Yes it’s true, you can pay for a deluxe hosting package through godaddy.com and host multiple blogs on the same account. The blogs share bandwith and storage, and that saves you money!
When I set up TysTips.com I signed up for godaddy’s economy hosting plan for $4.75 per month. The economy hosting provided 10 Gigs of storage space (10,000 MB), and 300 Gigs of monthly bandwith (300,000 MB). That was plenty of space (in fact, at the time of this post, TysTips.com was only using 22 MB of storage space and 32 MB of bandwith per month. Basically I was using 0.2% of the storage, and 0.1% of the bandwith. Why not put that other 99.7% to work hosting other blogs? Get the idea?
To do so I had to upgrade from the economy to the deluxe hosting package. This cost me an extra $1.90, so it was like getting another hosting account for $2. For the extra dough, you get some extra space. The deluxe plan has higher storage and bandwith limits (150 GB of storage, and 1.5 TB of bandwith). Furthermore, if I host a 3rd blog it won’t cost me anything extra. I could have 10 blogs hosted on the same deluxe plan, all sharing the storage space and bandwith for $6.65 per month. The steps below will be broken down into 2 parts. Part 1: Upgrading your plan, and Part 2: Hosting your new blog.
Part 1: Upgrade to Deluxe Hosting:
- Log into your godaddy account and click on Hosting > My Hosting Account.
- Click on the name of the hosting account (in this case I’ll be showing you the steps by upgrading geektechblog.com since tystips.com is already upgraded). Ignore the checkbox to the left of the name, it will become checked once you click on the name of your hosting account. Once clicked you’ll see the storage and bandwith data to the right (yea, geektechblog.com gets a ton of traffic, I know …). Below that you’ll see “Upgrade/Downgrade hosting account. Click that link. See the image below (click the image to enlarge it if necessary).
- Select the Deluxe Hosting - Linux plan from the list (be sure to pick Linux and not windows if you’re using WordPress, since you can’t host a WP blog on a Windows hosting plan).
- Further down in that same column you’ll see a green continue button. Click it and pay for the hosting upgrade. Note: It may take a few hours for your upgrade to process, but mine only took a few minutes.
Once you’ve upgraded, you’ll need to follow the next few steps to point a second domain name to your Deluxe hosting account and begin installing your new WP blog. For the rest of the steps below, I’ll be using my TysTips Hosting account that’s already been upgraded to Deluxe Hosting.
Part 2: Hosting your new blog:
- Your hosting account should now say “Deluxe Hosting - Linux …”. Click on the “Manage Account” link to the left.
- If you see this image, it means your account is in “Pending” status and it isn’t set up yet. Go grab lunch and check back in an hour (once it’s set up, proceed to step 3).
- Your screen should look something like what’s shown below. To point your new domain to this hosting account click Settings > Domain Management.
- Click “Add Domain”
- Fill in the domain name. I’m setting up hosting for a hobby site, ProjectsInMetal.com. Since you’ll be setting up a whole new blog, you’ll want the contents of that blog in it’s own subfolder. I’m naming that folder “/projectsinmetal”.
- It may take a while for Godaddy to setup your new domain name. If your screen shows “Pending”, give it an hour or two and check back. In the image below you can see that I now have “2 Hosted Sites” (TysTips and ProjectsInMetal), but the projectsinmetal.com link isn’t clickable yet. You can also see that the folder that will hold the contents of my new blog is correctly setup. And finally, you can see that the change is in “Pending” status. Your screen should look similar. Once your new domain name says “Setup” you can proceed.
- Once your status has changed to “Setup”, click on the “Home” tab to proceed.
- From the Home screen, click “Your Applications”. This will take you to the Godaddy Hosting Connection where you can easily install applications like WordPress.
- Click on the “My Applications” tab.
- You can see that I already have WordPress installed on 2 blogs, TysTips and GeekTechBlog, but I need to install WordPress on my new blog, ProjectsInMetal. To do that I need to find the WordPress applications link. It’s currently showing up as the top link in the “Most Popular” category, but you can also use the search box to find it (by typing “WordPress” in the searchbox).
- Once you’ve found the WordPress link, Click it and you should see a screen that shows you the details of the current Version of WordPress you’ll be installing (for me, it’s 2.7). Also, I told you earlier that WordPress requires a Linux hosting account, but it looks like it may now work on Windows (TysTips uses WordPress 2.5, which only works on Linux). Click “Install Now!” to install WordPress.
- Choose the domain you want to install WordPress to. Then scroll to the bottom and click next.
- Choose a password, change the database description (if you wish), and click next.
