In the event that you have outgrown your web site Content Management System (CMS), or you are just not happy with the existing web site solution, these are some of the things you want to know and should do that focus on for your SEO before pulling the trigger to migrate to a different CMS platforms.
Functionality checklist
Create a spreadsheet of things that you are currently struggling to accomplish with your current website platform. Just list out a laundry list of things that is hampering your SEO growth, or you find it inefficiency to do something. Categorize those items and within that, isolating some of the key functionality you would like the platform to address. Some of the things that I might want to look at
- Content publishing
Will your solution support publishing text content, imagery, video, podcast and such in a SEO friendly manner? - URL structure and directory
Does your CMS support custom directory such as www.domain.com/directory-name/article-title - Balance between automation and customization
Will the new CMS provide the ability to automate publishing of content and allow you to customize some easily? - Schema Structured Data
Does your solution support structured mark-up that will help with rating, reviews, authors and such. - Sitemap
Do you have automatic publishing and control over the sitemap, and does it support a XML sitemap? - Mobile rendering
As mobile traffic is on the rise and some website will see up to 90% of their traffic from Mobile devices, how will is the UX on mobile devices. - Social tools
With all the chatter and conversation – does your solution take into consideration being part of that conversation.
Scan your competitors and industry
If you’re not leading the pack when it comes to SEO due to the website platform, pull a page of the playbook from your competitors. Look at what some of the companies are doing online and how their customers are using their website – then translate those features into words and add those features to nice-to-have on the functionality checklist above. It does not necessarily mean that those features will be implement into the new platform, but rather as an enhancement to your existing list of things you would like to see.
Implementing the CMS platform & using SEO tools
Once you have done your due diligence and identified the CMS platform that you would like to deploy, it comes down to how well the execute on the plan in order to not lose momentum for the existing website. So what are some of the key things to benchmark to ensure that your new CMS platform is not worst off than your soon-to-retire platform? What are some of the SEO tools to use to monitor the progress?
- Goals and Timeline
- Set a timeline on what you would like to see happen, and what needs to go into place. Then set a 15 day check-in and recovery plan for SEO. Follow up, in 30 days.
- Organic web traffic via Web Analytics
- Setup a benchmark for the last 90 days of traffic, and relevant KPI that is critical to your organization. From there, you are able to set a PRE-vs-POST migration reporting. KPI that I would tracks should include, visits, time on site, orders (or leads) per day to start off with.
- Site Indexing, Keyword Positioning, click-through, & Impression
- Other than tracking the web traffic from Search Engines from your Web Analytics program, the Google Search Console will give you a 24 hr turnaround on how well the site migration went as it will allow you to submit you sitemap and inform you on the URL indexed. It will also provide visuals for keywords ranked, impression and clicks.
Once you have these tools and monitoring process in place, you would want to have a weekly pulse check to see if the CMS migration impacted the SEO program in a positive manner.