I have a client whose shop will be down a few days. What would provide less impact to organic search program?

[smulto]

I have a client who is moving their warehouse, and their shop will be down for four days.  I have been doing  some research on the best ways to handle this and I wanted to get the communities feedback on this.  One thought is to have the pages live, but people can't place an order - but this does not provide the best customer experience.  Another thought is to just do temporary redirects for the shop pages, to land on the "sorry we are moving" page for customers.  Another thought was to do 503 HTTP status codes on the pages and then do a temporary redirect to the landing page.

Have any of you experienced this issue?  If so, what did you do to minimize the impact to the organic search programs?

NOTE: All of their static content will remain in tact.  Only the shop/store will be down.

[KeriMorgret]

Here's a blog post from a couple of years ago that talks about that and should be helpful in your situation. http://moz.com/blog/how-to-handle-downtime-during-site-maintenance

Best of luck!

[smulto]

Yes, I read that one.  Figured it was a few years old and maybe there was another solution available.  

Thanks!

[BruceA]

Not sure of all the facts so very hard to make a call on what to do.

Initial thoughts:-  Why is moving warehouse stopping ordering?  If this is because you cannot ship fast enough, extend your lead time to ship to cover these days.

To recreate an old phrase of "Out of stock is out of business" to "Offline is out of business"....if a customer makes the effort to get to the site and then cannot buy, what is stopping this and is the reason really really valid. Can you give a few more details about what why and how come?

Warmest regards

Bruce

[CandymanKen]

I would agree with Bruce  in that unless this is a "must have tomorrow" industry, it might be best to leave everything as is and add something that tells your customers that you're down for a few days. Why not throw up a banner on every product page that says something like "we're moving to serve you better - so orders may be delayed for a few days more than normal". We did something similar when we moved and most customers understood.

Good Luck

Ken

[EGOL]

We have moved our place of business a couple of times. Big job. Everyone has also been out of the office for a conference.

Method 1) Move on Friday and have it done by Monday... maybe you can pick a three day weekend. Have a big sale on your bulky items for a couple weeks before the move. GET SOME SHELVES EMPTY. Place restocking order with supplier so that it arrives at your new location early in the week after your move.

Start moving all nonessential items on Thursday, anything that you can get out of there. Leave only what pack-and-ship people need to operate on Friday at the old location. Get minimal furniture and computers in the new location and operating on Thursday. Get empty inventory shelving at the new location ready to accept inventory. Take anything to the new location that you can.

On Friday, pack-and-ship people arrive early and get all orders picked and packed and shipped. As soon as pack-and-ship people are finished the moving team yanks their furniture and supplies and takes it to new location.Pack inventory in boxes and move shelving to new location before inventory. LABEL THE BOXES WITH SHELF NUMBERS.

Friday night, Saturday and Sunday moving team gets all shelving, inventory, and pack-and-ship supplies and furniture set up at new location. Pack-and-ship people work during the weekend to get the inventory back on the shelves as they want it. Don't let the moving crew do this or pack-and-ship people will be cussing.

Monday morning, pack-and-ship people are ready to go, starting a little early so they have extra time to be ready for your package pickup people. Pay overtime and a nice bonus for everyone's hard work.

2. Method 2)... place a big face-slapping sign on every page of your site and even bigger in the checkout. "We are moving to a new location. Please feel free to shop but know that orders will not ship until (fill in date)."

[KeriMorgret]

I would personally vote for having the pages live and either not being able to place an order (with a message), or have them be able to place an order but have a message saying things will be delayed. Totally depending on your client's type of business and customers, they could also do an email or blog post or note on their home page warning people in advance of the downtime.

My husband runs a small business, and many things are custom-manufactured by us. It's a small, niche industry, and many of the people know each other. There are only a handful of forums devoted to the hobby. We had a period where we were effectively shut down for a couple of months, due to a fire at the location we were using, followed by moving. We did a blog post on our site, and then posted on all the forums letting people know what was up and that orders would be delayed. I did take the shopping cart icons off the site at that point so that people couldn't order. Thankfully, people were fairly understanding.

[smulto]

Sure!  It is a large brand that has a warehouse system and inventory system hooked into its website.  By moving the warehouse, they must take the shop offline.  That is just a fact I have to deal with.   It is not a decision I can make or can influence.  But, I can influence how it is taken offline.

I can't agree more on the "give us a few extra days" solution, but their inventory system (which is hooked into its website) can't do it.  Otherwise they lose their data.  I don't get it, but that is the way it is...

Thanks!

[smulto]

Due to the limitations in their system (see my response to Bruce above) I have no say in having inventory or not.  But, one of the options is to have all the product pages live and no option to purchase.  Possibly putting a banner on the top explaining what is happening...  Maybe that is a better option the the temporary redirects... I just don't know.

[smulto]

This is a large consumer brand, so it isn't a handful of people - but let me chat with them about their communication plan.  Not sure what they are doing from a customer experience perspective and it would be good to note. Thank you!

So you vote with having the pages live and not order, rather than a redirect...   Even for a large consumer brand?

Thanks!

[Antony_Towle]

Remembered seeing this back in the day,

Matt Cutts Take,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eYJuT0yGrI&list=UUWf2ZlNsCGDS89VBF_awNvA

I should think you will be fine for just 4 days,

James