Below I have crafted a list of my favorite grunge and vintage websites. These sites look exceptional because of their simplicity and color schemes. We hope this article inspires you to make the best site possible using the Design Options Panel of the RichWP Themes.

Studio Bennett

Studio Bennett features a beautiful array of muddy greens, tans and black colors.  This color scheme blends perfectly with the vintage camera and phone icons which are located on the lower half of the home page. The image rotator on the homepage really completes the look of this site. I’m a huge fan of the fonts that are used on Studio Bennett. While the fonts may seem understated, they keep things simple.

Potbelly Sadwhiches

We covered Potbelly Sandwhich’s on our Best Resturant Websites showcase. When writing, I mentioned that it has an awesome, vintage look. This is because it features old, rustic signs for nav-buttons and a wooden sign as the background. This really brings the site together.

The Letter

The Letter is anything but low-profile. While I’m usually not a fan of “flashy” websites, The Letter has done it right. Their background features a paper-towel like texture and really stands out. The font on this webpage fits The Letter’s strange culture and personality. Overall, I think The Letter is doing over-stated in the right way.

Elan Snowboards

The Elan Snowboards site is on the verge of being vintage. I like to call this style of website a “grunge” site more than anything. Nevertheless, I’ve decided to add it to this list anyway. This is because color scheme is absolutely stunning. Elan has decided to use a mix bright yellows, whites, blacks and grays. This mix definitely shows off their snowboarding culture and style.

Spoon Graphics

Spoon Graphics features an amazingly low-profile image rotator that covers the width of the page. This image rotator blends in so well that you barely know it’s there, until the image changes. The font choices are great as well. Finally, the navigation bar at the top of the screen is absolutely beautiful. The rollover effects blend in perfectly and the logo is very subtle.

Thanks for checking out the RichWP blog. I hope I have inspired you to make the most of the RichWP framework and create the best grunge/vintage website on the net.  

The Nomination

A lot of customers ask me which WordPress News blogs I read to stay ahead of the game and find inspiration. They also ask where they should read up on new plugins and blogging techniques.

A lot of really valuable WordPress information sites were launched in 2011. Help me to figure out which WordPress resources provide the best knowledge and information on the subject.

Requirements:

• Your nominated site needs to publish WordPress related articles on a regular basis.
• The site should mainly be a Blog/Magazine (no theme labels or commercial plugin sites with an attached blog).
• The nomination period will end on Feb 28th

Win a RichWP FrameWork + Child Theme Package

I will give away a RichWP FrameWork + Child Theme Package (value $127). The winner will be chosen randomly out of all valid entries on Feb 28th.

Nominate your Top WordPress News Blog, now!

Please leave the URL of your Top WordPress Blog in the comment section below!

You created a Facebook Page, a Twitter account, a Google + and probably a LinkedIn profile and a Tumblr too. Now you’re faced with an age old dilemma: How to stand out from the crowd?

Consistency

DO: Post regularly. By being active and frequently updating your profiles, you build your brand and inspire trust in your products or services. Being consistent means you keep your clients well informed at all times.

DON’T: Post 10 articles/links at one time and then ignore your profile for the next 10 months. Instead, strive to post one article/link daily, even weekly; as long as you are consistent in doing so.

Know Your Target Market

DO: Post with your followers in mind. Take the time to research your target market. Have a clear idea before you create your profile. Ask yourself: What is the purpose of my Social Media Profile? Do I want to sell a specific product, or promote a service? Who are my products/services aimed at?

DON’T: Don’t be too general or random, and don’t post just for the sake of posting.

Interact!

DO: Interact with your followers. People want to be talked TO, not talked AT. Posting one article after the other, no matter how useful and informative, will intimidate your followers if you don’t make time to interact with them. When you receive a comment, give an intelligent and thoughtful reply. Follow other blogs/social profiles in your niche and leave comments relevant to the article.

DON’T: Post one word comments or leave generic replies. “Brilliant post,” “great suggestion,” or just a “thanks” will give the impression that you don’t really care about your followers. Instead, explain why you thought the post was brilliant or how the great suggestion inspired you.

Image

DO: Fill your profile out completely and add a professional avatar. This is the first impression you make; take the time to make it a good one. The more information you provide about your services, the stronger your profile will be.

DON’T: Leave blank spaces in your profile description and don’t upload inappropriate images, especially if you’re managing a business profile.

Tools and applications

Make use of the many available services and applications, such as Google Analytics, Tweetdeck and Hootsuite to build your social media profile.

