Merging Your Blogs – Part 2: How to do It?

This blog post is Part 2 of 2-blog post series on a blog merger topic. Here’s Part 1

In Part 1 we talk about whether merging your blogs is necessary. It’s only a waste of time (and money) to do needless things, you know 🙂

If you have read the Part 1, have considered your options and have decided that merging your 2 blogs is the way to go, then read on…

Merging 2 blogs is challenging – but very much possible

When merging 2 blogs, it’s not as simple as combining the blog posts from 2 blogs into one. You need to consider traffic and SEO: Your site visitors need to know where they should go in the new location; the search engines should know that the blog posts in the new location are actually just the same with the old ones…

Here’s the outline of what you should do to merge blogs:

1. Backup your blogs’ database

As things can go wrong anytime when you do something related to your blogs’ database, such as migration to another web hosting, merging blogs, etc., you need to “insure” your content. You MUST backup your database; no more excuse.

If you are looking for a guide, here’s an official guide from WordPress.org.

2. Move blog posts to the main blog.

Depending on the CMS running your blogs, you should do things carefully. In general, all you need is to access the database of your blogs and do export-import command. But you do need to understand database operations; otherwise, hiring a tech-whizz is a requirement

If your blogs run on WordPress (like AsepOnde.com,) then you are in luck as moving content from one blog to another one can be done via “Export” feature in “Tools” section of your blog’s Admin Dashboard.

Looking for a good guide? This guide by The Backlight’s Tristan is pretty helpful.

3. Check for consistency

Some weird things can happen when you import something; be sure to check thoroughly to see whether your old blog post on the new location looks great… check for images, internal links and so on to be sure that everything is pointing to the main blog.

If you are dealing with fixing URLs on too many blog posts, there’s a WordPress plugin you should use to make things way much faster – Search and Replace plugin.

4. Do permanent redirection (301 redirect) for your blog posts

Redirect permanently (301 redirection) the blog posts from the original location to the new one; this is to let search engine knows that your blog posts are moved to a new location. This is highly recommended so that you can keep your blog posts’ ranking and popularity on search engines in the new location.

Redirecting URL can potentially go awry. If you are not sure what you are going to do with it, it’s better for you to hire someone to do it for you. If you insist to DIY, here’s a WP plugin that can help you big time: Quick Page/Post Redirect Plugin.

Want some basics? Try this guide. Google also covers some ways to ensure that you don’t lose site ranking

5. Let your readers and search engines know about the new location

Just like moving houses, you might want to let your “neighbors” know about that. You also want to let services you subscribe know that you have changed address.

Merging your blogs mean that you need to inform your readers that they should visit the new location. Search engine-wise, you should let them know to avoid losing link values along the way. You also need to update any site details you have with other websites – your URL on your Facebook fan page; URL on your Twitter profile, etc.

In Google, there’s a “change of address” feature I recommend you to use (Configuration > Change of Address.) Here’s the official guide you should follow.

Takeaway

Whew! It is indeed a lot of work; but if you follow the right guideline, merging 2 blogs is pretty straightforward and won’t take too much time to do.

Hopefully, our 2-part guide can clear some mist for you. Just in case you missed it, here’s Part 1.

Photo credit: Lexinatrix via photopin cc