Retaining SEO value when changing the shopping cart software
-
I am looking into purchasing an existing ecommerce site with high SEO rankings. However, the site is old and beyond outdated. The shopping cart would need to be updated (say, to Magento). However, an updated shopping cart will force a change in the URLs (from example.com/category.asp to example.com/category). Will the SEO value be lost? Does anyone have any experience with this issue? There is a significant amount of money for me at stake so I would really appreciate to hear your experiences in this matter.
-
After implementation, I saw ranks improve, decrease and being the same.
The amount of PageRank that dissipates through a 301 is currently identical to the amount of PageRank that dissipates through a link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Filv4pP-1nw. So a small decay may occur resulting in a different rank.
On a second note, what happens many times is that the 301 redirect goes to a page that has more/less content, different template and so on as the original landing page. Since the content is different, the position in the serps may go up/down in organics (this happens even if the page is the same as a competitor's page may become more relevant for a query based on algo changes, content changes and so on).
The most successful migrations are the ones that have the majority of the pages 301 to a landing page that is roughly the same (all other things being implemented properly). Key is planning.
It's stressful, but feels great when implemented properly. Good luck!
-
Your safest route would be to either 1)patch up the current cart to not appear outdated to your customers or 2) find a different shopping cart system that uses the same example.com/category.asp format for it's URL's.
Patching up what is already working will be the least expensive route...
-
sounds good - have you ever had any direct experience with this?
I have noticed with SEO moves that some times even though things are executed properly, they can still not work out as promised.
-
If you do a proper migration, should not hurt your rankings much. Make sure you properly redirect your links (301's) and review the various checklists (planning is the key). After implementation, carefully watch analytics and fix any issues.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
SEO Drop
Over the last few months my rank has dropped by around half and for the life of me I can’t see why. There are no warnings on Google Console. Am I missing something? Website: thespacecollective.com
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | moon-boots0 -
Is there a difference in SEO ranking value between a single backlink from a domain and multiple backlinks
Hi all I see that Moz gives data on Linking Domains and also External Links. The former being the number of domains which have one or more links pointing at your site and the latter the total number of links, including multiple links on the same domain. Apart from the potential benefit of people clicking the links and coming to your site and so increasing traffic, is there any SEO ranking benefit from multiple links? The only one I can think of is that you MAY get benefit from different anchor text for each link...? I'd be interested to hear any comment or experience on this. Bob
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BobBawden10 -
Suggestions for a SEO Review
I think it would be beneficial to have a third party seo review of the network of sites my team and I manage and was wondering if any of you had suggestions for what sort of tests should be done or that we should expect to see done during one of these reviews. We are a small team who has varying seo experience and have been working hard to make improvements to our sites in the past year. Most of our sites have been completely overhauled in the last 12-16 months and seo work that had not been done in the past has been setup, along with some corrections that may have been harming seo. We believe we are on the right track and have learned a good amount about seo in that time, but it would be nice to have some "expert" feedback outside of our office to get a clearer picture on anything we may be missing or some suggested improvements. A sort of double check on the work we have done.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | unikey0 -
Mobile SEO
Hi there, My website when searching via mobile is now showing the mobile version of the site in SERPs, well for quite sometime now to be honest, anyway the ranking in mobile are no different to what they are on desktop, is there actually anything I can do to influence my mobile SERPs? 9 times out of 10 it's desktop websites that are ranking about me in mobile search. Any help would be appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Paul780 -
High Authority, What Value?
Hi there, We have recently had one of our products reviewed on the BBC, however there is no actual link going to our domain, it just mentions www.mydomain.com but not linking, does this have any value in SEO? Thanks
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Paul780 -
Does font size affect SEO?
In the eyes of Google, would the font text size of say a news article affect SEO? For example, a slightly larger font being easier to read by those with bad eyes? Accessibility? If so, what size would be ideal? 10, 12, 14? Your thoughts and suggestions are greatly appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Peter2640 -
What are the best joomla seo plugins?
When optimizing a joomla site what is the best plugins etc for seo tweeking
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | DavidKonigsberg0