Trade website relaunch with a plan for your existing visibility
The new site is built on a preview address while the old one stays online untouched. Every existing address gets a new target, and the switchover happens on a day you know in advance.
In short and in plain language
This page is about your old website. A relaunch means we rebuild it.
Your old site stays online until the new one is ready. Your web address usually stays the same.
Each old page then leads to a new page. So old links do not end in nothing.
We keep good old texts and your own photos. You know the price before the rebuild.
Not every old site needs a rebuild. Often maintenance is enough. Write to us, and we will look at your site.
Key figures
301
Permanent redirect for every old address
6 steps
From site review to switchover day
88 percent
are also listed in online directories (Bitkom)
94 percent
of German trade businesses run their own website (Bitkom)
Fixed-price relaunch · net, plus VAT
- The price is settled before the rebuild, never billed by the open hour
- Address plan and redirects are part of the fixed price, not an extra line
- Your existing web address stays as it is if you want to keep it
- One contact for technology, copy, images and the switchover day
Relaunching an existing website starts at 2,900 euros net. That covers the site review, the address plan, all redirects, carrying over or rewriting the content, mobile operation, the enquiry form and the switchover itself. Starting without an existing site is covered by the fixed-price website from 1,490 euros net. Afterwards: website support from 49 euros per month, cancelable with one month's notice to the end of the month, no minimum term. Hosting in Germany from 15 euros per month, cancelable with one month's notice to the end of the month, no minimum term. All prices net, plus VAT.
Prices as of September 2026.
A website does not need replacing because it is old. It needs replacing when it gets in the way: when visitors have to zoom on a phone, when nobody in the company can change a phone number, when form messages have been landing for months in a mailbox no one opens any more. A relaunch rebuilds the site without throwing away what the old one built up over the years: the web address, the entries in map and directory services, and the addresses your subpages are found under today.
The same business before and after the rebuild
The essentials in five sentences
- Not every older site needs replacing: if the technology and structure are sound, maintenance is enough and a relaunch would be the more expensive route to the same result.
- The address plan comes before the first draft: every subpage reachable today gets a new target before anything is built.
- Whatever holds up is carried over. Copy about trades, materials and working methods is tidied, not reinvented.
- The switchover is an agreed weekday morning, not a Friday-evening accident, and a week of follow-up checks comes after it.
- The relaunch starts at 2,900 euros net as a fixed price, redirects and switchover included.
What a relaunch is and what it is not
A relaunch is the orderly replacement of an existing website while keeping whatever works. It is not a fresh start on empty ground, and it is not a coat of paint on old render either. The difference lies in how the existing site is handled: a new build starts from zero, whereas a relaunch first records what is there today and then decides what stays, what gets rewritten and what disappears for good. If you have no site at all yet, the fixed-price website is the better fit. If you are weighing a website builder against a supported solution, the comparison is at builder or agency.
The facade comparison carries further than it looks. Nobody puts up scaffolding without first checking whether the substrate holds. And nobody strips sound render just because the colour has gone out of fashion. The site review works the same way: first we look at what is sound beneath the surface, then we decide how far the rebuild goes.
Three starting points, three answers
Whether maintenance, relaunch or a new build is right depends on the condition of the existing site, not on its year of construction.
Maintenance is enough
- Included: The site can be used on a phone without zooming
- Included: Credentials for the system, hosting and web address are available
- Included: Encryption, backups and availability are in order
- Included: All that is missing is current copy, contacts and project photos
A relaunch pays off
- Not included: Every trade sits together on one collective services page
- Not included: Using it on a phone means dragging and zooming
- Not included: The system has had no updates for years
- Included: Structure, copy and images are rebuilt, sorted by trade
New build without an existing site
- Not included: Credentials for the old system can no longer be found
- Not included: The old site is already switched off or permanently broken
- Not included: Content has to be created from documents and photos
- Included: The existing web address can usually still be carried over
Who the rebuild pays off for
94 percent (Bitkom) of German trade businesses run their own website and 88 percent (Bitkom) are also listed in online directories. For most businesses the question is therefore no longer whether a site exists, but whether the existing one still does what it was once built for. 74 percent (Bitkom) of businesses find that customers have become more critical, and 85 percent (Bitkom) see a clear expectation of constant availability. Both hit a site opened on a phone at half past eight in the evening harder than any design question. A relaunch typically pays off for businesses with 3 to 40 staff whose site is between six and fifteen years old and whose order mix has shifted since, for instance from new builds towards renovation and maintenance.
