How To Avoid Revenue Loss During Platform Migration To Shopify

As eCommerce businesses start scaling, they start to notice limitations in their existing platform that keeps their business from growing. 

However, most brands are too afraid to shift to another platform. That’s because they’re afraid they’ll lose their ranking, their business, and customers. 

This fear keeps brands that have a high potential for growth from deciding to migrate to better platforms. And rightly so. If migration is not done properly, brands might lose a lot. 

If you’re considering migrating to Shopify from your existing platform, read this guide that takes you through 15 steps to avoid revenue loss during the process of migrating to Shopify.

A peek into the key points in this article:

• Platform migration to Shopify carries real risks, such as lost data, SEO drops, broken integrations, and downtime, but these can be avoided with careful planning.

• Map and redirect every URL before migrating to protect your search rankings.

• Clean and standardize your product data before the move, not after.

• Identify and rebuild your highest-converting pages and checkout flows with precision.

• Thoroughly test payment gateways, international markets, inventory, and fulfillment workflows.

• Migrate during low-traffic periods and simulate peak load before going live.

• Validate all analytics and tracking so your marketing data stays accurate.

• Use a phased launch, cross-functional QA, and a rollback plan to minimize risk.

• Brief your customer support team ahead of launch to handle migration-related queries.

• Monitor performance closely right after launch and prioritize conversion optimization immediately.

Common issues that arise during eCommerce platform migration

Migrating from one platform to Shopify can cause disruption at multiple levels. Here are some common issues faced by brands:

• Data gets lost when migrating from one platform to another. For example, customer data, purchase history, account details, etc.

• SEO and search ranking can drop because of broken links or if migration is not done properly.

• Third-party apps, plugins, and other technical integrations can fail because of incorrect reconfiguration.

• The website could experience downtime or performance issues if all the elements are not migrated properly.

• Budget and costs could overrun because of unexpected issues and requirements.

15 things to do to avoid revenue loss during platform migration to Shopify

Migrating from one platform to another involves various processes, elements, and requires each and every element, small and big, to be in sync. Here are 15 tips for you to avoid loss during migration.

1. Lock down SEO and URL mapping before anything else

Broken or missing links often lead to loss of organic traffic during migration. For instance, URLs of your product pages, collection pages, blog posts, landing pages, etc. do not get redirected properly, it affects search results. Here are some steps your Shopify migration team will and should perform:

• Audit every URL on your existing platform before starting the migration process.

• Create a detailed redirect map, including each and every URL.

• Catalogue top-traffic URLs, category, collection, blog pages, etc.

• Implement 301 redirects accurately.

• SEO preservation should be treated as a prerequisite to migration.

2. Clean and standardize product data pre-migration 

When you clean, audit, and ensure consistency in data before migrating to Shopify, you get a headstart post migration. You do not have to spend time cleaning and examining product data while customers are already shopping. Here are some things your Shopify migration agency should do:

• Run a full audit of your product catalog.

• Standardize product titles and descriptions.

• Validate all variant configurations, confirm pricing rules and pricing logic.

• Ensure all metadata, meta titles, and meta description are correctly structured. 

3. Preserve high-converting pages and funnels

Different pages on your Shopify store carry different values. For instance, certain pages have been optimized over the years to become high-converting pages. These could be landing pages, bundle product pages, upsell sequences, etc. It is important to protect these pages during the process of migration. Here’s what should be done:

• Identify top-performing pages with the help of analytics tools.

• Make a note of what makes these pages perform well. For example, layout, copy, social proof elements, CTA placement, etc. 

• Rebuild these pages in the new platform - Shopify. 

• Do a QA of these pages to check if they match the original pages.

4. Maintain checkout logic across all scenarios

Any small issue in the checkout process, such as a broken discount code, a surprise shipping cost, or a dysfunctional payment method, could lead to cart abandonment. Here’s what you need to do to ensure proper checkout systems during migration:

• Test the checkout flow comprehensively.

• Run through every scenario you can think of.

• Run through scenarios of domestic, international, high-value, multiple-discount, gift-card, mobile orders, etc.

• Ensure every scenario has the expected outcome.

5. Test international market configurations thoroughly

For brands that deliver across international markets, migrating from one platform to Shopify can be more complex. It has various aspects that require attention to detail - multi-currency and -language, localized content, regional tax rules, separate marketing requirements, etc. Here are some things to factor in during the time of migration:

• Create a market-by-market testing protocol covering every region.

• Test the full customer journey, from discovery to add to cart to checkout for each market.

• Configure Shopify Markets correctly.

• Ensure currency and tax settings align properly with local requirements.

6. Validate global payment methods and gateways

For international brands, having all payment methods properly functioning is extremely critical. During the process of migrating platforms, every individual payment method has to be configured and validated. Here are some things your Shopify migration agency should do:

• Test payment flows before launching.

• Process real test transactions for each payment method.

• Ensure payment captures all data correctly.

