I have done:

Create:

test.mywebsite.com

Duplicate the database and change the configuration file

Now... test on the new subdomain prior to going live... write down any steps taken to 'fix' that may have to be taken on the current instance of the site. Then upgrade.

This is what I was thinking of doing to make sure everything was smooth, but once I take it off the subdomain to my main directory won't the structure change? E.G test.mywebsite.com/casinoreviews/casinohere or does this all sort itself out?

Also what would be the easiest way to stop Google from indexing that test site? Especially if its up for a little while whilst tweaking etc?

Yes.. I know.. you must be thinking.... thank you captain obvious

Not at all, appreciate all your help I have never done this through WP and I want to make sure I do it right. Before this site all my sites were HTML based and every page was written in wordpad (oh boy) then uploaded, so this is all pretty new to me.

 

[Guard Dog]

This is what I was thinking of doing to make sure everything was smooth, but once I take it off the subdomain to my main directory won't the structure change? E.G test.mywebsite.com/casinoreviews/casinohere or does this all sort itself out?

Also what would be the easiest way to stop Google from indexing that test site? Especially if its up for a little while whilst tweaking etc?

Make sure in your settings that you turn off notifications to search engines in the Settings > Reading (at the bottom: Search Engine Visibility). If this is off and you have NO links to the subdomain, the search engines will simply not know it is there. You can also password protect the directory itself in cpanel. It would force you to login at first, but that is ok

It will not change the structure as all you are doing in the sub-domain is testing 'how' you will upgrade and create/update your posts.

Not at all, appreciate all your help I have never done this through WP and I want to make sure I do it right. Before this site all my sites were HTML based and every page was written in wordpad (oh boy) then uploaded, so this is all pretty new to me.

I remember doing that Was brutal. Good work moving to a better platform.

 

[mattsgame]

Make sure in your settings that you turn off notifications to search engines in the Settings > Reading (at the bottom: Search Engine Visibility). If this is off and you have NO links to the subdomain, the search engines will simply not know it is there. You can also password protect the directory itself in cpanel. It would force you to login at first, but that is ok

It will not change the structure as all you are doing in the sub-domain is testing 'how' you will upgrade and create/update your posts.





I remember doing that Was brutal. Good work moving to a better platform.

Thanks for all your tips mate, appreciate it.

I will fill the coffee pot soon and get started, fingers crossed I don't bugger to much up.

Be prepared for a lot more posts here

 

[Guard Dog]

Thanks for all your tips mate, appreciate it.

I will fill the coffee pot soon and get started, fingers crossed I don't bugger to much up.

Be prepared for a lot more posts here

No problem at all. With that note... I'm going to assume you are on a completely different time zone than me. I'm just about ready for some sleep!

If you have cpanel, this shouldn't be too difficult for you. Creating a subdomain - lots of cpanel help out there (google). Securing a directory via cpanel - lots of help out there, but very easy. The most difficult part may be installing WP on your test domain, moving over your database content from the main site (i.e., copying tables to new database), and installing the theme + plugins.

But it will be well worth it, IMO. It's your saftey net. I, personally, love those. When I don't have them (like AGD) - I mess it all up.

 

[Guard Dog]

Actually... this might help a bit:

Making a duplicate Wordpress site for testing | InMotion Hosting


Looks like what I did all on my own without help. The only difference is that I secured the directory so that it couldn't be accessed without a password.

 

[mattsgame]

Geez, I am not doing so well so far :/ I will stick at it for a bit but I may end up giving up, the structure is so different etc. I may have to re-write all pages and just make sure they keep the same perma links.

 

[Guard Dog]

Geez, I am not doing so well so far :/ I will stick at it for a bit but I may end up giving up, the structure is so different etc. I may have to re-write all pages and just make sure they keep the same perma links.

What is your permalink structure? Typically it is something like this: /category%/%postname%/ or similar.

If that is the case... unless you change your category names or post names... or move your posts into different categories, it should remain the same URL.

 

[mattsgame]

What is your permalink structure? Typically it is something like this: /category%/%postname%/ or similar.

If that is the case... unless you change your category names or post names... or move your posts into different categories, it should remain the same URL.

My link structure is %postname%

I purchased a Flytonic theme which includes their frame work as well, so this is were I am having the trouble, it's just more about me reading and taking it all in. May take a while but I will hopefully get there.

My first hurdle has been trying to get my test site working properly, I followed the steps in your link and still managed to stuff it up. Changes I made to the test site happened on my actual site

I may have to cop a drop in serps and just re do the main site but put the same link structure in place, I do not know.

 

[Online18Casino]

My link structure is %postname%

I purchased a Flytonic theme which includes their frame work as well, so this is were I am having the trouble, it's just more about me reading and taking it all in. May take a while but I will hopefully get there.

My first hurdle has been trying to get my test site working properly, I followed the steps in your link and still managed to stuff it up. Changes I made to the test site happened on my actual site

I may have to cop a drop in serps and just re do the main site but put the same link structure in place, I do not know.

Re-check step 8 and 9:

"Step 8.Configure the Test Wordpress wp-config.php file for the test site. This needs to be done or the test site will use the main Wordpress site database. "

"Step 9.Change the site URL for the test site - The site URL is stored in the Wordpress database. in order for the site to load as a test site, the site url will need to be changed to the subdomain url. For example http:// testsite.yourdomain.com. "

If you don't do that part it will redirect you back to the main site. I had this problem a while back when moving hosts.

 

[mattsgame]

Finally, thank you all I managed to get my test site working properly as far as I can see.

There were some things like database changes I had trouble with because my database is not written the same as the description e.g wp_posts was tgd1_posts in my database.

Also I found a lot of old plugin files in my databases like Yoast are these ok to just leave there?

Thanks once again for all your help, appreciate it.

Now its time to get the whole site looking how I want and getting it back onto the main domain