Website migrations are where SEO agencies face their highest-stakes scoping challenge. Get it right and the client retains traffic through the transition. Get it wrong — or scope it poorly — and you're blamed for a traffic cliff that takes months to recover from.
The problem isn't usually technical competence. It's scope clarity. "SEO support for migration" can mean anything from a redirect map to full architectural oversight with pre- and post-launch audits. If the scope doesn't define exactly what SEO owns, what development owns, and what happens when the launch date slips, you're carrying risk you didn't price for.
Who this is for
- SEO agencies engaged for migration support (platform changes, domain moves, redesigns)
- Consultants scoping SEO involvement in larger migration projects
- Account managers pricing migration SEO without over- or under-committing
- Teams coordinating between SEO, development, and design during migrations
Variables that drive migration SEO scope
| Variable | Impact |
|---|---|
| Migration type | Platform change, domain move, URL restructure, HTTPS, redesign — different risks |
| Site size | 500 URLs vs 50,000+ URLs — redirect mapping alone changes by 10x |
| URL structure change | Same URLs vs complete restructure — restructure requires full mapping |
| Content changes | Content migrated as-is vs rewritten during migration |
| Number of domains/subdomains | Single domain vs multi-domain consolidation |
| Internationalisation | Hreflang, multi-region, language — multiplies complexity |
| Launch timeline | Phased vs big-bang — affects monitoring scope |
| Staging access | Available for pre-launch testing vs not |
Migration SEO phases
| Phase | Key activities | Typical effort |
|---|---|---|
| Pre-migration audit | Benchmark traffic, rankings, backlinks; identify high-value pages | 8–20 hours |
| Redirect mapping | 1:1 URL mapping, regex rules, pattern-based redirects | 4–40 hours (size-dependent) |
| Pre-launch review | Staging crawl, redirect verification, robots/canonical/sitemap checks | 8–16 hours |
| Launch support | Day-of monitoring, rapid issue detection, emergency fixes | 4–8 hours |
| Post-launch monitoring | Traffic tracking, indexation monitoring, redirect verification | 2–4 hours/week for 4–8 weeks |
Scope definition
- Migration type (platform change, domain move, URL restructure, redesign)
- Site URL(s) and domains included
- Estimated URL count for redirect mapping
- SEO involvement phases (pre-migration / redirect mapping / pre-launch / launch / post-launch)
- SEO role definition (advisory, hands-on implementation, or oversight)
Pre-migration benchmarking
- Organic traffic baseline (sessions, users, revenue — trailing 12 months)
- Keyword rankings snapshot (tracked keyword set)
- Top landing pages by traffic and revenue (top 50–200)
- Backlink profile snapshot (referring domains, top linked pages)
- Technical health baseline (Core Web Vitals, crawl stats, indexation)
- Content inventory of pages to migrate
Redirect mapping
- 1:1 redirect map for all indexable URLs (or top [X] URLs by traffic)
- Regex-based redirect rules for pattern-based URLs
- Redirect testing and verification in staging
- Handling for URLs with no equivalent (410 vs redirect to nearest match)
- Backlink-informed priority mapping (pages with external links get manual review)
Pre-launch review
- Staging environment crawl and comparison against production
- Redirect implementation verification (sample testing + automated checks)
- Robots.txt review (staging blocks removed, production rules correct)
- Canonical tag verification across all templates
- XML sitemap validation (new URLs, old URLs removed)
- Structured data verification on key templates
- Internal linking spot-check
Launch support
- Real-time monitoring during launch window
- Google Search Console verification and sitemap submission
- Critical issue escalation process
- Rollback criteria and communication plan
Post-launch monitoring
- Weekly traffic comparison (organic sessions vs baseline, by section)
- Indexation tracking (indexed page count, crawl stats)
- Redirect chain detection (new chains created by migration)
- Ranking recovery tracking (tracked keywords vs pre-migration baseline)
- Error monitoring (404s, 5xx, soft 404s)
- Monitoring period: [X] weeks post-launch
- Monitoring cadence: [weekly/bi-weekly] reports
Exclusions
- Website development or design
- Content writing or rewriting (content migrated as-is unless scoped otherwise)
- Server configuration or hosting setup
- Domain registration or DNS management
- Paid search migration or redirect management
- Non-SEO QA (functionality, design, browser testing)
- Monitoring beyond [X]-week post-launch period
Timeline
- Pre-migration audit: [X] business days before migration
- Redirect mapping: [X] business days (must be complete before staging)
- Pre-launch review: [X] business days (requires staging access)
- Launch support: Day-of (confirm date [X] days in advance)
- Post-launch monitoring: [X] weeks starting from launch date
Migration risk by type
Platform change (e.g., WordPress to Shopify): Highest risk. URL structures almost always change. Template-level SEO elements (schema, canonicals, sitemaps) need re-verification. CMS limitations may prevent 1:1 feature parity.
Domain move: Moderate risk if URLs stay the same. High risk if combined with URL restructure. Requires domain-level redirects plus Google Search Console change of address.
URL restructure (same platform): Moderate risk. Redirect mapping is the primary scope driver. Risk increases with site size and number of URL pattern changes.
HTTPS migration: Low risk (in 2024+). Most platforms handle this natively. Scope a verification crawl rather than full migration support.
Redesign (same URLs): Low SEO risk if URLs don't change. Moderate risk if template structure changes affect heading hierarchy, internal linking, or structured data.
How RuleDox helps
Migration scope varies dramatically — but the variables are predictable. Site size, migration type, and URL structure change determine 80% of the effort. The same agency runs the same migration playbook with different inputs.
With RuleDox:
- Migration type selects the right phases — a domain move includes change-of-address steps; a redesign doesn't
- Site size scales redirect mapping effort — 500 URLs get manual mapping; 50,000 get regex rules plus priority manual mapping
- Post-launch monitoring duration auto-populates — platform changes get 8 weeks; HTTPS migrations get 4
- Exclusions protect against scope expansion — "website development" and "content writing" are always excluded
FAQ
Should migration SEO be fixed-price or hourly? Fixed-price for defined phases (redirect mapping, pre-launch review). Hourly or retainer-based for post-launch monitoring, because migration recovery is unpredictable. If the launch slips three times, your fixed-price scope shouldn't absorb three rounds of pre-launch review.
How long should post-launch monitoring last? 4–8 weeks for most migrations. 12 weeks for large sites or platform changes. Traffic recovery typically takes 2–4 weeks for small sites and 4–12 weeks for large ones. Monitor until traffic stabilises relative to baseline.
What if the client's development team doesn't implement redirects correctly? This is the most common migration failure mode. Scope a pre-launch redirect verification step explicitly. If redirect implementation is the client's responsibility, define the verification process and what happens when errors are found (who fixes, within what timeframe, at whose cost).