| Quick answer:
Choose a website migration agency that can document how it will protect your SEO, customer data, subscriptions, and integrations before launch. Before signing, confirm that the agency provides: • SEO planning: A URL inventory, redirect map, and plan to preserve important content, metadata, and internal links. |
For a growing business that relies on its website for recurring revenue and organic acquisition, a migration can put two critical areas at risk: the customers already paying you and the search traffic bringing in new ones.
As order volumes, integrations, and customer accounts become more complex, even a routine-looking migration needs careful planning.
A subscription store might preserve every customer record but lose payment tokens or disrupt renewals.
A site might redirect every old URL correctly but still lose traffic if its content, internal links, or page structure change.
That is why choosing a migration agency isn’t just about finding someone who can move your site.
You need an agency that understands what keeps subscriptions running and what keeps valuable pages ranking, and can show how both will be protected, tested, and monitored before and after launch.
The questions below will help you assess that before you compare proposals.
Website migration risks increase with business complexity
Migration risk comes from what your site does, not how many pages it has. A 5,000-page blog moving hosts is routine. A 300-page store that renews subscriptions, ranks for its category pages, and syncs orders to an ERP is not. The following areas should be assessed before an agency finalises its scope.
SEO and organic traffic
Redirects are necessary, but they are not an SEO plan. One merchant on the Shopify Community forum wrote, “we have done ALL 301 redirects wherever possible,” and still saw a sharp traffic drop. A reply blamed changes to category and product names, content, schema, and site structure.
Recovery can be slow when it goes wrong. SALT.agency’s study of 1,052 domain migrations found that only about one in four recovered within 90 days, the median recovery took 304 days, and 13.9% hadn’t fully recovered after three years.
| EXAMPLE · Course platform: when the redirects work but the rankings don’t
An online course business moves from a hosted platform to WordPress. Its course pages used to live under /courses/, and each had a long description, an FAQ block, and course schema that earned rich results. The agency maps every old URL to its new /learn/ address, and every redirect works. But the new course template is shorter, drops the FAQ block, and ships without schema.Within six weeks, the three course pages that brought in most organic enrollments slide off page one. Nothing is technically broken. The pages Google is now ranking are simply thinner than the ones it ranked before.That’s why a redirect map is only one part of an SEO migration plan. The content and structure of your top pages have to move too. |
Subscriptions are billing agreements, not customer records, and they don’t move like the rest of your data. Renewals depend on saved payment tokens tied to a specific gateway account. As an admin on the Authorize.net developer forum put it, “Subscriptions created by one gateway account cannot be used by another gateway account.”
Missing records is another risk. A store owner on the WordPress.org forums found that “91 of the subscription orders did not migrate,” and admitted, “We do not know all the tables that are involved in the subscription process.”
Subscribers on the Old System?
CHECK THE TOKENS FIRST! Before you compare agencies, find out whether your payment tokens can move to the new setup and how the old system will stop billing. That answer shapes the whole migration.
Customers notice a lost login before they notice anything else. Passwords, order history, saved addresses, membership permissions, and course progress all need to be accounted for.
For LearnDash sites, learner progress records are stored separately from core WordPress user data. If the migration scope excludes the relevant course and activity records, learners may retain access to their courses but lose their completion history. Someone halfway through a course could return to the first lesson, and the issue may go unnoticed until support receives complaints.
Before migration, ask the agency to identify the relevant data structures, document what will be transferred, and verify learner progress against the original site after import.
| EXAMPLE · A membership site with 6,000 members
A membership business moves to WordPress and LearnDash. Its old platform stored passwords in a format the new one can’t read, so every member has to reset their password. No one plans the emails, so members find out by failing to log in on the day of a live session, and support gets 400 tickets in a week. The fix: confirm up front whether passwords can transfer. If they can’t, send a staged, branded re-activation email before launch, give support a script, and make sure course progress is imported so members land where they left off. Beyond passwords, learner progress records in LearnDash are stored in separate database tables from the main WordPress data. If those tables are not explicitly included in the migration scope, members can land back at lesson one of a course they half-completed and no one knows until they email support. |
Every integration is a dependency that can fail without an error on the page. Your ERP order sync, CRM, email platform, shipping tool, and accounting software all expect specific data in a specific place. A migration that changes either can stop orders flowing without anyone noticing until fulfilment does.
Custom functionality
Custom logic usually has to be rebuilt, not copied. Bespoke pricing rules, member access levels, or a checkout tweak built for the old platform won’t exist on the new one. An agency should list each one and say whether it will be rebuilt, replaced with a standard feature, or dropped.
Revenue during the transition
The cutover window is when orders and renewals are most likely to fall through the gap. Orders placed on the old site during the move, renewals due that day, and payments in flight all need a plan. That means a short order freeze, a defined cutover time, and someone checking that nothing landed on the wrong system.
| EXAMPLE · A store whose renewals cluster on the 1st
A coffee subscription store bills about 70% of its subscribers on the 1st of each month. The agency schedules a cutover for the night of the 31st because it’s quiet. The renewal run fires halfway through the switch, some renewals process on the old site, some on the new, and a few on neither. The fix: check when renewals cluster before you pick a cutover date, move the cutover to mid-cycle, freeze orders for the window, and reconcile both systems afterwards. |
A migration affects more than website files. It can also affect search visibility, recurring payments, customer records, and order fulfilment. Before requesting a quote, check whether the agency has assessed these dependencies and accounted for them in its proposed scope.
