Difference between $129 Guided transfer & Bluehost free support?

  • Unknown's avatar
    bigapplecurry · Member ·

    Bluehost says they provide support for a guided transfer for free, so what is the benefit of purchasing the WordPress/Happiness Engineer guided transfer for $129?

    The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)

  • eurello · Staff ·

    Hi there – The main difference is that Bluehost support does not have access to your WordPress.com Dashboard and Domain Manager. Our team will migrate all your content for you, move your domain to the new site, install the Jetpack plugin, and move your followers over.

    I’m not familiar with Bluehost’s guided transfer option and I don’t find it on their site, but if you’d like to link me to what you were looking at, I can take a look at it.

  • Unknown's avatar
    bigapplecurry · Member ·

    Thanks for the reply. In a nutshell, my blog has been on WordPress.com for more than one year, and I’m ready to shift to self-hosted on WordPress.org. I see that WordPress recommends Bluehost as a reputable web host.

    I wasn’t sure what to do first (i.e. set up an account on Bluehost first OR go ahead with the WordPress $129 Guided Transfer first — classic chicken/egg question) so I reached out to Bluehost and they recommended purchasing with them first because their support team could guide us through the transfer at no cost. When I asked how the Bluehost support team differs from the Happiness Engineer that WordPress would assign to us, they said “Our support team is fully trained on WordPress and would be able to walk you through the process step by step. Our support is free. Our support team would be able to help with everything the guided transfer helps with, and just as well as the guided transfer would.”

    Hence, this is what led me to post my question here. As you say, it’s not noted anywhere on Bluehost’s site, so it was unclear. I would like to shift to self-hosted as soon as possible, so if you wouldn’t mind answering these three questions for me, I would appreciate it:

    1. What is your general recommendation in light of the offer of “free” support of the guided transfer as described by Bluehost above?
    2. What exactly does “the entire process is transparent to your readers” mean? When they transfer occures over a 24-hour period, what exactly will readers see when they visit our URL?
    3. Does the 2 weeks of support from WordPress begin as soon as the site has been transferred successfully OR does the 2 weeks include the Guided Transfer itself?

    Thanks in advance!

  • eurello · Staff ·

    Hi there – I couldn’t tell you for sure what Bluehost support does, but I’d assume they explain to you how to transfer your content whereas a Guided Transfer does it for you. You have to get hosting with Bluehost anyway, so you’re welcome to try it on your own with their guidance, and then if you get stuck, you can do the Guided Transfer. We have instructions for how to transfer your own site here:

    http://en.support.wordpress.com/moving-a-blog/#moving-to-wordpress-org

    Many of our users successfully transfer their own sites, but others prefer to have it handled for them.

    What exactly does “the entire process is transparent to your readers” mean? When they transfer occures over a 24-hour period, what exactly will readers see when they visit our URL?

    Your readers will see what they always saw – importing content into the new site doesn’t delete it from the old one. So all stays as is, and once everything’s set up at the new site, we point your domain there so your readers arrive at the new site rather than the old. We also move your subscribers, so there’s no interruption in their email subscriptions.

    However, when the DNS is changed on your domain name, it can take some time to fully propagate everywhere. That will be the case no matter how you choose to transfer.

    Does the 2 weeks of support from WordPress begin as soon as the site has been transferred successfully OR does the 2 weeks include the Guided Transfer itself?

    It begins after the transfer.

  • Unknown's avatar
    bigapplecurry · Member ·

    This is very helpful, I appreciate it — for WordPress bloggers like us who are interested in moving to self-hosted, it is challenging to find answers to these questions, hence by making this forum topic public, we hope it will be helpful to others.

    I’ve decided to purchase the WordPress Guided Transfer for $129. Should I first open an account with the web hosting company (i.e. BlueHost) and then proceed with the Guided Transfer OR should I meet with the WordPress Happiness Engineer first upon purchasing the Guided Transfer and then open an account with the web hosting company? Does it matter? What is best practice for the most efficient process?

    Thanks!

  • eurello · Staff ·

    Hi there – feel free to go ahead and obtain web hosting with Bluehost, as that will be the first thing the GT folks will ask you to do, so that will save you a step. :)

    Good luck with the move!

  • Unknown's avatar
    bigapplecurry · Member ·

    Ok done. I will set up an account with Bluehost first and then purchase the Guided Transfer from WordPress. I will do this tomorrow.

    Thanks again, fingers crossed that it all goes well!

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