TL;DR
Migrating to a new site or domain can cost you search traffic if not done right. Key: 301 redirects (old URL → new URL), updated sitemap, verification in GSC, and patience – reindexing and ranking stabilization often take weeks to months.
Who this is for
- Site owners planning a redesign or domain/CMS change
- SEO and marketing teams
- Agencies and developers running migrations
Keyword (SEO)
website migration seo, 301 redirect domain change, migration without losing rankings
Why migrations hurt SEO
Google treats the new URL as a new page. The old URL has history, links, and signals. If you don’t tell the engine “this old address is now this new one”, you lose rankings and link equity.
Solution: permanent 301 redirects from every old URL to the corresponding new URL.
Step-by-step migration plan
1. Audit the old site
- List all URLs – export from GSC (Coverage/Pages) or crawl (Screaming Frog, Sitebulb)
- Important pages – high rankings, strong traffic, backlinks
- 1:1 mapping – old URL → new URL (if structure changes)
2. Preserve or map addresses
- Ideal: same URL structure (e.g.
/services/stays/services/) - Structure change: mapping file (old → new), then configure redirects from it
3. 301 redirects
- Each old URL → one new URL (preferably same content)
- Don’t: old → homepage (loses context)
- Don’t: 302 (temporary) – for a permanent move use 301
Example (Apache):
RedirectMatch 301 ^/old-page/?$ https://your-domain.com/new-page/
Example (Nginx):
return 301 https://your-domain.com/new-page$request_uri;
4. New site – technical
- sitemap.xml – updated, new URLs only
- Canonical – each page points to itself (new URL)
- Internal links – point to new URLs
- GSC – add new domain (or property), submit sitemap
5. After migration
- Tests – all important old URLs return 301 and correct destination
- GSC – monitor indexing (Coverage), errors, traffic
- Time – full reindex and stabilization often 4–12 weeks
Domain change
- 301 redirects from old domain to new domain (each URL → matching URL)
- In GSC: Change of address (Settings) – point to new domain
- Keep old domain and redirects at least 6–12 months, often indefinitely
Checklist
- List of all indexed URLs from old site
- Mapping old URL → new URL
- 301 redirects configured on server
- No 4xx/5xx on important pages
- Sitemap and canonical on new site
- GSC – new property, sitemap, Change of address (if domain change)
- Monitor traffic and rankings for 2–3 months
FAQ
Can I redirect everything to the homepage?
No. Mass redirect to one page loses context and usually hurts rankings. Each important page should have its own destination URL.
302 instead of 301?
301 = “permanently moved”. 302 = “temporarily elsewhere”. For a permanent migration use 301 so Google transfers signals to the new URL.
When will traffic come back?
Depending on site size and redirect quality – often 4–8 weeks for visible stabilization. Full reindex can take longer. Don’t remove redirects after a week.