Also Read: When to Hire WooCommerce Migration Experts
8 questions to ask a website migration agency, and what the answers reveal
Use these on every shortlisted agency, and compare how specific the answers are. A vague answer to any of them usually means the step hasn’t been planned.
1. How will you protect our rankings beyond a redirect map?
• Why it matters: redirects pass ranking signals, but content, titles, internal links, and schema changes can still cost traffic.
• A strong answer: a URL inventory of top pages, a one-to-one redirect map, metadata and schema carried over, a Search Console plan, and ranking checks after launch.
• Red flag: “SEO will be preserved” with nothing written down.
2. How will subscriptions, renewal dates, and payment tokens move, and how do you stop the old system billing?
• Why it matters: The old site can continue processing recurring payments if billing isn’t explicitly switched off during the migration.
• A strong answer: a token migration plan for your gateway, renewal dates preserved, a dry run on staging, and a named step that switches billing off on the old system.
• Red flag: “We’ll import your customers,” with no mention of tokens.
We cover this step in more depth on our WooCommerce Subscriptions migration page.
3. How will customer accounts and passwords carry over?
• Why it matters: forced password resets drive support tickets and lost renewals.
• A strong answer: whether passwords can transfer, and if not, a planned, branded re-activation email and a support script.
• Red flag: finding out after launch.
4. Which integrations will you test, and how?
• Why it matters: a broken sync is often silent.
• A strong answer: a dependency list with a test case per integration, run on staging with real data.
• Red flag: “We’ll reconnect them after launch.”
5. What does staging look like, and who signs off?
• Why it matters: problems found on staging cost hours; problems found live cost revenue.
• A strong answer: a full staging copy, a written test plan including a real test renewal, and your sign-off before cutover.
• Red flag: testing on the live site.
6. What’s the cutover plan, including the order freeze and DNS?
• Why it matters: orders placed during the move can land on the wrong system.
• A strong answer: a cutover window away from your peak days, a short order freeze, lowered DNS TTL in advance, and a named owner.
• Red flag: “We’ll switch it over on Friday.”
7. What triggers a rollback, and how long would it take?
• Why it matters: without agreed triggers, a bad launch becomes a debate instead of a decision.
• A strong answer: specific triggers (failed payments, checkout errors, a traffic drop past a threshold), who decides, and a tested time to restore.
• Red flag: “We’ve never needed one.”
8. What do you monitor after launch, and for how long?
• Why it matters: SEO issues and failed renewals often show up weeks later.
• A strong answer: daily checks on 404s, rankings, renewals, and failed payments for at least 30 days, with a clear support window.
• Red flag: support ends when the invoice is paid.
Related Read: WooCommerce Subscription Migration: How to Transfer Without Losing Customers
Eight questions in, one document to go. The answers on a call matter, but the proposal is where an agency commits to the work in writing. That’s where you can see whether the risks you’ve discussed are actually included in the scope.
A website migration proposal should show the plan, not just the price
A good proposal reads like a plan you could hand to another team. If it only lists deliverables and a fee, you can’t tell what the agency will actually do. Look for these eight sections.
| Proposal section | What to look for |
| Discovery and audit | Current platform, plugins, custom code, data volume, and integrations |
| Data migration | What moves, field mapping, and how record counts are verified |
| SEO | URL inventory, redirects, metadata, schema, internal links, and Search Console |
| Integrations | Dependencies, testing, owners, and fallback plans |
| Staging and testing | Staging environment, written test cases, and sign-off |
| Launch | Cutover window, order freeze, DNS changes, and owner |
| Rollback | Triggers, decision-maker, and recovery process |
| Post-launch | Monitoring period, SEO checks, payment checks, and support |
Migration agency red flags that show the risk hasn’t been scoped
Most migration problems are visible in the proposal before anyone touches the site. These are the gaps to look for:
• “SEO will be preserved” with no URL inventory or redirect plan.
• No staging environment, or testing on the live site.
• No rollback process, or rollback described as “restore a backup.”
• A generic migration checklist that could apply to any website.
• No discussion of integrations beyond “we’ll reconnect them.”
• Subscriptions treated as ordinary customer data, with no mention of payment tokens.
• No post-launch monitoring or support window.
• A fixed price before discovery, which means the scope was guessed.
These gaps are easy to overlook when comparing prices, but they are exactly where migration risk tends to hide. If an agency can’t explain how it will handle one of these areas, ask for it to be added to the scope before comparing quotes.
