Introduction
Migrating a website involves more than just copying files and the database. After the move, the homepage may load, but the site may still contain old absolute links, incorrect canonical URLs, the old sitemap, and the robots.txt file from the previous domain. To users, this appears as broken pages, and to search engines, it looks like technical confusion.
Symptoms
Images, buttons, forms, service pages, sitemap.xml, robots.txt, menu links, and redirects often break. Ads may link to an old URL that doesn’t redirect to the new one, causing search engines to receive mixed signals about which version of the site is the primary one.
What is being checked
- Which domain is the primary one, and how are the www and non-www settings configured?
- Which internal links are still absolute and point to the old domain?
- What canonical tag is specified on the key pages?
- Are sitemap.xml and robots.txt still relevant?
- Which URLs return a 404 after the redirect?
- Do the forms and thank-you pages work?
- Have the UTMs and promotional landing pages been preserved?
Correction Process
First, the main URL structure is established. Then, the CMS database is checked for old domains, internal links, and media files. Old URLs are given 301 redirects to the corresponding new pages, rather than simply to the homepage. After that, the sitemap is regenerated, the robots.txt file is checked, and several key pages undergo manual and automated verification.
Normal result
The result: the website loads according to the new structure, old links no longer lead to dead ends, the sitemap contains up-to-date URLs, the canonical tag does not conflict with the domain, and traffic from ads and search engines is not lost.
Conclusion
The migration is considered complete only after links, forms, redirects, and technical files have been checked. Until this is done, the site may appear to be functioning, but it will continue to lose traffic and indexing.