Google Analytics is a real-time data tracking service from Google. It tracks the visitors to your site, and provides you with information such as how they found your site. (ie, through LinkedIn, Twitter, ect.) This will give you an idea on how effective your Social Media Strategy is with regards to generating traffic.

Hootsuite was rated the best tool for managing social media platforms, as it brings everything together in one easy-to-use dashboard. You can add up to five social media profiles to the free version. The professional version is available for the nominal fee of $5.99 per month and boasts more features.

Tweetdeck is another social media dashboard that brings all your Twitter and Facebook needs together in a simple, user-friendly package. It interfaces with Twitter and allows users to send or receive tweets. The recent Tweetdeck update also supports Google Buzz, Foursquare, MySpace and LinkedIn.

With the plethora of Social Media Services at our disposal, the onus has moved from merely deciding which platform to use, to using it well enough to stand out above the rest.

Leonardo da Vinci said the human foot is a masterpiece of engineering. Some of these websites decided to make their blog’s “foot” a masterpiece in their own right. Some are minimal and offer creative ways to connect with the owner others are simply works of art that command your attention.

Below are some excellent examples of the endless possibilities of the footer space. Most of these websites are dripping with great design so be sure to savor the entire site when visiting instead of just scrolling down immediately.

Illustrated – These are the fanciest of the bunch, some being striking pieces of web art that help cap off an already visually stunning website. Most are extensions of the rest of the site but others offer a simple artistic flair that makes them unique.

Mark Forrester

The Pixel

justBcoz

Jayme Stone

Singularity Design

Illustrator’s Lounge

Bad Ass Ideas

Dean Oakley

Noupe

Bloody Marie

From Me To You

Duirwaigh Studios

Prismtone

Launch Mind

Minimal But Useful – These follow a more traditional footer design but offer up some creative ways to engage the visitor. Including a contact form is a great idea for your footer, it allows you to drum up some additional business and connect with your readers.

WebResourcesDepot

SimpleBits

Queer Lisboa

KYEE

Hey Indy Design

Design Spartan

Behance Network

All For Design

Nybble Tech

Energy Cell Web Design

Ecoki

So, which one was your favorite? I hope these gave you some ideas on how to improve the bottom of your site.

That’s the easy part though.

Once you’ve found that, you hop online and start your blog. If you’re here, you’ve either made the right choice and decided to use WordPress to build your site, or you’re thinking about it. If you’re in the latter group, thinking about becoming a beginner blogger, stop thinking and get started. WordPress is by far the best platform for bloggers with any level of seriousness, and the themes here are solid.

Step two is where the rubber hits the road. The best advice I have for a beginner blogger can really be summed up by telling them to “go nuts”. By that I mean you need to go above and beyond what bloggers you’re going to be competing with will do. If you actually care about what you’re going to be writing about, this isn’t discouraging – it puts fire in your belly.

If you’re like me, the idea of starting a blog bubbled up in my head after being disappointed with existing blogs in my niche, and thinking I could do better. If you can write a decent post, are crazy about what you’re going to be writing about, and are smart about it… you’re right. You probably can.

I’m not talking about warm and fuzzy stuff when I say “do better”. I mean real, tangible, proven things you can do to make your site’s readership grow faster. Most of your opposition wont do much networking, wont work social networks and will have mediocre to bad site designs.

Networking is really important, especially at first. Dig up as many blogs as you can on what you’re writing about and get active in their comments. Don’t be one of those annoying spammers that just leaves a response to display a link to their own site. Leave something interesting and thoughtful, and name drop your site from time to time. If you comment on other peoples’ blogs with any level of frequency, the admins there will probably take notice and check your site out. Those are the sort of early adopting readers that you want the most. They’re into the subject enough to maintain a blog of their own about it, and you might be able to get them to add a link on their sidebar to your site, so their readers might check your site out.

Social networking is a lot like regular networking. You’d be surprised at how many of even the best blogs don’t take advantage of Facebook and Twitter, giving you a edge. Facebook takes a while to build a following, but setting up a fan page, adding a link to your blog’s sidebar (‘above the fold’ and hard to miss), inviting friends who are interested in what you’re blogging about and then sharing links to your posts (with short hand written notes that make it more likely that people will comment or share) really is a snap. Twitter is even easier, and you can make it so your posts are shot out onto your Twitter feed automatically (just make sure your headlines are catchy and make clear what the post is about).

