I’ve tried unsuccessfully to find satisfactory answers to this concern of mine so I’m posting instead.
My existing website is one project in my Webflow account, it’s been live for some time and has been indexed and ranked, etc. by Google.
My new website I created as a new project in my Webflow account. Now that it’s ready I would like to set up the domain names of the old website to point to the new one thereby cutting over to my new website.
I could simply remove the domain names form my old website and add them to the new one but I don’t know what, if anything, that will do for my SEO.
What gathered karma with search engines is your pages. Your homepage will keep the same URL obviously so Google and your SEo are going to be fine with this.
But any page that has a different URL needs a 301 redirect set on the new site. Static pages and CMS pages. If you managed to keep everything identical, well, you’re not going to lose any SEO juice.
If you have a really big amount of CMS pages that have a different URL, you can use some wildcards to batch import them. Follow the help links in your site’s settings Hosting tab around the 301 section.
You’re migrating from a SSL domain to another SSL domain right?
Thanks for the reply, yes we are moving from one SSL domain to another.
Another question for you. If I do the above things, with no changes being made to page names or paths as you suggest. Is there any risk if I also change my primary domain name? So I currently have about five domain names on the website. The one that is currently primary I would like to replace with a new one that I added recently.
Do you see any risk with that from a SEO perspective?
If the path is the same but the domain different, you have to set a series of 301 redirect. If you’re using multiple domains for the same content, you should worry about content being seen as duplicate, and read about how to set one content canonical (reference) to avoid being penalized.
I’m maybe partly wrong, I’m not a SEO expert at all. An SEO audit or mission for your site may be very affordable. I recommend it, especially if you’re having structures with multiple domains. Find a local guy so you can interact directly and have future collaborations.
Just know that Webflow has everything in place for you to follow the advices of a SEO expert.