Short answer: rankings drop after a redesign when pages disappear, page addresses change without redirects, or the content Google valued gets cut. Avoid that by recording what ranks today, mapping every old URL to a new one, setting 301 redirects, keeping or improving the content on your best pages, and checking indexing settings on launch day. Then watch Search Console for a few weeks.
A short dip while Google re-crawls a changed site can happen even when everything is done right. A lasting drop almost always comes from one of the mistakes below.
Step 1: Record where you stand today
Before anything changes, take a snapshot. If you have Google Search Console, open the Performance report, set the date range to the last few months and export the pages and queries. That tells you which pages bring in visitors and for which searches. Note your top pages: these need the most care.
No Search Console? Connect it now, even if the redesign starts next week. It only shows data from the time it's connected, but a few weeks of history is better than none. While you're there, note any pages other websites link to, because those links carry value you want to keep.
Step 2: List every page on the current site
You need a complete list of the site's addresses, not just the pages in the menu. Good sources are your sitemap (usually at /sitemap.xml), the Pages report in Search Console, and a crawl of the site with an SEO crawler. Old blog posts, landing pages from past ad campaigns and PDFs often turn up here. They may still get visits.
Step 3: Decide what happens to each page
For every address on your list, choose one of three outcomes:
- Keep: the page stays at the same address. This is the safest option for anything that ranks.
- Move or merge: the page gets a new address, or several thin pages become one stronger page. The old address will redirect to the new one.
- Remove: the page is no longer useful and has no close replacement. Only remove pages that get little or no traffic and have no outside links.
Write this down as a simple spreadsheet: old URL in one column, new URL in the next. This is your redirect map, and it's the single most important document in a redesign.
Step 4: Keep what Google liked about your best pages
A redesign is a good time to improve copy, but don't strip out the content that earned your rankings. For each top page, keep the main topic, the key phrases customers search for, and the useful detail. A sleek page with three words and a big photo usually ranks worse than the plain page it replaced.
Carry over or improve each page's title tag, meta description and main heading. Keep image alt text and internal links pointing to the right places.
Step 5: Set up 301 redirects
A 301 redirect tells browsers and search engines that a page has permanently moved. Without it, anyone following an old link or search result lands on a "page not found" error, and the page's ranking signals are lost.
- On Wix: use the URL Redirect Manager in the SEO area of your dashboard. You can add redirects one at a time or import a list.
- On WordPress: use a redirect plugin (several SEO plugins include one) or rules at the server level. Test a handful afterward to make sure they work.
Redirect each old page to its closest new equivalent. Pointing everything at the homepage is a common shortcut, and Google generally treats it like the page was removed.
Step 6: Build on a staging copy, and keep it out of Google
If the new site is built on a separate test address or staging site, block it from indexing so Google doesn't find two copies of your business. Then, and this is the step people forget, remove that block when you launch. On WordPress, check that "Discourage search engines from indexing this site" under Settings, Reading is unticked. On Wix, check the site-wide and page-level indexing settings. Our guides to WordPress indexing and Wix indexing cover these checks in detail.
Step 7: Launch-day checklist
- Every important page is published and loads on desktop and phone.
- Redirects work: test old addresses from your top-pages list.
- Indexing is allowed site-wide and on every important page.
- Each page has its own title, description and one main heading.
- Canonical tags point to the live addresses, not the staging site.
- The sitemap lists the new pages, and you've submitted it in Search Console.
- Forms, phone links and booking buttons work. Send a test.
- Analytics and any tracking still fire on the new pages.
Step 8: Watch the first few weeks
In Search Console, check the Pages report for a rise in "Not found (404)" errors, and fix them with redirects. Use URL Inspection to request indexing for your most important new pages. Compare the Performance report with your snapshot from step 1, page by page. Some movement in the first weeks is normal as Google re-crawls. A top page that keeps falling usually points to a missing redirect or content that got cut.
If you're changing platforms too
Moving between Wix and WordPress changes more than the design: page addresses, templates and how structured data is added all change. Everything above still applies, but the redirect map matters even more, because almost every URL will be different. If you're on another builder and thinking about moving to Wix or WordPress, contact us and we'll talk it through. For the platform question itself, see Wix vs WordPress for SEO.
How we handle it
Every website redesign we do follows this process: benchmark, URL map, redirects, content carried over, and a launch check before and after. Nothing goes live until you've approved the preview. The free site overview is a good first step: it shows what's working on your current site, so you know what to protect.