Do you have pages on blogs? Really old blogs? Definitely old enough to be a WordPress site? How do you plan to get rid of them?
You can end up with some really nasty code if you don’t wipe it clean. Most websites use WordPress templates to install and keep track of pages – check to see if yours are in good shape. If they aren’t, clean it up before you submit an application to convert your old site to WordPress.
Do you need to wash your lines? If you really don’t like how the pages look, wash them clean with a bit of detergent you may need a strong detergent, so be sure it’s labeled “preclean”).
A website guide from Google has a list of potential cleanup alternatives to different tools. Most of these have been around for a while, and have come up for use many times, but they are the best that were out there at the time.
You may not have any choice but to scrap an old blog. Ideally, you want to “own” your site as long as possible. Remember that content, and the way it is presented. No one wants to read photos of poop on a blog.
But if you’re stuck, you have a few things to try. First, you can decide to get some professional help. Luckily, there are ways to make money from those old sites. Maybe you can sell old images and post them in a new site? Re-envision a few of those old blogs and take a turn making them valuable.
Maybe you can rent them to others to keep them around, and use them for your own site instead. Think like a farmer – leave the cow alone, but take the milk.
Of course, if you’re older than 55, you may just need to retire your old blogs. It’s the hardest thing to do with WordPress, but doing so preserves your writing from illegal use and hacking.
They may have been hard to delete, but hard to save from a digital copy.