- Next you’ll need to choose your install directory. Since ProjectsInMetal is aliased to TysTips/ProjectsInMetal, it already has it’s own unique install directory. If I were to leave the directory box blank, all the WordPress files would be installed in TysTips.com/ProjectsInMetal. If I add a folder named “WordPress” (which is what’s shown in the picture), all the files would be installed in TysTips.com/ProjectsInMetal/Wordpress. It really doesn’t make much of a difference if you choose to have a WordPress folder or not. Having all the WordPress file in their own folder might make things a little cleaner in the future if you decide to make changes to your blog.
- Configure Your Login info and click Next.
- Next, you will see a screen that says your installation request has been submitted. Click on the My Applications link to proceed.
- Under My Applications you can see that the status of ProjectsInMetal.com is pending because Godaddy is still creating the database. Once it’s created the database it needs to install the WordPress application, etc. This can take a while, so go get a cup of coffee and check back later. Once the status says “Installed”, you’re ready to go.
- Once your status changes to “Installed”, you’re ready to start posting to your new blog. Clicking on the link (in my case PROJECTSINMETAL.COM/wordpress) will take you to your new blog. Click it!
- Here’s what your new blog should look like. Click “Log in” under “Meta” in the lower right corner to log into your blog and start posting. You’ll need to use the login name and password you chose in step 15.
That’s it. If you want to customize the look of your blog (which I would reccommend), search google for how to change your WordPress theme. There are thousands of free themes out there, so find one with the colors and functionality you are looking for and install it.
If you run into any trouble post a comment and I’ll try to help you out.
Thanks for visiting!
Update: Nov 3rd 2009
Dave posted a comment below that my tutorial results in a setup where you have the ability to get to domain2.com by typing “www.domain1.com/domain2.com” in a browser. The turtorial results in a functional setup, but Dave mentions that there may be an issue with SEO rankings if you have one domain as a subdirectory of another domain.
The changes below are optional. If you do decide to make these changes, read though everything first and make sure you copy your existing bloggs into their own subfolders first before changing your domain settings.
To fix your directory settings so that you can’t get to domain2 by typing domain1.com/domain2 you need to make a change to your primary domain in your hosting account with Godaddy. Initially I had TysTips.com as my Primary domain and ProjectsInMetal.com as a domain in the subdirectory (/projectsinmetal).
Now I have “FakePrimaryDomain.com” listed and set as the primary domain (notice the gold star). I moved the contents of the TysTips.com files into their own subfolder (/tystips.com) and ProjectsInMetal.com were already in their own subfolder (/projectsinmetal).
Here’s a picture of my current setup:
Here’s how I changed my primary domain from TysTips.com to FakePrimaryDomain.com:
- Click on your primary domain (in my case this is tystips.com - notice the gold star). Then choose “Change Primary” from above. I called the new primary domain “FakePrimaryDomain.com” - but you can call yours anything you want. The name doesn’t matter.
- You’ll get warning messages. If you warning messages looks like the one I got below click ok (if they are different, call Godaddy to make sure that you’re not messing anything up).
- Now you need to re-add your old primary domain back in as a domain pointing to a subfolder. Here I’m adding back TysTips.com and pointing it to the /tystips subfolder. NOTE: Be sure to copy all your website files to the subfolder first! Then point the domain to the subfolder (otherwise the domain will be pointing to a subfolder that doesn’t exist).
That’s it.
Dave, if you notice any steps I missed, please let me know. Thanks!
Tyler
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62 USER COMMENTED IN THIS POST
well this is a great news for a blogger. This is great, and thank you for all info for users.
Love your easy to follow post here! Fantastic! This has got to be the most easy-to-follow post I have come across on the web!
I followed it with ease until step 11, and then I ran into problems…
I already have 1 website AAA.com running with wordpress, and hosted on a godaddy deluxe account. The problem for me is that I can’t install wordpress on website BBB.com because it already shows as ‘installed’.
In other words I don’t get the option to install wordpress.
I think it must be something to do with the way I installed the first wordpress (AAA.com). I’m not very technical, so please bear with me and I’ll try and explain how it is set up.
Bacially,
In ‘Domain Management’ I created a folder /bbb for Website ‘BBB’ as in Step.7
Under ‘My Files’, the folder /bbb is listed, the order is:
root (which looks like it’s empty)
/bbb
sitemap
wordpress
wp-admin
wp-content
wp-includes
then a bunch of files…
(on the left side, these are all listed under a file named html)
These are all the files for Website AAA.com.
How do I get the wordpress files I need for the second website into /bbb.com?
Any info you could give me would be a great help as I am SO confused! Thanks!
Hey Lucy, sorry you got stuck. Lets see if we can fix that. First, check a few things for me to confirm that Godaddy knows where you new site (BBB.com) is aliased to. In step 12 you can see in the image that projectsinmetal is aliased to tystips. Yours should say bbb.com is aliased to aaa.com. Does it?
