How do you plan and schedule your website migration to minimize downtime and disruption?

Work with a host provider that has your best interests in mind. Oftentimes, individuals look at price but not support. Make sure you are working with a company that has easily accessible customer support (as your tech team may not always be available). Be sure they provide backup services (had a client learn the value of this the hard way) and check to see what limitations are present with the host provider. Don't be fooled into thinking you need all the bells and whistles of a dedicated server, but understand the limitations of shared hosting. Very important, if you plan to have more than one business – make sure you go with a host provider that either allows add-on domains or gives you the dashboard capability to build more than one site.

Plan accordingly! DNS records can take up to 24 hours to propagate. Make sure you have taken the time to update all your records from one host provider to another. You don't want to discover that, sometime in the middle of the night, your nameservers refreshed, and your email stopped working because you forgot to add your MX records to your new server. Double-check that your DNS records mirror one site to another, double-check your website via an IP link (as the domain itself will still point to the old site), and have a "Maintenance" landing page in place just in case something is overlooked when the change is completed—giving you time to do one final check before going live.

In addition to checking errors, links and functionality issues, prior to the website relaunch, the team can launch their search engine optimization audit. For example, ensure a proper linking structure within the site, implement meta data for those new and existing images and optimize the speed not only for great CX but also for search engines.

Why migrate broken, underperforming, or outdated stuff? The very first step in migrating is a thorough audit of your existing site. Find and fix issues before migrating, or cut those elements from the migration, along with underperforming and outdated elements, especially content. Also, consider migrating in phases, rather than waiting to migrate until your entire site is rebuilt. This way, you can start capitalizing on the efficiencies of the new web host sooner.