7. Rebuild integrations with intent, not assumptions

Ecommerce brands require various integrations, such as ERP, CRM, OMS, marketing automation platform, loyalty program, etc. Many people make the mistake of assuming these will be migrated without any hassle. But that’s not the case. Shopify APIs differ from other platforms, and hence, integrations might need to be rebuilt. Here’s what your Shopify migration team should do:

• Approach every integration as a rebuild project

• Confirm with each vendor if the platform/tool is compatible with Shopify

• Test each integration before launch

• Pay attention to detail, especially for integrations related to customer data, payments, etc.

8. Stress-test inventory and fulfillment workflows

Inventory management and order fulfillment are among the most critical functions in eCommerce stores. If these systems are not migrated correctly, it can lead to cancellations, cart abandonments, negative reviews, and customer churn. Here’s how you can avoid these situations:

• Test all fulfillment scenarios before you launch your Shopify site.

• Test domestic, international, split location orders, pre-orders, backorders, etc.

• Check that inventory deductions happen correctly at checkout.

• Ensure inventory levels sync correctly across all connected systems.

9. Avoid migrating during peak revenue periods

No matter how perfectly you plan your migration, there could be some issues and setbacks. Hence, it is best to choose a time to migrate when traffic and revenue are low. Migrating during the peak period carries more risk. 

• Identify a low-traffic, low-revenue period for migration launch.

• It could be post holiday, between two campaigns, after an annual sale, etc.

• This will also give your Shopify migration team time to fix issues in case problems arise.

• Optimizing the new Shopify site is easier during low-traffic periods.

10. Simulate peak traffic and order value

Performance during high traffic periods can be challenging even on Shopify because while Shopify platform has the ability to scale, the other integrations and third-party tools might not have the ability. Hence, it is important to simulate tests involving high traffic and multiple orders. Some things you can do are:

• Simulate concurrent page views, multiple add-to-cart scenarios, multiple checkouts at the same time, etc. 

• Ensure pages and flows that involve third-party apps function properly.

• Identify slow pages or issues that need to be resolved so that your Shopify website can handle peak periods.

11. Validate analytics, tracking, and attribution 

If your Shopify site tracking and analytics is broken, it will impact your marketing, promotions, and merchandising teams. For instance, missing conversion events will mean your ad platforms will optimize toward the wrong signals. 

• Audit every tracking element before launch.

• Test that every key event, such as page view, add to cart, checkout, purchase, etc. follows the right path.

• Launch the Shopify site with clean and validated tracking.

12. Run parallel QA with cross-functional teams

Cross-functional QA can help assure that all functions are running smoothly. For instance, your product pages might be functioning properly on desktop but not on mobile. Here’s how your Shopify migration agency can perform cross-functional QA:

• Engineering teams must validate code and integration behavior.

• Marketing teams must validate campaigns, discount codes, etc.

• Merchandising teams must validate product catalog presentation, collections, search results, etc. 

• Customer support teams must validate order management tools, customer account pages, etc.

13. Plan a controlled or phased go-live

Launching your Shopify website in phases can help avoid many problems. You can easily monitor each and every page and element of your Shopify store, identify problems, and address them before launching the other parts of your site. 

• Soft launch a part of your website, a geographic rollout, or having an internal-only preview period.

• During this time, create clear monitoring systems for conversion rate, checkout completion rate, average order value, etc.

• Set up alerts for anomalies and issues. 

• Have a rollback plan in case there’s a big problem with the new site.

14. Prepare customer support for migration fallout

An important thing to do during migration is to train your customer support team to handle customer queries that might be arising due to migration. Your customer support personnel should be able to provide helpful answers to customer queries. 

• Ensure your customer support team understands the migration timeline.

• Explain customer-facing changes that can occur. 

• Equip the support team with tools they need to quickly loop in other teams if need be.

• Increase support staff during this period to ensure every customer query is attended to in time.

15. Prioritize immediate post-migration optimization 

Once you launch your Shopify site after migration, it is critical to track performance, identify issues, and optimization opportunities. The period immediately after migration is the best time for optimization. Here’s what your Shopify retainer agency can do:

• Focus on tracking, data, and analytics.

• Identify conversion rate gaps compared to pre-migration.

• Audit your site speed, review collections, product pages, etc.

• Prioritize CRO on high-traffic pages.

Are you prepared for migration to Shopify? 

Migrating to the Shopify platform from another platform should not cost you revenue loss or loss of customers. If done well, it can instantly increase revenue and customer engagement as soon as you launch your new site. 

The 15 tips and best practices shared in this article will guide you to ensure your migration is smooth, and the result is greater ROI. Partnering with an efficient Shopify migration agency can make this process a breeze for your business and customers. 

XgenTech is a Shopify agency with focus and expertise in migration. XgenTech’s team of migration experts manage every technical, operations, and strategic aspect of your platform migration. 

Contact XgenTech to migrate to Shopify.