Is your website redesign about to backfire? A stunning new design won’t matter if search engines can’t find your site or if it’s riddled with technical errors. Don’t let your rankings plummet or your traffic disappear!
Technical SEO is the often-overlooked foundation of a successful website redesign. Without addressing these critical considerations, you risk losing all your progress in search engine visibility and user engagement. This guide will reveal the hidden dangers of neglecting technical SEO and provide actionable strategies to safeguard your rankings and ensure your redesigned website thrives in the digital space.
Why Technical SEO is Crucial for Redesigns
Search engines like Google use complex algorithms to crawl, index, and rank websites. Technical SEO is the backbone of your site’s relationship with these crawlers. When you redesign your site, it’s like changing the map those bots use. Without proper guidance, they can get lost, leading to decreased visibility and lower rankings.
If you don’t pay attention to technical SEO, here are some risks you may face;
- Broken Links and 404 Errors: Changing URLs without proper redirects sends visitors to dead ends, frustrating them and hurting your site’s reputation.
- Loss of Link Equity: Backlinks are valuable for SEO. If these links point to outdated or deleted pages, you lose their authority boost.
- Crawling and Indexing Issues: A poorly structured website can confuse search engine bots, making it difficult for them to index your content properly (Check out more on structuring your website in this post)
- Slow Page Speed: Technical issues like unoptimized images or bloated code can drastically slow down your site, negatively impacting user experience and search rankings.
Technical SEO Checklist for a Smooth Redesign
1. Pre-Redesign Audit
Before you start changing anything, perform a thorough SEO audit of your existing site. Identify top-performing pages, keywords, and backlinks. This data serves as a benchmark and informs your redesign strategy.
2. URL Mapping and 301 Redirects
When changing your website’s structure or URLs, create a detailed URL mapping plan. For each old URL, determine its equivalent new URL and implement 301 redirects. This ensures visitors and search engines are seamlessly redirected to the correct pages, preserving link equity and avoiding 404 errors.
3. XML Sitemap Creation
An XML sitemap is like a table of contents for search engines. It lists all your important pages, ensuring they are easily discovered and indexed. Update your XML sitemap to reflect your website’s new structure and URLs.
4. Robots.txt File
The robots.txt file instructs search engine crawlers which pages they can and cannot access. Double-check your robots.txt to avoid accidentally blocking important pages on your new site.
5. Canonical Tags
If you have similar or duplicate content on your site, use canonical tags to indicate to search engines which page should be considered the “original” for ranking purposes. This avoids issues with duplicate content penalties.
6. Site Speed Optimization
Ensure your redesigned website is blazing fast by optimizing images, minifying code, leveraging browser caching, and using a content delivery network (CDN) if necessary. (Learn more about improving site speed in this blog)
7. SSL Certificate
Make sure your website has a valid SSL certificate (HTTPS) to ensure secure communication between your server and users’ browsers. Google considers HTTPS a ranking signal.
8. Internal Linking Structure
Optimize internal links to connect related pages within your site. This helps establish topical relevance for search engines and guides users to discover more of your content.
9. Structured Data (Schema Markup)
Implement schema markup to provide search engines with additional context about your content, potentially earning you rich snippets in search results.
Preserve your Rankings With Edens Digital
Technical SEO is the foundation of a high-performing website that ranks well in search engines. By addressing these technical considerations during your website redesign, you’ll ensure a seamless transition and maintain (or even improve) your search visibility.
Worried your internal team cannot handle the technical complexities of SEO, don’t worry! Edens Digital has got you covered. Contact us today to learn more about how we can optimize your site for success.
