Migrate from wordpress.com to a WordPress blog on your own domain
Aqua-dapter have a blog about their Water Fed Pole tap.
We recently moved it from http://aquadapter.wordpress.com/ to http://blog.aqua-dapter.co.uk/
Hosting a blog on your own domain not only allows you to keep your urls etc consistent and help with branding, it also allows greater flexibility, as there are thousands of WordPress Plugins available to add features to your blog.
We’re used to doing this kind of thing, but the process was fairly easy for anyone with basic computer skills. There are more in depth articles available on redirection etc., if you need that, but here are the basic steps to take (I’m assuming you already have a domain name):
- Install WordPress
Most, if not all, web hosting companies offer 1-click WordPress installation. You just enter a few details like blog name, admin password, and the technical part (database creation etc.) is taken care of by a ‘wizard’. Make sure that you install WordPress in a sub-domain or sub-directory.
- Export posts from WordPress.com
Go to your old WordPress.com admin dashboard, then click Tools –> Export, and save the XML file to your computer.
- Import posts to WordPress.org
In the new site’s WordPress admin panel, click Tools –> Import and choose WordPress.
Select the file you saved to your computer. On the next page, choose authors, and put a check-mark in the box that says “Import Attachments.”
Everything from your old WordPress.com blog, including images and attachments, will be imported into your new WordPress.org blog!
To preserve SEO result etc. you may want to look into redirection, but there is a (minimal) cost involved with this.
If your not too concerned with that, your new blog should start being indexed fairly quickly, it’s worth directing your readers over to the new blog from the old one so that they know why it’s not being updated any more 
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