If I could send a message back in time to myself over a year and a half ago, it would mostly be filled with simple tweaks like these, that make it more likely that people who stumble across my site come back for more later.

First impressions are important online – do not settle for a mediocre site theme (other platforms might call themes a skin or template).

Buy a good premium theme (like the killer theme’s we’ve got here), and tweak it a bit to make it your own. The RichWP WordPress Theme Framework makes that sort of thing really easy, even for new bloggers who wouldn’t know CSS, HTML and PHP from Joe Schmoe on the street’s left pinky toe. Past that, it’s all about making it more likely that people who come across your site share what they read with their friends, and/or subscribe to your site through something like RSS, Twitter, Facebook or Email.

I won’t get into how to set those things up right now (don’t worry… WordPress makes it easier than you might think), but the idea is that you need eye catching buttons to those feeds so someone who’s come across your site, and likes what they see, might notice the button and subscribe by email or RSS, follow you on Twitter, or become a fan on Facebook. If they don’t, the vast majority of the time, they’ll never come back. If they do, that one page load just turned into dozens, hundreds or thousands over time.

If you only do some of the above, you’re already ahead of a large majority of bloggers out there. The only two things I regret about with blogging is that I waited until a couple years ago to jump in, and didn’t read enough about about it in the first few months to do things like I talk about here. About a year and a half from when I was a beginner blogger and my site gets tens of thousands of hits a month, I’ve caught the attention of big name people in my niche, interviewed figures I’ve seen on major news networks, and I’m getting paid to write about things I am passionate about on three different sites.

You can do the same thing too – you just have to go that extra mile. You’ve gotta “go nuts”.

To put things as simple as possible, WordPress.com is a blog-hosting service that lets users create a free blog on a WordPress.com sub-domain. The package available for download at WordPress.org is essentially the software behind WordPress.com. Using this software, you can set up your own website or blog on your own server.

WordPress.com is generally better for those who want a quick and simple blog with little setup and no investment. Unfortunately, blogs hosted here may eventually outgrow the service, as WordPress.com does not allow users FTP access, monetization options or the ability to modify core files and templates. There’s also the domain name issue (although a custom domain name is possible at WordPress.com for an annual fee). If you’re serious about blogging, you’re better off purchasing a hosting package and hosting the blog on its own domain, rather than one on WordPress.com.

Moving from WordPress.com to a Self-Hosted WordPress Installation

The first step to moving from WordPress.com to a self-hosted installation of WordPress is making sure you have the software installed on your server. Many Web hosts offer “one-click” installs of WordPress and other software. Browse through your hosting dashboard or contact your host directly for more information. If your host doesn’t offer such a script, you can easily install WordPress manually.

Download the latest version of WordPress from WordPress.org. Unzip the package then upload the contents of the WordPress folder to the desired server directory using an FTP client. While this package is uploading, sign in to your hosting control panel and create a new database. Write down the database details, such as the name, username, password and host name.

When the package finishes uploading, point your browser to the following URL: [domain-name]/wp-admin/install.php

Here you’ll be prompted to create a configuration file:

After creating the file, input the database details and set up a user account to finish the process:

Because WordPress.com uses the same file format self-hosted WordPress sites use, transferring your posts and images is a simple process.

Sign in to your WordPress.com dashboard and click on the sidebar “Tools” menu, and then click on “Export.” Check the “All Content” selection and click “Download Export File” to download the XML file containing your WordPress blog data.

Warning: Keep your WordPress.com blog active until you’ve successfully imported the data. If you don’t, you may not be able to import your file attachments, such as photos and videos.

Now that you’ve downloaded the data file, sign in to your self-hosted WordPress admin panel. Click on the “Tools” sidebar link, and then click on “Import.” Select the WordPress format and activate the importer to continue.

Click on “Choose File” to select your data file, and then click on “Upload File and Import.”

Now you’ll choose an author to assign posts to and choose whether or not to import your file attachments. If you want to import your photos, videos and other attachments, check the box next to “Import File Attachments.”

Click “Submit” to finish the process. The data from your WordPress.com blog is now transferred to your self-hosted WordPress blog.

Moving from Blogger to a Self-Hosted WordPress Installation

Blogger is a service similar to WordPress.com, although it does allow you to monetize your blog through Google Adsense. If you’re ready to move on from Blogger, you can use the export feature to easily transfer your content to a self-hosted WordPress installation.