Next, in step 14 at the top of the image you should see a similar notation (if godaddy will let you get that far, I hope you’re not actually stuck at step 11 and unable to proceed). You can see that for me projectsinmetal is aliased specifically to tystips.com/projectsinmetal. This means that the wordpress install will be located in the projectsinmetal subfolder within the tystips.com directory. If yours doesn’t say aaa.com/bbb than you don’t have it pointing to the subdirectory. It’s probably pointing to the root instead.
Which is another thing I need to clear up. In your comment you mentioned that your root directory looked empty and you listed the files you saw, starting with /bbb like this:
/bbb
sitemap …
bla bla bla
The files listed below the /bbb folder are all in the root directory. The /bbb folder is also in the root directory. Think of the root as a big metal filing cabnet. It’s what holds all the files and folders. It’s not empty because it holds the /bbb folder, and all the other files and folders within it. If it was empty it would just say / … and that would be it. Nothing else would be listed. Does that make sense?
For some reason Godaddy’s installer thinks you’ve already installed WP into whatever directory you’re trying to install it into, which suggests that it’s trying to install to the wrong directory. You want it to install to the empty /bbb directory.
Double check everything to make sure you haven’t missed a step. Confirm that your screen matches the screenshots. If everything looks exactly as is’t supposed to and Godaddy still doesn’t work, never fear. You can always download a copy of Wordpress, extract it, and upload it yourself to your new /bbb folder using an FTP client.
FileZilla is a good one (free). If you use FireFox the FireFTP addon works great (also free). You can even use IE as a primitive FTP client, but it’s clumsy (google for instructions on how to do this).
Really all the Godaddy installer is doing is putting the WP files and folders where they need to be to start blogging. If it doesn’t want to work, upload the files and folders yourself and you’ll be all set.
If all else fails I can try to walk you though things over the phone (if you live in the US). You can reply with your phone number and a good time to call. I won’t approve the reply so nobody but me will see your number.
I hope this helps. Good luck!
I Love You! Thank-you for this explanation. I’ve been trying for hours to work out a way of running multiple wordpress blogs (and domains) off the same hosting plan. Its a waste of money to purchase multiple hosting plans just to be able to run wordpress on each domain.
This one post has saved me many dollars and hours! Thank-you.
Cheers,
The Guru
Hey Guru, glad I could help! Let me know if you get stuck.
Hello!
Very Interesting post! Thank you for such interesting resource!
PS: Sorry for my bad english, I’v just started to learn this language
See you!
Your, Raiul Baztepo
Hello !!!!
My name is Piter Kokoniz. oOnly want to tell, that your blog is really cool
And want to ask you: what was the reasson for you to start this blog?
Sorry for my bad english:)
Thank you!
Your Piter Kokoniz, from Latvia
I tried doing this with my secondary website, but when I get to step 5, I get an error message, essentially saying my new domain name is unavailable.
Hi Ejsteeler, did you get things figured out?
If you recently registered the domain name through godaddy it might be that it isn’t completely set up yet.
If you’ve registered the domain name through another domain service, (which is another reason that I can think of that you might be having this problem) you’ll need to transfer the domain name to godaddy before you can set it up this way.
If you’re still stuck you should definitely give godaddy a call. They have always been very helpful when I’ve called them.
Let me know if you’re still stuck.
Good Luck!
Tyler
@PiterKokoniz -
I started this blog as a way to document the process of setting up a wordpress site. I wanted to keep track of the problems and solutions I encountered. The intent was not only to help others, but to help me remember how I figured everything out.
The first site I set up a few years ago took a lot of effort and I ran into several ’snags’ along the way. I eventually figured everything out, but I didn’t write anything down. When I went to set up a similar site several months later I ran into some of the exact same issues, and I couldn’t remember how I’d overcome them on the previous site. That’s when I decided that I needed to keep track of the process.
This site is kind of like a tech diary, a place where I’ve documented what worked, what didn’t, and how I did it. That’s why I started this site. Hopefully I’ve helped a few people along the way.
Tyler
But isn’t your domain name (url) projectsinmetal.com/wordpress? I recently tried to install new blog domains and when you create a folder to install a new blog in your site is no longer http://mywebsite.com it’s now http://mywebsite.com/mywebsite if you look at your number 18 you can see how your 3 url’s are different. So basically you have to type in http://mywebsite.com/mywebsite because if you type in the regular url you get directed to a “site construction” page.
Hi Michael,
Nice catch! You are quite correct. It does seem like your URL would be http://www.xyz.com/wordpress, since all your blog files are within the wordpress subfolder on your site.
However …
Wordpress should automatically fix this issue. Because as you pointed out, if you typed in http://www.xyz.com/wordpress you’d get a 404 Error - page not found.
