SEO checklist for a website redesign

During development, the site is closed from indexing, and it is important to ensure that it is open for indexing.

Check which URL opens the site, as well as whether the main mirror is configured. This way, we'll avoid duplicates, which negatively affect the site's ranking.

The site should open only with one URL option. All others, HTTP, www., .html, etc., must be redirected by 301-redirect to the main URL.

If there was a change in the structures and page URLs in general during relocation, add new 301 redirects from old pages to new ones. In this case, the file from step 0.2 will be useful.

On multilingual sites, it is important to monitor errors related to the hreflang tag.

Check if structured data is displayed and if there are errors in them using https://search.google.com/test/rich-results.

Check whether Canonical settings were transferred from the old site and also assign new Canonical to pages that appeared on the new site and that require this tag.

Check how the new site is displayed on mobile devices (with different OS).

If you confirmed your site with an html tag or file in the root of the site, check whether they remained after the site relocation.

In the era of Core Web Vitals, site loading speed is an important factor. After relocation, check the speed using different services: PageSpeed Insights, https://www.webpagetest.org/, and others and compare with old performance.

Check the correctness of information transferred from the old site, including texts, images, headings, and subheadings. Look at all the content that was transferred.

Check the correctness of the transfer and display of Title and Description. Also, check if there is duplicate meta information to edit or delete it.

Check the correctness of transfer and display of H1 headings.

Check whether there are new 404 errors. We also pay attention to the way the 404 page itself looks on the site. This should be a designed page with information that the content was not found, contact details, and the possibility to return to the site.

Also, look at the 404 errors of external links. If there are any, remove or edit them.

If you had goals for Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel, etc. installed on your site, it's worth checking their functionality. Prescribe new goals if there's been a change in the logic of event sending. For example, previously, you used a Thank You page, but now, the form is sent without a separate URL appearing. In this case, it is necessary to enter new events into analytics systems.

Check whether events, traffic, forms, and requests are sent to analytics systems. Fill in the forms in the test mode and check if the events work.

Check if everything works when filling out forms, applications, etc. Manually go through the entire user path and check the correctness of the site.

If various elements of letters (pictures, logos, etc.) were embedded on the old site, check the correctness of their transfer and functionality in the trigger emails that are sent from the site.