SEO Migration Checklist: 10 Steps for Success

Whether you are rebranding, switching platforms (Old Joomla website to WordPress), revamping your content management system (CMS), merging with another company, website migration is an important step for any business.

Just like moving to a new home is a major life event that involves careful planning and meticulous attention to ensure that nothing valuable is left behind. Similarly, in the digital scene, the stakes are just as high with potential traffic loss, loss of domain authority or data gaps.

You really don’t want to leave anything behind…

Picture this. You have large furniture as well as small family heirlooms that must all be safely transported to your new home in one piece. SEO migration is quite similar, it involves moving a website from one domain to another adjusting its structure or updating its content while maintaining its search engine rankings and performance. In both scenarios, leaving behind something valuable can lead to unnecessary costs and headache!

Planning Your SEO Migration

Before embarking on the migration, a thorough planning is essential. Here are the 10 steps that covers the most essentials parts of a successful migration:

1. Declutter before migration
   First, you need to check everything you have at your current website and decide which pages you want to keep, which ones should just redirect visitors to the new site, and which ones you can get rid of. This helps you spot any mistakes so you can fix them before moving. That way, you won’t bring any problems to your new website.
2. URL Mapping
   Mapping old URLs to new ones is similar to deciding where each piece of furniture will go where in your new home. This step is crucial to prevent any loss in traffic.
3. Technical Audit
   A full technical audit of the new website ensures there are no issues that could lead to SEO problems post-migration. Before going live, thoroughly test the new site in a staging environment. Check for broken links, missing content, layout issues, and functionality of forms and scripts.
4. Set up Metrics
   Make sure you don’t lose track of your analytics when your new website goes live. Check your analytics tracking before you move to the new site.
5. Backup: Always have a full backup. This ensures you can restore your old site if anything goes wrong.
6. Redirects: Implementing redirects is like forwarding your mail to your new address. It ensures that visitors and search engines are directed to the correct pages.
7. Internal and external linking: Check that all internal links point to the correct pages on the migrated site and that external links are still operational.
8. Monitoring: Just as you would keep an eye out for any lost or damaged items during a physical move, monitoring for 404 errors is crucial.
9. SEO Health: Once the migration is successfully completed, the focus shifts to settling in, conduct a full SEO health check to ensure everything is running as expected
10. Performance Monitoring: Continue to monitor site performance and user engagement, adjusting as necessary, to ensure the new site lives up to its potential.

Home, Sweet (New) Home

With the right preparation, SEO migration doesn’t have to be daunting. Remember, when you migrate with professional help, your digital valuables are safe, and you can look forward to the excitement of settling into a new domain.

Why hire a SEO Data Migration expert?

When it comes to migrations, there’s no such thing as being too careful. Every single detail accounted plays a significant role into the process. Much like making sure that all your belongings are properly labelled and inventoried before a house move the SEO Data Migration experts will help you not only prepare for the migration but also ensure that the collection of data is maintained throughout the process.