How can you ensure your migrated content supports your original content strategy?

1 Audit your current content

Before you start migrating your content, you need to know what you have, where it is, and how it performs. A content audit is a systematic analysis of your existing content, covering aspects such as quality, relevance, accuracy, consistency, structure, metadata, and analytics. A content audit can help you identify what content to keep, update, delete, or consolidate, as well as any gaps or opportunities for improvement. It can also help you map your content to your new CMS and design, and prioritize your migration tasks.

2 Define your migration scope and criteria

Once you have a clear picture of your current content, you need to define the scope and criteria of your migration project. This means deciding what content to migrate, how to migrate it, when to migrate it, and who will migrate it. You also need to establish the standards and guidelines for your migrated content, such as tone, style, format, accessibility, SEO, and governance. These decisions should be based on your original content strategy and goals, as well as the requirements and capabilities of your new CMS and design.

3 Prepare your content for migration

Before you move your content to your new CMS, you need to prepare it for migration. This means making sure your content is clean, consistent, and compliant with your standards and guidelines. You may need to edit, rewrite, or reformat your content to fit your new design and structure, as well as add or update metadata, tags, links, and images. You may also need to create new content to fill any gaps or meet any new needs. Preparing your content for migration can help you improve its quality, usability, and effectiveness.

4 Test and validate your migrated content

After you migrate your content to your new CMS, you need to test and validate it to ensure it works as expected and meets your expectations. You need to check your content for any errors, issues, or inconsistencies, such as broken links, missing images, formatting problems, or content duplication. You also need to verify that your content is aligned with your original content strategy and goals, as well as the needs and expectations of your users. Testing and validating your migrated content can help you ensure its accuracy, functionality, and suitability.

5 Monitor and optimize your migrated content

Once you launch your new website or CMS, you need to monitor and optimize your migrated content to measure its performance and impact. You need to collect and analyze data on how your content is being used, accessed, and consumed by your users, such as traffic, engagement, conversions, feedback, and satisfaction. You also need to identify and implement any changes or improvements to your content, based on your data and insights, as well as any new trends or developments. Monitoring and optimizing your migrated content can help you achieve your original content strategy and goals, as well as adapt to changing user needs and expectations.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?