A new website is supposed to look fresher and work better. What often comes along with it, nobody sees right away: a drop in Google. After go-live, traffic falls, inquiries dry up, and nobody knows why. It doesn't have to be that way. Rankings survive a relaunch if a few things are right.
Why a relaunch costs rankings
Over the years, Google has learned which of your URLs stand for what. A relaunch often changes exactly that: new URLs, a different structure, rewritten texts. If Google can't find the old pages anymore, the trust it built up is gone, and building it up partly starts from scratch.
The most important rule: 301 redirects
When URLs change, every old URL has to point permanently to its new target, via a 301 redirect. That way the trust you've built up carries over to the new page.
- List every existing URL before you move.
- Map each old URL to its matching new target.
- Don't blanket-redirect everything to the homepage, Google treats that as an error page.
Take content and structure with you
Visibility depends on content. Don't throw away what ranks during a relaunch.
- Keep or improve texts, don't cut them without replacement.
- Keep the heading structure clean, one H1 per page, a clear hierarchy. The basics are in SEO made simple.
- Add structured data back in, so Google and AI understand the page. More in Structured data.
Technology: sitemap, robots, load time
- Generate a new sitemap and submit it to Google.
- Check robots.txt: The new site must not accidentally be set to noindex. This one checkbox has already thrown entire websites out of the index.
- Keep an eye on load time, a new design quickly gets heavy. See Core Web Vitals.
After go-live: monitor
The move isn't finished at go-live. In the first few weeks, check in Search Console whether pages drop out of the index, redirects lead nowhere or errors show up. Caught early, most of it is quickly fixed.
In short
Redirect old URLs cleanly, take content and structure with you, check the technology and then monitor. If you do that, you move without crashing.
Planning a rebuild and want to avoid losing rankings? Take a look at Websites and the SEO and GEO analysis, or drop me a quick message via the contact page.