Migrating a website (Website Migrations) can be quite complex and challenging. If you don’t have enough expertise, errors in the website data can easily occur immediately, which can turn into a troublesome problem that is difficult to resolve. Whether it’s 404 Errors appearing on pages, a drop in the website’s SEO ranking, or important content pages becoming inaccessible, database migration is still necessary when there are policies to improve database efficiency.
Tools like Screaming Frog are excellent helpers to use to gather information on website pages and then use that information to verify the complete and accurate website migration. Therefore, this article provides a 7-point checklist to prepare for website migration.
1. Don’t Forget to Back Up Your Data
Backing up your website data is crucial for website migration. If something goes wrong, at least you can restore the backed-up data and quickly resolve the issue, minimizing the impact on subsequent steps. Therefore, before starting the website migration, always remember to back up your data first. Then, create a staging site to support website migration testing.
2. Check Your SEO Structure
One of the problems of migrating a website is often a drop in SEO rankings, regardless of the cause. Remember to check the following list to ensure that the website migration has no errors affecting SEO rankings.
These are just some examples. If you’re not confident about SEO, consult an SEO Specialist to reduce the complexity that may follow.
3. Try a Benchmark Test
Website benchmark results can provide the best technical perspective. You can refer to the basic information from:
- Page Load Speed
- Page Indexing Rates
- Crawl Errors
- Keyword Ranking
This step can be repeated several times before the website migration to monitor for any errors, allowing you to address them more precisely.
4. Pay Attention to Key Website Pages
Don’t forget to closely monitor the key website pages – the “bread and butter” – and prioritize these pages as the first choice for checking for any errors. Even if the website has more than 1,000 pages, always prioritize the pages that have the greatest impact on the website.
5. Check the Website
It’s good to thoroughly check the website to avoid serious problems. In the initial website verification step, you can check the following:
- Check Redirects for accuracy and completeness
- Check Internal Links
- Check Server Response Times
- Check Noindex tags for usage
6. Confirm Website URL with Search Console or Webmaster Tools
If you change the website domain, remember to add the new information to Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools to confirm the change of the website address. Then, if you want search engines to become familiar with the website, create an XML sitemap and robots.txt using an SEO tool like Screaming Frog and submit them to Google Search Console to make it easier for Google to access our website pages.
7. Usability Testing
To maintain the best possible website ranking, it is necessary to test to find indicators of how smoothly the website can be used. Testing should support all platforms, both mobile devices and desktops, with features to check such as live chat, payment systems, and navigation systems.
Of course, the website migration process requires knowledge and understanding and time to operate properly. Some steps may require quite technical knowledge, but with the 7 checklists above provided by Relevant Audiene in this instance, it can be considered a good foundation for preparing for website migration.
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Relevant Audience is a company providing services as a Digital Performance Marketing Agency, with the main goal of providing digital marketing services to businesses to reach target audiences looking for products or services at the right time, place, and device through various online channels. Our services cover Search Marketing, Social Media Ads, Search Ads, and SEO (Search Engine Optimization) to Influencer Marketing and are also part of the Google Partners program.
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