If you are having an issue with your URL looking odd you can change your URL settings (which I think you find under the General Settings tab in Wordpress).
However, I don’t remember ever needing to change this with any of the blogs I manage, so I’m pretty sure if Wordpress is installed properly you shouldn’t have any issues.
You’ll notice that on this site, as well as the projectsinmetal.com site mentioned, both have proper looking URLs with no “/wordpress” anywhere in them. Wordpress fixed that for me automatically.
To take it one step further, my projectsinmetal.com site is located (if I’m remembering correctly) within a /projectsinmetal/wordpress subfolder within my tystips.com hosting account. And somehow wordpress fixed that too. It would suck to have to type tystips.com/projectsinmetal/wordpress to get to projetcsinmetal.com - that wouldn’t even make sense and would certainly confuse visitors.
Luckily Wordpress fixes this automatically (or at least it should fix it automatically, let me know if it doesn’t).
Good luck!
I’ve had other blogs on GD already installed. I didn’t start having a problem until 2.7 came out. You can go in General Settings and change it from mywebsite.com/wordpress to just mywebsite.com but then you get a 404 on the home page.
Wow Michael, I’m not sure what the problem is. I’m assuming that you’ve given GD enough time to make the changes on their end (that can take up to 24 hours, but usually happens much faster). Other than that, I’m not sure what would cause you to keep getting a 404 error.
I’m sorry I can’t be of more help. I’m in TX right now for a business trip. I’ll be back in the office next week and I can google it a bit then. But hopefully you’ve figured out a solution by then.
If anyone else has had this problem please reply to this post with your experience, especially if you’ve figured out a solution.
Hi! GoDaddy has suggested that I combine the 4 domains that I have hosted with them separately into one Deluxe hosting account, sort of as you describe above. But they’re already established WordPress blogs, and I’m wondering if I’ll run into issues with losing backlinks, issues with linking structures, etc. Do you know? I’ve talked with several GoDaddy service reps, and one seemed to know what he was talking about and highly recommended doing it (but it was over my head and I’ve been trying to figure it out since), but yesterday, I talked with a young woman who said it was a bad idea, but I don’t think she knew how to do it. I’m confused, want to switch everything over, but would really like to have the straight scoop before attempting it…
Hi Heather,
You shouldn’t have a problem. However, there’s an easy way to protect yourself if you run into one. Here’s my suggestion.
First, make sure you have a way to monitor traffic. I use Histats, but Google Analytics or any other traffic monitoring program will work fine. You just want to know where your traffic is coming from (backlinks) and how much traffic you’re getting. I assume you’re already doing this.
Next, (starting with your least visited blog) copy all your Wordpress files and folders to your new Godaddy hosting account.
Next, go into your first domain and point the domain to the newly copied folder on the hosting account. For a Godaddy hosted domain, it takes a few minutes (15-20) to switch the domain. Wait until your change has taken place (with Godaddy, a change will say “pending” until it’s complete).
Once the change is complete, check your site to make sure that it’s loading properly. If you’re using FireFox, hit F5 to reload the site and clear the cache (to make sure it’s loading the new files, and not cached information).
If you have access to multiple computers, check your site from multiple computers and multiple browsers (for example, maybe your friend has a Mac and can check to make sure your site is loading properly on Safari).
If your original folder and the new copy on your hosting account are identical, you shouldn’t have run into any problems. But to be sure that your backlinks and traffic aren’t affected, monitor that sites traffic for a day or so. If it looks similar to the traffic you received the day before you should be all set.
If you experience any issues at all you can always point your domain back to the original location and start over.
If everything is working properly on your new server, and your traffic is unaffected by the change, then you can copy the next site, etc. Once all your sites are up an running on your new hosting account you can have your other hosting accounts deleted. However, I would suggest making backup copies of the sites before you shut the hosting services down. You’re already FTP-ing everything, so why not make a backup? Copy the files to your computer, burn them to a CD/DVD, and file the disk away in a safe spot.
I’ve moved things around before and re-pointed the domains to a new server with no issues. No change in traffic, no change in backlinks, etc. WITH 1 EXCEPTION. Sometimes thumbnail images don’t copy when using FireFTP. Here’s a link to my post that talks about this:
http://www.tystips.com/archives/56/please-read-image-issue/
This probably won’t be an issue for you since it had a lot more to do with my setup than with Wordpress or Godaddy. But since it can happen, I thought I’d mention it.
Just remember, everything is reversible. If you run into an issue you can always revert back to your original setup with little or no site interruption. I also suggested starting with your least visited blog so that the least amount of visitors are affected if you do run into any issues.
I hope this helps. Let me know how it all turns out.
