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Some redesigns start with a taste decision. Others start with an email from a vendor announcing a final support date. The second kind is a different project, and it is worth naming the difference before planning.

A forced migration has a deadline that nobody in the room controls. It arrives whether or not the content audit is finished. It does not move because a stakeholder is on holiday. Planning has to run backwards from that date, with the risky work placed early.

The first question is what actually depends on the old platform. Usually more than expected. Form handlers. A search index. Scheduled emails. An integration somebody built years ago that nobody has touched since. These are found by reading logs and configuration, not by asking around. People forget what they set up.

The second question is which parts genuinely have to change. End of life for a content system does not mean every template must be redrawn. Separating the forced work from the wanted work keeps the deadline achievable. The wanted work can follow later, on a calendar the team controls.

Data export deserves an early rehearsal. Exporting once, at the end, is how projects discover that a field type does not survive the trip. We export early, import into the new system, and look at the result. Then we do it again. Each rehearsal is faster than the last, and the final one happens under no time pressure at all.

Addresses need the same care as content. Old URLs keep their traffic and their links, and a platform change is the most common way to lose both. Every address that answered on the old system should answer on the new one, or redirect to a specific replacement. A mapping file is the deliverable. A blanket redirect to the front page is not a mapping.

There is also a decision about what not to carry over. A long-lived site accumulates pages nobody reads and features nobody uses. A migration is the cheapest moment to leave them behind. That choice should be made from usage data, with somebody accountable for each removal, and a record of what was dropped.

Finally, the cutover itself. Traffic patterns differ by business, and there is usually a quiet window. The work is to know which one, and to have the previous system reachable for a while afterwards. Not live. Reachable, so a question can be answered by looking rather than guessing.