§ 01

Pre-migration

• [ ] Crawl current site (Screaming Frog) — full URL inventory
• [ ] GSC top-pages export (impressions + clicks last 90 days)
• [ ] Map every URL: keep / merge / delete + 301 destinations
• [ ] Backup full current site (DB + files)
• [ ] Schema audit: what to preserve

§ 02

Build phase

• [ ] New site on staging (password-protected)
• [ ] LCP under 1.6s on staging
• [ ] All schema present
• [ ] Forms tested (test conversions firing)
• [ ] Analytics installed (GA4 + GTM)
• [ ] Robots.txt blocks staging from indexing

§ 03

Launch day

• [ ] DNS cut
• [ ] Verify HTTPS + HSTS
• [ ] Submit new sitemap to GSC
• [ ] Verify 301 redirects (sample 50+)
• [ ] Check Google Business Profile still points correctly
• [ ] Crawl new site with Screaming Frog → 200/301 only, no 404s

§ 04

Day +1

• [ ] GSC monitor: indexing status
• [ ] Page speed monitor: did launch impact LCP?
• [ ] Conversion monitor: forms firing as expected?
• [ ] Error log monitor: 404s, 500s, slow pages

§ 05

Week +1

• [ ] Compare GSC top-pages: any pages dropped >50%? Investigate.
• [ ] Compare conversion rate: drop = something broken
• [ ] Compare ad-landing-page CTR: drop = mismatch

§ 06

Week +4

• [ ] Full crawl audit
• [ ] GSC: indexing fully resumed
• [ ] Rankings: no major drops on top 50 keywords
• [ ] If ranking drops: redirect audit, content audit, schema audit

§ 07

Day +60

• [ ] Decommission staging
• [ ] Close out old DB / hosting if cutover complete
• [ ] Document migration for next time