Goodbye Netlify, Hello Ghost: My Blog's New Home

In October 2021, I published my first blog post on Medium: up on Netlify using

Fast forward to recently, when I accidentally checked Google Analytics and discovered my forgotten

Why Ghost? Evaluating My Options

When I decided it was time to move on from my clunky old setup, I started exploring different options. I wanted something that would make blogging easier and more enjoyable, so I looked into a few alternatives:

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   Notion as CMS : Tools like , or or or . It had everything I was looking for—sleek design, easy setup, and features like built-in subscriptions that just made sense. Plus, did I mention their animated admin logo? Love at first sight.
   
   
   

   
   
   
   How I Migrated My Blog to Ghost
   

   
   
   

   If you’re considering switching your blog to Ghost, here’s exactly how I did it after setting up my account:

   
   
   

   
   
   
   1. Exporting My Articles
   

   
   
   

   The first step was moving my content to Ghost. I came across . Once I uploaded the export into Ghost, everything worked smoothly—well, almost. I had to manually fix the links to my GitHub Gists, but overall it was a straightforward process.

   
   
   

   
   
   
   2. Choosing a Theme
   

   
   
   

   Ghost offers a variety of free and paid themes to choose from. For now, I’ve settled on the simple ) and got a 2-week free trial to test everything out.

   
   
   

   
   
   
   4. Adding Google Analytics
   

   
   
   

   If you had Google Analytics set up on your previous site or want to add it to your new blog, you’ll need to grab your

   
   
   

   
   
   
   5. Setting Up Redirects
   

   
   
   

   After moving my blog to Ghost the links to my posts changed, which meant anyone finding my content through Google searches was landing on a 404 page. To fix this, I needed to redirect the old URLs to their new locations. Ghost’s Lab feature makes this easy by allowing you to upload a redirects.json file. Here’s an example:
   
   

   
   
   
   
   

   CODE Kopieren

   [
   
       {
   
           "from": "/posts/kafka_connect_to_aws_s3_pipeline/",
   
           "to": "/from-kafka-to-amazon-s3-partitioning-outputs-36304a2ab852/",
   
           "permanent": true
   
       }
   
   ]
   
   
   
   

   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

   (because it’s more affordable than Zapier or n8n) to automatically post to Medium and Dev.to.

   
   
   

   For Dev.to it turned out to be relatively straightforward. Although I couldn’t find any integration in Make or Zapier, Ghost’s custom RSS feature made it easy. I simply created a feed that Dev.to can pull from. Now, whenever I publish a new post on Ghost, it shows up as a draft on Dev.to automatically—no extra effort on my part.

   
   
   

   ). So, for now, I still have to copy posts manually to Medium. It’s not ideal, but at least it keeps everything consistent across platforms.

   
   
   

   
   
   
   7. Workflow and Tools
   

   
   
   

   With my new setup blogging finally feels organized and (dare I say) enjoyable. Here’s how my workflow looks now:

   
   
   
   
   
   • 
     Notion: I use a Notion database with a simple Kanban dashboard to organize my ideas, notes, and drafts. It helps me track each post’s progress from concept to publication.
   
   
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     Ghost Editor: I draft and write my posts here—it’s simple, clean, and easy to use.
   
   
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     ChatGPT: Once the draft is ready I run it through ChatGPT for proofreading. Let’s face it, as a non-native English speaker, I’d rather catch my grammar mistakes before my readers do.
   
   
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     Dev.to: Thanks to the RSS feed integration, my pulished posts magically appear as drafts on Dev.to.
   
   
   • 
     Medium: even though it’s not as active as it used to be, I still have a soft spot for it. Sadly, there’s no automation here, so I copy posts over manually.
   
   
   
   
   

   
   
   
   What’s Next?
   

   
   
   

   Switching to Ghost felt like letting go of the unspoken pressure every technical blogger faces—the idea that your blog isn’t “real” unless it’s self-made and self-hosted. It’s like the eternal debate between using the Git CLI or a Git GUI: are you trying to get things done efficiently, or is your goal to suffer for eternity? For me the choice was clear—I just wanted to write, not spend my life debugging my own blog.

   
   
   

   If you’ve been stuck with an outdated or frustrating blog setup like I was, consider giving Ghost a try. It might just breathe new life into your content. And hey, if you need a push to start blogging again, this is it. 😊

   
   
   
   
   
   

   Got a question about Ghost or blogging tools? Drop it in the comments — I’d love to hear your thoughts! And if you’re curious about my blog, check it out at datobra.com. Who knows, you might even find something useful there.

   Vollständiger Original-Bericht

   Ausführliche Details, Code-Beispiele & Hersteller-Stellungnahme auf dev.to.

   ↗ Original-Artikel auf dev.to lesen