Summary: A new design can lift conversions — or wipe out years of search traffic if handled carelessly. Follow this redesign checklist to keep your rankings intact.
Website redesigns often fail on one point: they change URLs, remove content or break technical elements that search engines relied on. Traffic drops, enquiries fall and the new design gets blamed.
Before you start
- Crawl the current site to list every URL, title and meta description.
- Export top pages from Search Console and Analytics.
- Note which pages bring enquiries.
- Record current rankings for important keywords.
During the redesign
- Keep URLs the same where possible.
- Where URLs must change, map every old URL to the most relevant new one.
- Preserve valuable content; improve it rather than deleting it.
- Keep titles, headings and internal links meaningful.
- Carry over structured data.
At launch
- Implement 301 redirects for all changed URLs.
- Update the XML sitemap and submit it.
- Check robots.txt and remove any "noindex" left from the staging site.
- Test forms, tracking codes and WhatsApp buttons.
After launch
Monitor Search Console for crawl errors, indexing issues and traffic changes daily for the first few weeks. Fix broken links and missing redirects quickly.
FAQs
Will rankings dip temporarily?
Small fluctuations are common; careful migrations usually recover quickly.
Can we change domain at the same time?
It is possible but adds risk. Ideally do one major change at a time.
Should we remove old blog posts?
Only if they are irrelevant and have no traffic or links. Otherwise update and keep them.
