Move Your WordPress Website Without Headaches or Cost
Moving a WordPress website to a new hosting company can sound like a major undertaking. For many businesses, that concern is one of the reasons they stay with a hosting provider or web developer long after they have become unhappy with the service.
Fern Web can move your existing WordPress website to our managed hosting environment and take care of the technical details for you. When you move your hosting to Fern Web, there is no charge for the standard website migration. I have hands-on expertise in domain name management (DNS), SSL, plugins, and the other technical details that keep a WordPress site running smoothly
Once your site is moved, you have someone you can contact directly for hosting support, WordPress updates, maintenance and help when you need it.
Why Businesses Move Their WordPress Websites
There are many reasons a business might decide it is time for a change.
Sometimes the website itself is working perfectly well, but the hosting or support behind it isn’t. In other situations, the website may need updates or improvements, but the current provider isn’t responsive enough to get the work done.
Common reasons for considering a move include:
- Slow or unreliable website hosting
- Difficulty getting technical support
- Recurring WordPress problems
- Increasing hosting or maintenance costs
- An unavailable or unresponsive web developer
- Security or maintenance concerns
- Wanting to work directly with a local web developer
- Wanting hosting, maintenance and website support handled in one place
The important thing is that changing your hosting provider does not automatically mean changing your website.
What Actually Happens When a WordPress Website Is Moved?
A WordPress website consists of more than the pages you see in your browser. There are website files, a database, themes, plugins, images, configuration settings and other components that all need to move together.
Before a migration, the existing website should be reviewed and backed up. The site can then be transferred to the new hosting environment and tested before the changeover is completed.
A properly handled migration should also consider things such as domain and DNS settings, SSL, website forms, email configuration and existing SEO.
The objective isn’t simply to copy some files from one server to another. It is to make sure the website continues working properly after the move.
What About Your Google Rankings?
This is an important consideration for an established business website.
Simply moving a WordPress website to another hosting server does not require changing its domain name, page addresses, content or existing SEO structure.
When possible, those elements should remain intact.
If changes are required during the move, they should be handled carefully so existing URLs, redirects, metadata and other SEO elements aren’t unnecessarily lost.
For a business that has spent years building visibility in Google, preserving what is already working can be just as important as improving what isn’t.
Moving Doesn’t Have to Mean Redesigning
Another misconception is that changing website companies means you have to buy a new website.
You don’t.
If your existing WordPress website is doing its job, it can often be moved as it is. Once it is safely running in its new environment, you can decide whether any improvements are necessary.
In some cases, a website may benefit from better performance, updated plugins, improved security, SEO work or design changes. In others, very little needs to change.
The first priority should be getting the website moved properly.
[Learn more about WordPress Website Migration]
Nearly 30 Years of Website Experience
Fern Web has been building, hosting and supporting business websites since 1997.
Web technology has changed enormously during that time, but one thing hasn’t changed: businesses need their websites to work, and they need to know who to contact when they don’t.
If you’re happy with your website but not with the company hosting or supporting it, you don’t necessarily need a new website.
You may simply need a better home for the one you already have.