Business owners and marketers periodically face the need for site migration. This is a long and complex process that is frightening in its scale. But it is greatly simplified if you have a detailed plan and consult with SEO specialists.
The main reasons for site migration
Site migration is the process of making changes to a site’s layout, technology, structure, content, design, or user interface. There are several basic types of site migration. Some of them are easier to implement, others are quite complex, but all of them require the mandatory involvement of an SEO specialist.
Simple types of migrations
The main reasons for such migrations are switching from HTTP to HTTPS or changing the site’s domain name. They do not foresee significant changes in the appearance of the site, its structure and functionality. Therefore, they usually pass quickly and require less control and involvement.
These types of migration are considered simple, because they involve making the same type of changes using code. In one case, all URLs change from HTTP to HTTPS, in the other case, all pages change their names when the domain changes. Therefore, it is much more difficult to make a mistake when setting up the binding of pages.
But this is still migration, which involves the same risks as in more complex cases. Therefore, it is necessary to involve an SEO specialist who will check the correctness of the URL using his methods. It will check whether everything moved correctly and whether there were no software errors.
Transition from HTTP to HTTPS
This type of migration is currently quite rare, as HTTPS encryption became one of the Google ranking factors back in 2014. As of July 2018, popular browsers such as Chrome, Mozilla, and Safari mark all HTTP sites as unsafe.
Newly created sites start with HTTPS by default, but older sites that haven’t been touched for a long time may need this action.
Change of domain name
There are a number of reasons for changing a website’s domain name.
- The company changed its name. This usually happens after rebranding.
- Domain name is hard to remember. Maybe it has too many hyphens and numbers, or it’s long and complicated. The domain name of the site must pass the “radio test”. If someone hears a domain name on the radio without seeing it in print, they should understand its spelling and be able to get to the site.
- The domain extension needs to be changed. Maybe you didn’t have enough budget for a .com domain name at first, but now you have this opportunity. Or vice versa, the company purchased the domain .org, but it turned out that in this niche it is better to use .tech or .net.
Simple types of migrations require setting up 301 redirects and “gluing” old and new pages, and therefore specialist attention and constant monitoring of the migration process.
Complex types of migrations
They require a greater amount of effort to move, because the appearance of the site, its structure and functionality are changing.
With complex types of migration, page URLs change completely unpredictably. The directory structure may be different, page names will be generated differently, etc.
The difficulty is that in order to set up redirects, you need to compare the old and new pages. If the site has 100,000 pages, you will need a programmer to write a special script for automatic or semi-automatic comparison. But it also happens that old pages are named manually, without a certain structure of formation. It can be very difficult to separate and match them using code, so it has to be done manually.
Redesign of the site
A site redesign involves a significant modernization of the site to improve the user experience. On average, companies tend to redesign every three years. It allows you to update the appearance, navigation, add new functions and opportunities to the site.
Moving to a new site
When a site needs significant changes in design, structure and functionality, it is sometimes cheaper to create a completely new site instead of fixing the old one.
Moving from a site-builder to a CMS
Site designers often have weak functionality, a small selection of designs and limited management.
Transition to a new CMS
As the business grows, the old engine may no longer meet its needs. Example:
- the site cannot cope with large volumes of traffic and its sudden surges;
- the company loses customers due to the fact that users are not comfortable or do not understand how to find and purchase products;
- on the old CMS, it is difficult to connect the necessary advertising tools and systems to the site;
- the site has limited functionality, but you want to use modern marketing tools to increase sales.
Risks of redesigning and moving to a new CMS
A complex migration directly affects SEO, because after the move Google has to re-index the entire site again. Therefore, in the short term, the amount of organic traffic will most likely decrease. However, in the long run, migration can improve page positions, because Google prefers fast and user-friendly sites.
In order not to have large losses in traffic, you need to involve SEO specialists when planning the migration . Which have to perform three main tasks:
- Transfer all content to the site.
- Save reference mass.
- Match the old and new URLs.
The success of the migration directly depends on the professionalism of the team involved in it. There is a risk that inexperienced professionals will fail to set up important 301 redirects or “lose” important pages along with link mass and traffic. Also, they may not transfer texts and meta tags to new addresses.
