Checklist for site revamp [Archive] - Search Engine Watch Forums

priyaswami

07-25-2007, 07:43 AM

hi,
I would like to know if there is a checklist which i can use while i do a site revamp so that i can keep my search engine rankings and traffic. The premise to the question is: I have a client who is revamping the look and feel of the site as a result of which the new pages are going to get uploaded soon. I want to know if there is a list of things i need to do for example a 301 permanent redirect or a robot.txt tag or whatever. The new pages will be loaded in the same domain, but the page names may / may not look different. any help in this matter will be really appreciated.
regards
Priya

cctech

07-25-2007, 12:13 PM

It depends on your definition of "revamp". A facelift is one thing, but a total redesign is another. There are some things you should consider before starting. If you are only adding new pages, search engines will pick them up. But if you are adding new pages AND in any way changing the names of existing pages, you might consider these steps:

1 - Benchmark. You need to know exactly where the site is currently so you can make improvements. Thoroughly check its rankings, Referral URLs, top entry pages.
Use Google Webmaster tools (http://www.google.com/pagead/iclk?sa=l&ai=BAgu31HKnRsaIBZvqgwTy9KWfArz92Qqy9aOTAqadg-oMkE4IABABGAEgtlQ4AFD5t9XlA2DJ5qqKpKSIEZgBhIcBmAGZ iQGYAe6XA6AB8KL2_QOqAR9vcmcubW96aWxsYTplbi1VUzpvZm ZpY2lhbCsyR01MyAEB2QPy3fNy9_GA9Q&ggladgrp=308476166&gglcreat=478378586&adurl=https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/docs/en/about.html) and Yahoo Site explorer (http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/)
MSN is manual - http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=linkdomain:[put the domain name here].com - this will show you the site's backlinks
http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=site[put the domain name here].com - this will show you the number of pages indexed.

2 - 301 redirects. For the most part, any pages that are already indexed should be redirected if their name is changing.

3 - Possibly consider creating a custom 404 error page. This will help catch any pages that fall through the cracks.

Again, this depends on how much you are changing what is already there. ANY change to the URL will have an impact on the search engine listing (changing from .htm to .php, .asp, .html, for example).

Hopefully this will get you started or maybe bring up some additional questions. I am also sure that others here will have some good advice to consider.