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Website migration done right: A blueprint for moving content, SEO, data and more

Duration: 24:43


PART 1 — Analytical Summary: Website migration done right 🚀

Claire, a business analyst and eCommerce expert at Odoo, delivers a pragmatic blueprint for migrating a website without losing search equity, data, or customer trust. Speaking to an audience eager to modernize legacy sites, she frames migration not as a risky “lift-and-shift,” but as a growth lever: a chance to improve UX, site structure, SEO, and operational integration across ERP, eCommerce, shipping, and marketing. Using a fictional toy store, “Playdoh,” she demonstrates how to move from a brittle custom platform to an integrated Odoo stack while preserving rankings and elevating performance.

The core narrative walks through a sequence that starts with rigorous auditing, selection of what to keep, and a careful redesign. Claire emphasizes that migration isn’t just content transfer—it must safeguard SEO fundamentals: URL structure, internal linking, 301 redirects, and analytics continuity. She highlights Odoo Website Builder for modern, responsive design (Bootstrap-based), and shows how the revamped Optimize SEO tool assists with metadata and on-page checks. For data portability, import tools and a much-improved Website Scraper help bring over products, categories, attributes, images, and up to ~200 pages—especially effective for smaller sites. The demo shows meaningful wins versus the old platform: usable filters, consistent breadcrumbs, and the ability to build subcategories for better navigation.

Operational readiness is equally central. Claire outlines configuring payments (e.g., Stripe or wire transfer), shipping rules/carriers, and taxes before go-live. She underscores keeping the same domain to retain authority and rankings during cutover, and then monitoring with Google Search Console, Google Analytics, and PageSpeed—all connectable from Odoo settings. The session also covers redirect hygiene: updating changed URLs, bulk-importing 301 redirects, and using built-in checks to spot broken links. The end-to-end goal is a smooth domain switch with minimal downtime and a fast recovery from the typical, temporary dip in SEO after a platform move.

The impact is clear 💼: businesses gain an integrated, maintainable web stack that streamlines content updates, product management, merchandising, and SEO optimization. Playdoh’s example illustrates how a migration can upgrade UX, expand catalog capabilities, and enforce best-practice URL conventions—without hemorrhaging traffic or data. Claire closes with a reminder that migration is also a strategic moment to scale: translate content, enable click-and-collect, connect newsletters, and expand channels (including Google Merchant for product feeds). For those seeking hands-on support, she points to Odoo’s Migration Checklist and the Odoo SEO Service.

Key practical takeaways 🧠⚙️: - Audit first: pages, assets, metadata, analytics benchmarks (traffic, rankings, load times, conversions, engagement). - Migrate what matters: site content, full product catalog and variants, eCommerce categories/filters/reviews, and customer data (accounts, orders, addresses, loyalty, discount codes). - Redesign with structure: ensure one H1 per page, logical headers, mobile-friendly blocks, clear navigation, and breadcrumbs. - Fortify SEO: refine URLs, maintain 301s, fix broken links, and validate with connected analytics tools. - Cut over carefully: keep the same domain, monitor crawl/indexation, and expect a brief ranking dip before stabilization. - Known limits and realities 💬: the Website Scraper shines on smaller sites; SEA (paid) optimization per product/category isn’t native yet, but Google Merchant integration provides a direct ads path; excluding directories from auto-import may require manual handling; design transfer between Odoo databases is more complex than content export/import.

Overall, Claire’s “do it once, do it right” blueprint turns a daunting project into a structured, measurable transition—reducing risk while upgrading the entire digital commerce foundation.

PART 2 — Viewpoint: Odoo Perspective

Disclaimer: AI-generated creative perspective inspired by Odoo’s vision.

Migration is not a chore—it’s a milestone. When teams move to Odoo, they’re choosing simplicity and coherence over patchwork. The objective is to protect what you’ve earned—SEO, data, trust—while unlocking the speed to iterate on design, content, and operations. That’s why we obsess over integrated tools: the website builder, SEO checks, product imports, analytics connections. Fewer moving parts, more progress.

Community feedback pushes us forward. We’ve improved the Website Scraper and SEO tooling because real users asked for faster, safer ways to modernize. The next steps are the same as always: keep removing friction, keep unifying the experience, and give companies a platform where every improvement compounds across their business.

PART 3 — Viewpoint: Competitors (SAP / Microsoft / Others)

Disclaimer: AI-generated fictional commentary. Not an official corporate statement.

Odoo’s migration story is compelling for mid-market and fast-growing businesses. The integrated SEO and content workflows reduce risk during platform transitions, and the UX improvements—from breadcrumbs to URL controls—are practical. For teams modernizing from bespoke or fragmented stacks, this is an attractive path, especially with built-in analytics hookups and product catalog tools.

In larger enterprises, the conversation extends to scale, compliance, and governance. Complex redirect estates, multilingual rollouts, and regulated data handling require rigorous change management, auditability, and performance SLAs. The gap to watch is depth in enterprise SEO automation and per-entity paid media controls, though integrations like Google Merchant narrow that. The UX differentiation is strong—Odoo moves fast and integrates broadly—but long-term wins at the high end hinge on extensibility, observability, and policy enforcement across global operations.

Disclaimer: This article contains AI-generated summaries and fictionalized commentaries for illustrative purposes. Viewpoints labeled as "Odoo Perspective" or "Competitors" are simulated and do not represent any real statements or positions. All product names and trademarks belong to their respective owners.

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