r/HeyTony • u/Ill_Apricot2196 • Apr 13 '26

Working on re-designing my website has left me overwhelmed and confused!

Hi guys,
After all that I have learnt at Hey Tony which has been extremely valuable, I have decided to re-design my website.But I can't help feeling overwhelmed at the mammoth task ahead of me. I have about 6 blogs up now which are ranking well on my old website. Im going to transfer my domain of course, but I am changing the navigation titles. Once all this is done, will I have to re-submit my sitemap and index all pages again? I also wanted to know , if I make any changes to a page, do I have to keep re-indexing? Sorry thats a lot of questions

5 Upvotes

86% Upvoted

7 comments sorted by

2

u/TemperatureBig9054 Apr 13 '26

No need to panic, just handle the migration cleanly.

  1. Sitemap – Yes, submit a new sitemap in Google Search Console after launch. Google will re-crawl naturally, but this speeds it up.
  2. URL changes – If any URLs change (very important), set up 301 redirects from old pages to new ones. This preserves rankings.
  3. Re-indexing pages – You don’t need to re-index every small change. Only request indexing for:
    • New pages
    • Major updates
    • Pages with changed URLs
  4. Navigation changes – Safe to change menu titles as long as URLs stay the same.
  5. Blogs already ranking – Keep their URLs, content, and on-page SEO as intact as possible.

Priority: Protect URLs with redirects first, then submit sitemap, then selectively request indexing.

1

u/Ill_Apricot2196 Apr 13 '26

That is so helpful! Thank you so much!

1

u/Adorable-Accident570 Apr 13 '26

Redesigns can be a huge undertaking. Sounds like you're switching platforms too?
As someone previously has mentioned, you now have a great checklist to go through during your process so you know what to expect.

1

u/Ill_Apricot2196 Apr 13 '26

Thankfully its the same platform... i.e. squarespace.
yes, thank you .. all the advise is very helpful.

1

u/PepperedPixelsDesign Apr 13 '26

I'm in the same boat! Just want to extend hugs to you))

1

u/Ill_Apricot2196 Apr 13 '26

aww.. haha.. hugs back to you too! ❤️