All this will lead to the following problems:
- Reduction of site ranking in organic search.
- Reducing the authority of the site.
- Difficulties with tracking analytics, mobile responsiveness and page speed.
But if you correctly configure the necessary redirects, transfer content and meta tags, there should be no problems.
Read also what are the SEO requirements at the site development stage.
How to make a complex migration successful
There are four critical components to a successful migration.
- Step-by-step planning. Having a detailed plan will help make the process more organized and help avoid a negative impact on SEO.
- Thorough preparation for migration. It is necessary to select and prepare data in the correct format for transmission in advance.
- Clearly written and implemented TOR. A specification is an important document that outlines the scope, timing and cost of a project between two parties, usually the customer and the supplier. Its purpose is to ensure that all parties have a common understanding of the expectations and responsibilities associated with the project.
- Coordinated teamwork. During the migration of the site, a large number of specialists are involved. They have to communicate with each other and try to jointly achieve the business goal in the most effective way.
Main stages of site migration
Site migration is divided into three main steps.
Step 1. Preparation for migration
This is the most time-consuming part of the work. It is important to make a detailed plan and prepare content for the move. This stage can be divided into several parts.
- Planning and scope of work. At this stage, you need to create a work plan with deadlines, form teams and provide team members with all the necessary data for work.
- Saving information from the old site. It is necessary to save the main sources of traffic from the old site so that they can be transferred to the new one without loss.
- Promotion during development. New tools need to be created to attract traffic and minimize losses during migration.
- Final testing, comparison of sites and preparation for release. Test when all the main work is done and only minor refinements remain.
Step 2. The actual migration
The main goal of the migration is to move the site and ensure the smooth operation of most pages and the overall functionality of the site.
It will pass smoothly if you prepare well for it. The main thing is to have a coordinated team and a clear plan. Developers, content managers and SEO specialists must communicate during all stages of the migration.
Step 3. Post-migration
The goal of this step is to get the site up and running with all working pages, collect complete analytics data, and restore traffic to pre-migration levels.
After a successful migration, you need to wait for the full recovery of traffic. During this time, the team should also set up analytics, identify problem pages and work on fixing or improving them.
Site migration team
I will tell you in a little more detail about the specialists who make up the site migration team. They are obliged to cooperate closely in order to achieve common goals. Each of them has its own area of responsibility.
- A project manager is a person who synchronizes the work of the team and monitors the achievement of the main goal of the migration, i.e. compliance with the customer’s requirements. He is a liaison with the rest of the team.
- The developer or development team is responsible for the functionality of the website and compliance with the technical requirements provided by the client. An element of cooperation between SEO specialists and developers is also important. Site structure is important for attracting traffic, especially when dealing with multilingual sites. SEO specialists will help with optimization, as well as the selection and creation of multi-regional or multilingual functionality.
- The SEO specialist is responsible for making the site SEO-friendly, as well as for the correct comparison of the old and new sites. When the site moves to a new CMS system, all previous developments are actually destroyed. It is worth keeping the best of them and at least partially transferring them.
- The content manager is responsible for content on the site, including transferring content from the old site.
- The designer is responsible for the appearance of the site. The design team also needs SEO recommendations, and it is desirable to provide them at the stage of page development in order to make changes in time. Often, SEO is taken into account too late in the process of developing a page, and you have to either redo the page from scratch, or lose the opportunity to get additional traffic.
If your site needs migration, fill out an application to get help from Yakovenko Agency’s specialists.
Conclusions
- Business owners and marketers periodically face the need for site migration.
- Possible reasons for migration: transition from HTTP to HTTPS, rebranding, change of CMS system or domain name.
- A successful migration requires careful planning, thorough preparation, clearly written and implemented TOR, and coordinated teamwork.
- SEO specialists should be involved in the migration process. They need to migrate all site content, maintain link mass, and map old and new URLs.
- Site migration is divided into three main stages: preparation, migration and post-migration.
- The website migration team consists of a developer, SEO specialist, content manager, designer and project manager.
