Bad if Hosting Company Performs Domain Migration

[Kingalan1]

InMotion Hosting hosts our domain.

At the moment, we use domain "A". Domain "B" redirect to domain "A" . Domain "B"" better represent our brand and we want to redirect domain "A" to "B". Our website is designed in Wordpress. It contains about 750 pages.

At the moment we do not have an SSL certificate. I would like to add the SSL certificate at the same time we migrate the domain. The data we collect on the site  are company name, phone number, email address etcetera. No transactions. I was told that the Auto SSL free certificate is fine and that there is no need to pay for a certificate. Is this correct?

My developer has told me that installing an SSL certificate would take about 8 hours. And that migrating the domain would take 24 hours, plus or minus 5 hours. My developer is very professional, and usually does a great job but this seems costly considering a $24/hour labor rate. It also seems like an inordinate amount of time.

Several well rated (100% approval) Upwork developers are willing to perform this job for less than $200. Huge differential!!

Also, Inmotion Hosting is willing to migrate the site  and install the certificates for free.  But pay nothing and the quality is usually questionable. Any thoughts??

Also, I have a lot to lose in terms of SEO  if something goes wrong. Are there any specifications that I should insist on to make sure the migration proceed smoothly? What do I need to modify on Google Analytics once the migration is done. Any steps I should take to ensure the maintenance of page rank?

Thanks!!!!
Alan

[AjazMozPro]

Hi Alan

I hope you're well,

Firstly the offer made in InMotion hosting for free migration and free installation of the SSL certificate - this is fine, they will certainly swap your domains so that Domain B becomes primary for you on the server and perform the SSL installation but if anything was to go wrong, they will likely ask you to refer to your developer to adjust your site to suit. They will do the basics and in a very basic website, that is sufficient but it sounds like you have quite a large site with lots of content, so I wouldn't recommend it.

To quote for swapping your primary domain and installing the SSL will depend on how much work is involved. Lets say for example your home button links to domainA.com as well as all your images and text links being linked to domainA.com/destination. - They can either set it up so it automatically redirects all the links to the correct address or they could go through manually and make edits to all the pages (header.php, footer.php and so on) to change domainA.com to domainB.com through all the code.

I preferably would change all the traces of DomainA.com to DomainB.com as a pose to setting up the redirects and if this is necessary, it could become very time consuming if you have links and images within the content.

My site is of similar size and I'm extremely fussy about this sort of thing. I would stick with your developer if he's worked on the site before, he will know what's involved. Maybe ask him to confirm the work that is involved so that you're aware what will be included.

I hope this helps and I hope you have a very Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year

Best Regards

Ajaz

[GastonRiera]

Just to add some extra info,

Take a look on these three articles. They might help you.

The Big List of SEO Tips and Tricks for Using HTTPS on Your Website - Moz Blog
The HTTP to HTTPs Migration Checklist in Google Docs to Share, Copy & Download - AleydaSolis
Google SEO HTTPS Migration Checklist - SERoundtable

IMHO, spend an extra bucks and be completely sure that everything is done correctly. And the one that makes the migration takes the responsability for the job.

Hope it helps.
Best luck.
GR.

[ThompsonPaul]

Hmmm, there seem to be a number of significant disconnects here.

First, an AutoSSL will be perfectly fine for your purpose. There's actually no difference between how a free SSL performs and a paid one. The encryption is the same. The thing is, the whole point of AutoSSL is that it is a two or three click installation process. It literally takes three or four minutes, not eight hours. Your developer must be assuming he is going to have to generate and install an old-fashioned certificate in the completely manual method that used to be necessary. That's simply not the case with AutoSSL in cPanel.

Second, the actual domain name migration is going to need to be made up of two overlapping parts. The first part is getting all of the website files and objects to run under the new domain name and HTTPS protocol. The second part is getting all of the external elements adjusted and corrected so they are also using the new domain name.

For the first part of that process, there are WordPress plug-ins that will do the basic website migration in about an hour. These plug-ins will handle changing all of the URL references to the new domain name, and updating them to reflect the HTTPS as well. Then it's necessary to do quality assurance on the site to make sure that any small exceptions or manually created URLs get caught and corrected as well.

