I'm a designer helping a local food bank rebuild their website after they fell victim to web development scammers. I have some basic understanding of domains and DNS but lack backend knowledge. They currently have two domains—one through WordPress and another through landingsite.ai. I need the URL for the landingsite.ai page to redirect to the new WordPress site, and subsequently, we want to delete the landingsite site to avoid further costs.
I've encountered a challenge since the landingsite interface only allows me to edit DNS entries, which doesn't provide redirection options. ICANN lookup indicates GoDaddy is the registrar, but the client doesn't have an account there, making it hard to reach support.
Additionally, I have offline files for a WordPress site created by a developer who is no longer part of the project. I need to upload these files safely for a preview at foodbankdomain.com/preview without overwriting the existing site. The themes and plugins don't overlap with the current setup, and I suspect the existing site hasn't been updated in a while. Any guidance on how to proceed would be greatly appreciated!
3 Answers
It's great that you're stepping in to help! You're right that DNS alone won't handle redirects. If you can't access a forwarding option from the registrar, consider a basic hosting plan to handle redirects via a script. As for GoDaddy, if they're the registrar, the client could reach out to GoDaddy support to verify ownership. For uploading site files, creating a /preview directory in WordPress should be doable without affecting the current site. Just ensure everything is set up correctly!
To set the redirect, you'll need to log into the domain registrar and set up a 301 redirect. This helps transfer any SEO from the old domain to the new one. If the content stays the same for both sites, it should be simple. But if there are differences, you might need to decide what each should point to. If you can't find the redirect options, it'd be best to check if you can point the old domain to a new host that can manage redirects.
I get that! There's not much support documentation at landingsite.ai. If you can reach out to them or try GoDaddy's support, hopefully they'll clarify how to set it up without too much hassle.
For the WordPress setup, look for shared hosting options. You’ll need to find where the existing domain was bought to manage the DNS properly. It’s important to track down the registrar to ensure you can point it to the new hosting. Everyone always forgets about that initial setup!
Got it! I’ll keep an eye on that. At least it seems like I have an easier route for the WordPress upload.
Thank you for the tips! They surprisingly had the GoDaddy credentials available. Hoping the upload goes smoothly!