How to migrate from Shopify or WooCommerce without losing SEO

The short version

A store migration is safe for SEO when every URL that used to work still leads somewhere useful, and when Google can see that clearly. In practice that means ten steps:

1. Crawl and export your full URL inventory.
2. Keep product, collection and page handles unchanged.
3. Map every old URL that changes to a 301 redirect.
4. Keep titles, meta descriptions and structured data.
5. Move images together with their alt text.
6. Bring over customers and order history.
7. Plan the DNS cutover and lower the TTL a week ahead.
8. Verify Search Console and submit the new sitemap.
9. Monitor 404 errors for 2–4 weeks.
10. Know what to expect in rankings.

1. Crawl and export your URL inventory first

Before you import anything, write down what exists today. Google's guide to site moves with URL changes recommends building a mapping of old URLs to new ones, starting from your sitemaps, server logs and analytics.

Collect URLs from four places:

• Your current sitemap.xml (products, collections or categories, pages, blog posts).
• A crawl of the live store with any SEO crawler.
• The Search Console Performance report, exported for the last 3–6 months.
• Landing pages from your analytics tool, sorted by visits.

Put everything in one spreadsheet with these columns: old URL, page type, new URL, SEO title, meta description, clicks in the last 3 months. The clicks column tells you which pages to check by hand first.

2. Keep handles and slugs

The cheapest redirect is the one you never need. If the URL stays exactly the same, Google has nothing to relearn.

From Shopify. Omniterra storefronts use the same URL patterns as Shopify: /products/handle, /collections/handle, /pages/handle and /blogs/blog/handle. The Shopify import keeps your handles, so most Shopify URLs stay exactly the same after the move. Check separately any URL that doesn't follow these patterns, for example pages created by an app.

From WooCommerce. WooCommerce permalinks have a different shape, such as /product/slug/ or /product-category/slug/. The import keeps your slugs as handles, but the path around them changes, so these URLs need redirects.

3. Map every old URL to a 301 redirect

Google treats a permanent server-side redirect (301 or 308) as a signal that the target should be the canonical URL, while a temporary redirect doesn't carry that signal. That is the core of Google's page on redirects and Google Search. Use permanent redirects for a migration.

Three rules for the mapping:

• Redirect each old URL to its closest equivalent, not to the homepage.
• Avoid chains. Point old URLs straight to the final address.
• Keep the redirects for a long time. Google's site-move guide says "generally at least 1 year".

What the Omniterra importers do

The Shopify import brings over your existing URL redirects list, along with products, variants, collections, customers, orders, discounts, pages, the blog, menus and files.

The WooCommerce import converts categories into collections and imports products, customers, orders, coupons, pages and blog posts. It also creates 301 redirects from your old product, page and post permalinks to the new URLs. Check category URLs manually: compare the old /product-category/ addresses in your spreadsheet with the new collections, and add any missing redirects yourself. Also decide what to do with tag archives and other URLs your old store generated.

4. Keep titles, meta descriptions and structured data

Rankings depend on more than the URL. After the import, open your spreadsheet and spot-check the SEO title and meta description of your top 50 pages by clicks. If a title changed, restore it before launch.

Structured data matters too. Product pages usually carry product markup with price and availability, which feeds rich results. Test a few product URLs with Google's Rich Results Test before and after the move, and make sure canonical tags point to the new URLs, not the old domain.

5. Move images with their alt text

Images bring image-search traffic, and alt text is also an accessibility requirement. Add an alt-text column to your inventory for your most visited products, then check after the import that each product image still has a meaningful description. If you rename image files, you lose nothing important, but missing alt text is worth fixing before launch.

6. Customers and order history

SEO is only half of a migration. Returning customers expect their account and past orders to be there. Both importers bring customers and orders, and discounts (Shopify) or coupons (WooCommerce) come over too, so codes you've already sent in newsletters keep working. Place a test order and look up an imported customer before you switch the domain.

7. DNS cutover timing and TTL

Google's guide to changing your hosting recommends lowering the TTL of your DNS records to a low value, such as a few hours, at least a week before the move. When you then point the domain to the new store, visitors and Googlebot switch over quickly instead of hitting the old server for a day or more.

Plan the switch for your quietest hours, and freeze catalog edits on the old store during the move so nothing gets changed in two places. On Omniterra, your custom domain gets SSL automatically. Keep the old store accessible to you for a few days in case you need to check something.

8. Search Console: verify, submit, and change of address only if needed

Make sure your domain is verified in Search Console before the move. Right after launch, submit the new sitemap in the Sitemaps report and watch the indexed page count grow.

Use the Change of Address tool only if your domain changes, for example from oldstore.ro to newstore.ro. Google's help page says not to use it for moves that keep the same domain, such as switching from HTTP to HTTPS. If you only change platform and keep your domain, redirects and a new sitemap are enough.

9. Monitor 404s for 2–4 weeks

For the first week, check the Search Console Pages report every day, and re-crawl your old URL list against the new site. Every 404 on a URL that used to get clicks is a missing redirect: add it. After that, check twice a week until four weeks have passed. Also confirm that no page is left with a noindex tag and that robots.txt doesn't block the new store, two of the common mistakes Google lists.

10. What to expect in rankings

Some movement is normal. Google says that for medium-sized sites it can take a few weeks or more before the new URLs replace the old ones in results, and longer for large sites.

If your URLs stayed the same, as with most Shopify moves, you should see little change. If URLs changed, as with WooCommerce, expect some reshuffling for a few weeks while Google processes the redirects. A drop that is still growing after a month usually points to missing redirects, lost titles or a blocked crawl, so go back to steps 3, 4 and 9.

Where Omniterra fits

Besides the importers, Omniterra offers a Shopify-compatible Admin API, so many tools built for Shopify can keep working with little or no change. Every plan has 0% platform commission, including Free at €0/month.

You can test the whole migration before you touch your domain. Start free and import your store, check the URLs against your spreadsheet, and switch DNS only when you're satisfied. For side-by-side details, see Omniterra vs Shopify and Omniterra vs WooCommerce. If the move is also about cost, read e-commerce platform costs explained and compare our pricing. Starting from scratch instead? See how to start an online store in Romania.