Usable in one hand
Most visitors arrive on a phone. Type, spacing and tap targets are laid out for a thumb, and the phone number is one tap away, not three.
Short load time
Old sites often serve uncompressed photos at full camera size. Images are reprocessed and delivered in modern formats; the largest element should appear in under 2.5 seconds.
One page per trade
The collective page becomes separate pages per service. Anyone searching for a specific job lands on it directly instead of scanning a long page. More on this under being found in the trades.
Enquiries that arrive
The form asks for trade, location and time frame and goes to a mailbox somebody reads. Before and after the switchover a test message is sent to every recipient.
Encryption and backups
The new site runs fully encrypted, is backed up daily and updated regularly. The scope is set out under maintenance and support.
Credentials with the business
Web address, hosting and editorial access belong to the business and are handed over in writing. Nobody has to hunt down an old provider at the next change.
The sequence in six steps
Site review
We look at the existing site: every reachable subpage, the system in use, hosting, certificate, backups and the question of who actually administers the web address. The result is a list of what stays and what gets replaced.
Address plan
Every address reachable today is recorded and assigned a new target. Merged pages lead to the new collective page, pages without a successor lead to the matching trade page rather than blanket-routing to the home page.
Structure and content
The list turns into the new outline: one page per trade, plus town pages for the service area, team, careers and contact. Existing copy is carried over and tidied, missing copy is written.
Build on a preview address
The build runs on its own address that nobody but you knows and that is closed to search engines. Your old site stays reachable throughout and keeps taking enquiries.
Switchover day
On an agreed weekday morning the new site is moved onto the existing web address. A complete backup of the old site is ready beforehand; afterwards every redirect is opened by hand.
Follow-up checks
Over the following weeks we watch for error pages and add old addresses that were not in the inventory, for example because they were only linked from a directory entry.
We look at the existing site: every reachable subpage, the system in use, hosting, certificate, backups and the question of who actually administers the web address. The result is a list of what stays and what gets replaced.
Every address reachable today is recorded and assigned a new target. Merged pages lead to the new collective page, pages without a successor lead to the matching trade page rather than blanket-routing to the home page.
The list turns into the new outline: one page per trade, plus town pages for the service area, team, careers and contact. Existing copy is carried over and tidied, missing copy is written.
The build runs on its own address that nobody but you knows and that is closed to search engines. Your old site stays reachable throughout and keeps taking enquiries.
On an agreed weekday morning the new site is moved onto the existing web address. A complete backup of the old site is ready beforehand; afterwards every redirect is opened by hand.
Over the following weeks we watch for error pages and add old addresses that were not in the inventory, for example because they were only linked from a directory entry.
Two points where relaunches go wrong
The switchover is a date, not an accident
The most common mistake is switching over on a Friday afternoon, when by Monday nobody remembers which version actually went live. We switch on a weekday morning, with a complete backup of the old site behind us and with time to check the same day. What gets checked is not just whether the home page loads, but whether every redirect fires, whether encryption is consistent, whether map and directory entries point to the right address, and whether the form actually delivers. A test enquiry goes to every recipient on file, because a silent form failure otherwise only surfaces weeks later, when enquiries fail to appear.
- Switchover on a weekday morning with a contact available in the company
- Complete backup of the old site before anything is touched
- Test enquiry to every form recipient before and after the switchover
- One week of follow-up checks on error pages and late-reported addresses
The address plan comes before the first draft
Anyone who only gathers the old addresses on switchover day loses exactly the pages that brought enquiries for years. So the relaunch begins with a table: old address on the left, new target on the right, status beside it. Everything reachable today is recorded, together with the addresses pointing to your site from outside and the links from map and directory services. Every line is justified, none is left empty. Where an old page has no successor in content, the redirect leads to the nearest matching trade page rather than blanket-routing to the home page, because someone searching for a repair does not want to read a welcome.