Tyler
Thank you, Tyler, for your quick response! I really appreciate it!
So, I don’t need to create aliases, and using the pointing method won’t necessitate a change in permalinks/URLs?
I’m hitting a steep learning curve here and really appreciate your help. I hope you’ll pardon me if I’m missing something that should be obvious.
Thanks,
Heather
Hi Heather,
You will be pointing your domain name (mysite.com) to your Wordpress sub-folder within your new hosting account (/mysite/wordpress). So Wordpress will know to look in the /mysite/wordpress folder instead of the root. Wordpress is (usually) smart enough to fix the path automatically. If not, there is a place in Wordpress to change your blog address settings.
For example, if your blog’s info is located in http://www.mysite.com/mysite/wordpress, but you want your URL to just say http://www.mysite.com, you can change that. Here’s a link an explanation on how that works:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Giving_WordPress_Its_Own_Directory
I wouldn’t worry about aliases or anything else, at least not yet. You should be fine letting Wordpress handle things automatically.
However, I should put a disclaimer in here. I’m not an expert. I blog as a hobby. If you’re playing with a few hobby sites that’s one thing, but if you’re moving sites that make you a significant amount of income, I’d suggest hiring a consultant to help you. Just to make sure that you’re not missing a critical step.
But again, keep in mind that you can always revert your settings back to their original state if everything falls apart.
And by all means, call Godaddy back and have them help you. They might tell you that they aren’t set up to support your Wordpress Blog (which is true), but they are set up to answer any and every hosting question you might have. So explain what you’re trying to do, and have them help you through it. If the first person can’t answer your questions, ask for another person or call back. I’ve always had great luck with Godaddy support. Most of their people are very well trained.
Keep me posted on how things turn out.
Tyler
Hi Tyler! I have started one site under the Deluxe hosting, and finally got someone on GoDaddy’s support team who was able to explain the process of moving established WP blogs over in a way that I could understand and that seemed clear would be fine in terms of linking structure remaining the same (so as to keep backlinks). I’ll let you know how it goes when I move the least important blog over.
Thanks very much for your help, encouragement, and the super clear directions here.
Best regards,
Heather
I have only six words for you.
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!
Your instructions were clear and flawless. Everything worked without a hitch. Thank you very much for this excellent article and the accompanying pictures. This is exactly what I wanted to do - GoDaddy.com mentions that with a Deluxe hosting plan you can host multiple domains, but it doesn’t easily tell you how to do it.. especially when you throw multiple WordPress into the mix.
You made my day/week/month!
Ditto what Sean said
I can now very happily report that I have 5 WordPress sites set up under one Deluxe GoDaddy account and they are all working fine. I migrated all of them from separate GoDaddy hosting accounts. The one hitch thus far is that the oldest site is having strange characters show up uninvited — the character set must have been Latin, from the old database. There are plugins to automatically fix this, but I haven’t tried them yet, since I do use some odd characters on purpose and I’m not sure if they’ll remove those, too. I’m happy to report that SEO seems to be working fine, since someone found a post I had written just the other day.
Thank you, Ty!! You’re an internet angel!!
Sincerely,
Heather
Heather, Shawn, and everyone else, I’m so glad that I’ve been able to help you guys. It makes all the work I’ve put into this site worth while.
My original intent was to simply document the steps it took for me to setup my own blog. Since this hobby is all about trouble shooting, I wanted to keep track of the process along the way (mostly so I wouldn’t forget everything).
If the posts helped others, that was a bonus. I’m actually surprised at how many people have been helped by this blog.
As far as an internet angel … I don’t know. Maybe I’m just earning a few extra Karma points here and there. But you made me smile
Have fun and keep blogging!
I see a major problem with this. Each of your “added on” domains would also be visible as subdirectories of your primary domain.
Example: http://www.tystips.com/projectsinmetal
Now, based on your instructions above, that SHOULD load your projectsinmetal.com site, but I notice it does not. To me that indicates that you changed something, probably because you also discovered the flaw in this tutorial?
The point I am suggesting, is that google and all other search engines would eventually find that all your different domains are actually subdomains of your PRIMARY domain, and in my opinion, PENALIZE the hell out of any and all listings.
If one is trying to set up say 10 blogs on 10 domains for search engine work and gain the benefit of having 10 unique domains, i can’t fathom that the SE’s arent going to see through this “scheme” and realize this is all content on one site rather quickly, although I hope I am wrong.
Am I missing something?
Hi Dave,
You are right that tystips.com/projectsinmetal doesn’t pull up a valid page. That’s because of the way that WordPress and Godaddy handle the sub directories.
You actually have settings in both Godaddy and in Wordpress that enable you to tell each where the root directory for each blog resides (See Step 5).
I can assure you that my websites are still set up in this fashion (with all of them being hosted under the same account). Everything works fine.
