A website redesign is one of the few marketing projects that can make things worse. Done well, it makes your site faster, clearer and better at turning visitors into enquiries. Done carelessly, it can wipe out years of search traffic in a week. This website redesign checklist covers the 25 things to keep, fix and measure — before, during and after launch — so the new site performs better than the old one.
If you would rather have it built for you, our website redesign services team can scope your project for free.
Before you start: set the goal and the baseline
Most redesigns start with “the site looks dated”. That is a reason, not a goal. Agree on what the new site must improve, then record where you are today so you can prove it worked.
- Write down one or two measurable goals. For example: more quote requests per month, a higher conversion rate on service pages, or faster load times on mobile.
- Export a baseline from Google Analytics 4. Sessions, conversions and conversion rate for the last 12 months, by page.
- Export a baseline from Google Search Console. Clicks, impressions and average position by page and by query. This tells you which pages earn your search traffic.
- Record Core Web Vitals. Note LCP, INP and CLS for your key templates from PageSpeed Insights or the Search Console report.
- Crawl the current site. Use a crawler to export every URL, title, meta description, H1, status code and internal link count. This becomes your migration map.
Keep: what the new site must not lose
The pages and signals that already work are the most valuable part of your old site. Protect them first.
- List your top pages by traffic and by leads. These are the pages that need their URL, content and on-page SEO carried over with the most care.
- Keep URLs where you can. Unchanged URLs need no redirects and lose no signals. Change them only when there is a clear reason.
- Keep the content that ranks. Improve it, but do not replace a ranking page with a short, design-led version that drops the information people searched for.
- Keep title tags and meta descriptions on ranking pages, or improve them deliberately. Do not let a new template overwrite them with defaults.
- Keep tracking working. List every analytics tag, conversion event, pixel and form integration so each one is reconnected on the new site.
- Keep structured data. If the old site has schema for your organisation, services, FAQs or reviews, rebuild it on the new templates.
Fix: what the redesign should improve
Use the audit to decide what changes. These are the improvements that usually matter most for a business site.
- Navigation built around how buyers search. Group services the way customers describe them, not the way your org chart does.
- One clear H1 and a logical heading structure on every page. Each page should target one main topic.
- Merge thin and duplicate pages. Several weak pages on the same topic compete with each other. Combine them into one strong page and redirect the rest.
- Clear calls to action. Every service page should say what to do next — book a call, request a quote — above the fold and again at the end.
- Faster templates. Lighter themes, compressed images in modern formats, fewer third-party scripts and no page builder bloat.
- Mobile first. Design and test on a phone first; most visitors will see it there.
- Accessibility. Sufficient colour contrast, alt text, keyboard navigation and form labels. It helps every user and reduces legal risk.
- Internal links. Link service pages to related services, case studies and guides so visitors and search engines can find them.
Launch: the migration steps
- Build a redirect map. Every old URL that changes gets a one-to-one 301 redirect to its closest new equivalent — not to the home page.
- Test on a staging site. Crawl staging, check every redirect, form, tracking tag and template on desktop and mobile before launch. Make sure staging is blocked from search engines and that the block is removed at launch.
- Launch at a quiet time and submit the updated XML sitemap in Google Search Console the same day.
Measure: the weeks after launch
- Watch Search Console daily for two weeks. Look for spikes in 404 errors, pages dropping out of the index and big position changes on your top pages.
- Re-crawl the live site. Fix any broken internal links, redirect chains and missing titles the crawl finds.
- Compare against the baseline after 30 and 90 days. Some ranking movement after a launch is normal. Judge the redesign on conversions and traffic once things settle.
The most common redesign mistakes
- Launching without redirects, or redirecting everything to the home page.
- Leaving the “discourage search engines” setting switched on after moving from staging.
- Cutting long, useful service page copy to make the design look cleaner.
- Forgetting conversion tracking, so nobody can tell whether the new site performs better.
- Changing the domain, platform and design all at once, which makes problems hard to trace.
For a deeper look at protecting rankings during the move, read our guide on how we plan website redesigns and the companion guide on how to redesign a website without losing SEO.
Frequently asked questions
How long does a website redesign take?
A typical business site of 10–40 pages takes six to ten weeks from audit to launch. Sites with large migrations, many templates or complex integrations take longer.
Will my rankings drop after a redesign?
Small movements are normal for a few weeks while search engines re-crawl the site. Large, lasting drops usually come from missing redirects, removed content or technical mistakes, which this checklist is designed to prevent.
Should I change platforms during a redesign?
Only if the current platform is holding you back. Changing platform adds migration work and risk, so do it for a clear reason such as speed, security or editing limits.
How often should a business website be redesigned?
There is no fixed cycle. Redesign when the site no longer explains what you sell, is slow on mobile, is hard for your team to update, or converts poorly compared with your competitors.