Businesses often worry about the potential impact of website redesign on their search rankings and organic traffic. In this guide, we'll explain how to redesign a website and maintain your good SEO stats.
In brief:
5 Key Steps for an SEO-Friendly Website Redesign
When redesigning your website, prioritize SEO to maintain or improve your search engine performance.
1. Identify SEO Goals and Involve Your SEO Team
Begin by setting clear SEO goals aligned with your redesign objectives. Involve your SEO team from the start, collaborating with key stakeholders, including developers and marketers, to develop effective enterprise SEO strategies. This cooperation helps preserve URL structures and implement 301 redirects, preventing potential SEO issues.
2. Analyze Your Current Website Performance and Top Content
Conduct an SEO audit to assess current performance metrics such as:
Understanding these metrics and how they impact website indexing helps you preserve important pages and find opportunities for improvement for a smooth transition.
3. Plan Your New Site Architecture and URL Structure
Ensure your new structure supports a logical hierarchy and optimized navigation. Maintaining consistent, keyword-rich URLs helps users and search engines understand your site's organization.
4. Set Up 301 Redirects for Changing URLs
When URLs change during a redesign, setting up 301 redirects preserves your site's link equity and guides search engines to the new structure. A detailed redirect map is essential for preserving SEO during migration, so that all old URLs point to their new counterparts and prevent loss of rankings and traffic.
5. Optimize Existing Content and On-Page Elements
Optimize existing content and on-page SEO elements by keeping high-performing content and updating or combining low-performing pages. Focus on optimizing:
and other SEO visibility techniques to improve search visibility.
Best Practices for SEO Success During Redesign
Attaining SEO success during a website redesign involves several steps and effective redesign strategies.
Improve Site Speed and Mobile-Friendliness
Start by improving site speed, security, and mobile-friendliness. Fast-loading pages are important for user satisfaction and search engine rankings. According to research by Akamai, a 100-millisecond delay in website load time can decrease conversion rates by 7% (Akamai).
Optimize images, reduce HTTP requests, and use efficient coding practices to fix slow loading times. Additionally, securing your site with HTTPS can improve SEO with HTTPS and build user trust.
Since mobile traffic now exceeds desktop—accounting for over 54% of global website traffic in 2021 (Statista)—search engines prioritize mobile-friendly sites. Following a responsive design checklist can help you optimize your site's performance on all devices. Given the shift towards mobile usage, it's vital to prioritize mobile optimization. Adopting a mobile-first indexing guide can help ensure your site meets search engine expectations.
Update Your XML Sitemap
After your redesign, a new sitemap helps search engines index your updated pages correctly. Submitting it to major search engines makes sure they know about the changes and help maintain visibility and rankings.
Monitor Website Performance Post-Launch
After launching, it's important to monitor your website's performance. Use analytics tools to track rankings, traffic, and any crawl errors. This allows you to quickly address issues that could harm your SEO.
Common SEO Pitfalls to Avoid During Website Redesign
When redesigning your website, avoid these common SEO mistakes that can harm your search engine performance.
Preserve Link Equity and Valuable Content
One big risk is not preserving link equity and valuable content. Proper 301 redirects are critical when URLs change to ensure the existing SEO value transfers to the new site structure. Avoid removing important content, especially pages that bring significant traffic or conversions.
Conduct a Thorough SEO Audit
Use SEO crawling tools to analyze your website and create a list of URLs and on-page elements. This analysis helps identify important pages for SEO success that should be preserved or redirected in the new design.
Provide Proper Analytics Tracking
Make sure that analytics tracking is in place. During a redesign, it's easy to forget to transfer your analytics setup, which can lead to data loss. Confirming that analytics tracking is properly configured on the new site allows you to monitor performance and address issues quickly after launch.
Ways to Preserve SEO Value During a Website Transition
Preserving SEO value during a website transition is another step to maintain search engine rankings.
Map Out Redirects for Removed or Consolidated Pages
A key step is mapping out redirects for any removed or consolidated pages. Implementing 301 redirects helps preserve link equity and guides users to new page locations, avoiding "404 Page Not Found" errors.
Create a Comprehensive URL Log
Start by creating a detailed log of current URLs and their new counterparts. This makes sure every old URL has a corresponding new destination, maintaining your site's SEO authority.
Monitor Redirects Post-Launch
Careful planning and regular monitoring of these redirects after launch are essential to catch any missed links and fix them quickly.
Takeaways
Redesigning your website while protecting your SEO equity is a complex task, but with careful planning and execution, it can lead to better search visibility and user engagement.
See the Webstacks difference: Schedule a brief discovery call today. Discover how we can transform your website into a high-performance, scalable digital solution tailored to your needs. Visit Webstacksto get started.
