SEO Step-By-Step Guide– 171. When it is Time for Website Revamp

All of us will come to a stage whereby, we will have to revamp our website, give it a face-lift, and make some cosmetic changes so that our customers are not bored with our website and our interface. Here are some factors that you need to consider while taking on your website redesigning project.

Before you make any changes to your website, take a complete backup of your existing website so that in case something should go wrong you can always revert to the latest functional website. This will ensure that your website never goes offline for too long and when the search engine spiders visit, they will find a live website.

Secondly, clearly document your current ranking status so that you will know how your new design has affected your search engine ranking. The changes in your search engine ranking can be for the good or for the worse. Therefore, you should know how your website’s cosmetic changes are affecting your ranking.

Thirdly, document all the changes that you would like to make to your website so that you will know in which direction your redesign project is likely to move. Do not make random changes, as this will only bring confusion especially when you have an ecommerce website.

After you document all the changes that you are expecting to make to your website, consult your SEO company and get their input on the changes planned. Some of the changes may enhance your website’s ranking whereas others may have yield poor results. Therefore, it is best to avoid changes that will pull down your website’s ranking. Be all the more careful when you want to move pages to a new location or remove page completely. Such changes will result in 404 errors, which should be avoided by using permanent redirects. Unless you document the changes you would like to make, you will miss out such issues especially when you have a large website.

After the implementation of the changes check your website completely for its functionality and also check for cross browser compatibility. If you fail in this area, then you can lose a considerable amount of traffic. People are no more limited to IE; they are exploring other browser options more freely than before. Therefore, cross browser compatibility checking is vital.

When it comes to changing the content of the website, search engines love fresh content. However, make sure that the keyword density does not drop. If you have been successful with a particular positioning of the keywords, try to retain the same positioning and formatting styles to create as little damage to your ranking as possible.

Be systematic with your approach and you will save yourself from a number of problems.

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