The final step is getting the DNS and redirects in place so that all of the old domain traffic is correctly redirected to the new domain and pages. In addition, all of the external/third-party tools that are used with the site must be updated. Things like Google Analytics, Google Search Console, AdWords, ad servers and other tools must be updated to reflect the new domain name and protocol. In addition, all the external profiles you use must be updated as well for things like Facebook, Twitter etc. If your site relies heavily on Facebook share counts for social proof, there are also extra steps that must be taken to salvage those counts after the migration. And finally, you must decide how you're going to handle company email with the change in domain name. This relates to both the company email mailboxes, and the way email is handled from forms on the website.

Doing a domain and https migration like this is definitely a significant undertaking and needs a proper, well-thought-out project plan for implementation, But the actual moving of the files and website to the new domain name and HTTPS is certainly not a 30-hour process. It's managing all the rest of the elements of the migration to ensure both usability and SEO are maintained that take up the time.

Hope that all makes sense?

Paul

[Kingalan1]

Hi Paul:

Thanks for this most detailed response!! The Wordpress plugins (what is the name of this plugin) that do the basic Wordpress migration in about an hour. You say that they will change all of the URL references to the new domain name, and updating them to reflect the HTTPS as well.

By this do you mean that they will create redirects or actually change them to the new domain? If I understand correctly (sorry I am a novice) it is imperative that I actually change the addresses rather than implement a redirect.

From what you are saying, a lot of the work is updating things like Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Facebook etcetera. But it seems like even a novice like me could do that,

So do you think the following sounds about right:

Basic domain migration using Wordpress plugin: 4 hours
Update of third party tools: 3 hours
Redirecting website forms: 30 minutes
Install of SSL Certificate: 1 hour
Miscellaneous: 1 hour
Total: Less than 9-10 hours.

One thing I did not mention. We use Amazon CDN to host about 1,000 images. I don't know how this affects site migration but I would think it complicates it somewhat.

Important thing is good quality control for this critical task. Don't want to under pay and have problems. On the other hand I don't want to pay a multiple of what is should cost.

Also, should I install SSL after the migration has occurred or at about the same time?

[Kingalan1]

Do you think the entire process should take 3-5 hours or more like 5-10 hours?

Also, we use Amazon CDN to host our images. So maybe this adds a few more steps.

I am willing to invest more for a good job, but 8 hours for SSL install and 24 hours for domain migration sounds excessive.

[ThompsonPaul]

The WP migration plugins I'm referring to do a rewrite of the URLs in the database. And yes, this is critical to a solid migration, instead of using redirects. There are a number of WP tools for this. My preferred tool is BackupBuddy (paid- 40% off this month) as it does an excellent job of the migration and is then a top-notch tool for managing the ongoing backing up of the site, as well as helping create a staging version of the site for future dev and maintenance purposes. I've also used the free Duplicator plugin for one-off migrations, and have used Updraft Plus on occasion as well.

The majority of the work is in tuning up the site after migration, and yes, making sure all the related functionality and tools have been updated as well.

My timeline would look something like this:

• Create addon domain in hosting cPanel for new domain and enable AutoSSL certificate - 15 mins
• Use migration plugin to move site to new domain - 1 to 1.5 hours depending on experience
• Run quality Assurance testing to insure all of site and functionality is running properly under new domain and HTTPS, including updating CDN and testing forms - 1-2 hours.
• Review and update 3rd party tools and off-site profiles - 2 hrs
• Implement final DNS changes and redirection of old domain to new, add change of address in Google Search Console - .5 hr
• Miscellaneous, including setting up backup protocol for new domain - 1 hr
• (And don't forget 3-4 hours of careful monitoring and followup for any errors over the following 4-6 weeks after migration, plus earning of new links to the new domain, and getting existing links replaced with new ones to the new domain where possible.)

For a total of about 6 or 7 hours for the migration work itself.

You're right, a clearly laid out and well-priortised project plan for this kind of migration is absolutely essential. You need to know exactly what's going to be done, and in what order, so you can insure all necessary steps are taken. To be blunt, many devs (even really good ones) don't take into account the extra details necessary in migrations like these that an experienced SEO pays attention to.

Having all the images on Amazon CDN actually simplifies the migration somewhat as those images will not have to be moved during the changeover, just have the CDN adjusted instead. The SSL should absolutely be installed on the new domain before migration - otherwise, you are going to add a lot of wasted time and complexity rewriting the database URLs a second time after the domain name change to update them to HTTPS.

Paul