How to Transfer Site from Wix to WordPress | Cheap ASP.NET Hosting Review

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Wix and WordPress are two world-popular web design platforms, each of which is the leader in its niche. The systems are used to complete an extensive variety of tasks, targeting diverse user categories. They utilize diverse approaches to the process of website development, which is mainly explained by the distinctive features of both platforms.

While Wix is the all-in-one websites builder, WordPress is a renowned Content Management System. The platforms imply various degrees of web design proficiency and they differ in integrated characteristics used for website development.

Situations when you start realizing that your Wix website lacks functionality are quite frequent as it is impossible to tell in advance how thriving your business will be. Whether you have an online store or a business website built with Wix, you may feel the need to use more advanced features and tools for its further development. If this is just the situation you face, you may consider an opportunity to switch from Wix to WordPress.

When adopting the decision to transfer your website from Wix to WordPress, you should realize that the process is not quite simple. This is especially true for beginners, who may lack web design skills and expertise to handle a variety of technical nuances. The migration process also implies content and domain transfer, traffic redirection to new hosting, preservation of the search engine ranking of your project and lots of other issues. If you feel that it will be difficult for you to take care of all these nuances on your own, have a look at the tips this gude offers to simplify the transition process for you.

1. Moving Website from Wix to WordPress – Is it Worth It?

Here is the list of widespread reasons that can make you think about switching from Wix to WordPress:

If you run a Wix-based business website, a web store, a portfolio or any other web project, you may realize that your company/business keeps developing steadily. This may require deeper integrated functionality that goes far beyond those options the website builder offers. WordPress, in its turn, may provide those tools and features you currently need.
You might need unique design customization options or integrated functions Wix cannot offer as a website builder. In this escase, WordPress proves to be a more feature-laden platform due to its extensive plugin integration and template customization opportunities.
Finally, you may need a fully-responsive website, no matter what specialization it has. WordPress has more to offer in this respect, while Wix allows creating mobile-ready projects that may lack responsive nature.

Whatever reasons you have to move your website from Wix to WordPress, you will definitely be satisfied with the result. The system has much to offer, although, it also requires coding proficiency to get the most out of its performance.

2. Wix versus WordPress – What Is the Difference?

Wix and WordPress are two quite different systems, which offer deep functionality and website customizability. The difference between the systems, however, is quite striking, which is mainly explained by the features and implication of each platform.

First and foremost, Wix is a popular SaaS website builder, which makes it possible to create different types of one-of-a-kind websites. WordPress, is a CMS, which requires preliminary download and installation to be further used for website creation. Secondly, Wix comes with an integrated collection of high quality mobile-ready templates that are completely customizable and niche-specific.WordPress, in its turn, implies the need to pick a suitable design out there – the choice is fantastic yet you have to be very attentive not to choose a low quality theme.

wix editor

The next distinction between the platforms is about their integration options. Wix grants access to its App Marker, where everyone can choose from multiple free and paid widgets for further website integration. WordPress stands out from the crowd due to its advanced integrations, offering hundreds of free and paid high end plugins to boost the performance of your web project. It takes time and knowledge to integrate the selected plugin into your website, though, and you also have to be twice attentive when making your choice because of the increased website security threat.

WordPress Themes

Finally, one of the main distinctions between Wix and WordPress is hosting choice. While the website builder comes with integrated hosting/domain name options, the CMS triggers the need to pick a third-party hosting provider, a suitable package and a domain name. This, correspondingly, requires extra budget investment.

Thus, the differences between Wix and WordPress are quite obvious. These distinctions give each platform its unique functionality and special features, which also affect user choice.

