Understanding the Basics: How to Transfer a Website

So you’ve just made your first purchase on Flippa, and now you need to know how to transfer a website so that you can get your web acquisition up on a different hosting company. The process of taking ownership of a site and completing a successful website transfer from one host to another can be daunting, but it’s a valuable experience and often a good idea.

We spotted a fantastic guide on the process of transferring websites by Clinton over at experienced-people.co.uk, and are re-publishing parts of it with his permission.

How to transfer a website

Step 1: Transfer of the domain name to the control of the new owner.

Contact your registrar and the site’s old registrar for details. Broadly, this is what you do:

1. The buyer starts the process with the “gaining” registrar following their instruction.
2. The gaining registrar sends an email to the administrative contact listed in the WHOIS.
3. If the contact replies within the time limit, the gaining registrar sends a request to the registry (the controlling body that oversees registrars). The registry sends an email to the losing registrar.
4. The losing registrar now sends an email to the administrative contact.
5. Provided the contact approves, the losing registrar releases the domain to the gaining registrar.

Step 2: Getting/downloading all the site’s files and folders in the correct structure.

Getting a copy of the applications (if any), database/s (if any), and non-publicly viewable configuration files such as the “.htaccess”. Getting manuals, lists, instructions and passwords from the previous owner. You want to prepare a list of questions for him. I quote a small sample here:

1. What’s required of the hosting? For example,

• What OS (Apache/Windows) is needed?
• What bandwidth and storage allowance do I need?
• What size of database is required?
• Do I need access to set cron jobs or change conf files?
• Do I need access to set size of the log files and rotation parameters?
• Do I need to change default SSI extension names from shtml to something else?
• Do I need Frontpage extensions on the server?
• Do I need a dedicated IP?

2. What affiliate or other codes do I need to change? Adsense publisher IDs and other affiliate codes will eventually need to be changed to your own publisher ID/account number.

3. What about order processing and payment facilities? If these facilities are not transferring with the site, do I have something else in place?

4. What’s needed to transfer the mailing list?

5. What software licenses do I need?

6. If the site has affiliates, how are they managed? If it’s a third party application then can control be handed over to you or will you lose all the affiliates?

7. What about agreements with merchants or drop-shippers? Will they transfer their agreements to me?

8. How do I backup the site?

Step 3: Uploading all the files, databases etc., to the new hosting company’s server. 

These need to be placed in the right location following the instructions provided by the host (and doing all this while the site is still fully operational at the “old” location).

Step 4: Making the changes to take control.

These fall into three areas – management, technical and financial.

1. Management

• Create email addresses for all the emails that are in use at this domain.
• Change the code for any free statistics such as Google Analytics.
• Transfer control of the mailing list
• Transfer control/ownership of software licenses
• Sort out the agreements with merchants or drop-shippers
• Offsite changes: If the seller referred to his product on his various web 2.0 profiles pages and other pages or sites he controls has he updated the references?

2. Technical

• If it’s a dedicated server, you may have to set a service plan, allocate space and resources, create users etc.
• You may need to modify file or folder permissions: CHMOD
• You may need to edit files that access the database
• You may need to double check what’s in the htaccess file to ensure it does what you expect it to do
• You need to double-check all forms, feedback and comment functions to verify the destination
• You may need to setup cron jobs
• You may need to install scripts
• You may need to edit conf files
• Use Google Webmaster Tools and carefully go through all the options. There may be unseen problems on the old site that you can now rectify on the new server.

3. Financial

• AdSense or other affiliate codes need to be changed to your own publisher ID/account number.
• Advertisers, link-buyers etc., paying members, paying subscribers etc., need to know the new contact address. If they are paying by PayPal subscription or some other regular automated payment, that needs to change so you receive the funds.
• Payments-out need to be similarly altered to avoid a situation where your valued partners (such as affiliates) don’t get paid on time and withdraw their support.

Step 5: Changing the DNS settings at the domain registrar to point to the new hosting company thus allowing visitors to reach the new location of the site.

Have you used a different process when transferring a new website purchase to a different host? Do you have any other tips on how to transfer a website? Let us know in the comments below!