The flexibility, extendability, and scale of WordPress makes it a very attractive option for businesses considering a CMS migration. However, a CMS migration can present a number of unique challenges for project teams, particularly for sites with complex implementations. In this video, Leo Postovoit, Head of Partnerships and Product Strategy from XWP takes a look at a number of tools and strategies implemented by migration specialist agencies that massively streamline the process, ultimately minimizing the risks of change and equipping your business to unlock the potential of WordPress sooner.

1. AGENCY BREAKOUT

2. Mastering
Migration
HOW TO MANAGE A MOVE FROM
ANOTHER CMS TO WORDPRESS
WITH CONFIDENCE
Head of Partnership and Product Strategy, XWP
WordPress Component Maintainer for Core Privacy
@PostPhotos
@xwp
Leo Postovoit
AGENCY BREAKOUT

3. Leo Postovoit
Head of Partnership and Product Strategy, XWP
WordPress Component Maintainer for Core Privacy
@PostPhotos
@xwp

4. Agenda.
MASTERING
MIGRATION:
MOVING TO
WORDPRESS
Should I move to WordPress?
How hard will it be?
Planning and Execution
Tackling the “Gotchas”
Q&A

5. Should I move to WordPress?
THESE ARE COMMON CONCLUSIONS MANY DECISION MAKERS COME TO:
Yes, because
It’s Open Source
§ Avoiding Vendor “Lock-in”
§ Future portability to/off the CMS
§ GPL’s “four freedoms”
§ Plugins, Themes and more
§ Reliable partners and platforms
§ REST API, WP-CLI and beyond
§ “36% of the Internet” and beyond
§ Long-term maintenance built in
§ Core and Community Support
Yes, because
tools are available
Yes, because
it’s reliable

6. Other solutions that exist.
THIS MIGHT BE YOUR OWN, OR OTHER PLACES YOU’VE LOOKED. EACH HAS VARIOUS FEATURES
SUPPORTING REST APIs AND “STATIC” HTML PAGES.
Other “Open Source” options Cloud/SaaS solutions Roll your own
• Drupal
• Magento
• Others (GhostCMS, etc.)
• Shopify, BigCommerce, AEM
• CraftCMS, Arc, Chorus
• RebelMouse, Medium
• Custom CMS components
• Custom headless view
• Risk/reward

7. WordPress is probably your answer
for most scenarios that
require a CMS...
...But that might not be the right answer depending on your situation.

8. Different approaches based on
requirements.
HOW HARD WILL IT BE?
When approaching a migration, you need to recognize the amount of effort it will
take to complete the project, plan for unknowns and work through this list to
ensure nothing is missed. Factors to consider include:
§ Did you do that SWOT Analysis?
§ Difficulty levels:
§ “Greenfield” vs “we’re moving it over”
§ “Go for it!” or “White Glove”
§ “Doing it for fun” vs “Sensitive client projects”
§ One website vs many websites // Single Site vs Multi Site
§ Larger sites often ask: “How much to do at once?” Roll out strategies?
§ Might have several “acceptable” or “tolerable” approaches, but level of
completeness depends on your needs
§ Gutenberg Block Editor vs Classic vs [other solutions]
”Normal”
“Intermediate”
“Advanced”

9. When tackling a smaller or simpler migration, you’ll have a
simpler set of needs at hand.
Points to consider:
§ Off-the-shelf migration tools
§ WP All Import
§ FG Drupal to WordPress
§ WP Import Tools
§ Frontend: Often Not as concerned with mapping
custom templating, leveraging the ecosystem
§ Post-switch monitoring to ensure discoverability,
analytics, etc. are all good.
§ Assumes “maintenance mode” is a reasonable option
§ Migrations of medium/large sites in flight rarely are this
simple.
“Normal”
HOW HARD WILL IT BE?

