ProPhoto - Premium Wordpress Theme for Professional Photographers - Single Column, big pictures - Blog Template

One of the great things about switching to WordPress is that you can very easily import your old blogs. This post will cover how to import blogs from three platforms: Blogger (blogspot), TypePad, and WordPress.com. Together, these three types of blogs probably make up 95% of the blogs that people want to import into self-hosted WordPress blogs.

NOTE: after successfully importing an old blog, DO NOT delete that old blog. Just let it sit there. Your photos from your old blog are not actually moved over to your new blog, they are simply referenced by your new blog and must be left in place to display correctly.

For all three types, you start by going to “Manage” –> “Import” in your WP Admin area, which looks like this:

Importing a Blogger Blog:

If the blog you are importing is a blogger blog (i.e., ends with a .blogspot.com), follow these steps. (NOTE: if you have a blogger blog that was set up to publish via FTP or SFTP (fairly uncommon), see this post for info on how to get it imported.)

1. Open up your blog’s WordPress Admin area, and go to “Manage” –> “Import.”
2. Next, open another tab of your browser, or a new browser window, log in to your Blogger account. Make sure you are logged in and not just visiting your blogger blog.
3. Then, go back to your WordPress Admin area and click on the “Blogger” link, then click “Authorize.”
4. If you did step 2 right, you should see a screen that looks like this:
5. Click to grant access, and then you will be able to click an “import” button for the blog you want to import, shown below:
6. When it is done importing, the “Magic Button” will change to saying “Set Authors.” Click it and map your blogger users to WordPress users. If you haven’t created any WordPress Users except the default “admin” you can navigate away from this page and click on “users” in the upper right of your screen, create some users and come back to this screen to map them correctly. That’s it. You’re done!

Importing a TypePad (Movable Type) Blog:

I’ve only done this a handful of times, and I don’t have a TypePad account that I have access to so that I can take screenshots, so I’ll have to do this section from memory. As I recall, the steps are:

1. Login to your TypePad blog admin area. There should be an option somewhere that says “Export.” Click it and download the file it creates.
2. Then, rename the download file “mt-export.txt”
3. Next, in your WordPress blog’s admin area, go to “Manage” –> “Import” and click on the link that says “Moveable Type and TypePad”.
4. In the next screen, click on the “browse” button and locate the “mt-export.txt” file.
5. Click on “upload file and import.”
6. The rest should be simple

NOTE: I have noticed that imported TypePad blogs occasionally display weird behavior in ProPhoto WordPress blogs, where instead of showing full posts on the homepage, they only show excerpts. To fix this, in your WP Admin area, click on “Design” –> “AWP Managment”. Then click on the “Posts & Pages” module, and disable inline posts. Scroll down to save your changes, and your posts should now display in full.

Importing a WordPress.com Blog:

If you have a free blog through WordPress.com and are switching to a self-hosted WordPress installation on your own domain and webhost, the steps to import are pretty simple.

1. First, log into your old WordPress.com blog admin area and click on “Manage” –> “Export” and then click on “Download Export File.”
2. Next, log into your new, self-hosted WordPress blog, and click on “Manage” –> “Import”. Click on browse and locate the file you just downloaded, and then click “Upload file and import.”
3. Finally, map your old users to existing users in your new blog or create new users to map to and click submit.

If you uploaded correctly-sized (980px x 250px) images for your flash fader header slideshow, and they are showing up tiny, follow these steps to fix it:

1. In your Flashfader management area (under “Manage” –> “Flashfader”) make sure you have set the dimensions correctly to 980 width and 250 height and click “Save”, as shown below:

2. Then, DELETE the images you already uploaded by clicking the “Delete” button next to them, shown below. (You have to delete them because if you uploaded them with the wrong settings, Flashfader actually crops the images while they are being uploaded).

3.  Then, upload your images again.

4. Finally, you’ll have to force your browser to empty its cache before you can see the changes in your blog.  In Firefox, this is done by going to “preferences” –> “privacy” –> “private data” –> “clear now.”   In Safari,  just go to the “Safari” menu and choose “Clear cache…”.  In Internet Explorer, go to “Tools” –> “Internet Options”  –> “General” –> “Browsing History” — “Delete…”.

Related Post:  Why can’t I see changes to my Flashfader header slideshow

If you want to remove your bio picture, there are two steps. In your WP Admin area, go to “Design” (”Presentation” in old versions of WordPress) –> “Theme Editor”. Then,

First, click on “bio.php” to edit that file. Look for this chunk of code and then delete it. Be careful to only delete these two lines.

Next, click on “Stylesheet (style.css)” and look for this chunk of code at line 282:

Change the second and fourth line of that chunk so it looks like this:

Click update file to save your changes, and refresh your browser to check your work.

If you’re using Statcounter to track your hits, this is where you insert the tracking code:

In your WP Admin area, go to “Design” (”Presentation” in old versions of WP) –> “Theme Editor” and open up the file called “Header (header.php).” Insert the code right AFTER this line:

<body class="<?php sandbox_body_class() ?>">

Then save your changes.

Related post:  Adding Google Analytics tracking code to your blog

Q: How can I make a quick buck promoting ProPhoto theme to my friends and colleagues?

A: Now that is a really great question. I’m glad you asked it.

If you love ProPhoto theme and want to brag about it to your friends, and families, and in any photography forums you’re a part of: email me at sales@professionalphotographertheme.com and put “Quick Buck” in the subject line. I’ll email you a unique discount code for $5 off ProPhoto. For as many people use your code, I’ll give you the $5. Scout’s honor.

Q: I’m interested in a custom blog design for my business. Can I get a quote?

A: Right now I’m not accepting any completely custom blog design and development work because I simply don’t have the time, and I’m focusing on developing ProPhoto even more and releasing new themes. I do however do unique, advanced customizations of the ProPhoto theme for usually around an additional $150-$300. Email us at to enquire. Be prepared to clearly state your design requirements and budget. Do not use this email address for ProPhoto support.

Q: I changed images in my flashfader flash movie, but I don’t see the changes in my browser. What’s wrong?

A: When you are adding or subtracting new images from your flash movie, you may not see your changes immediately. This is because many browsers “cache” .swf files. English translation: many browsers download and save flash movies in a temporary folder to speed page loads. Your browser may be using an old version of your flash movie. To get around this, you can just wait a couple days, test in another browser, or force your browser to empty its cache.  The option to force the browser to empty its cache can often be found in preferences, or options, or privacy, or something like that.

Q: How do I add a simple border around all my images that I post?

A: Open up “Stylesheet” (style.css) from within your WP admin area, under “Design (’Presentation’ in WP 2.3 and earlier)” –> “Theme Editor.” Scroll way down near the bottom of the file, around line 511, look for this big ugly-looking chunk of code.

Add the lines shown highlighted in red. Change the number of pixels or color code specified in the first red line to customize your border.