Website Migration SEO

Why Migrations Go Wrong

Website migrations are one of the highest-risk events in organic search. A poorly executed migration can wipe out years of accumulated rankings in a matter of days — and Google's recovery process is slow and unpredictable. Most migration traffic losses are entirely preventable with the right preparation.

The most common causes of post-migration traffic loss: missing or incorrect redirects, canonicals pointing to old URLs, updated sitemaps not submitted, internal links not updated, and page metadata not transferred correctly. I have built a migration process that systematically prevents all of these errors — covering every stage from pre-launch preparation to post-launch monitoring.

Types of Migration I Handle

• Domain migration — moving to a new domain while preserving rankings and backlink equity
• HTTP to HTTPS — securing your site without breaking redirect chains or losing link signals
• CMS replatform — moving from one CMS to another (WordPress, Shopify, Webflow, custom) with full URL mapping
• Subdomain to root domain — consolidating blog or shop subdomains for SEO benefit
• Full redesign — restructuring URL architecture, navigation, or content hierarchy
• International expansion — adding hreflang, ccTLD or subdirectory structure for new markets

Phase 1 — Pre-Migration Audit

Before any migration begins, I build a complete picture of your current SEO state — what rankings exist, which URLs carry the most value, and what cannot afford to break. This phase produces the migration's source of truth:

• Full crawl of all indexable URLs on the current site
• GSC ranking and impressions export for every URL
• Backlink export — identifying URLs with the most inbound link equity
• Traffic segmentation by page type (category, product, blog, landing page)
• Identification of all canonicals, hreflangs, and meta directives in place

Phase 2 — Redirect Mapping

The redirect map is the most critical deliverable of any migration. I produce a complete, validated mapping of every current URL to its new destination — prioritised by SEO value, with coverage across 100% of indexed pages:

• Old URL → New URL mapping for every indexed page
• 301 redirect implementation file in the correct format for your server/CMS
• Redirect chain detection and resolution (no multi-hop redirects)
• Redirect loop detection
• Coverage report — confirming every high-value page has a destination

Phase 3 — Pre-Launch Checklist

Before the new site goes live, I run a staged validation on the staging environment:

• Crawl of staging URLs to verify page metadata, canonical tags, and heading structure
• Schema markup validation on key page templates
• Internal link audit — ensuring all internal links use new URLs (not old, relying on redirects)
• Sitemap validation — correct URLs, no noindex pages, correct lastmod dates
• Robots.txt check — staging environment blocked, production environment correctly configured
• GSC and GA4 verified on new domain/configuration

Phase 4 — Post-Launch Monitoring

The 30 days after launch are critical. I monitor closely for issues that only appear once Google starts re-crawling:

• Daily GSC coverage report monitoring for unexpected drops in indexed pages
• Crawl error tracking — 404s, redirect errors, server errors
• Ranking comparison — old vs. new domain performance
• Core Web Vitals monitoring on new environment
• Weekly status reports for the first month post-launch
• GSC change of address tool submission (for domain migrations)