Website migrations are among the most challenging aspects of technical SEO. Despite careful planning and thorough preparation, there can always be unexpected problems during the migration process. I’ve prepared a dedicated checklist that you can use to minimize these issues in your upcoming project.
This technical SEO checklist compiles my years of migration experience and I divided it into three main phases: Pre-Migration, Migration, and Post-Migration. Each of these phases is broken down into smaller, manageable sections for better understanding.
Pre-Migration Phase
Creating a Project Plan
At the beginning of every migration, focus on creating a detailed project plan that includes a roadmap and financial budget for external resources or tools. The plan must address specific website requirements and project details while identifying potential risks.
Secure early access to all necessary tools. This includes Google Search Console, Google Analytics, Bing Webmaster Tools, and any other monitoring or analytics platforms currently used by the website.
Analyzing the Current State
The first technical step should be analyzing the current state of your website. Analyzing the existing website requires a full crawl without page limitations. I use Screaming Frog SEO Spider for this purpose. This detailed crawl serves two critical functions:
- Establishing a baseline for post-migration comparison and
- Developing insights about the website’s structure and current issues
I perform this crawl typically at least 1-2 weeks beforehand, allowing sufficient time to crawl large websites and adjust plans based on discovered issues. Additionally, maintain consistent crawler settings throughout the process to ensure reliable comparative data.
Preparing for Migration
To complete the preparation phase, identify top-performing pages and high-traffic pages for close monitoring after migration. Also create a detailed mapping of old and new URLs that will require redirects, avoiding redirect chains whenever possible.
If DNS changes are planned, ensure the infrastructure team lowers the expiration time (TTL) of related records at least two weeks before migration. When DNS hosting will change, it should be made before the actual website migration.
Verifying the New Website on Staging
For migrations involving domain or subdomain changes, run the new website directly on the new domain when possible. For CMS migrations, deploy the new website on a staging subdomain.
Once staging is running with the new website, immediately block crawling via robots.txt to prevent indexing.
After deploying the final version of the website on staging with all content that will be live on migration day, thoroughly test the entire website. Verify that all forms work properly, and for eCommerce websites, test the complete purchasing process. Everything must function perfectly.
Don’t forget to migrate essential elements including meta titles, descriptions, and canonicals. Ideally, update all internal links to point to new URLs during this phase to avoid redirects and redirect chains.
From an SEO perspective, carefully check meta titles, descriptions, and canonicals. Verify all sitemaps, especially XML sitemaps, and prepare a validated final version of robots.txt for release with the new website.
Based on the URL mapping, check for 404 errors and confirm all redirects work properly. Double-check URLs used in paid advertising to ensure they won’t return 404 errors after launch.
Also validate content structure and structured data for any bugs.
Mobile optimization requires special attention since search engine crawlers typically visit websites as smartphones. Ensure everything displays correctly and all intended content is visible on mobile devices.
At this stage, test most important pages with Google PageSpeed Insights or Chrome DevTools, and optionally DebugBear to identify technical SEO or performance issues, including Core Web Vitals.
Once everything is verified and working properly, you should always conduct one final audit to confirm everything is implemented correctly.
Migration Phase
Launching the New Website
A few days before migration, I hold a kickoff meeting with all stakeholders to ensure everyone understands their tasks and responsibilities. For at least the first week after migration, the DevOps/infrastructure team and development team must be ready to address any issues promptly.
Just Before Launch
A few hours before migration, freeze the old production environment, migrate the latest content and changes made after the last content migration, and temporarily stop all paid traffic.
Right before migration, perform a final backup of the old production environment in case a rollback is needed if something unexpected occurs.
Once the migration is ready, apply the production robots.txt file that allows the website to be crawled and indexed. This also applies to the noindex tag if it was used. Replace all staging URLs with production URLs in the database.
At this stage, I typically test the website one more time by changing the local hosts file to point to the new server instead of the old one. Once everything works as expected, including redirects, sitemaps, and robots.txt, I revert the local hosts file. This step is beneficial but not always possible, especially when websites are on the same server.
Going Live
Since everything is ready, release the new website by changing DNS records to point to the new server or swapping folders, depending on the migration type and server setup.
Immediately after release or after DNS records are updated and recognized, clear all cache, especially CDN, and start testing everything again. Focus primarily on redirects, sitemaps, and robots.txt, then move on to overall website functionality.
Now it’s time to update website URLs in all tools if the URL changed with this migration, especially in Google Search Console, and resubmit new sitemaps. Double-check all other tools and don’t forget about annotations in tools like Google Analytics.
Post-Launch Monitoring and Testing
Set up DebugBear for real user monitoring of Core Web Vitals for at least one month after release. Also configure Ahrefs for daily or continuous monitoring for at least one month.
On migration day, encourage as many internal team members as possible to test the website to ensure everything functions properly and report issues immediately for quick resolution.
Post-Migration Phase
Analyzing the New Website
Once the website is fully migrated, I conduct a complete post-migration audit using the same configuration as the initial audit performed on the old website.
For safety, I typically run this audit 2-3 hours after migration to ensure testing with freshly generated cache in the CDN or on the server. While the audit can be done immediately, strongly monitor server performance to prevent outages if your server lacks sufficient capacity.
Fix all critical issues identified during this audit immediately. Less urgent issues can be scheduled for later resolution.
Monitoring the New Website
Post-migration monitoring is a crucial part of website migration. I focus on monitoring rankings in Ahrefs and tracking crawl issues, page problems, and performance in Google Search Console. This monitoring should continue for at least one month, but ideally for 3-6 months depending on the website.
Also monitor log files for at least 3-7 days for errors, especially 404 errors. Don’t forget to monitor other logs such as PHP errors and overall server performance.
Final Checks and Tests
Before considering the website migration successfully completed, check all redirects once more to ensure they’re working properly. Also verify that all external systems and integrations are functioning correctly and receiving the expected data.
In this phase, double-check backlinks to the website to ensure they aren’t pointing to 404 pages. If they are, find suitable pages where the old URLs can be redirected.
Also update all links to the website to point to correct URLs without redirects.
Final Thoughts
Website migrations require careful planning, meticulous execution, and thorough monitoring. By following this detailed checklist, you can successfully manage migrations while minimizing risks and maintaining business and SEO performance.
The key to success lies in thorough preparation, detailed testing at every stage, and vigilant post-migration monitoring. While each migration presents unique challenges, this systematic approach I’ve developed provides a solid foundation for navigating even the most complex website transitions.
Remember that patience is essential during the post-migration phase, as search engines need time to recognize and adapt to changes. In my experience, consistent monitoring and quick issue resolution during the first few months will ensure your migration achieves its intended goals while preserving your website’s search engine visibility.