It’s not necessary to download your content from Blogger — WordPress can connect to your Blogger account and download the content automatically.

Sign in to your self-hosted WordPress site. Click on “Tools>Import>Blogger.” Install and activate the Blogger importer. Click on “Authorize,” and then click “Grant Access.” You’ll now be directed to the following screen:

Click on “Continue” to import the content from Blogger. Unfortunately, you’re images will not be imported from Blogger. If you want to retain your images, you’ll need to download each image then manually add it to the imported post in WordPress. You can also try the Blogger Image Import plugin, available in the WordPress plugin repository. It appears to work correctly on the latest version of WordPress, but has not been updated in a few years. Use it with caution.

Moving from TypePad to a Self-Hosted WordPress Installation

TypePad is a service similar to WordPress, except the company charges a monthly fee for Typepad.com hosted blogs. To make the switch from TypePad to WordPress, sign in to your TypePad dashboard and click on “Blogs>Settings>Import/Export,” and then click on “Export.” After TypePad generates the export file, click on “Download.”

Sign in to your WordPress panel and click on “Tools>Import>Movable Type or TypePad.” Activate the TypePad importer, and then upload your import file. Alternatively, you can rename the import file mt-export.txt and add it to the /wp-content folder via FTP.

As with Blogger, you’ll be left to import your files and images manually.

Dealing with Redirection Issues

Importing your content from WordPress.com, Blogger or TypePad isn’t the most difficult part about moving your blog. If your blog receives a fair amount of traffic, and you’ve build up your Google PageRank, the issue that causes the most grief relates to content redirection.

You not only want your old blog URL to redirect to your new URL, but you want your old posts to redirect to the new posts.

Because WordPress.com does not allow FTP access or the editing of server files, generating a traditional 301 permanent redirect is impossible.

WordPress.com does, however, offer a Site Redirect upgrade option through the Store panel in the admin dashboard. This inexpensive package lets you redirect your old blog to your new blog with ease. The WordPress team even takes care of individual post redirection.

Users of TypePad and Blogger will have an even more difficult time. Your best bet is to file a site change of address on the old blog through Google Webmaster Tools and make sure Google has the sitemap URL for your new self-hosted WordPress blog.

There are six tips for creating killer content that people will be glad to read.

• Grab Your Reader’s Attention – Why do you read newspaper headlines? Because they grab your attention, right? Well, the same goes for your website visitors. Before they read the content, you have to make them want to read it. Think about your article. Then create a title that is impossible for visitors to ignore.
• Keep it Short – Short content, except when providing a tutorial, is key. Short paragraphs and short sentences are important. People become overwhelmed when they see a lengthy paragraph. Keep the paragraphs and sentences short, and you’ll keep the reader’s attention.
• Keep it Organized – Organization is another huge key to killer website content. Using bullet points and subheadings let your reader know where you are going. Bullet points and subheadings also direct readers to the meat and potatoes of your content.
• Keep it Useful – If a visitor takes time to read your content, they want to get something out of it. Offer them tips. Offer them advice. Tell them about a new piece of information about your industry. Giving them useful information is going to show the visitor that you care about them, thus increasing your repeat visitor ratio.
• Keep it Simple – Unless it’s essential to your industry, stay away from the words that your visitors aren’t going to know. This is going to make them feel dumb. It may also make them feel like you are trying to hide something. Use simple terms to explain what you mean. If you need to use terms that visitors may not know, take the time to explain what it is that you mean.
• Keep it Current – Visitors don’t want to read summer content in the fall. As the seasons change, bring your content up to date as well. In just about every industry you will find opportunities to update your content. Keeping content current shows your visitors that you are thinking about what they need. It also shows them that you are there and that you aren’t a phantom haunting the Internet.
• Keep it Readable – Look at your text. What is the font size? Who are your clients? Is it readable for your average visitor? One thing that a lot of webmasters don’t think about is their font size and color. For example, if your clients and readers are mostly older people, you may have to make the font larger. You can also provide the option on the website to change the font size. If the font’s too small, visitors won’t read it.

When you are creating content for your site, look at it from your visitor’s perspective. Is this giving them useful information? Is it short and readable? Does it use terms that are easy to understand? Is it well organized? Is it up to date? Did you answer yes to all of these questions? Then you have some great content that your visitors will love and will come back to read again and again.

So what is content marketing and why is it so important?

First, let’s look at the meaning of content marketing. Content marketing is marketing to your target audience without trying to sell them your product or services.

