Website migration & recovery
Website migration without forgetting the awkward bits.
Content, images, products and old URLs all need somewhere sensible to go.
When the move has more dependencies than expected
If you are moving a site, rebuilding it or trying to recover content from an old setup, I can help preserve the pages, data, images and URLs that still matter.
Where I focus
Website moves can become awkward when the source is old, inconsistent or missing a usable export. I've worked on reconstructing archives, restoring image relationships and matching old pages to their replacements. The aim is to understand what exists before deciding how to move it.
Find what needs preserving
Pages, dates, captions, images, categories and product relationships can all matter. I want an inventory of the actual material, not just a list of menu links.
In a legacy archive recovery, that meant discovering valid old content before rebuilding the articles.
Move relationships as well as files
Copying an image file does not necessarily restore its connection to a post. Likewise, a product row does not explain its relationship to a parent, a variation or a brochure.
Image association repairs and product and brochure matching are examples of the work behind the visible page.
Treat redirects as part of the move
A new website should not leave the old URLs as an afterthought. The intended destination needs to make sense, and website changes must be separated from other services using the domain.
My migration work has included page and product mapping while preserving the existing email service during the transition.
What needs to survive the move?
Send me the site or a safe sample of the data and explain what is taking too long or not working. I will focus on the smallest useful job first.
Be clear about missing material
Some sources have gaps. I can't recover a file merely by putting its name in a spreadsheet. Missing images, incomplete records and uncertain matches need to be identified rather than quietly replaced with assumptions.
A staging build can demonstrate the approach without proving the final migration has gone live.
Define a finish line
Agree what should be present, how it will be sampled and which exceptions remain. A migration checklist makes the sign-off more useful than 'the new site looks right'.
For large product datasets, the work often overlaps with catalogue imports.
Questions
What happens if there is no clean export?
The first step is to establish what can be recovered from the existing content and assets. Recovery can be a separate investigation, and I'd not promise completeness before checking the material.
Does a website move include email?
Not unless the scope says so. Where a domain change affects email or other services, those dependencies need to be included explicitly and tested.
HAVE SOMETHING AWKWARD?
What needs to survive the move?
Send me the URL, what is happening, what you have already tried and what a useful result would look like. A small anonymised sample is enough to start - do not send passwords, credentials or sensitive customer data.