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In the longest SEO mythbusting video yet by Google's Martin Splitt, he invited Glenn Gabe to talk about site migrations. It is a wonderful topic and they covered a heck of a lot. One of my favorite parts was the analogy with food trucks and how they move around but yet offer the same food - should the same signals pass as the truck moves around? You have to watch it to follow that analogy.
Martin also discussed with Glenn when you should consider reverting a site migration. Normally that is a no-no - never revert a site migration. But sometimes, if things go terribly wrong and you cannot fix it, sometimes the only answer is to revert.
The topics were vast, not just on site migrations but also on domain name changes, merging sites, moving parts of sites and much more. Here is the timeline of what was covered, it is worth watching the whole thing:
- Redirecting images during a site redesign or migration (0:00)
- Will you always experience a drop in traffic with a domain name change or a site migration? (1:53)
- Buying a new domain name with history & traffic anomalies (2:40)
- Site merger vs site move (6:24)
- What goes on on the Google side once a domain name change is triggered? (8:12)
- Why would one use the Change of Address Tool? (10:16)
- If a site moves, is there a reassessment of content quality by Google? (11:15)
- Should you revert back if a site migration results in a major drop in traffic? (14:54)
- Should one unblock URLs normally blocked by robots.txt during a site migration? (17:31)
- Most common problems after a site moves & doing things step-by-step (18:16)
Here is the video:
Is there anything specifically new in this video? Nah. But it is good to listen to because these are pretty solid topics that every SEO should fully understand.
Forum discussion at Twitter.
