Website Migration SEO Checklist
- Pre Migration
- Launch Day
- Post Migration
- Is the migration worth it?
- Does the website have established search engine traffic?
- Are there high traffic pages that may be affected?
- How would this migration affect the back link profile of the website?
- What are the SEO benefits after the migration?
- What are the SEO risks from this migration?
- Will there be code/architecture changes caused by the migration?
- Etc.
- Identify growth opportunities and risks
- Set realistic objectives and goals
- Prepare the project plan
- Review prototypes and wireframes (if there are changes)
- Purchase and setup SSL for new domain (if domain is changing, or SSL migration is your goal)
- Setup hosting for the new domain (if different from current domain)
- Prepare the SEO specifications (there are always SEO implications, make sure to cover all the grounds)
- Identify priority pages (you need to make sure your top traffic pages are safe)
- Benchmark analytics/SEO traffic/backlinks
- Review staging environment setup (if you have one)
- Review page templates (if there are changes)
- Review content
- Review all internal links
- Review technical SEO
- Crawl time issues
- Cloaking checks
- Javascript crawling
- Mobile optimization
- Structured data
- Pagination(s) / prev/next meta tags
- 404 pages
- Sitemap files
- Hreflang (if any)
- Site speed checks
- Check redirects
- Review analytics setup
- Generate a full content inventory
- CDN Configuration Preparation
- Ads & 3rd-Party Extension Preparation
- Google Tag Manager
- Adobe Analytics
- Google Analytics
- Facebook Pixel
- Etc.
- Add new domain to Google search console and verify
- Spot check search engine crawling
- Old URL redirects
- New URLs
- Internal links
- Robots.txt
- Server responses
- Canonical tags
- Noindex/indexes
- Cloaking checks
- Google Search Console
- Request indexing of the new site
- Carry out site change in search console
- Spot check URLs for crawling
- Check and update URL parameters
- Submit and test sitemap XML files
- Configure URL parameters
- Crawl using bots
- Create a new content inventory
- Compare new inventory to old inventory
- Check to make sure legacy redirects were not lost
- Check to ensure no long redirect chains
- Compare old and new meta data comparison
- Titles
- Descriptions
- Headings
- OG tags
- Etc.
- Update all social media links
- Update all Ads & 3rd-Party Extensions
- Google Tag Manager
- Adobe Analytics
- Google Analytics
- Facebook Pixel
- Etc.
- Check for any third party software and update the domains
- Regularly check the index coverage report
- Monitor sitemap indexation levels
- Keep an eye on crawl stats reports
- Download and review crawl errors
- Fix any errors ASAP
- Look out for mobile usability issues
- Track top keywords daily
- Keep an eye on performance reports
- Mobile speed
- Desktop speed
- Bounce rate
- Conversion report
- Update all social media links
- Update all Ads & 3rd-Party Extensions
- Google Tag Manager
- Adobe Analytics
- Google Analytics
- Facebook Pixel
- Etc.
- Check for any third party software and update the domains
Table of Contents
Checklist for Website Migration
Any website migration project comes with it’s challenges and risks, especially with search engine optimization. I have compiled this checklist to make it easier for SEO professionals to prepare for a website migration.
Whether you are migrating from HTTP to HTTPS, non-www to www (or vice versa) or to a completely new domain, I hope this list will come in handy.
Website Migration Process
When someone tells me about website migration, I prepare for 3 stages:
These are the stages and allow the SEO specialist to prepare for it properly.