SEO relaunch support: protect your visibility in a relaunch

Requirements catalogue for agency, developers and editors
Redirect plan for every URL with rankings and traffic
Staging check, go-live support and monitoring afterwards

Request relaunch support

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4.9

Based on 33 reviews

Relaunch with SEO from the start

A relaunch is the riskiest moment for your visibility

New design, new CMS, new structure: a relaunch changes almost everything search engines and AI systems have learned about your website. If redirects are missing, pages cannot be indexed or canonicals point nowhere, organic traffic drops after go-live. We support your relaunch from planning through to the weeks after go-live, so that rankings, enquiries and revenue are protected as far as possible.

SEO belongs in the planning

In many projects it is unclear who is responsible for SEO. The developers see it as an editorial topic, the editors as a technical task. We bring the requirements in early, while they can still be implemented at no extra cost.

Fixing it later costs far more

Our rule of thumb from many projects: an SEO requirement that is retrofitted after go-live costs around three times as much. Some decisions, such as URL structure or rendering, can only be corrected later with a great deal of time and effort.

SEO is the foundation for GEO

AI systems such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude draw on search indexes and on your website. What Google can no longer find after the relaunch is also missing from AI answers. That is why we check both together, classic search and GEO.

What relaunch support includes

Six building blocks for a safe relaunch

Scope and depth depend on your project: from a new design on an existing system to a change of CMS, domain and structure. You receive documents your agency or development team can work with directly.

Baseline

We record what your website delivers today: rankings, traffic, backlinks and conversions per URL. This makes clear which pages must survive the relaunch. It is based on an SEO analysis of the current state.

Requirements catalogue

A binding document for development, design, concept and editorial teams. Every requirement is explained and prioritised in five levels, from essential to optional. The catalogue covers hosting, indexing, rendering, site structure, structured data and editorial guidelines.

URL mapping and redirects

Every old URL gets a suitable destination. To do this we combine all sources: a crawl of the old website, Google Search Console, web analytics, SISTRIX and backlink data. The result is a redirect table your developers can import directly.

Staging check

Before go-live we check the new website in the test environment: status codes, canonicals, hreflang, internal linking, page titles, structured data, loading times and rendering. We separate what is normal on a staging environment, such as password protection or noindex, from real errors.

Go-live support

On the day of go-live we test the redirects, robots.txt, the XML sitemap and indexability. In addition to the new XML sitemap, we submit a second sitemap with the old URLs in Google Search Console. This way Google fetches the changed addresses sooner, follows the redirects and updates its index quickly. We watch crawling from the start.

Monitoring after the relaunch

In the first weeks we check visibility, index coverage, error pages and loading times at short intervals. We report deviations to your developers with specific corrections, where possible before they affect rankings.

Planning a relaunch?

The earlier we are involved, the less has to be corrected later.

Contact person:
Ralph Grundmann
0228 243 313 53

Get in touch now

How relaunch support works

From planning to after go-live

We work with your agency, your development team and your editors, and follow the timeline of your project.

Kick-off

We clarify goals, timeline, people involved and the scope of the relaunch: design, CMS, domain, structure, languages.

Baseline

We crawl the old website, analyse rankings, traffic and backlinks and define the baseline values against which we later measure the relaunch.

Requirements catalogue

We hand over the catalogue and go through it with everyone involved. We answer open questions from the developers during implementation.

URL mapping

As soon as the new structure is in place, we assign every old URL to a new one: ideally through rules (regex) for whole directories and URL patterns, the rest individually in a mapping table. For important pages without an equivalent, we recommend carrying the content over to the new website.

Staging check

We check the test environment and deliver a prioritised list of errors with links to the affected pages. After the corrections we check again.

Go-live and monitoring

We support the go-live, test all redirects and watch the website in the weeks that follow. At the end we compare the results with the baseline values.

Your relaunch is coming up

Do you know which of your pages bring the traffic?

We show you which URLs, rankings and links you need to protect during the relaunch.

Request relaunch support

SEO and GEO in a relaunch

What to watch out for with Google and AI search

Many requirements apply equally to classic search and to AI systems. Some are added for GEO. The most important points:

Redirects: every old URL is redirected permanently with a 301 to its new destination, without chains and not simply to the homepage. This protects rankings and backlinks. AI systems also cite your old URLs and should still land on the right content.
Indexing: robots.txt, XML sitemap, canonicals and noindex must not contradict each other. Typical errors are a canonical pointing to a redirected URL or a blocked page in the sitemap.
Access for AI crawlers: new firewalls, bot protection and robots.txt rules often block crawlers such as GPTBot or ClaudeBot without anyone noticing. We check whether the crawlers you want can reach the new website, on request with a log file analysis.
Rendering: content that is only loaded via JavaScript is seen by Google with a delay. Most AI crawlers, including those from OpenAI, Anthropic and Perplexity, did not execute JavaScript in a measurement from late 2024 and do not see this content. Important text therefore belongs in the HTML that is delivered. For JavaScript applications that load content via Ajax, we recommend server-side rendering.
Content and facts: in a relaunch, texts are often unintentionally shortened, merged or moved into PDFs. If details about services, prices or locations are missing afterwards, AI systems answer imprecisely or wrongly. We compare the content before and after the relaunch.
Structured data: markup for the organisation, products and articles is often lost when the system changes, or is poorly maintained afterwards. It is rebuilt in the new template and validated before go-live.
Loading time and stability: hosting, caching and image formats determine the Core Web Vitals. Slow or faulty server responses slow down every crawler.
Measurement: tracking and consent are migrated and tested as well. In addition, before the relaunch we record how often AI systems mention your brand, for example with a GEO audit, and measure again afterwards.