Also, there have been several other people who have commented that this approach has worked for them as well, most recently Heather and Shawn above. I would think that if there was a flaw in the tutorial, someone who has gone through the steps would have discovered it already and pointed it out.
As far as SEO is concerned, I don’t see why Google/Yahoo/etc would care one way or another. ProjectsInMetal shows up on the first page of Google for several different search queries. For instance, if you google “Metalworking Projects” my website is first on the list. So I think my SEO is ok. Can’t get much better than the top listing … right? I’ve never checked Yahoo or MSN or Bing, because they drive such a small amount of traffic to my sites compared to Google. And as I understand it, Google is the most restrictive and most difficult optimize for, so I really only worry about them. Time will tell if Bing will become a big player. If so, I’ll research optimizing for Bing as well.
Also, I’m not sure why this approach would be considered a “scheme” by anyone. Except maybe Godaddy, since they don’t get the benefit of charging you for several hosting accounts. Again, I just don’t see why search engines would care one way or another.
I can appreciate your skepticism. But I can assure you that it works. And unless Godaddy changes something in the future I am optimistic that it will continue to work.
Now, I will say I’m not an SEO expert, so if there are some tools that you know of that would allow me to tell if this approach is somehow a detriment to my site(s) SEO ranking, please let me know. I think that kind of information is something that everyone who visits this site could benefit from.
Thank you for taking the time to share your opinion and concerns. And please (seriously) let me know if I am missing something. I’m not an expert, so its definitely possible.
Tyler
Thanks Tyler, I should have read my post before I submitted it. I use the word “scheme” liberally, meaning “plan” and didn’t mean it offensively like it sounded. My post definitely sounded more negative than I intended it to and I apologize for that. Your tutorial is spot on and helpful, my only concern is the seo aspect and my fear that if I set things in motion with this plan, as I am seriously considering doing, google and other SEs may penalize my sites. Sorry for being a poor communicator at times, and thanks for the tutorial. Perhaps some others will have some input on the possible SEO ramifications.
Hi Dave,
No harm done. Your questions got me thinking - which is good. If you google PageRank checker and SERP checker you’ll find tools to check a sites ranking. Tystips doesn’t have a google PageRank, but ProjectsInMetal has a PageRank of 2. Which is interesting because TysTips has been up for over 2 years and PIM is less than a year old. Apparently there are more incoming links to PIM than to TT. PIM is also one of a few sites about metalworking. There are thousands of sites about blogging, so I think this site gets lost because there is so much competition.
I tried a quick SERP checker (Search Engine Results Page Checker) and some search engines had PIM right at the top, others had it 3 or 4 pages in. Some didn’t even have it listed in the top 10 pages for “metalworking projects”.
It’s really hard for me to tell what works and what doesn’t with regard to SEO. Partially because different search engines handle SEO differently. That’s why I’ve chosen to only worry about my Google searches.
One final thing to consider, if you’re moving existing sites you don’t want to mess anything up and have that hurt your search traffic, so your concerns are definitely warranted. Maybe Heather from a few comments ago will see this and reply with how her merger went. I think she merged existing sites with existing incoming traffic. If she saw a noticeable decrease in her incoming traffic than there might definitely be something to your concern.
Heather? Did you notice any change?
Maybe to insulate yourself from any risk of dropped traffic you can copy your sites to the new hosting account, but keep your old hosting services up. Point the domains to the new sub-directories and see if you notice a change in your traffic patterns. If you do, point your domains back to their original locations. Basically don’t delete your old setup until you know that your new setup works. That way you can revert back if needed.
I didn’t have to worry about this because I launched PIM with this setup, so I started with zero traffic.
Dave, if you do decide to make the change to 1 deluxe hosting account please keep me posted on your findings.
Thanks,
Tyler
Hi again Tyler, can I get a clarification on this:
“You are right that tystips.com/projectsinmetal doesn’t pull up a valid page. That’s because of the way that WordPress and Godaddy handle the sub directories.”
I have followed the tutorial step by step but my http://www.domain1.com/domain2 website is still viewable online. Is there a specific setting somewhere I need to alter so that doesn’t occur? Thanks.
Hi Dave,
I don’t really know how to say this except I was wrong. Supremely wrong. And I’m sorry. I went back through everything this morning and FTP’d into my setup to double check. It turns out that I had made changes to the file structure after writing the tutorial, but It was months later and I had forgotten that I had done it.
I made the changes for a different reason (to clean everything up) so it didn’t register when you asked about your domain1.com/domain2 question (I didn’t make the change for that reason so I didn’t remember that I had even changed the subfolder structure). Michael actually asked a similar question above.