10. Consider all of the “Normal” Items, plus these factors:
§ A redesign? A “lift and shift?”
§ Some data mapping done by hand
§ Where is data being read/written to existing site?
§ Assumes some custom Bash/WP-CLI scripts
§ Minimal/no code freeze and content freeze
§ Assumes “maintenance mode” may be reasonable
§ Migrations of medium-sized sites in flight are often in
this area.
§ Are you using any processing tools (REST API proxies,
search tools like Elastic Search or SOLR, CDNs) that
depend on your content? Do you need to allow these to
build ahead of your deploy?
“Intermediate”
HOW HARD WILL IT BE?

11. Leverages WP Engine’s
Geolocation API services as
part of a domain
consolidation to better
support regional radio
localization needs
Platform tooling This is a sample treatment
for highlighting content.
Move wherever necessary.
Screenshot highlight
This is a sample treatment
for highlighting content.
Move wherever necessary.
Screenshot highlight
Case study: novafm.com.au

12. Consider all of the “Advanced” Items, plus these factors:
§ Large sites in flight are often in this area.
§ Assumes “maintenance mode” is NOT an option
§ Do you need to shard/rectify databases or build REST API solutions
needed to avoid losing data or enabling any downtime?
§ Custom WP-CLI scripts are usually the way to go. Pagination should
be built into the script so that you can stop/restart as needed.
§ Rollout strategy (many sites or very large sites)
§ Most data mapping done by hand
§ Where is data being read/written to existing site?
§ Assumes some custom Bash/WP-CLI scripts
§ Testing, testing, testing
§ Segmented code and content freezing
§ Considers multisite, ecommerce, advanced search, etc.
§ Considers seasonality: when is the right time of “year” to go live?
Hint: the future, probably not a Friday
“Advanced”
HOW HARD WILL IT BE?

13. Worked with a large team
to allow for easy
switchover
Fresh content
20 years of records
Leveraging cloud compute
functions to process
Support archive data
Case study: rollingstone.com

14. This is the framework you should consider as you prepare to do a large migration.
Planning and
Documentation
§ Have you done a SWOT analysis?
§ Have we considered all the
stakeholders in our planning?
§ To what extent can I leave content
behind? Where is the critical data?
§ Questions of long-term planning,
GDPR, monetization, etc.
§ Building repeatable, deployable,
testable scripts
§ Testing these scripts a pre-launch
environment
§ Building frontends that work across
devices/regions/etc. to line up with
SEO/usability goals
§ Don’t forget to QA and test!
§ How sure are you about launching? Do
your scripts work well enough, and did
it pass QA/UAT?
§ Going live means pressing “the red
button.” Deploy to server or offloaded
services
§ DNS switchover
§ Did you QA and test some more?
Testing, Testing
And Testing
Rollout/Go-Live
(And More Testing)
“Advanced” migration checklist.
PLANNING AND EXECUTION

15. In a good migration, you’ve considered all the factors.
Processing: “Just in time”—Process the bulk of the data a
week before the go live and then only process the diff and
updated data just before go live.
§ Leverage cloud resources to scale up processing
Media Assets and CDNs: How should these be attached to
WordPress? Leveraging S3? Cloudinary?
§ Thumbnail processing of media will take time/space in your
directory
SEO: Consider Pre/post reviews and staggering large changes
to the site to better understand the impact of migration,
redesigns, etc.
QA, pre-testing, updates, mapping all matter deeply—do not
shrink this time.
Tackling the gotcha’s.
PREPARE FOR THE WORST,
ENABLE THE BEST TO HAPPEN

16. Conclusion.
MIGRATIONS
REQUIRE PLANNING,
TESTING AND EVEN
MORE TESTING.
Should I move to WordPress?
How hard will it be?
Planning and Execution
Tackling the “Gotchas”
Q&A
Probably
At least a little hard.
Don’t skimp.
Know what to look
out for.

17. Q&A

18. Thank you.
Head of Partnership and Product Strategy, XWP
WordPress Component Maintainer for Core Privacy
@PostPhotos
@xwp
Leo Postovoit