Before launching a new business website, verify useful public pages, working customer journeys and a measurement baseline. This checklist is for a genuinely new site. If an existing website is being replaced, also plan redirects and preservation of its useful URLs and assets.
Treat the launch record as evidence, not a set of unexplained ticks. Give each check an owner and save the URL, date and observed result.
Prepare a small set of complete pages
The homepage should explain what the business does, who it serves and the next useful action. Service or product pages need enough detail to support a decision: scope, relevant coverage, exclusions, examples and a contact route.
Use one clear purpose and a descriptive title for each important page. Link related information where it helps a visitor. Avoid creating several pages with different town names but essentially the same information merely to enlarge the site.
Use a launch acceptance table
| Area | Check before launch | Evidence to record |
|---|---|---|
| Public address | Final HTTPS domain and preferred URL are correct | Final address and redirect result |
| Access | Important pages work without a password and show their intended content | Signed-out page check |
| Indexing instructions | Production pages do not inherit unintended noindex or crawler blocks | Relevant instruction and URL Inspection result |
| Page purpose | Title, heading and content agree with the intended customer question | Page URL and one-sentence intent |
| Navigation | Main service and contact pages are reachable through ordinary links | The linking page and destination |
| Images | Cover and useful content images load, are visible and have accurate descriptions | Page screenshot and image address |
| Enquiries | A labelled phone-based test reaches the expected destination | Test identifier and received status |
| Measurement | Correct property and meaningful actions work under the chosen consent settings | Labelled validation result |
| Handover | Someone owns updates, access, recovery and enquiries after launch | Named responsibility and handover date |
Mark unresolved checks as unresolved. A website can look finished while a form is not saving messages or a production setting still blocks its main pages.
Check images on the actual page
Use images that are relevant and that you are entitled to publish. A cover should be visible in the page, available at a working image URL and described accurately. Check both desktop and phone layouts: an image hidden by a display rule may not help visitors even when its file opens directly.
Where a preview or image sitemap names a primary image, use the same stable URL as the page. A sitemap is a discovery aid, not a guarantee that Google will choose that image for a search result.
Test the complete enquiry journey once
Use the public form on a phone and identify the message clearly as an internal launch test. Confirm receipt in the enquiry system or inbox that the team actually uses. Do not infer email delivery only from a browser success message.
Record a contact-button click separately from a received enquiry. If analytics are used, verify acceptance and refusal choices and keep form names, email addresses and message text out of analytics events. Label the test so it is not counted as a newly acquired customer.
Submit the preferred pages for discovery
Verify the correct Search Console property. Check that the sitemap contains the public URLs intended for search and that important pages also have useful internal links.
For a small number of important managed URLs, use URL Inspection and request indexing when appropriate. For a larger set, submit the sitemap. Repeatedly submitting the same URL does not move it forward in the queue.
Google's technical requirements make an accessible, successful page eligible for indexing. They do not promise inclusion or a specific position. Keep the status and last crawl date alongside the launch record so that a later review uses actual evidence.
Review the release in stages
Immediately after launch, check page access, image display, navigation and enquiry delivery. Next, review discovery and indexing of the core pages. When enough comparable data is available, examine relevant searches and qualified enquiries rather than calling the launch successful because a few test visits appeared.
Use the SEO measurement report for the later comparison and the maintenance checklist for routine ownership after handover.
