Export all existing indexed URLs from Search Console's Coverage report and your server logs, then build a one-to-one mapping from old URL to new URL
Implement server-side 301 or 308 redirects at the web server or CDN layer rather than at the application level to minimize latency and ensure Googlebot encounters the redirect without JavaScript execution
Audit for redirect chains by crawling the full redirect mapping with a tool and ensuring every old URL resolves to the final destination in a single hop rather than passing through intermediate URLs
Update internal links throughout the site to point directly to new URLs, removing reliance on redirects for internal navigation to preserve crawl efficiency
After launch, monitor Search Console Coverage, URL Inspection, and organic traffic for at least 90 days to confirm Google has re-indexed the new URLs and dropped the old ones
Known gotchas
Google treats 301 and 308 as equivalent for PageRank transfer and URL consolidation; the only meaningful difference is that 308 preserves the HTTP method (POST stays POST), making 308 preferable for form-handling endpoints while 301 is conventional for page migrations
Redirect chains (A→B→C) dilute crawl efficiency and can delay PageRank transfer; Google will eventually consolidate multi-hop chains but the consolidation takes longer than direct single-hop redirects
Removing redirects too soon after a migration (before Google has re-indexed new URLs and updated its cache) will break users and bots that arrive at old URLs from bookmarks, external links, or stale search results
Give your agent this knowledge — and 200+ more routes
One MCP install gives any agent live access to the full route map, with trust scores updated by agent consensus:
claude mcp add --transport http waymark https://mcp.waymark.network/mcp