Let me explain. The way the tutorial shows works (although it sounds like you’re right about the domain1/domain2 thing since you’re having that problem right now).
However, the thing I didn’t like about how things worked out in the original tutorial had to do with how the files showed up in FireFTP.
Basically I had all of my TysTips wordpress files in the root (/) and then mixed in among them I had my ProjectsInMetal folder (/projectsinmetal). I made the change to clean up the root directory. So you’re right, my TysTips.com files are now in their own folder.
/
/tystips
/projectsinmetal
Again I apologize. The change in structure happened so long after this original tutorial that it didn’t even register that I had made a change (since I made the change to fix an aesthetic issue and not to fix the issue you’re having). In other words, my setup was working for months, I just thought that the file structure was sloppy so I changed things around.
Now I have to rack my brain to remember how I changed things.
Ok, here’s what I did:
Originally I had a hosting account called “TysTips.com”
I changed that hosting account to “FakePrimaryDomain.com” - I don’t have a domain called FakePrimaryDomain.com, but since you have to call it something, that’s what I called it.
Then I put both sites in their own subfolders (projectsinmetal was already in its own subfolder, I just needed to move all the tystips files into their own subfolder).
Then I pointed the TysTips domain to /tystips folder just like I pointed the ProjectsInMetal domain to /projectsinmetal folder in the tutorial.
I’ll try to ad a few pictures above to explain what I mean. Again, I apologize. I’m not an expert and I made a mistake.
Tyler
Hi Dave, new screenshots have been posted above with the changes. Let me know if I missed any steps. I tried to re-create the process, but I may have missed something. Thanks!
Tyler
Thanks Tyler! The fake primary domain is exactly what I was considering doing, thats a perfect idea. And no apology is necessary from you, you’ve provided a great tutorial here and you certainly are a very patient guy to deal with people like myself (lol).
I’m setting all of my domains and blogs up today using the inactive/fake primary domain and approximately 20 real domains and blogs. I’ll try to post back to confirm all went well.
Thanks again.
At first I used one of my real domains as the primary domain, like you described in the first half of your post. I played with that for a while and it worked out just fine. I was able to FTP files and folders up using the primary domain’s address, user name, and password. Then I set up a fake primary domain as per the second part of your post. The problem is that I don’t know what domain/username/password to use when I want to ftp files/folders to one of my domains that is set up under the primary fake domain. Does that make sense? I’m using GoDaddy, by the way. How do you do it? Which info do you use? I’d really appreciate a reply ASAP. Thanks!
@ Tristan,
You should be able to FTP into your blog using the blog’s actual domain name. For instance, I don’t go to fakeprimarydomain.com to FTP into my site, I go to tystips.com or projectsinmetal.com. I think the username and pw is the same that you use when you log into wp-admin, but it’s been a while since I’ve set up a new blog (I use FireFTP, which stores my settings, so I haven’t played with them for over a year). If it’s different than your wp-admin user/pass, please reply to let others know what you found out.
@ Dave,
Dave, did you get everything working? I’m interested to see how everything worked out on your end.
Tyler
Hi
I’m currently in process of changing my primary domain to a fake one, I was just wondering how long do I have to wait for change to take effect?
I had no trouble to changing primary domain to fake one, it’s listed under my domains but when I try to re-add my old primary domain I get following error:
Domain name is used. Please select a new domain name.
Can anyone help?
Hi Gosa, changes can (but shouldn’t) take up to 24 hours. Call Godaddy if it takes too long and they can look into it for you.
Thanks Tyler, I’m not in a hurry but was wondering if I have done anything wrong, I can relax now i guess
Thank you again for quick replay
Hi Gosa,
Were you able to re-add your domain? Just checking back to make sure you’re not still stuck.
Tyler
Tyler,
Thank you for the excellent tutorial. I was just wondering if having a fake domain name as your primary domain will cause any SEO problems. I setup my old and new websites the way you described and it seems like my traffic has dropped. The older sites do not use wordpress, they are just basic html with each set up as separate subfolders. Maybe they are just not getting that much traffic. Any thoughts.
Thanks,
David
Hi David,
I’m not an SEO expert, but from what I understand of it I think (fingers crossed) you should be fine.
Here’s why I think you’re fine:
If you had made changes that caused Google to have to re-index your site (like changing the domain name) it would take a while and you would see a serious change in traffic until your site was re-indexed. If you haven’t seen a huge change (which is how it sounds), I think you’re going to be fine.
You could also try to run an SEO tool like Website Grader to see what it says about the age of your domain name (the longer a domain name has been registered and in use, the better it is for SEO).I talked about Website Grader in a previous post.
http://www.tystips.com/archives/33/how2-optimize-your-blog-or-web-site-with-free-seo-tools/
If you set up your site 3 years ago and Website Grader still says your domain is 3 years old and not a week old, you know that to the outside world your domain situation hasn’t changed.
