My Observations 6 Months After Moving from Blogger to Wordpress
Wow! Has it really been six months since moving the old blog from Blogger over to Wordpress? Where does the time go!
So I was thinking that it might be a good time to reassess the big move. This was the list of observations that I came up with. Who knows, maybe you can come up with more:
1. I’ve pretty much retained my blog rank (after the Google shakeup) like I had predicted thanks to htaccess redirects, although some individual post pages still need updating. That’s of course due to losing backlinks but curiously Google hasn’t yet caught up to all of my post redirects like it did to my domain. So what I’ve been doing is republishing some of my more popular posts for indexing and see if that will help. Only time will tell.
2. Do I get more post comments than before? Not really. One of my reasons for moving to Wordpress was because of Blogger’s annoying comments feature. Although I have not noticed any significant increase in comments on this blog, some Blokester’s comments like Kathy Frederick’s blog have gone through the roof. Go figure.
3. I’m definitely being indexed better with Google than I ever was on Blogger, although I still have some catching up to the copycats for keywords such as ”blog tips”.
4. It has taken me all this time to tweak the template and fix all of the bugs. Like housework it never seems get done. Just when I think I’m finished I find another problem or something that I need to change.
5. Regrets? Absolutely none. The blog definitely looks more professional, is more SEO friendly, stable, easier to modify and maintain, and there are so many more advanced features available thanks to Wordpress plugins.
Your thoughts?
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Happy Canada Day Bloke ! (Or Dominion Day if you are anti-Trudeau).
I’m happy with WordPress so far. I’ve passed the stage of extensively tweaking the template to finding new toys for readers to play with like a rating system etc.
I am more concerned about the security issues that are recently being brought into light especially by Techcrunch.
Recently a Turkish spammer infested my blog with tens of comments all over. I had to install WP-Ban and block his IP. What a relief it was after that !
I’ll be unfolding my beach chair in my balcony to watch the fireworks. Most folks although, are heading to the waterfront.
Jaffer’s last blog post..LIUNA changes mind agreeing to Lister Block Deal
Same to you Jaffer. I will be watching celebrations down at the ocean front myself this evening.
Regarding security I’ve also had to ban a Malaysian splogger who’s been giving me a hard time. Have you tried the built-in WP function for banning IP addresses in the Options, Discussion, Comment Moderation/Blacklist section? Before a comment can appear I’ve also set it to the comment author must first have a previously approved comment. I also use Simple Trackback Validation http://sw-guide.de/wordpress/plugins/simple-trackback-validation/. Combined with Akismet it seems to be doing a good job keeping the bad guys out.
I notice that WP-Ban is having some problems: http://bloggin-ads.com/wp-ban-plugin-messing-with-my-visitors and here http://www.untwistedvortex.com/2007/02/16/i-gave-up-and-installed-the-wp-ban-plugin/ Spammers can change their IP address faster than you can block them and be careful using wildcards because you might block out legitimate readers.
I’m taking your advice and I’ve disabled the WP-Ban plugin. My IP too changes once in two months. That’s when my ISP (Cogeco) decides to have an upgrade or has some other issues.
I agree with the second link (untwistedvortex). Akismet still does a superb job dealing with spam compared to Defensio and Typepad Antispam.
I’ve never received Trackback-spam yet !
Jaffer’s last blog post..LIUNA changes mind agreeing to Lister Block Deal
Jaffer reply on July 1st, 2008 11:47 am:
Blog Bloke reply on July 1st, 2008 10:56 am:
Looks like your robots.txt and sitemap.xml are good to go! Have you registered with Google Webmasters? If you do, you can check out the last index, what you’re indexed for, as well as any issues!
Wordpress is a great move and the site looks much better!
Douglas Karr’s last blog post..links for 2008-07-01
No issues here either. It’s good to know someone’s watching my back
Thanks Doug.
Blog Bloke reply on July 1st, 2008 3:30 pm:
Hey Doug, why don’t you write a guest post here?
Blog Bloke reply on July 1st, 2008 6:16 pm:
I’ve never used anything but WP and I highly doubt I would change…lovin it!
As you found out, with the right tools, spam is not the OMG! issue that so many make it out to be…I think some just need things to complain about, valid or not
Dennis Edell’s last blog post..First Ever Direct Sales Web Marketing Blog Article Round-Up, Yeehaw!
I have to agree with you Dennis. Wordpress is pretty much the cat’s meow when it comes to blogging platforms. There’s no turning back.
Blog Bloke reply on July 2nd, 2008 6:50 am:
Wordpress is by far the best blog software. I don’t even know why people would even try another service, although competition is the backbone of capitalism.
Wordpress is and always will be a far greater blogging tool than Blogger.
Far more plugins and themes.
David Hobson’s last blog post..Promoting a Website With Squidoo Part 7