Migrating a site

[daniel.alvarez]

Hello, I have what a I think it's a noob question..

I have a medium size website and need to put it into maintenance for the next 2 months, and afterwards activate a completly new site. My client asked me to do this, cause the same people whoe run the constant flow of information on the site, are the ones who are going to develop the new site, so he wants to just close it out

So... what are the steps for doing this with minimum impact on any SEO advances made this past months?..

How do I tell the search engines, Hey, just under maintenance for a while....then... i'm back in the game but this is my new structure. and the old one should go here

[TellThemEverything]

I really wouldnt take it offline - not for two months. Craziness

Make it read-only if possible - or schedule some new content if you can. If you truly want minimum SEO impact, then wait until the new site is out of beta then push live and setup your 301's..