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Migrating CMS, keeping rankings/PR.. best practice

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  • 30-07-2012 2:11am
    #1
    bacon?
    Registered Users Posts: 782 ✭✭✭


    Hi guys, I'm redesigning an old site, that's using an ancient cms.

    I'm going to convert to wordpress.

    I found this article, very in-depth.. http://www.searchenginejournal.com/how-to-avoid-seo-disaster-during-a-website-redesign/42824/

    Do I need to clone every page? or just go back a couple of months?

    I'll clone all the main pages of the site, but there's a lot of news, blog enteries...

    Is it ok to leave these?


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    #2
    MagicRon
    Registered Users Posts: 138 ✭✭MagicRon


    bacon? wrote: »
    Hi guys, I'm redesigning an old site, that's using an ancient cms.

    I'm going to convert to wordpress.

    I found this article, very in-depth.. http://www.searchenginejournal.com/how-to-avoid-seo-disaster-during-a-website-redesign/42824/

    Do I need to clone every page? or just go back a couple of months?

    I'll clone all the main pages of the site, but there's a lot of news, blog enteries...

    Is it ok to leave these?

    More of a question for your client? Do they want every page in the new site?


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    #3
    bacon?
    Registered Users Posts: 782 ✭✭✭bacon?


    MagicRon wrote: »
    More of a question for your client? Do they want every page in the new site?

    They haven't a clue really.

    I'm just wondering what's best for SEO purposes?

    A lot of these pages, while indexed, wouldn't have backlinks going to them....

    So, I'm assuming that every page doesn't need to be changed...


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    #4
    Trojan
    Registered Users Posts: 16,413 ✭✭✭✭Trojan


    Make sure you have everything backed up, twice or more. Pull down a flat HTML version of the site too if possible.

    I would definitely try to keep all content. If you want to maintain all rankings then try and change as little as possible, and do it in baby steps over a couple of months. E.g. if you need to change hosting do that either first or last.

    If moving CMS, try and make the new HTML template and URL structure the same as the old ones. Leave it a few weeks to settle and then update the look and feel, a couple weeks after that change the URL structure. Map the old URLs to new with .htaccess 301 redirects.

    One option, if they have a lot of old content that you don't want to migrate and you're certain they will never want to edit, is upload flat HTML versions of those pages, and just keep the newer content in the CMS. This has implications for site search and editing so be sure you're making the right decision.

    HTH.

    🎙️ The Recognized Authority Podcast



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