But wait. Isn’t selling products and services what marketing is all about?

Perhaps a better way to put it would be that you are selling yourself. You are selling the knowledge that you have. You are getting your customer to trust you and communicate with you. But you aren’t giving your audience a hard sell. You aren’t saying to them, “Buy my products. They are the best on the Internet.”

So, you aren’t selling your products and services with content marketing. If you aren’t trying to sell your products and services to your customers, how does content marketing help your business?

Let’s take a look at an example. There are two car websites on the Internet that are selling used cars.

Website A offers the following:

• Large inventory of cars
• Search by state and city
• Live chat with customer service
• Great website navigation

Website B offers the following:

• Large inventory of cars
• Search by state and city
• Live chat with customer service
• Great website navigation
• Articles about things like:
• Choosing the right car seat
• Driving in hazardous weather
• What car has the best gas mileage
• How to change a flat tire

What site do you think more customers are going to be interested in? Both of the sites offer the same basics. But site b offers articles about things that visitors would like to know. The site knows that not every person who goes on it is going to buy a car. But they are offering information that they know visitors want to know on their site. This is good customer service.

Content marketing is sometimes done on the website, but it’s often done on other sites as well (guest writing, interviews, etc.). It’s a great way to establish yourself as an expert in your field. A website developer who is looking to expand his customer base might write articles such as:

• Choosing the right color scheme for your website
• How to make your website more user-friendly
• Setting up your website guestbook

There are plenty of great sites on the Internet where you can place content in order to establish your knowledge. Most sites offer a resource box where you can place your bio and more information about your company.

One of the biggest things that content marketing offers to you is your customer’s trust. The customer knows that you are going to try and sell something to him or her. But a business owner who provides free information that they can use before
even trying to sell is more likely to get their business.

Customer’s thought after a hard sell – They don’t care about me. All they want is my money.

Customer’s thought after content marketing – Wow, this person knows what they are talking about. They are giving me information for free. They must really care about my needs. I bet they are a great person to deal with.

The other great thing about content marketing is that it will help bring an influx of visitors to your website. They keywords placed in the content will bring people to the content. But the content itself, words read by visitors, is what will be the true attraction. When a visitor reads a great piece of content, he or she will more than likely share it. This means more people who are impressed by your content marketing. This also means more people who will visit your website and potentially become customers.

So, what is content marketing? Yes, it’s a soft sell to customers. But it’s also something that no business should be without.

Smash Burger

Smash Burger’s site is a very sleek combination of reds, grays and browns. These subtle colors are easy on the eyes and the font used throughout the site is very clear and easy-to-read. The site features an oversized image rotator on the homepage, giving the website a really classy feel while adding just the right bit of flare.

Potbelly Sandwiches

Vintage is the new cool, and Potbelly’s decided to fully embrace this idea from top-to-bottom. I’m a huge fan of this look as it accurately displays the company’s culture and style. The menu bars are clean and only appear when hovered over. Whatever restaurant facts you may be looking for are clearly listed at the top of the site in cool-looking boxes.

Giraffe

The Giraffe site is absolutely stunning. Giraffe features lovely bright blues, tans and whites. The beautiful image slider on the homepage really brings the site together and is put to good use. Coupons and pricing are visible when you first open the website, sparing you the task of having to find the location of the “coupon” button. Perhaps the most awesome feature is the social media integration: Giraffe uses breathtaking social media buttons and Flickr integration.

Pizzeria Uno

While Uno’s website may seem very structured and basic, I’m a fan. The different shades of tan really bring the site together. The rollover animations blend in nicely with the design. The only downside to this site is the Flash-based image rotator; while it may look nice, it cannot load on most mobile devices.

Mon Ami Gabi

Mon Ami Gabi may have the best restaurant webpage on the web! Once you have chosen your location, you’re greeted with an image rotator and a map. Both are designed with excellence and match the rest of the site. The website features colors such as light blue, red and yellow–this color scheme is perfect as it accurately portrays the restaurant’s French roots.

Restaurant WordPress Theme

If you are looking for the perfect WordPress Theme to built a restaurant website, check out out RichCORP theme. Its Point & Click Design Editor lets you customize your design exactly how you want it, no programming skills required.
» More Information

We hope we helped inspire you on your quest to designing the perfect webpage. Make sure to check back daily for more inspirational web design articles.

