How to move an exchange to a new platform without losing clients or rankings

Exchange owners rarely change scripts, even when the old one gets in the way. The reason is clear: they're afraid of losing clients, order history and a search position that took years to build. But those losses almost always have the same cause: the move was done in one evening, with no preparation and no way back.

Here's how to move so that clients barely notice.

1. Audit before the move

Start with a list of everything on the old site:

• exchange directions with their limits and minimum and maximum amounts;
• rate settings: sources, markups, rounding;
• modules: payment gateways, KYC, AML, the Telegram bot, the affiliate program;
• pages and texts: rules, FAQ, articles, direction pages;
• page addresses: the full list of URLs, for example from sitemap.xml or Google Search Console.

This list becomes your checklist for testing the new site. Anything that isn't on it is easy to lose.

2. Moving the data

What you should definitely move:

• users, with their verification status, so clients don't have to go through KYC again;
• order history, which clients, accounting and support all need;
• partners and referral links, so partners don't lose their earnings;
• directions and pages, with their texts.

Separately, find out whether passwords can be moved. It depends on how the old script stored them. If they can't, warn clients in advance and give them a simple way to regain access.

3. A parallel launch

The new site first goes live on a test domain while the old one keeps taking orders. On the test domain:

• go through every direction from creating an order to the payout;
• compare the rates with the ones the old site shows;
• check that a client sees their order history and a partner sees their statistics.

Keep the test domain out of search indexes, so search engines don't see a duplicate of the site.

4. Switching the domain

The main rule for search: page addresses must not change. If a direction page lived at /exchange/usdt-to-uah, it stays there. For addresses that did change, set up permanent (301) redirects from the old address to the new one.

After the switch:

• submit the new sitemap.xml in Google Search Console and watch for 404 errors;
• check that the rates file for monitors is available at the same address, or tell the monitors the new one;
• make sure partners' referral links work.

5. The first days after the move

Keep a copy of the old site and database at hand in case something needs to be compared. Watch for stuck orders and support requests: that's where whatever got lost in the move shows up first.

Your data stays yours

Whatever platform you choose, make sure you can get a full database export at any time. If you ever want to change scripts again, that's what decides whether the next move is an easy one.

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With Obminly, moving from your current script is included in the price and goes exactly like this: an audit; moving users, order history, directions, partners and pages; a parallel launch on a test domain; and a domain switch that keeps page addresses. Your old site keeps working until the new one is ready.