Here’s why I can’t be sure that you’re fine:
I’m simply not an expert. There are so many factors that affect SEO that I couldn’t possibly say with any degree of certainty one way or another. All I can say is that I can’t think of any reason that this would cause you SEO problems.
Give Website Grader or some other SEO tool a try (WG is free). You might notice several other factors that are negatively affecting your SEO score. You’d be surprised at how much actually goes into it.
Let me know how everything shakes out, and good luck!
Tyler
Tyler,
It looks like I am in good shape. Thanks for directing me to the website grader. It’s an amazing tool. Awesome!
David
Excellent! Glad I could help.
Thanks for the wonderful tutorial. I have a problem, i successfully changed my primary domain to a fake domain (www.myfake.com) which i later found out already exists. This wouldn’t have been a problem except now i can’t log into in via ftp://myfake.com, filezilla says username and password is wrong. Please help.
Bummer! Have you tried changing myfake.com to something else? Something unregistered?
I’m curious how long it took others for their fake domains to go through. I’ve been waiting around 18 hours, and it still says “pending change”. Plus, while it’s doing that, I can’t re-add the first site I made, for the same reason as Gosa.
I suppose I’ll give it another day, and then get onto GD’s tech support.
Hi Tim, to be honest I don’t remember how long it took, but I’d give Godaddy a call just to be safe. Their support is excellent, and they can tell you how long it should (or shouldn’t) take.
Let me know how it turns out.
Tyler
Ended up going through okay. For some reason, it just ended up taking around 24 hours. Curious, that.
Thanks for the tutorial, though! It was a great help!
Good to hear. Thanks for leaving a note letting me know how long it took. Others might want to plan making changes during a slow traffic time on their site (if there is one).
Hi! I have a question, I’m using the godaddy deluxe hosting plan for windows and I’m stuck on step 12. When I try to install wordpress, it only gives me my primary domain, the new domain is not an option even tho I set up the new folder on my godaddy hosting. Would using the linux plan work better? and if I switch to that would I mess up my blog because my OS is windows?
p.s. thanks for the awesome tutoral- the pics really make it easy to follow!
Hi Rachel,
Back when I wrote this article Linux was the only hosting option for using Wordpress on Godaddy - and it doesn’t matter if you’re using a PC running Windows, a Mac running OSX, or a PC or Mac running Linux. The hosting service can be run on a Windows Server or a Linux server regardless of what computer you’re using.
I would recommend using Linux unless you have a good reason not to - that way you can follow the tutorial more easily. You won’t notice a difference on your end. Your site will function just the same. Try switching to Linux and see if that fixes your problem. If not, get back to me.
Good luck!
Tyler. The tutorial looks great. I have a very basic question however.
Before setting up the fake domain name, are you saying we need to create a new folder in the root directory and move the current web site into it? (This will at least for a short time make the site inaccessible from the original URL right?)
Then … my main question … which files do we actually move into the new subfolder? Do we move EVERYTHING that was in the root directory or just certain files pertaining to Wordpress? Plus we have to keep all the subdirectories in the root moved intact into the new subdirectory? So these subdirectories wind up two levels down in the tree instead of one?
I hope the question makes sense. I don’t want to proceed before I know exactly what I’m doing.
thank you, I searched for hours for this info until I found your site.
Thank you for the detailed explanation, Tyler.
When I first wanted to install another Word Press blog I found so many web pages telling about the “Multisite” feature of Wordpress like this one: http://codex.wordpress.org/Create_A_Network
But I didn’t want to have a subdomain or subfolder blog, I wanted to have it for my new domain, exactly like the one in your tutorial. Thanks a lot
@ Simon and Emre, I’m glad you found the post helpful!
@ Matt, your question slipped by me and I’m just now noticing it. Did you get things figured out? It’s been several months, so I really hope so. Sorry for such a long delay!
I am very thankful to this topic because it really gives great information -.~
I am really thankful to this topic because it really gives up to date information ,~*
Hey, really enjoyed the tutorial. I’ve just set up a second site on my existing hosting account and I plan to do a few more. I do have a question, however. What if I set up a large number of sites and my bandwidth, space is not enough. If I want to move them to a separate hosting account later, will it cause any problems? I suppose that the links might be able to stay the same, but I’m not sure how that would be accomplished. Have you thought about that?
Ty, never mind that first question, I think it’s been properly explained in the previous comments.
On the other hand, though, I do still have a question about the search engines crawling both locations.
When I type in primarydomain.com/secondsite, my second blog does not come up, but I did not set up the fake domain thing or anything. Any ideas why this might be the case? I didn’t do anything special. Do I not have to worry, then?
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