Technical SEO checks we run before every launch

A new site often loses search traffic in its first month. The cause is almost always technical. A redirect is missing, a page is blocked or a template sends the wrong signal to search engines. These problems are easy to fix before launch and painful to fix after.

We run the same eight checks on every project. Each one takes minutes, and together they catch most of the risk.

1. Crawl the staging site

We crawl the whole site with a crawler tool and look at the results. We check for broken links, pages that return errors and pages that are too deep in the structure. Anything that a visitor cannot reach in four clicks gets a closer look.

2. Check the robots file

The robots file tells search engines what they may visit. A staging site often blocks all crawlers on purpose. Many launches forget to remove that block. We check the live file twice, once before and once after launch.

3. Map every old address

If the new site has different page addresses, every old address needs a redirect to the closest new page. We build the redirect list from the old sitemap and the analytics data. Pages that get traffic come first.

4. Check canonical tags

A canonical tag tells search engines which version of a page is the main one. A mistake here can split the ranking between two versions of the same page. We check that each page points to itself, unless there is a clear reason.

5. Review titles and descriptions

Every page needs a unique title and a clear description. We check that no two pages share the same title, and that each one describes the page honestly. Long titles get cut off in search results, so we keep them short.

6. Test the structured data

Business, product and article details can be marked up in a way that search engines understand. We test each template with the official testing tool. Errors are fixed before launch, not after.

7. Measure speed on a phone

We test the main pages on a mid-range phone with a normal connection. Images are sized for the screen, and scripts load only where they are needed. A page that takes five seconds to show content loses visitors before they read a word.

8. Set up tracking

Search Console and analytics must be connected on launch day. If they are not, the first weeks of data are lost. We also check that the consent banner does not block the tracking code for visitors who accept it.

A launch is the best time to find SEO problems and the worst time to discover them.

After launch, we check the list again within 48 hours. The most common issue at that point is a redirect that was missed, and it is quick to fix once you see it.