From practice

Typical errors around go-live

The following points come from relaunch projects we have supported, anonymised here.

Gaps in the redirect plan: in a staging check in 2026, 92 old URLs had no destination. After go-live these pages would have returned a 404 error. The gap was closed before go-live. On the day of go-live, all 392 redirects tested led to a suitable destination.
Settings from the test environment: a noindex or a blocking robots.txt moves from staging to the live website. Exactly this happened at a go-live in 2026 and was corrected straight afterwards. That is why we check indexability again specifically on the day of go-live.
Googlebot locked out: on one website, an IP blocklist at the hosting provider locked out Googlebot. Visibility fell by around two thirds within a week. After the correction it was back at its previous level two weeks later. Whether crawlers can reach the website therefore belongs on the checklist for every change of hosting.
Launch without server-side rendering: an online shop was due to go live without server-side rendering. Search engines and AI crawlers would have seen a largely empty page instead of the products. We were able to prevent this shortly before go-live.
Missing content: pages with good rankings have no equivalent in the new structure, or their text has been cut heavily. We then recommend carrying the content over instead of only redirecting.
Internal links to old addresses: menus, body text and canonicals still point to old URLs and run through redirects. This costs loading time and crawl budget.
Language versions: hreflang annotations point to pages that no longer exist, or the language versions do not reference each other.

Results from practice

How relaunches we have supported have developed

Four examples from our work, anonymised. The figures come from Google Search Console and SISTRIX.

Medium-sized company, go-live in December 2025: from June to September 2026, Google Search brought 57 per cent more clicks than in the same period of the previous year. The SISTRIX Visibility Index has more than doubled since go-live.
Private clinic, go-live in February 2026: health topics are YMYL topics (Your Money or Your Life), where Google applies particularly strict standards. This makes it all the more important that specialist content, doctor profiles and author details survive the relaunch completely. The Visibility Index rose from around 0.65 before go-live to 1.8 at the end of September 2026.
Online shop changing its shop system, go-live in summer 2026: in the first weeks, the average position in Google Search fell from around 6 to between 8 and 9. After six to seven weeks it was back at the starting value, and the Visibility Index remained stable. Such fluctuations are normal as long as redirects and content are right.
Specialist clinic, go-live in September 2026: in the first week after go-live, clicks from Google Search were 12 per cent above the previous week.

Read more in our article Typical errors in a website relaunch.

Frequently asked questions about SEO relaunches

FAQs on relaunch support

The essentials on timing, scope and collaboration.

When should we involve Rheinwunder?

Ideally in the concept phase, before structure, CMS and templates are fixed. The requirements can then be planned in without extra effort. We also join later, for example for the URL mapping and the staging check shortly before go-live.

Do you work with our agency or our development team?

Yes. We do not build the new website ourselves. We deliver the requirements, answer questions, check the result and implement individual SEO measures ourselves on request. The requirements catalogue is written so that development, design and editorial teams each find their points.

Do we always lose visibility in a relaunch?

No. Short-term fluctuations are normal because search engines first have to crawl and reassess the new website completely. With complete redirects, content carried over and sound technology, visibility is generally preserved. Larger losses are almost always caused by avoidable errors.

What changes with a domain change?

A domain change is the most demanding case because all signals have to be transferred to the new address. In addition to the redirects, it includes the change of address in Google Search Console, updating important backlinks and longer monitoring.

How long does monitoring last after go-live?

We watch the website particularly closely for the first 14 days. After that we continue to check at longer intervals until indexing and visibility are stable. For large websites or a domain change this takes longer.

Do you also support the launch of a completely new website?

Yes. Without old URLs there is no mapping, but all other requirements apply in the same way. A launch is mainly about search engines and AI systems capturing the new website quickly and completely.

What does the relaunch have to do with AI visibility?

AI systems obtain information about your company from search indexes and directly from your website. If pages are no longer reachable after the relaunch, blocked for AI crawlers or only readable via JavaScript, you are mentioned less often or described incorrectly. That is why the GEO requirements belong in the same catalogue as the SEO requirements.

Request relaunch support

Let us talk about your relaunch

Tell us what you are planning and when the new website is due to go live. We will get back to you with a proposal for scope and process.

Customer satisfaction

4.9

Based on 33 reviews

Founder and Managing Director Ralph Grundmann 0228 243 313 53