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Moving from self-hosted to WordPress.com – My experience

A few months ago, I moved this site to WordPress.com. Sure, it means I might actually have a chance of blogging more because I don’t have to worry about any of the technical details of running my own WordPress install. But what else does it mean?

In this post, I’ll dive into some of the other reasons I’m enjoying WordPress.com.

Simplified Content

WordPress.com helped me simplify the overall structure of my site. Before I moved, I pared down my content in a big way. I consolidated two custom post types (portfolio and another one I used to manage review’s) into this site. Yes, I could have kept some of the custom post types, like the portfolio, but I  figured out I rarely used it anyway. I had actually made it just because I could 😛

Like many others when choosing between WordPress.com and WordPress.org I thought I need to be able to do anything and everything. But believe me, we don’t need it most of the time. That flexibility often comes with too much responsibility to handle. Sometimes, this even includes web developers like me who just want to write a personal blog.

The Plugins I Need

When I self-hosted my site, it seemed I was always trying this new plugin or that popular plugin. At WordPress.com, I have all I need and not much more. I don’t have to keep an eye out for what’s new and what the best plugin is that does “X” or “Y” because someone else does that for me.

What Backups?

Similarly to plugins, I also don’t have to worry about backups. On my self-hosted site, I used UPdraft Plus to back everything up. It wasn’t the perfect solution but worked for me in most cases, I also had a git repo I had maintained using Revisr. WordPress.com has me covered there.

Speed

I came from a droplet on Digital Ocean running an Easy Engine instance, I still use it for some projects. However, when you use WordPress.com, you know your site and the architecture behind it will be as fast as possible. A lot of people take this for granted when they sign up for a WordPress.com account.

 

More Readers

When you write a blog, sometimes you feel like you’re on an island. I’ve not been a regular blogger,  but I know, the posts where you get comments or a stats spike are few and far between. Building an audience takes time, but with WordPress.com I have a better shot at a bigger, more passionate audience. Things like subscriptionslikessharing and more help with all that. We’ll see how it goes.

The Reader

I was a vivid user of Google Reader. Unfortunately, I am no more active. I liked it a lot, but it wasn’t perfect. The WordPress.com Reader isn’t either. I miss being able to group RSS subscriptions with tags, but I like its simplicity. It keeps me close to blogging and helps me discover great content – those are the important things. I’ve also been using it more on my cell phone for jotting down points before I actually sit down to write a detailed post.

Conclusion

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