When I sold said site to a somewhat technically-challenged buyer, I had no choice but to dive right in. The simplicity of the move and lack of downtime amazed me, and I’ve since gone on to move the majority of my Web properties to a much faster, more reliable host.

Clean Up and Get The Files

To get things started, you’ll need to download your site’s files. I recommended first going through your admin panel and deactivating/deleting unnecessary plugins and themes, as this gets rid of garbage files you don’t want to bring with you. Such files add to the time it takes to download and upload your site. As you’ll find out, the process is already tedious enough.

Connect to your server using an FTP program. I personally use FileZilla (WIN) and Cyberduck (Win & MAC), both are available for free, but any FTP client will do.

Tip: You’ll need your hostname, FTP username and FTP password to connect. If you haven’t done this before, contact your Web host.

Navigate to the folder containing the WordPress installation you want to move. You’ll usually find your site files in the <public_html> directory. Click on the sub-folder  in which your site resides, and then right-click the folder and select “Download.” If your site resides in the root directory (i.e. the primary hosted site), simply highlight all of the files in the root directory and download them to a folder on your computer. I prefer to set the target location as the desktop for easy access.

Be patient. Depending on the number of themes, plugins, photos and other files you have, this process could take some time.

Get the Database

Now that the site files are downloading, it’s time to turn your attention to the true heart of your WordPress site: the database. The database is perhaps the most important part of your site, because it contains all of your posts and custom data.

Access MySQL through your Web hosting control panel. Here you should see a list of your databases and a link to manage them through phpMyAdmin.
You should now be at the database-management screen, which looks like this:

Click on “Export,” and then check the selection boxes next to “SQL” and “Save as File.” Scroll down and click “Go” to export the SQL file. It should now automatically download to your computer.

Set Up a New Database and Import Data

In all likelihood, your site files are still downloading, so we’re going to move on to set up the database with your new Web host. Sign in to your new hosting control panel and open MySQL. You should see a link here to set up or create a new database.

Create a custom MySQL database username, and then set a password. Make sure both of these are uncommon and difficult to guess to protect your database against intruders. Once you’ve created the database, your host should assign a custom hostname. Make note of these values and do not lose them.

Tip: In addition to standard characters, use numbers and/or capitalization.

When the blank database is created, sign in to phpMyAdmin to manage it. Click on the “Import” link, and then click on “Choose File.” Select the database SQL file you exported from the previous database. Click on “Go” to import your data into the new database.

Change the wp-config.php

By the time you’ve finished this, your site files should be finished downloading.
Open the folder you’ve downloaded containing your site’s files. In the root directory, you’ll see a file named <wp-config.php>.

Open this file using a text/PHP editor such as NotePad++, TextPad or NotePad2. Do not use a word-processing program.
Scroll down to line 42. Here you’ll see the field containing your MySQL database hostname, username and password. Each of the values will be stored between single quotation marks.

Replace the present values with the custom values you previously assigned when you created your new database. Leave the single quotation marks in place and save the changes to the wp-config.php file. The WordPress installation will now be linked to your database when you upload the site files.

Upload the Files to the New Host

Now you’ll begin the process of uploading the files to your new hosting account, which is simply a reversal of downloading the files from your previous host. Access your server via FTP and select the downloaded folder containing the files. Set the target directory to the directory or folder you want your new site to reside in.

Tip: If your site will be hosted as the primary site, upload the contents of the folder, rather than the folder itself, to the <public_html> folder.

The transfer may be time consuming, just as the process of downloading the site’s files from the previous host was.
Tip: Verify the permission code for the wp-config.php file on your new server is set to 600 (some caching solutions might require different settings) to prevent unauthorized access. You can view and edit the file permission code by right-clicking on the file when accessing your site via FTP.

When the files are finished uploading, you should have a complete working copy of your site on the new server.

Point your Domain to the New Host

It’s important to remember, that your domain is still pointing to the original copy of the site on the old server.

You’ll now need to complete the process by changing the DNS  (Domain Name Server) settings of your domain to point to the new host. Some hosts will also require further setup for your domain. This may result in a bit of downtime for your site while the changes propagate. For this reason, I recommend initiating the switch during a time your traffic is generally minimal.

Check Everything

Navigate through the copy of the site and verify the transfer went smoothly. Check links and post attachments to make sure everything is working correctly, and then browse through your admin panel to make sure it’s working.

Tip: The admin log-in name and password are the same as they were previously.

Once the transfer is complete, it’s safe to delete the files and database on your old server, as the domain permanently points to the files on the new server.