Compare website migration services on the plan, not the checklist
Compare agencies by the evidence, ownership, and testing details they provide for each migration risk. Put each shortlisted agency’s proposal against this table.
| Criteria | What to look for | Weak version |
| SEO | Redirect map plus indexing plan, metadata and schema carried over | “301 redirects included” |
| Data | Clear migration mapping with record counts checked | “All data migrated” |
| Subscriptions | Recurring logic, renewal dates, and payment token handling | Subscriptions not mentioned |
| Integrations | Dependency map with a test per integration | “Reconnect integrations” |
| Testing | Staging plus written QA, including a real renewal | “Thorough QA” |
| Launch | Controlled cutover with freeze and named owner | A launch date only |
| Rollback | Defined triggers and recovery time | “Backups available” |
Once the table is filled in, the remaining question is whether your migration needs a specialist at all.
You need a specialist migration agency when the site does more than display pages
Match the provider to the risk, not to the size of the site. Plenty of migrations don’t need a specialist, and paying for one when you don’t need it is a waste.
When your host’s free migration is the right choice
A host migration fits when you’re staying on the same platform, keeping the same URLs, and only changing servers. Google treats this kind of move as test, switch DNS, and monitor. Read the host’s terms, though: free migrations usually cover files and the database, not fixing anything that breaks.
When a general WordPress developer is the right choice
A capable WordPress developer fits a content-led site with modest URL changes and no transactions. If there are no subscriptions, no customer accounts, and no business-critical integrations, the risk is mostly SEO, and a clear redirect plan covers most of it.
When a specialist migration agency is the right choice
A specialist fits when the platform changes and the site carries subscriptions, customer accounts, integrations, or significant organic revenue. That’s where the planning in this guide matters most.
| Is your migration high-risk?
Answer yes or no to each question, then count your yeses. 1. Are URLs, the domain, or the platform changing? (Y/N) 2. Does the site take recurring payments or subscriptions? (Y/N) 3. Do customers log in to accounts with order or course history? (Y/N) 4. Does the site sync with an ERP, CRM, accounting, email, or shipping tool? (Y/N) 5. Does organic search bring in a meaningful share of revenue? (Y/N) 6. Is there custom functionality that must be rebuilt, not just copied? (Y/N) 0–1 yes: low risk. A host migration or a general developer is likely enough. 2–3 yes: medium risk. Ask the 8 questions above, and insist on staging and rollback in writing. 4–6 yes: high risk. Shortlist specialist migration agencies and require each one to scope these risks before quoting. Plan your website migration → |
What to look for in a migration partner
A successful migration keeps essential business operations running, with renewals processing, customers accessing their accounts, and search visibility monitored after launch
Every subscription, integration, and ranking page adds a dependency the agency has to account for, which is why bigger revenue makes a simple-looking move harder.
Use the checklist below before choosing an agency. It can help you spot gaps in the proposal and make sure the migration plan covers what your business actually depends on.
| Final website migration agency checklist before you signBefore you sign, the proposal should let you tick every line below.
• ☐ The agency asked about subscriptions, accounts, integrations, and rankings before quoting • ☐ A discovery audit is included and its findings are referenced • ☐ A data mapping document lists what moves and how counts are verified • ☐ The SEO plan covers URL inventory, redirects, metadata, schema, and Search Console • ☐ Payment tokens and renewal dates have a specific migration plan • ☐ The old system’s billing has a named switch-off step • ☐ Each business-critical integration has a test case • ☐ Staging, a written test plan, and your sign-off happen before cutover • ☐ Rollback triggers, owner, and time to restore are written down • ☐ Post-launch monitoring runs for at least 30 days |
If the agency can answer these questions clearly and commit the answers to the proposal, you have a migration plan you can evaluate, not just a price to compare.
If several of these items are missing, ask for them to be scoped before you sign.
The more your site depends on subscriptions, customer accounts, integrations, or organic revenue, the more important that level of planning becomes.
If you need help assessing the risks in your migration before choosing an agency, plan your website migration with us →
FAQ
How much does a website migration agency cost?
It depends on what moves. Duplicator’s pricing guide puts simple freelancer migrations at “$200 to $1,000,” while agency projects for large stores run “several thousand and up.” Subscriptions, integrations, and custom functionality push the cost up, because each needs its own planning and testing.
Will I lose SEO rankings when I migrate my website?
You don’t have to, but it’s common when the plan stops at redirects. Google says permanent redirects don’t lose PageRank, yet SALT.agency’s study of 1,052 domain migrations found a median recovery time of 304 days when traffic did drop. Protecting content, metadata, and structure on your top pages is what keeps rankings stable.
How long should 301 redirects stay in place after a migration?
Google recommends keeping redirects “for as long as possible, generally at least 1 year.” In practice, keep redirects for any URL that still has backlinks or traffic indefinitely, since removing them later can cost you rankings you’d already kept.
Can subscribers be charged twice during a migration?
Yes, if the old system keeps billing after the new one takes over. WooCommerce’s documentation warns that when a database is migrated on the same domain, staging mode won’t trigger and the old site “will continue to process real recurring payments.” A good migration agency includes a named step to switch billing off on the old system before cutover.
