10 Tips for a Successful Shop Relaunch

Whether you're rebranding, making technical upgrades like mobile first, or simply feel it's time for a change: sooner or later, every e-commerce company faces a shop relaunch. The team at dc has planned and delivered many different relaunch projects. In this article, we've pulled together the 10 most helpful tips from our experience. You'll also learn why the best shop relaunch might be no relaunch at all.

1. Buffer, not deadline

Set an internal timeline, but don't communicate a fixed launch date externally. If you're planning a major shop relaunch, build in generous buffers for delays and avoid announcing a fixed date or even a countdown publicly - nothing is more frustrating than presenting your customers with an unfinished online shop. If your relaunch is actually just around the corner, of course you can let your website visitors know why your shop may be unavailable and roughly how long it will take. A professional offline page works well for this. Your employees, involved agencies, and marketing partners, however, should be informed about the relaunch and your rough timeline early on so they can align their activities accordingly.

2. Keep what works

Bring the most popular elements from your old shop into the new one. Of course, you want to give your customers a new and improved shop after the relaunch. But it's especially important not to lose the features your customers already love and the elements that are performing well in your current shop. Before the relaunch, make a list of all key features and check in advance that they will be carried over. That could include blog posts ranking well on Google, popular payment methods, or custom-built functionality.
 

3. Test, test, test

Plan enough testing cycles, analyze user behavior, and optimize your shop accordingly. Your new online shop should be thoroughly tested before go-live: Does it display smoothly across different devices and browsers? Does it hold up in performance tests during simulated peak times? We also recommend UX testing. Let a group of existing customers try out a beta version of the shop and use their feedback for your relaunch. A voucher or discount is a great way to thank them for their support.

4. Make the new shop compliant

Have a specialized lawyer review your new shop for legal compliance. It's not unusual for a shop relaunch to affect legal requirements as well - especially if you're using new external tools. Terms and conditions, privacy policies, customer information, legal notice, cookie banner, and more are best reviewed by an expert. Don't overlook this topic, or you could face legal warnings, fines, and a loss of customer trust.

5. Prepare external tools

Check how your external tools behave and inform providers about the relaunch early. Create an overview of all interfaces and external tools connected to your current shop and test whether they will also work in the new online shop. Most of these tools need small adjustments and should be prepared for the relaunch as well. Payment providers such as credit card companies and trust seal providers like Trusted Shops often want to review the new shop again before launch so their services can remain active. Interfaces to other systems such as your ERP software or newsletter may also need to be adjusted and re-implemented. To make sure both you and your providers have enough time for possible improvements, plan enough time before launch and inform your partners early.

6. Set up redirects

Use 301 redirects to prevent your shop from losing SEO rankings and backlinks. To keep traffic coming after the relaunch, your shop still needs to be easy to find on Google and other search engines, and existing links must keep working. That's why you should set up a solid redirect strategy for your indexed pages. Make sure all pages already indexed by search engines and all URLs linked from blogs and other websites are redirected with 301 redirects to the correct pages in your online shop.

7. Align marketing with go-live

Adjust your marketing campaigns and pause ads during the relaunch. You don't want to waste valuable ad spend. That's why you should turn off your ads on the day of the relaunch and for up to two days afterward. In most cases, it doesn't make sense to push extra traffic to the new shop on go-live day, because it first needs to prove itself under real conditions. But once the relaunch is complete, don't forget to reactivate your campaigns and promotions. You may also need to update campaigns if the relaunch changes things like category structures or URLs.

8. Migrate your data

Transfer all data from the old shop so your customers can continue shopping seamlessly in the new one. Test early whether all master data, products, and customer data have been migrated correctly. Customer data in particular should be imported again shortly before the relaunch so that new customers and login credentials are fully up to date in the new shop. Check whether less obvious data, such as partially used gift vouchers, has also been transferred correctly. Even so, make sure to free up extra support capacity for the days and weeks after launch so you can respond quickly if customers run into issues.
 

9. Have an emergency plan

Don't shut down the server of your current system, and have a plan B that lets you switch back. Even with solid planning, extensive testing, and all the right precautions, unexpected issues can still happen. Prepare for that with a clearly defined rollback plan that allows you to return to the old shop if needed. This is especially advisable if your customers have trouble using the new shop. A strong plan B gives you the time to resolve issues calmly and then make another attempt.  

10. The best relaunch is no relaunch

Avoid a major relaunch and implement changes in smaller steps instead. Think of your webshop as a 24/7 project that you continuously improve and expand. In most cases, we actually recommend against relaunching shops in one big all-at-once move. A gradual transition is easier for everyone to plan and won't catch your existing customers off guard. Ideally, your shop relaunch should happen through small, regular updates.

Our takeaway for you

We're convinced that online shops should be built with long-term thinking in mind. Ideally, don't invest in your shop only every few years - invest continuously. We recommend skipping a major relaunch and optimizing your online shop step by step instead. That mindset is sustainable and will set you up for long-term digital success. At dc, we're already working on making sure our software enables even complex e-commerce projects to keep their online shop up to date through small monthly updates.

But with realistic planning and enough testing, even a major shop relaunch can be smooth and stress-free.