This article explains changing your existing website domain to another domain.


This is a major undertaking which requires careful planning and preparation due to its impact on ranking, website traffic, the ability to take orders and 3rd party services connected with your website.


Planning and preparation: £285+VAT

Cutover: Starts from £95+VAT and then charged on a per hour basis due to different site complexities.


The information below helps explain the areas that need to be changed and acts as a checklist and test plan.


Important please read: 

  1. The implementation may occur over different days - first to setup Cloudflare, then the live change
  2. There may be some disruption when domain names are changed over. 
  3. When the site is redirected it will be configured to send across to the same urls between domains, e.g. oldsite.com/Home will redirect to newsite.com/Home, same for all categories, products, pages etc. Note that rankings/traffic can drop while the new site builds up in Google's index.

Key Steps

  1. Preparation
  2. New domain DNS backup & cloudflare setup
  3. Domain name redirect change on server and HTTPS configuration
  4. Change to new domain name in Google Analytics
  5. Setup new Google Search Console property for new domain name
  6. Change relevant 3rd party tools and apps to new domain name
  7. Change redirects with absolute paths to new domain name
  8. Recaptcha changes
  9. Testing

Preparation 

DNS records

  • Understanding current DNS configuration
  • Use of Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) like Cloudflare
  • Backing up DNS records
  • DNS changes and propagation - timings

Connections to 3rd party systems

Identify connections to 3rd party systems and services which may have a dependency on the domain name including:

  • Email (such as Mailgun or other email services)
  • Google Analytics
  • Google Ads
  • Google Search Console
  • Other SEO tools e.g. Bing Webmaster Tools, SEMRush, Moz, etc.
  • Chat apps e.g. Tawk.to
  • Uptime monitoring tools e.g. Pingdom
  • Business apps (e.g. Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, Hubspot CRM etc)
  • Social media
  • Payment processors 
  • Delivery providers
  • Google Recaptcha used for registrations and forms
  • Currency converters
  • Translators
  • Maps
  • Custom JS/Script widgets in use from 3rd parties

Server and HTTPS configuration

  • Reconfiguring server redirects
  • HTTPS / HSTS changes if required
  • SSL certificate changes if required

Redirects

  • Identify redirects which use absolute domain paths

Example Implementation Plan

Preparation

  • Have a written record of all the 3rd party services used on the site and who is responsible for changing each one.
  • Establish who is changing the DNS / CDN and have all contact details ready.
  • Agree the dates for the changes to happen.


Part 1 - Preparing for the live transfer

  1. Backup the DNS of the new domain name.
  2. Create a new account of Cloudflare
  3. Point the nameservers of the new domain to the new Cloudflare account 
  4. Point the A records to the site (it will redirect to the current site which is ok for now)
  5. Add any other records/zones in as per the backup. (E.g. TXT records etc, don't proxy ones such as mail ones that may cause issues, also don't bring over AAAA records as these are ipv6 A records and would otherwise cause issues).
  6. Ensure that any SPF records set are updated with the site IP to allow sending emails from the website.
  7. While here also check the DNS records from the backup and on Cloudflare are correct, e.g. there's a www record or a wildcard one meeting the same need. 
  8. Setup the Cloudflare account conf as normal, e.g. disabling Scrape Shield, adding the page rule for bypassing cache etc. in admin. (see general config from an existing site for more).
  9. Set the SSL mode to Flexable instead of full (if both domains are on Cloudflare then do this on both - Flexable means we can use just Cloudflare ssl to help minimise downtime while the ssl on the server is switched over).
  10. Pause for 24 hours to allow these changes to take place

Part 2 - Making the change to the live site

Note that there may be a short period of downtime, hopefully less than 1 hour.

This allows us to transfer the site folder on the server to the new name, DNS records, redirects and setting up the SSL


  1. Ensure DNS has fully migrated by checking www A record points to the Cloudflare's proxy 2 IPs rather than the site IP. Also check another couple key records from the previous backup such as the MX records & any mail. subdomain/zone that may be related to that. 
  2. Rename the current site on the server from the old domain to the new domain
  3. Set up the redirect for the old domain to the new domain
  4. Ensure the HTTPS connection is working on both sites and the redirect works
  5. Once SSL created on server, In Cloudflare, switch back to full SSL mode.


Part 3 - Google Analytics, Search Console, 3rd Party Services & Apps

Complete this immediately after part 2.

  1. Change to the new domain name in Google Analytics
  2. Add a new property for Google Search Console for the new domain name
  3. Submit a new sitemap in Search Console
  4. Update Google Ads with the new domain name
  5. Update all other 3rd party apps and tools with the new domain name (where required)
  6. Change your redirects to use the new domain name in REC+ Admin > Redirect manager
  7. Update the Recaptcha with the name domain name if it is in use

    If you need to temporarily disable the recaptcha do this in:
    Admin > Site Settings > General > "Require Google Recaptcha During Registration"
    Admin > Form Builder > Contact Us > "Use Google reCAPTCHA?"

Part 4 - Testing & Monitoring

  1. Put through test order(s) as a non-logged in user to check all the services work, including payment processors and different delivery services.
  2. Get the client to do the same.
  3. Monitor the site in Google Analytics and Search Console to ensure everything is working satisfactorily