Website Redesign and SEO: A Guide to Avoiding Traffic Loss

Redesigning a website presents opportunities to improve user experience and brand image, but it also carries risks for search engine optimization (SEO). The source materials emphasize the importance of careful planning and execution to avoid losing rankings and traffic during and after a website redesign or migration. Key strategies include setting up a staging website, preserving existing content, implementing 301 redirects for URL changes, and thoroughly auditing both the old and new sites for technical issues.

Setting Up a Staging Website

Before implementing any changes to a live website, the source materials recommend creating a staging website. This allows for safe testing of the new design and functionality without impacting the live site’s performance or SEO. A staging environment can be established as a subdomain (e.g., staging.yourdomain.com) or on a new domain, depending on the hosting provider’s capabilities. The source materials note that most hosting providers offer staging environments.

Crucially, the staging website must be prevented from being indexed by search engines to avoid duplicate content issues. This can be achieved in WordPress by checking the “Discourage search engines from indexing this site” option in Settings > Reading. Alternatively, a robots.txt file can be edited to disallow all search engines access to the staging site using the following code:

User-agent: * Disallow: /

It is important to remove these settings once the new website is live. Additional security measures for the staging site include password protection, and maintaining the staging environment on the same hosting server as the live site to ensure accurate performance testing.

Preserving Existing Site Content

The source materials strongly advise preserving all existing site content during a redesign. Search engines have already indexed this content, and removing or significantly altering it can lead to ranking declines. Content should only be removed if absolutely necessary.

Managing URL Changes with 301 Redirects

If a website redesign involves changes to page URLs, implementing 301 redirects is essential. A 301 redirect informs search engines that a page has permanently moved to a new location. Without 301 redirects, search engines may treat the old URLs as broken links (resulting in 404 errors), which can negatively impact rankings and traffic.

The source materials explain that 301 redirects pass SEO value from the old URL to the new one, ensuring users and search engines are directed to the correct pages. To implement 301 redirects, a list of old and new URLs must be created and then configured on the server. For WordPress or Apache servers, this can be done by adding the following code to the .htaccess file:

Redirect 301 /OLD-PAGE-URL NEW-PAGE-URL

For example:

Redirect 301 /contactus.html https://example.com/contact-us

Technical Audits: Before and After Redesign

Thorough technical audits are critical both before and after a website redesign. The source materials highlight the importance of understanding the existing site’s structure and identifying potential issues. A crawl of the existing site using tools like Screaming Frog can reveal the site’s structure, metadata, and URLs.

The audit should focus on identifying issues such as:

Missing page titles
Duplicate page titles
Page titles outside optimal length (below 200 pixels or over 512 pixels)
Missing or duplicate H1 tags
Missing or duplicate meta descriptions
Meta descriptions outside optimal length (over 923 pixels)
Canonical tags

After the redesign, the audit should verify that no content or metadata has been lost during the migration. Tools like Detailed SEO Extension (a Chrome extension) or site audit tools can be used to check metadata page-by-page. Internal links should also be reviewed to ensure they are functioning correctly and pointing to the new URLs. Failure to address internal links can result in 404 errors or unnecessary 301 redirects.

Indexation and Staging Site Monitoring

The source materials emphasize the importance of monitoring indexation throughout the redesign process. The new site should be live and indexed by search engines, while the staging site should not be indexed. To check indexation, a search can be performed in Google using the site:yourwebsite.com operator. If the staging site appears in search results, it should be reported to developers immediately.

Content Analysis and Site Architecture

The source materials suggest analyzing existing content to identify opportunities for consolidation. If similar pages exist with varying rankings, combining them via a 301 redirect may improve performance. The redesign process also provides an opportunity to review and optimize the website’s architecture, considering which URLs should be featured in the navigation and footer, and whether any URLs should have their slugs updated. Collaboration with leadership and marketing teams is likely necessary during this phase.

Checking for Broken Links

Broken internal links and missing pages can harm SEO. The source materials recommend using tools like Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, or Google Search Console to scan the site for broken links and fix them before launching the new website.

Conclusion

Website redesigns require careful attention to SEO to avoid traffic loss and maintain search engine rankings. The source materials consistently emphasize the importance of planning, testing, and auditing throughout the process. Key steps include creating a staging website, preserving existing content, implementing 301 redirects for URL changes, and conducting thorough technical audits. By following these guidelines, businesses can minimize the risks associated with a website redesign and ensure a smooth transition for both users and search engines.