From Google Sites to Wordpress - Anyone Ventured this SEO terrain?

[_Thriveworks]

We have a few sites in Google Sites - and they are ugly! We have a majority (40+) of websites in Wordpress. But we have a few websites just stuck on Google Sites, and since Google won't let you fully edit the HTML, add scripts, or implement any technology since 2000, we want to move.

The sad problem - the Google sites are ranking well. We rank well in Manhattan, Atlanta, Dallas, and Philadelphia. The problem is - the sites do not give much room for growth - and the bounce rate is high because they are so ugly.

Has Anyone moved from Google sites to Wordpress? Should we just stay with Google and bite the ugly bullet? My fear is that these sites will not allow for growth. It is hard to update them and even harder to make them look nice.

To get a sample - beware: www.counselingphiladelphia.com

Even another reason to leave: The slider is non-semantic and terrible SEO. Google won't allow a slider script with tags and a hrefs, so the only way to implement a slider is through a Google Docs Presentation that keeps sliding. I know - terrible SEO (#donthate) but we needed something.

Any advice and thoughts would help! Thanks Mozzers!

[evolvingSEO]

Hi Anthony

There's two separate things here, so I'll attack each one individually - and give you some insight to the thought process.

• First - there's the issue of IF you should move them to WP
• Second - if you should, the question is how?

Should You Move To** WordPress**

It's unquestionable that for design, practicality, and long term benefits - you should move them to WordPress. The issue it really all about the ranking. So the questions then become - WHY is the site ranking now, and could you preserve that ranking with a migration.

I would look at things in the following ways.

• First - determine what keywords we're talking about. Is it just head terms? Is it just the exact match of the domain? I'd make a list.
• Then - try to determine why the sites are ranking for the given keywords. The Keyword Difficulty tool is great for that.
• Basically - what we really need to rule out, is if Google sites pass any authority that regular sites do not? I don't see that this is the case.

My inclination would be the say that you can safely migrate - so long as it's done correctly .. see next.

How To Migrate To WordPress

I should preface and say that I have no experience with Google Sites. But let's assume the following things are possible.

1. Build your new WordPress site - obviously on a test server of some sort.
2. Make the new WordPress site have the same content as the current site (same text, titles, etc). We want as little variables and moving parts. Scrape the existing site if you have to with Screaming Frog to grab a lot of that.
3. You can change URLs if you want to - but prepare the 301 redirects ahead of time.
4. "Flip the switch" - I assume you're on your own hosting? You can just basically switch out Google Sites with WordPress.
5. Immediately activate the 301 redirects (if any).
6. Immediately crawl the site looking for 404s
7. Monitor webmaster tools for 404s.
8. After a few weeks, you can probably start improving text etc etc.

Obviously without a deeper look I can't guarantee this as full proof. But I believe you should be fine - the main thing is just those 301s.

Also - couldn't hurt to just try this on one site first!

-Dan

[GKLA]

If its generating converting traffic for you - I would not fix what was not broken.

I've seen many websites sites that were not at all graphically pretty, or even laid out in a way that was very user friendly- they were simple design, with a strong message that generated millions of dollars in revenue.  It is pretty amazing.