Redesigning without losing your Google rankings

What changes when you redesign

Every page on a website has an address, its URL. Over time those addresses pick up connections. Google has them in its index, other websites link to them, customers bookmark them, and your Google Business Profile, social profiles, and old emails point to them.

A redesign often changes the addresses. A page at /services.html might become /services/drain-cleaning, a blog might move from /news/ to /blog/, and sometimes the domain itself changes. If nothing connects the old addresses to the new ones, each of those links ends at a “page not found” error.

A redirect makes that connection. It’s an instruction attached to the old address that sends anyone who asks for it, whether a person or a search engine, on to the new page.

Why it matters to your business

Start with visitors. Someone following an old link from Google, a directory, or an email should land on the page they were looking for. An error page gives them a reason to go back to the search results and pick someone else.

Then there’s search. Google treats a redesign that changes URLs as a site move. Its guidance says to “expect temporary fluctuation in site ranking during the move,” and that recrawling and reindexing “can take a few weeks or longer” depending on the size of the site (Google Search Central). Redirects let Google connect each old page to its replacement. Without them, Google sees old pages disappear and unrelated new ones appear.

Google’s definition of a site move is broad. Its examples include changing from HTTP to HTTPS, changing the domain name, and changing paths, such as example.com/page.php?id=1 becoming example.com/widget. If any of those is part of your redesign, the steps in this guide apply. For small and medium sites, Google recommends moving all the URLs at once rather than one section at a time.

Links from other websites matter too. Google’s local ranking guidance counts “how many websites link to your business” toward prominence. You can’t ask everyone who ever linked to you to update the link, but a redirect sends their visitors to the right place anyway.

How redirects work

When a browser asks for a page, the server replies with a status code. For a redirect, the code starts with 3, and the reply includes a Location header with the new address. According to MDN, browsers “immediately load the new URL provided in the Location header” (MDN).

Permanent vs. temporary

The status code tells search engines whether a move is permanent, and Google handles the two kinds differently (Google Search Central):

Pages in a redesign have moved for good, so their redirects should be permanent.

Server-side redirects work best

A page can be redirected in several ways, and Google recommends “a permanent server-side redirect whenever possible.” It treats an instant meta refresh tag in the page as permanent too. JavaScript redirects come last: Google says to “only use JavaScript redirects if you can’t do server-side or meta refresh redirects,” because it may not process them.

Avoid chains

In a redirect chain, one redirect leads to another, and sometimes another after that. Google advises sending each old URL straight to its final destination. MDN adds that “performance is impacted with every redirect,” so each extra hop also makes the visitor wait. Check for this when your old site already had redirects from an even older one, and point those straight at the new pages as well.

Building a redirect map

A redirect map is a two-column list, with every old address on the left and its new address on the right. Build it before launch.

Start by listing every old URL. Google’s site-move guidance begins with mapping old URLs to new ones (site moves), which needs a complete list. You can find addresses in four places:

• Your old site’s sitemap, if it has one (sitemaps overview).
• The pages report in Google Search Console.
• Your analytics, which show the pages people visit.
• Pages that other sites link to. Google also suggests keeping a record of the sites that link to your old URLs.

Next, match each old URL to its closest new page, which is what Google’s guidance calls for. The old drain cleaning page goes to the new drain cleaning page, and the old “About us” goes to the new “About.”

Some old pages won’t have a replacement, such as a page for a service you’ve stopped offering. Point those to the closest related page when there’s a sensible one. Sending everything to the home page leaves visitors somewhere they didn’t ask to go.

Finally, include the variations. An old address may exist with and without www, with http and https, or with and without a trailing slash. Google treats those as duplicates of one page (canonical URLs), and all of them should end at the one new address.

Launch day and after

Google’s site-move guidance lists several steps for launch and the weeks after:

• Point links within the new site straight at the new addresses, without going through redirects.
• Give each new page a self-referencing canonical tag, which tells Google that this address is the main version of the page.
• Submit the new sitemap in Search Console.
• Use the Change of Address tool only when the domain changes. Google says it isn’t needed for moving from HTTP to HTTPS or between www and non-www.
• Keep redirects in place “for as long as possible,” which Google says is “generally at least 1 year.”
• Watch traffic shift. Visits to old addresses should fall as visits to new ones rise, and Search Console’s indexing and sitemap reports show Google catching up.

Mistakes that undo the work

PDFs get forgotten. An old menu, price list, or brochure has its own address, and other sites may link to it, so it needs a redirect like any page.

The old domain lapses. When a redesign moves to a new domain, the redirects live on the old one. Google recommends keeping them for at least a year, so the old domain has to stay registered and renewed for at least that long. If it expires, every redirect stops at once.

Redirect methods get mixed. MDN warns that server redirects and in-page meta refresh redirects can loop endlessly if the two disagree, and browsers then show an error instead of a page. Use server redirects, kept in one place.

Crawlers stay blocked. If the new site was built on a private preview hidden from search engines, that setting has to come off at launch. robots.txt is the file that tells crawlers which pages they may visit (Google Search Central), so check the live one the day the site goes up.

Your own links stay old. Redirects will catch visitors from your Google Business Profile, social profiles, and email signature, but you can edit those links yourself, so point them at the new pages.

Check your own site

Before a redesign:

1. Find your most important pages, meaning the ones that get visits from Google and the ones other sites link to. Search Console and your analytics show both.
2. Ask your web provider for the redirect map and read it. Every important old page should have a new home.

After launch:

1. Test old addresses one at a time with Search Console’s URL Inspection tool, which Google suggests for checking redirects. For a long list, Google mentions command-line tools or scripts.
2. Paste a dozen old addresses into your browser. Each should land on the matching new page, not the home page or an error.
3. Check the redirect type. In Chrome, open developer tools, go to the Network tab, tick “Preserve log,” and load an old address. The first line should show a 301 or 308 status.
4. Search Google for your business and main services and click the results. Old results should redirect cleanly while Google updates its index.
5. For the next few weeks, watch Search Console for pages reported as “not found.”

A checklist

• You have a written list of every old URL, including pages other sites link to.
• Each old URL maps to its closest new page, not to the home page by default.
• Redirects are server-side and permanent (301 or 308).
• Every old URL goes straight to its final page, with no chains.
• www, http, and trailing-slash variations all end at one address.
• Internal links on the new site point directly to new addresses.
• Each new page has a self-referencing canonical tag.
• The new sitemap is submitted in Search Console.
• Redirects stay in place for at least a year, ideally for good.
• Your Business Profile and social profiles link to the new addresses.

How we handle it

Redirects from your old site’s pages are included on every site we build. We build the redirect map before launch and set up permanent redirects as part of go-live. If you want your old text and images brought over, the “Move content from your old site” add-on handles it page by page.

Every build also comes with a managed launch and a 30-day fix warranty, so an old address the map missed gets fixed.