Re-designing a home page - I've been burned before

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So, guys, I'm in a predicament that I have only myself to blame.

I postponed finalizing the design of the home page for a few months and in the meantime got some decent links to it.

I finally HAVE to do it but I've already seen drops in rankings once I change the page - I can keep all of the text and add a section or two...my main problem is that I have a sidebar there right now that has no place being on the home page.

I feel like removing it might be to big of change & might trigger the links to be devalued. So, I'm thinking of keeping the sidebar but instruct my developer to make it it hidden by default.

So, I'm looking for experience and advice on how to do it safely.

Thanks in advnace
#search engine optimization #burned #home #page #redesigning
  • HI Eoon:

    If you don't mind, can you share your website URL to look into it and give your suggestions?

    Look forward.

    Steve
  • Removing the side bar does not mean removing the content within.

    You don't have to lose your ranking: don't change what matters. Go take a look at the cache of your home page (Google your site, when Google shows it in the SERPs, on the right of the url, there's a little green arrow, click it, click on Cached, then on text-only... Analyze that, figure out which words/phrases you need to keep, which you can change...
    • [1] reply
    • I can keep pretty much everything, even the links from the sidebar, I'd just move them to a section within the home page.

      But after what happened with one of my last sites, I'm wary of even doing that - pushing them from above the fold towards the bottom...even though, the sidebar is technically the last element of the page in the text-only view that you suggested.

      Thanks
      • [1] reply
  • That is likely to have the same effect as removing it might. Google is better but not perfect at reading within javascript. My advice to my clients is to ramp up the link building. Your rank should never be so unstable that changing the design while keeping most of the content is a lasting deal breaker.

    Many sites have to redesign for customer reasons.
    • [1] reply
    • Thanks, Mike, but I didn't really understand...what is a lasting deal-breaker?
  • Is there a link to your site? In general, the hidden menu is a great move in design.
  • yes, there's already like 50 links pointing to the home page
    • [1] reply
    • Banned




      That doesn't tell us anything.

      Is it 50 nofollow forum profile links (example of a useless link).

      ...or is it 50 followed links from authority webpages that each have their own followed link profiles (example of a strong link).
  • One more question - the site I messed up with the changes - it's in a freefall...would you recommend reverting the changes, could that help if the links are devalued...
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