How to switch SEO agencies without losing Google rankings

Switching SEO agencies means moving control of your accounts and your website from one provider to another. Done as a handover of logins, it changes nothing Google can see. Rankings are at risk when the switch also changes the domain, the page addresses, the hosting or who owns your Google Business Profile. Nobody can promise your rankings will not move, but you can remove most of the avoidable causes before you give notice.

This is written for the owner of an HVAC, plumbing, roofing, electrical or solar company who already pays for SEO and is thinking about leaving. It covers what you should own, what to get in writing, what Google's own documentation says about redirects and site moves, and a checklist to run in order.

What actually puts rankings at risk when you switch?

Four things: losing an asset, changing URLs without redirects, a botched hosting move, and pages or listings that disappear with the old agency. The contract ending is not on the list, because Google does not know who you pay.

Google's guidance treats these as different events. A new agency taking over the same site on the same domain is not a site move at all. A rebuild that changes page addresses is what Google calls a site move with URL changes, and its documentation says plainly: expect temporary fluctuation in site ranking during the move. Moving the same site to a new host with the same addresses is covered by a separate hosting guide, which says a temporary drop in Googlebot's crawl rate right after launch is normal and is followed by a steady increase over the next few days.

So the first question for the agency you are moving to is simple. Are you taking over my current site, or replacing it? If the answer is replacing it, the risk is in the rebuild, and that is a decision you can make separately from the switch.

Who should own what before you give notice?

You should own every account, and the agency should be a user on it. Where that is already true, a switch is an afternoon of removing one user and adding another. Where the agency is the owner, fix that first, while the relationship is still friendly.

Domain. This is the one you cannot rebuild. ICANN's registrant responsibilities put sole responsibility for the registration and use of a domain on the registrant, and require the registrant's contact details to be accurate. If the registrant on record is your agency, the agency is the party the registrar answers to, not you. Ask for it to be transferred into your own registrar account before anything else.

Google Business Profile. This is the listing homeowners call from in the map results, and Google's rules are on your side. Its third-party policies say all customers of an agency must retain ownership or co-ownership of their profile at all times, that the business decides whether a partner is a co-owner, a manager or has no access, and that an agency must give you the ability to disconnect within 7 business days of notice. Google's recommended setup is the business as owner and the agency as manager.

One timing detail matters here. Google's owners and managers help page says a new owner or manager has to wait 7 days before they can remove other users or transfer primary ownership. Get yourself added as an owner well before you give notice, so you are not stuck inside that window on the last day of the contract.

Search Console. Google's Search Console help separates verified owners, who proved ownership with a token on the site, from delegated owners who were added by someone else. A property must have at least one verified owner or nobody has access. When you remove an old owner, their verification token stays on the site, and Google says a removed owner can verify again as long as that token remains. Check the unused ownership tokens list and have the tokens removed.

Analytics. In Google Analytics only an Administrator can add or remove users, per Google's access management page. If you are an Editor or Viewer on an account the agency created, you cannot keep them out or let the next agency in. Ask to be made Administrator at the account level. If the account belongs to the agency and holds other clients too, ask for the property to be moved to an account of your own.

Call tracking numbers. If a tracking number has been on your profile, your truck wraps and your listings for three years, homeowners have it saved. Ask in writing whether those numbers will be released to you when you leave. If the answer is no, you need time to swap your real number back in everywhere before the tracking numbers go dead.

What should you get in writing before you give notice?

A short email thread is enough. You want the answers on record while the agency still has a reason to be helpful.

• Confirmation that you hold owner access on each account in the table above, with the date it was granted.
• What you receive on the last day: site files or a full export, page text, images, and the list of directory listings with logins.
• Whether the website runs on a platform the agency licenses, and what happens to it on termination.
• Whether tracking phone numbers will be released, and to which provider.
• That existing pages, redirects and listings stay in place through the notice period.
• A list of the work done in the last 12 months, so the next provider does not undo it.

