How will a sites ranking be affected??

[Anthonykal-group]

Hey guys,

My MD has just put this to me, we have a site the is currently ranked in top 3 for all there chosen search terms. The company is undergoing an overhaul of their design and want a new site to match this.

They have asked how changing the site design will affect their rankings.

More content is going to be added with this there will be new pages links etc

Any information would be greatly appreciated..

Thanks Anthony

[Matt-Williamson]

Hi Anthony - I am assuming that the site design change will basically be a change to the template more than the actual content? I think you need to make sure that you plan this carefully, but in my experience the most important thing is to make sure that the titles and other onpage elements stay the same, so that you are less likely to upset your current rankings. When you redesign the site are you going to keep the same URLs as you currently have or will this change? If this is the case you need to make sure you have mapped all the old URLs to their new corresponding ones using 301 redirects. I would also look at your current onsite menu structure and internal links between pages and make sure that you try to keep this the same. If you plan this carefully and make sure that you keep the current content, but add to it then there shouldn't be a negative effect on your rankings. While the redesign is being done you could actually plan on improvements like you have mentioned more content, you could also make sure you have all the latest Google tracking code for Analytics if you use it. You could also look at all the potential ways in which you could have the new design built to be optimised for site preformance meaning every page loads as quick as possible. Also adding new pages into your structure is another positive step to actually improving your online preformance with this redesign.

[AlanMosley]

It certainly can affect their rankings, it could improve them or decrease them.

Changing content can have a great affect a well as the design, bad crawlability can also have a great affect.

If the site is generating good income i would not be trusting this job to an amature with a off the shelf CMS.

There is also a change in site structure and 301's to consider.

Depedning in the current site, a rebuilt can oftem be a good chance to fix inbuilt problems. A lot deopends on your choice of devloper.

[Anthonykal-group]

Hey Alan,

Content is going to stay the same, just with additions.

The old site will be completely removed and replaced with the new design, not just an update of the template.

[Webmaster_SEO]

Even if no change in the URL structure is done, small changes in content can upset (even improve) the rankings as the keyword placement, density and proximity do change with even slight change/addition in content.

Also, with addition of more pages and changing template you will be altering the internal linking of the site which again will effect the rankings. You will also need to make sure that the crawl pattern should not change with these changes which means if content is closer to start of body tag and then comes the internal links you might want to maintain similar flow in new design.

Even if you do everything perfectly, do set expectation that it might take upto 2-3 months to get back to where you  are currently as there are always some fluctuations after site design changes time of which can vary.

[Dr-Pete]

I think Matt's absolutely right (although Alan's warning are definitely worth noting). It really depends a lot on what "change" means. Even "just a template" could mean that your navigation options move, change, increase/decrease, and that can change your internal PR flow. IF the navigation is the same, and IF you aren't adding a lot of ad space, and IF your content, titles, URLs stay roughly the same, and IF you 301-redirect properly (or don't need to, because URLs aren't changing), then you may see very little long-term impact.

You may see a bounce/shuffle as Google re-evaluates the site - any change can trigger short-term bounce. Other things to keep in mind:

(1) Make sure the new template doesn't radically alter load-times.

(2) If you're adding new content, that should be fine, but if you add a lot of content, you could dilute your index, create duplicates, etc. Plus, you'll be linking to that new content, which may draw internal PR from other pages. It's always a balancing act.

Not to make it sound grim. Plenty of people change their sites with no harm and even for the better (especially if it's better for users). Just go in with your eyes open and plan carefully.