Website migrations
A site migration or domain migration planned around the search traffic you already have.
A retailer is changing its name and its domain in the same month. A marketing lead has a new site arriving from an agency in 8 weeks, and nobody has listed which pages bring the traffic.
Search engines have to relearn a site when its platform or domain changes, and rankings can move while they do. This service is the SEO side of a site migration or domain migration. It measures what's at risk before anything moves and maps what has to carry across. Then it checks the new site on staging and tests the old URLs on switchover day, alongside whoever is designing and building the new site.
I run migrations as projects, with a sequence and a sign-off for each stage. The most recent was a retailer's rebrand, with a new domain and a new store. On switchover day, 600+ old URLs all redirected to the new site.
Which situation sounds like yours?
Replatform
You're moving to a new platform
Products, pages, posts and redirects have to arrive intact. I reconcile the content inventory on the new site before switchover.
Rebrand
You're changing the brand name or the domain
Searches for the old name tend to fall for a while after a rebrand. I measure how much traffic depends on the name and forecast the dip before the domain migration. Redirect mapping covers the rest.
Redesign
An agency is building the new site and you want search in the brief
Keyword research and page structure come before design. I write the requirements for the build team and check them on the staging site, the private copy of the new site before launch.
Tracking
Your ads and product feeds have to keep working through the move
Conversion tracking is specified before the build. Product feeds and ad accounts are updated to the new domain at switchover.
What the work covers
Pre-migration benchmark and forecast
Traffic split into brand and non-brand search, with the landing pages that carry each. A forecast of the dip to expect in the first months, and the actions that keep it at the low end.
Migration plan
What moves, in what order, who owns it and what gets checked before each stage is signed off.
Staging audit
A technical SEO audit of the new site on staging. Anything that doesn't need a developer is fixed before switchover.
Redirect mapping and switchover
A 301 redirect mapped for every old URL, each one tested on switchover day. A change of address is filed with search engines the same day.
Post-migration monitoring
Rankings and traffic measured against the pre-migration benchmark at 4 weeks and at 12.
How an engagement runs
Step 1
A short fit call
A short call to check the work suits both sides and agree the timeline, including the switchover date and who's building the new site.
Step 2
A scoping audit, from £564 + VAT
A pre-migration review of the current site. It shows which pages bring the traffic and how much depends on the brand name. Quick fixes go in as I find them.
Step 3
Forecast and migration plan
The risk forecast and a sequenced plan, with the checks for staging and switchover day. You keep both whatever you decide next.
Step 4
Staging checks and switchover
I work alongside your build team through switchover on a fractional basis, from £1.8k a month. Every old URL is tested on the day, with post-migration reviews at 4 and 12 weeks.
Book a fit call or see pricing. Prices are indicative, and each package is scoped to the project.
I work with what you've got
Moves between platforms, or between 2 stores on the same one. I work alongside the agency or developer doing the build.
Ecommerce
Shopify, Merchant Center feeds
CMS
WordPress, Squarespace, headless, custom builds
Search data
Search Console, Bing Webmaster Tools
Tracking
GA4, Tag Manager, ad platform conversions
Where this work has run
2 projects for the same retailer in 2026, 5 months apart.
Shopify relaunch
Rebrand and domain migration
FAQs
What is a site migration?
Moving a website to a new platform or design. A domain migration is the same move with a change of web address. The SEO work covers the pages, redirects, structured data and tracking that have to carry across.
Will we lose traffic when we migrate?
Some movement is normal. A site migration on the same domain tends to settle within 4 to 8 weeks. A domain migration takes longer. In a retailer's rebrand, most of the forecast dip in searches for the old name fell in the first 3 to 6 months. That forecast comes before anything moves, with a plan for what keeps the dip at the low end.
How is this different from technical SEO?
The checks overlap. A site migration adds a switchover date and a before-and-after comparison, and the work is planned as a project with stages and sign-offs.
Our web agency says it handles SEO in the migration. Do we need this as well?
I work alongside build teams. The parts that often sit outside a build brief are the risk forecast before the move and the test of every old URL on switchover day.
Can we get the plan and run the migration ourselves?
Yes. The forecast and the migration plan stand on their own, with the checks written so your team can run them.
Start with a fit call
A short fit call comes first. Most projects then start with a scoping audit of the current site before anything moves, from £564 + VAT. The rest is scoped around what you need.