Plenty of agencies hand this over without a fight. A good one has you set up as owner from day one and will send a clean handover document. If your current agency already works that way and your complaint is about results, ask first whether the plan can change before you assume the provider has to. Google's guidance on hiring an SEO says a provider should be willing to explain every change they make to your site. That is a fair test of the agency you have and the one you are considering.

What does Google say about redirects if the site gets rebuilt?

Map every old address to its closest new page, use permanent server-side redirects, and leave them in place for at least a year. That is the short version of Google's documentation, and a rebuild is the part of a switch with the most ways to go wrong.

The redirects documentation says 301 and 308 status codes mean a page has permanently moved, and that Google uses a permanent redirect as a signal that the new address should be the one shown in results. A temporary redirect does not send that signal. Google recommends a permanent server-side redirect whenever possible and says JavaScript redirects should be a last resort, because Google might never see them if the page fails to render.

Google's site move guide adds the working rules. Do not redirect many old URLs to one irrelevant destination such as the new home page. Permanent redirects do not cause a loss in PageRank. A small to medium-sized site can take a few weeks for most pages to move. Keep the redirects as long as possible, generally at least 1 year. If the domain name itself changes, the Change of Address tool applies, and its help page says to maintain redirects for at least 180 days and to keep paying for the old domain for at least a year.

For a contractor's site, the pages that matter are usually few: the service pages (AC repair, furnace install, water heaters), the city or service-area pages, and whatever posts bring in calls. Pull the top pages from Search Console before the rebuild and make sure each one has a new home with the same information on it. A new design that quietly drops your service-area pages will cost you more than any redirect mistake.

One newer check belongs on the list. A rebuilt site ships with a new robots.txt file, and that file decides which crawlers get in. OpenAI's crawler documentation says sites opted out of OAI-SearchBot will not be shown in ChatGPT search answers. If you care about being named in AI answers, read the new file before launch. Our post on why an HVAC company does not show up in ChatGPT or AI Overviews walks through that check.

What normally happens to rankings during a handover?

If nothing on the site or profile changes, usually nothing you can trace to the switch. If URLs change, expect some movement for a few weeks. If rankings fall and stay down, something was lost and needs finding.

Be careful what you blame. Google's traffic drop documentation lists several causes of a drop that have nothing to do with a handover: technical problems that stop Google crawling or indexing pages, manual actions, core updates, and seasonality. A cooling company that switches in October will see fewer searches in November no matter who runs the account. Compare calls and clicks with the same weeks last year, not with last month.

The honest summary is that a careful switch lowers the odds of a drop and shortens it if one comes. It does not remove the risk, and Google's hiring guidance is blunt that no one can guarantee a #1 ranking. Be wary of any provider, old or new, who tells you otherwise.

The switch checklist, in order

1. Log into your domain registrar yourself. If you cannot, ask for the domain to be moved into an account in your company's name.
2. Get added as primary owner of your Google Business Profile, then wait out the 7 days before you change anyone else's access.
3. Verify yourself as an owner in Search Console and get Administrator on your Analytics account.
4. Ask in writing what you receive at termination: site files, content, images, listings, tracking numbers.
5. Export your top pages, queries and 16 months of clicks from Search Console, and save a full crawl or backup of the current site.
6. Screenshot your Business Profile: categories, services, service areas, hours, phone number.
7. Ask the incoming agency whether they will keep the site or rebuild it. If they rebuild, ask for the URL map and redirect plan before you sign.
8. Pick a shoulder month, not peak season, and give notice.
9. On handover day, add the new agency as manager or user, remove the old one, and clear unused ownership tokens in Search Console.
10. If the site moved, test the redirects for your top pages, check robots.txt, and submit the new sitemap.
11. Watch Search Console's page indexing report and your call volume weekly for 8 weeks, against the same weeks last year.
12. Keep the old hosting and any old domain paid for at least a year.

How to check where you stand

Run a ten-minute test today, whether or not you plan to switch. