PHASE 01
Verify ownership
Use a domain property where possible and keep more than one responsible owner.
- DNS verification
- Owner access reviewed
- Old property retained
Search telemetry / 04
Search Console for a new website
Set ownership up before launch, submit only the final canonical sitemap and use indexing reports as evidence rather than expecting instant ranking changes.
Release sequence
Move through the launch in order
PHASE 02
Submit final signals
The sitemap should contain only canonical URLs that return 200 and are allowed to index.
- Final sitemap
- No preview URLs
- Canonical pages only
PHASE 03
Observe, then act
Inspect a small sample immediately and monitor coverage and performance for patterns.
- Home page inspection
- Priority page sample
- Weekly comparison
Operator briefing
Decisions before buttons
Set access before the old setup changes
A redesign often changes hosting accounts and team access at the same time. Confirm property owners and DNS access before launch so the monitoring account is not lost during the move.
Indexing requests are a prompt, not proof
Requesting indexing asks Google to revisit a page. The URL Inspection result and indexing reports show what happened later; neither a submitted sitemap nor a request guarantees indexing or position.
Compare equivalent periods
Record launch day and compare queries, pages and countries against a useful earlier period. Separate a normal migration fluctuation from technical errors such as blocked pages or missing redirects.
Related routes