Informing Google of a website domain and URL change is very important to maintain search engine visibility (good SEO), updated results in search engine result pages (SERPs), and to ensure that visitors can still find your website to avoid broken links (404 pages), and maintain good user experience. Here’s how you can tell Google Search, and other search engines, about these changes:

see this YT video on how to do basic anchor linking in basic HTML:
WordPress: How to hyperlink to anchor ids or anchor tags without plugins (e.g. Table of Contents)

Google Search Console (formerly Google Webmaster Tools)

  1. Sign in to your Google Search Console account.
  2. Add and verify the new domain or URL if you haven’t already done so.
  3. Once verified, go to the old domain or URL property in Search Console.
  4. Navigate to the “Settings” section and click on “Change of Address” tool.
  5. Follow the prompts to indicate the new domain or URL.
  6. Google will then verify the new domain and update its index accordingly.

301 Redirects

  1. Implement 301 redirects from the old URLs to the corresponding new URLs. This tells search engines and users that the content has permanently moved to a new location.
  2. Ensure that all internal links on your website also point to the new URLs.

Update Sitemap

  1. Update your website’s XML sitemap to reflect the new URLs.
  2. Submit the updated sitemap to Google Search Console.
  1. If you have control over external links pointing to your website, reach out to the webmasters of those sites and request them to update the links to the new URLs.

Update Social Media Profiles and Directories

  1. Update your website URL in your social media profiles and any online directories where your website is listed.

Update Content

  1. Ensure that all references to your website’s URL within your website’s content (text, images, etc.) are updated to reflect the new URL.

Monitor Performance

  1. Keep an eye on Google Search Console for any errors or issues related to the domain or URL change.
  2. Monitor your website’s performance in search results to ensure that traffic is being properly directed to the new URLs.

It’s essential to carefully manage the transition to minimize any negative impact on your website’s search engine rankings and traffic. Additionally, be patient as it may take some time for Google to process the changes and reflect them in search results.

You can monitor your SERPs easily by using the site operator in search engines – site:yourdomain.com. This search will only provide you results coming from your domain only.

 

More useful resources:

Site Moves and Migrations | Google Search Central  |  Documentation  |  Google for Developers

Change of Address Tool – Search Console Help