Before you change templates
Redesigns often start with visual direction, but search engines and customers both rely on stable URLs, clear headings, and crawl paths. Map legacy URLs to destinations early, decide what merges vs. redirects, and preserve titles or intentional updates where rankings already exist.
Inventory page-level intent: which URLs earn calls, which support education, and which can consolidate. Pair every important URL with a primary keyword theme and an internal link from the homepage or hub pages within two clicks.
Checklist
- Canonical hosts (HTTPS, apex vs. www) are consistent across staging and production.
- Redirect map covers deprecated URLs without chains longer than one hop where avoidable.
- Every live page has a unique title, meta description, single H1, and descriptive internal links.
- Images use readable file names and accurate alt text tied to page intent.
- Core templates ship fast LCP elements: compressed hero media, preloaded fonts where needed.
- Analytics and call tracking stay wired so you can compare pre/post launch fairly.