Moving a WordPress or Pro.Radio Station Site to RadioSiteMaker

If your station's site runs on WordPress, perhaps with a radio theme such as Pro.Radio and a handful of plugins for the schedule, podcasts and forms, moving to RadioSiteMaker means trading that stack for a site built around a live player. This guide shows where each part of a WordPress radio site goes, and what you have to do by hand.

RadioSiteMaker is our product. We've tried to be exact about what it does and doesn't do here, because a migration plan built on a wrong assumption costs you more than it saves.

The main point first: there is no WordPress importer. RadioSiteMaker can't read a WordPress export file or connect to your WordPress site. Pages, posts, DJ profiles, shows and the schedule are copied across manually. The one exception is podcast episodes, which can be imported from a podcast RSS feed.

For the general order of work (inventory, staging on your free subdomain, DNS and email records, testing, the domain switch and a rollback window), follow our step-by-step website migration guide. This article covers what's specific to WordPress.

What maps where

Things to check on your current site before you plan around them: any WooCommerce shop, membership plugin, or custom page-builder layouts. RadioSiteMaker has a fixed set of page types and themes, not a page builder, so layouts are not carried over; the content is.

Copying content by hand: practical tips

• Start with the evergreen pages: shows, DJs, schedule and about. They are what most visitors look for. Old blog posts can follow, or be left behind if they are out of date.
• Keep slugs. WordPress posts are usually at /my-post-title/ or /2024/05/my-post-title/; RadioSiteMaker posts are at /blog/my-post-title. The prefix changes, but reusing the slug keeps them recognisable and makes your redirect list easier to write.
• Re-upload images, don't link them. If you paste post HTML that still points at /wp-content/uploads/... on the old site, those images break once the old site is gone. Upload them again.
• Keep the original publish dates on posts so your archive stays in order.

Podcasts: import, and protect your feed

RadioSiteMaker imports episodes from a podcast RSS feed: create a podcast series, paste the feed URL, and existing episodes appear on your site with their titles, descriptions, dates and artwork. The episodes play from the audio files where they already live, so the audio host has to stay.

What decides how smooth this is: where does your podcast feed live today?

• On a podcast host (Libsyn, Buzzsprout, Spotify for Creators, Podbean and so on), with a feed URL on that host. Easy: import from that feed and change nothing. Subscribers aren't affected because the feed doesn't move.
• On your WordPress site, generated by a plugin (often a URL like yourstation.com/feed/podcast/). Careful. RadioSiteMaker shows episodes but does not publish podcast feeds, and once your domain points to RadioSiteMaker, that WordPress feed URL stops existing. Podcast apps that subscribe to it stop receiving episodes, and changing a feed URL breaks subscriptions unless the old address redirects to the new one.

If your feed is on WordPress, move the podcast to a podcast host before you switch the domain. Most hosts have an import-from-feed option. Then, while WordPress is still serving your domain, set a permanent (301) redirect from the old feed URL to the new host's feed, and add the new-feed-URL tag if your plugin supports it. Leave that in place for as long as possible before the switch, so podcast apps pick up the change. After the domain switch, the WordPress redirect is gone, so apps that haven't updated by then will lose the feed. Finally, import the episodes into RadioSiteMaker from the new feed.

Redirects: what needs access to the old host

RadioSiteMaker serves its own paths on your domain (/schedule, /djs/<name>, /shows/<name>, /blog/<post>, /podcasts/<name>, /events/<event>) and doesn't have a redirect manager. Once www points at RadioSiteMaker, requests for your old WordPress URLs reach RadioSiteMaker, not WordPress, so a redirect plugin on the old site can't help.

So:

• Anything that must redirect from a www URL (like the podcast feed above) has to be done while WordPress still serves the domain, and only lasts until the switch.
• Redirects from other addresses (the bare domain, an old subdomain like radio.yourschool.edu, or a second domain) can stay with your old host or registrar after the switch, because those addresses don't point at RadioSiteMaker. You need continued access to that host or registrar to keep them.
• Everything else is handled by recreating the content on the new site (search engines find it through the sitemap RadioSiteMaker generates) and by updating the links you control: social profiles, directory listings, newsletter templates.

Donations and forms

If you take donations through a WordPress plugin, the payment relationship is with your processor (PayPal, Stripe and so on), not with WordPress. RadioSiteMaker's donations page links out to those services rather than taking payments on the page. Before deactivating a donation plugin, check with your processor how any recurring donations are managed, so regular supporters aren't cut off.

For the contact form, set your contact email and details in the dashboard and send yourself a test message before the switch.

When to stay on WordPress

WordPress is the better fit if you rely on things RadioSiteMaker doesn't do: a full online shop, member logins, a custom page builder layout, or plugins your station can't work without. The WordPress vs RadioSiteMaker comparison and the Pro.Radio alternatives go through the trade-offs.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is there a WordPress importer?

No. RadioSiteMaker doesn't import WordPress export files or connect to WordPress. Content is copied by hand. Podcast episodes are the exception and can be imported from an RSS feed.

Will my podcast subscribers lose my show?

Not if your feed is on a podcast host and you keep it there; nothing about the feed changes. If WordPress generates your feed, move the podcast to a host and redirect the old feed URL before you switch your domain, because RadioSiteMaker doesn't publish podcast feeds and can't redirect the old one.

Can I keep my WordPress URLs?

Some of them. Simple paths like /schedule or /about may already match. Post and show URLs have a different structure on RadioSiteMaker, though you can keep the slugs. There's no redirect manager, so plan around recreating content and updating the links you control.

Does my stream change?

No. Your stream stays with your stream host. You paste the same stream URL into RadioSiteMaker.

How long does a WordPress migration take?

It depends on how much content you bring over. The setup itself is quick; copying shows, DJs and posts by hand is most of the work. Building on the free subdomain first means your WordPress site stays live until you're ready to switch.