Create a redirect map: correctly assign old and new URLs

Step 1: Collect all old URLs

• The XML sitemap of the old page.
• The pages with clicks and impressions from the Google Search Console.
• The most visited pages from web analytics.
• Pages with external links (backlink tools or Search Console, Links report).
• Printed addresses: flyers, business cards, posters, packaging, QR codes.
• A crawl of the old site with an SEO crawler to also find pages without a sitemap.

Step 2: Clean up list

Merge duplicate entries, remove parameters such as ?utm_source=, and standardize variants with and without a trailing slash. At the end, there is exactly one line per page.

Step 3: Assign

For each old URL, the most relevant new destination is entered. If the content no longer exists, use the next most suitable page, such as the parent category. Only if nothing fits at all is the address deliberately given the status 410.

Step 4: Check before going live

• Call each line in the test environment: If exactly one redirect occurs, does it land on an accessible page?
• No chains: The target must not redirect itself.
• Consider uppercase letters, umlauts, and special characters in old URLs.

Don't forget printed links

Printed addresses rarely end up in a sitemap, but are often the most valuable: a flyer in a waiting room is still scanned years later. Dynamic QR codes can be centrally redirected to the new address after the relaunch - still include them in the redirect map so that the list is complete.

Frequently asked questions