Phase 1: Pre-Migration Audit

Crawl the Existing Site

Before touching anything, crawl the current site and document:

- Every indexable URL (products, collections, pages, blog posts)

- Current page titles and meta descriptions

- Internal linking structure

- Canonical tags

- XML sitemap contents

- Robots.txt rules

- Structured data / schema markup

This becomes your baseline. You can't preserve what you haven't documented.

Map Current Organic Performance

Pull data from Google Search Console and analytics for the last 12 months:

- Top organic landing pages by traffic and revenue

- Top ranking keywords by page

- Pages with featured snippets or rich results

- Organic conversion rate by page type

Your highest-traffic, highest-revenue pages are the ones you absolutely cannot afford to break during migration.

Identify URL Structure Changes

Shopify has its own URL conventions:

- Products: /products/product-handle

- Collections: /collections/collection-handle

- Pages: /pages/page-handle

- Blog: /blogs/blog-name/post-handle

Map every existing URL to its new Shopify equivalent. This is the most important document in the entire migration.

Phase 2: Redirect Planning

Build Your Redirect Map

Create a complete 301 redirect map from old URLs to new URLs. This includes:

- All product pages

- All category/collection pages

- All content/blog pages

- Any legacy URLs that still receive organic traffic

- Image URLs if they're indexed

Use Search Console data to prioritise. Any URL receiving organic clicks in the last 6 months needs a redirect.

Handle Edge Cases

- Products that are discontinued: redirect to the parent collection or a relevant alternative

- Category structures that are changing: redirect old categories to the closest new collection

- Blog posts with different URL structures: map individually

- Pagination URLs: redirect to the collection root

- Parameterised URLs (filters, sorts): redirect the base URL

Implement Redirects in Shopify

Shopify supports URL redirects natively through the admin. For large catalogues, use the bulk CSV import. For complex redirect logic on Shopify Plus, use the redirect API or a dedicated app.

Test a sample of redirects before launch to make sure they work.

Phase 3: On-Page SEO Transfer

Page Titles and Meta Descriptions

Transfer your existing page titles and meta descriptions to the corresponding Shopify pages. Do not let Shopify auto-generate these from product names.

If the current metadata is weak, improve it during migration rather than doing it later.

Heading Structure

Make sure every product page, collection page and content page has a proper H1. Shopify themes handle this differently so check that your theme outputs the page title as an H1 and doesn't skip heading levels.

Image Alt Text

Transfer alt text for all product and content images. If the current site doesn't have alt text, use the migration as an opportunity to add it.

Structured Data

Check that your Shopify theme includes proper schema markup:

- Product schema (price, availability, reviews)

- Organization schema

- BreadcrumbList schema

- Article schema for blog posts

Most good Shopify themes include basic product schema but it's worth verifying and extending where needed.

Phase 4: Technical Setup

XML Sitemap

Shopify auto-generates a sitemap at /sitemap.xml. After migration, check that:

- All important pages are included

- No orphaned or broken URLs are listed

- The sitemap is submitted in Google Search Console

Robots.txt

Shopify manages robots.txt automatically. Review it to make sure nothing important is being blocked. On Shopify Plus you can customise robots.txt through the theme.

Canonical Tags

Verify that canonical tags are pointing to the correct URLs. Shopify handles this automatically for most pages but variant URLs and filtered collection pages can create issues.

Site Speed

Run a speed test immediately after migration. Common Shopify speed killers:

- Too many apps installed

- Unoptimised images

- Heavy theme JavaScript

- Third-party tracking scripts loading synchronously

Fix these before launch, not after.

Tracking and Analytics

Set up before launch:

- Google Analytics 4 with enhanced e-commerce

- Google Search Console (verify the new property)

- Facebook/Meta Pixel and Conversions API

- Google Ads conversion tracking

- Any other platform pixels

Test every conversion event in a staging environment before going live.

Phase 5: Product Feed

Google Merchant Center

If the store runs Shopping ads, the product feed needs to transition cleanly:

- Update the feed source to pull from Shopify (use Shopify's native Google channel or a feed app)

- Check that all product identifiers (GTIN, MPN, brand) carry over

- Verify pricing, availability and shipping data

- Submit the new feed and monitor for disapprovals

A broken feed during migration can collapse Shopping campaign performance overnight. Get this right.

Phase 6: Launch Day

Go-Live Checklist

- [ ] All redirects tested and confirmed working

- [ ] SSL certificate active

- [ ] DNS propagated

- [ ] Sitemap submitted to Search Console

- [ ] All tracking confirmed firing

- [ ] Product feed live and approved in Merchant Center

- [ ] Checkout flow tested end to end

- [ ] Payment processing confirmed

- [ ] Email/SMS integrations confirmed

- [ ] Speed test passed

Immediately After Launch

- Monitor Search Console for crawl errors (check daily for 2 weeks)

- Monitor organic traffic vs pre-migration baseline

- Check redirect chains (no double redirects)

- Monitor 404 errors and fix immediately

- Watch Shopping campaign performance for any feed issues

Phase 7: Post-Migration Monitoring

Week 1-2

- Daily checks: crawl errors, 404s, redirect issues

- Compare organic sessions and revenue to the same period last year

- Fix any issues immediately

Week 3-4

- Review indexation: are new URLs being indexed?

- Check keyword rankings against baseline

- Monitor Shopping campaign performance

Month 2-3

- Organic traffic should be stabilising or recovering

- Identify any pages that lost significant rankings

- Optimise those pages with updated content or additional internal links

Common Migration Mistakes

1. Forgetting redirects entirely. This is the number one cause of organic traffic loss during migrations. No redirect = dead page = lost rankings.

2. Launching without testing tracking. If your conversion tracking breaks on launch day, your paid campaigns are flying blind.

3. Ignoring the product feed. A broken Merchant Center feed can tank Shopping revenue within 24 hours.

4. Changing URL structure AND content at the same time. Change one variable at a time. Migrate first, then optimise content later.

5. Not monitoring post-launch. The first 2 weeks after migration are critical. Problems caught early are easy to fix. Problems caught 6 weeks later have already caused damage.

The Bottom Line

A well-executed Shopify migration should result in zero organic traffic loss and a faster, more capable store. The key is thorough preparation, a complete redirect map, clean tracking setup and disciplined post-launch monitoring.

If your agency has clients planning a platform migration and you need a team that handles the full build, migration and SEO preservation under your brand, that's exactly what we do at AdMerge.