- Complete inventory of all old page paths before the build
- A permanent redirect instead of a silent error page
- External links and directory entries are included in the inventory
- Open cases are settled in conversation, not decided in silence
| Old address | New target | Status |
|---|---|---|
| /leistungen.html | Electrical installation | set |
| /referenzen.php | Project gallery | set |
| /kontakt.htm | Contact and enquiry | set |
| /news/2016/ | to be settled in the meeting | open |
Addresses and redirects
The web address itself normally stays. It is on vans, invoices, site boards and business cards, and changing it costs more than it returns. What does change are the addresses of the subpages: one leistungen.html becomes several trade pages, one galerie.php becomes a project gallery. So that nobody runs into a dead end, every old address gets a permanent redirect to its new target. That is not a courtesy to search engines but to people who click a link from an old email or a directory entry.
- The existing web address stays and is transferred to the business if it still sits with a third party
- A permanent 301 redirect for every old subpage, never via an interstitial page
- Links from map and directory services are checked and corrected where needed
- The business profile entry is aligned with the new structure
- Encryption throughout, including all redirected addresses
- The old backup is kept on file for as long as the business wants it
The most expensive relaunch mistake
Carrying content over or rewriting it
Old websites contain more usable material than their appearance suggests. Descriptions of working methods, materials, inspection intervals and responsibilities are often still accurate; they simply sit in the wrong place and in paragraphs that are too long. Copy like that is carried over, reordered and tidied. What gets rewritten is whatever is missing or out of date: services the company no longer offers, contacts who have left, and above all the pages that never existed, such as one per trade or one per town. What that looks like is shown in the design examples; the underlying working method is described under web design for the trades.
| Element | Usually carried over | Usually replaced |
|---|---|---|
| Web address | Stays as it is, access transferred to the business | Only if the company name has changed |
| Service copy | Technical descriptions, tidied and reordered | Empty marketing phrases and discontinued services |
| Project photos | Your own shots, reprocessed and cropped | Stock imagery with no connection to the business |
| Structure | Nothing; the outline is rebuilt by trade | Collective pages listing every service at once |
| Forms | The recipient addresses, if still valid | Technology, required fields and consent wording |
| Legal texts | Company details from the imprint | The privacy notice, rewritten for the new technology |
Missing usable images is the most common reason a relaunch takes longer than planned. Where needed we therefore spend half a day on one of your sites and photograph finished work. This photo session has no separate price; it is part of the project price. What comes out of it and what matters is described under photos for trade websites.
The switchover and the week after
The switch happens on a weekday morning, with a contact in the company who is reachable. The sequence is always the same: take a backup, move the new site onto the existing address, verify encryption, open every redirect by hand, send a test enquiry to every form recipient. Then the quietest and most important phase begins: over the following weeks we watch which addresses still land on error pages. There are almost always a few that appeared in no directory and are clicked anyway. They get added without you having to ask.
Typical starting points for a relaunch
Example, not a client project. No particular outcome is assured.
What is not part of a relaunch
For a fixed price to stay fixed, the scope has to state what it does not include. A relaunch is a rebuild of the website, not a reinvention of the business. Everything below is possible, but it is discussed and priced separately.
- A new logo or a full visual identity for vehicles, workwear and print
- An online shop with basket, payment and shipping
- Advertising budget and the ongoing management of campaigns
- Running social media accounts
- Building interfaces to inventory or time-tracking systems
- Ongoing maintenance after the switchover; that is covered by website support from 49 euros per month, cancelable with one month's notice to the end of the month, no minimum term
What the relaunch costs
Relaunching an existing website starts at 2,900 euros net as a fixed price. That covers the site review, the address plan, all redirects, carrying over or rewriting the content, the on-site photo session, the enquiry form, the legal texts and the switchover itself. Starting without a site begins at 1,490 euros net. Running costs afterwards: website support from 49 euros per month, cancelable with one month's notice to the end of the month, no minimum term, and hosting in Germany from 15 euros per month, cancelable with one month's notice to the end of the month, no minimum term. If you also want to work on being found, SEO support starts from 490 euros per month, cancelable with one month's notice to the end of the month, no minimum term, and local visibility including the business profile from 290 euros per month, cancelable with one month's notice to the end of the month, no minimum term. The full overview is at pricing.
How the fixed price is arrived at