3. How to Switch from Wix to WordPress – The Ultimate Guide

The essentials are provided in this Wix to WordPress guide you can browse and memorize to complete the task in the best way possible:

Select a proper hosting. While Wix offers integrated hosting, WordPress allows selecting your own hosting provider. This is the very first step you should start with. Explore the available and the most popular hosts, select a suitable plan and learn the terms and specifications it offers.
Transfer domain name. If your Wix website comes with a registered domain name, the next step will be to transfer it to the selected hosting provider. The terms and cost of the migration process will depend upon the host and the plan you will go for.
Install WordPress. on the selected hosting and learn the basics of using the system. This doesn’t take much time and effort as the setup process is quick and simple. The system comes with an understandable tutorial, which offers step-by-step guidelines on how to cope with its installation with ease. Mind, however, that there may be certain technical nuances you shouldn’t overlook, if you don’t wish to put your website performance at risk.
Copy the Design. It’s impossible to copy the entire Wix design to WordPress automatically as there are too many nuances here. To get a similar website design, you have to manually create it yourself. With this purpose, you can either select and customize a ready-made WordPress template or hire a freelance web designer, who will complete the task for you.
Export Wix website data to WordPress. Just like with design transfer, you’ll have to export your Wix data and import it into WordPress manually. Copy the texts and create pages in your WordPress website to further import the posts there.
Import Images. WordPress doesn’t automatically import images from your Wix account. This means that you’ll have to do that manually once again. To do that, you need to install WordPress Import External Images plugin. As soon as the plugin is activated, access the “Media >> Import Images” section and complete the task.
Check out and Set up Permalinks. If you don’t wish to lose your Wix website traffic, take your time to check out the final WordPress URL structure to make sure it is correct. Fortunately, due to powerful plugins WordPress is a SEO-friendly CMS and it will make it possible for you to set up and customize the structure of all your website links. Take your time to check, if you have properly transferred your title and description meta tags for each website page.
Customize your website. Having done that, it is high time to explore WordPress and use its tool set to customize your newly-transferred website.

There is also one important issue you should be aware of. Don’t hurry to deactivate your Wix website or close your account. It may come in handy to you, if something goes wrong with website migration process. You will easily do that, when you are completely done with the migration process – just make sure your WordPress website functions well.

4. How to Transfer Own Domain Name from Wix to WordPress

When it comes to Wix-to-WordPress website migration, it is important to preserve your domain anime and to move it along with your website to the new platform. This contributes to the preservation of your project search engine ranking, traffic, brand recognizability and its further promotion.

To properly move your Wix domain name to WordPress, you should follow a standard algorithm of actions. Wix provides detailed steps in its customer support section and it’s up to you to analyze them and to pick the most suitable approach. Actually, you can either transfer the active domain name from Wix to WordPress or connect it to the CMS.

There is also an opportunity to transfer the expired Wix domain to WordPress, if you wish to preserve its current SEO positions. When dealing with your domain migration, you should not forget about email transfer/connection, which goes along with the domain. That’s the surefire way to receive all the important email notifications throughout the migration process. Fortunately, there are multiple resources that can help you find out how to transfer a domain name from Wix to WordPress correctly.

5. Professional Wix to WordPress Migration Services

Whatever the reasons to move from Wix to WordPress are, there are lots of issues to complete to make the process a success. The entire procedure of moving from one platform to another should not be difficult and complex, if you are aware of all the technical nuances and characteristics of both services. It’s great, if you are a niche specialist, but what if you aren’t? In this case, you can choose one of the available solutions.

The first solution provides an opportunity to select one of specialized website migration programs. These tools are not altogether safe as a chance that your website will come with serious mistakes after the migration process are also quite high. What’s more, website migration programs are not cheap, which means that you automatically invest into a service that does not guarantee decent result. Is there anything you can do about that? Fortunately, yes.

Bottom Line

Wix websites are undoubtedly full-featured, but WordPress is the CMS that really excels at functionality and can bring your website performance to the top notch level. Upon the completion of the website transfer process, don’t hurry to publish it. Prior to doing that, make sure all the plugins are installed properly and function correctly. The same is about the templates and content presentation.

You should also check, whether all the redirects from old to new website pages are activated and test the website one more time. Another must-have task is to check the responsive nature of your WordPress website to see how well it is displayed on mobile devices.