Switching to Shopify without the worry (and without losing your SEO)

Many business owners stay stuck on an outdated or frustrating platform, simply because switching seems scary. "What if I lose my customers? Or my spot in Google?" Fair questions — but with the right approach, a migration to Shopify is very manageable. Below we explain honestly how such a switch works.

Start with a backup and a plan

The first step is always the same: make a full backup of your current shop and map out what needs to come along. Not everything is equally important. Which products, which customer data, which order history? And which pages rank well in Google and therefore definitely mustn't be lost? That overview is your compass for the rest of the switch.

Move your data cleanly

Next, the products, variants, customers and orders move to Shopify. For common systems like WooCommerce, Magento or Lightspeed there are tools and proven routes to do this safely, preserving your data. It's important that product variants (sizes, colours) come across correctly and that your products end up neatly organised — a migration is a good moment to create some order.

The crucial part: 301 redirects

This is where most switches go wrong. Shopify uses a different URL structure than your old platform. Do nothing and all your old links — which Google has indexed and which people have shared — suddenly lead to an error page. The result: you lose visitors and your position in the search results.

The solution is 301 redirects: you tell each old URL where its new version on Shopify lives. That preserves the visibility you've built up and keeps shared links working. Along with that you carry over your meta titles and descriptions, so Google recognises your pages. Done well, you don't lose your SEO — it often even improves, because Shopify is technically fast and tidy.

Test everything before the switch

Before you go live for good, check everything: are the products and prices correct, do the payments work, do the redirects behave as they should? Only once all of that has been tested and is in order do you flip the switch. That's how you avoid surprises on the day itself.

How does Kattenberg 118 guide a switch?

Kattenberg 118 is a web studio in Borgerhout. Jonas migrated his own shops to Shopify and has plenty of experience safely moving catalogues, customer data and history from systems like WooCommerce, Lightspeed or Magento. A migration is one of those big, hands-on projects — often with a point-of-sale or work on site involved — and projects like that get our full focus, one at a time. Smaller websites run smoothly alongside it, but your switch gets the full attention it deserves.

For De Wereld van Smaken we moved an outdated platform to Shopify that way, including a pop-up with Shopify POS on top. We test everything thoroughly and on switch-over day we're right beside you — no panic over the phone, but going live together. We don't put a fixed price on the website, because a migration depends heavily on your current system and the amount of data. We do give an honest estimate after a short conversation. Stuck on an old platform? Get in touch.