Go-Live Plan

All of these should be true before we touch DNS:

• $1 test gift confirmed (July 20) — a real donation processed end-to-end through the on-site Blackbaud form. Donation is launch-ready.
• Remove the "Preview Access" password gate from the public pages (index / about / healing-groups / blog) — the site must be publicly crawlable at launch. Keep the Admin panel gate.
• Copy signed off · staff + first board bios in · events current · donation embedded on-site
• Final click-through: every nav link, the registration + cancellation forms, the donate hand-off, and all event Details popups
• Confirm robots.txt, sitemap.xml, canonical + Open Graph tags are live (added July 20)

• Registrar / DNS host: Network Solutions
• Confirm the current login owner. In the 2022 cutover, Paul Flaa held the Network Solutions access and made the change with Gary on a screen-share. We need to confirm whether Paul (or someone at LIM) still has that login before launch day — this is the single most likely thing to slow us down.
• Action: Jaylene / Robert to confirm who can log into Network Solutions, and schedule that person for a 30-minute screen-share on launch day.

This move is to Netlify, which is different from the 2022 Squarespace-to-Squarespace move (that used a Squarespace CNAME verification code). Target canonical host: https://www.lutheranindianministries.org (apex redirects to www; Netlify issues free HTTPS automatically via Let's Encrypt).

Option B — keep DNS at Network Solutions, point records at Netlify Recommended

• Safest because it leaves email and all other records untouched — we only edit the two website records.
• In Netlify: add the custom domain → Netlify shows the exact targets to use.
• At Network Solutions, set: apex A record @ → 75.2.60.5 (Netlify's load balancer), and CNAME www → <our-site>.netlify.app (Netlify gives the exact value).
• In Netlify, set the primary domain to www, enable Force HTTPS, and let it redirect apex → www.

Option A — move DNS to Netlify (nameserver change)

• Cleaner long-term (Netlify manages everything, incl. auto-renew HTTPS), but it moves ALL DNS to Netlify — so we'd have to re-create the Microsoft 365 email records (MX, SPF, DKIM, autodiscover) in Netlify first, or email breaks. More risk. Only do this if we want Netlify to own DNS.

Sequence on launch day:

• 1–2 days before: lower the record TTL to 5 min at Network Solutions so the switch propagates fast (and rollback is fast)
• Launch: turn off the Preview gate → update the A + CNAME records → Netlify verifies the domain and provisions HTTPS (a few minutes)
• Confirm https://www.lutheranindianministries.org serves the new site with a valid padlock; test on phone + desktop
• Keep the old Squarespace site published until propagation is confirmed everywhere (fallback)

The old Squarespace URLs (their page slugs) are what Google has indexed today. When those URLs change, we 301-redirect each old URL to its new page so we don't lose ranking or send visitors to a 404.

• Done — Netlify _redirects file built from the old sitemap (2,780 URLs). Renamed pages mapped (/healing-wounds-of-trauma → /healing-groups.html, /events/* → /healing-groups.html, /ways-to-give → /donate.html, /partners → /about.html, etc.).
• /about and /donate resolve natively (same filename) — no rule needed; the canonical tag consolidates them.
• The ~2,700 old devotions / news / reflections / podcast posts weren't migrated → they 301 to home (avoids dead links). If any are high-value, we can migrate + point-redirect them individually later.
• Post-launch: confirm in Search Console that old URLs resolve in one hop (no chains) and watch the 404 report.

Shipped July 20 so the site is search- and answer-engine-ready the moment it's public:

• sitemap.xml (6 public pages) + robots.txt (internal/admin + old -v duplicates disallowed, sitemap referenced)
• Canonical URLs on every public page → the www host (prevents duplicate-content splits)
• Open Graph + Twitter cards — proper title/description/image when a page is shared on Facebook, LinkedIn, iMessage, X
• Structured data (JSON-LD) for rich results + AI answer engines: NGO/Organization + WebSite on the homepage, FAQPage on Healing Groups (the 7 FAQs — strong for "answer" surfaces), BlogPosting on the three articles
• Titles + meta descriptions already unique per page; semantic headings; descriptive alt text

• Google Search Console — add/verify the property, submit sitemap.xml, request indexing of the homepage + key pages
• Bing Webmaster Tools — verify + submit the sitemap (feeds Bing + ChatGPT/Copilot answers)
• Confirm robots.txt resolves and isn't accidentally blocking; check no page is stuck on noindex
• Confirm the Feathr conversion pixel fires on a donation (the John/Meyer dependency) → feeds Robert's August ROAS report
• Connect / confirm Google Analytics (GA4)
• Update Google Business Profile + any directory listings to the new URLs
• Re-check the Google Ad Grant — it needs the live site to verify (Jaylene on Google for Nonprofits)
• Watch Search Console coverage for 404s / redirect errors for the first week

Low-risk because we lowered TTL and never touched email:

• If anything looks wrong, revert the A + CNAME records to the old Squarespace targets at Network Solutions — with a 5-min TTL it comes back quickly
• The old site stays published until we're confident, so there's always a live fallback