A website launch is easier when you treat it as a checklist rather than a dramatic switch. Before you announce the site, check the pieces visitors, search engines, and staff will actually use.
Content and Navigation
Read every key page. Check phone numbers, addresses, opening times, prices, forms, menus, and links. Make sure placeholder text is gone.
Technical Basics
- HTTPS works and redirects from HTTP.
- The site works on mobile.
- Forms send to the right inbox.
- 404 page exists.
- Backups are enabled.
DNS and Email
Confirm the domain points at the right hosting and email still works. Check MX, SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records if email is part of the launch.
Analytics and Search
Add analytics if you use them, submit the sitemap where appropriate, and make sure the site is not blocked from indexing by a staging setting.
Launch day should be boring. The more you check beforehand, the less exciting it needs to be.
Test the Customer's Tasks
Use a phone and desktop to submit every form, call each telephone link, follow directions and complete any booking or checkout. Confirm messages reach a monitored inbox and that success pages explain what happens next. Ask somebody unfamiliar with the project to find the price, contact details and privacy information.
Check the Technical Basics
Force HTTPS, select one canonical hostname, test old redirects and inspect the 404 page. Verify titles, descriptions, one H1, sitemap, robots rules and structured data. Compress images, set dimensions and check performance on a normal mobile connection.
Prepare Ownership and Recovery
Record who controls the domain, DNS, hosting, CMS, analytics and business profiles. Enable two-factor authentication and take a restorable launch backup. Keep the previous site or rollback package until forms, email, analytics and indexing have operated normally.
Write down the launch time and responsible contacts, then monitor uptime, enquiries, orders and error logs through the first complete business day.
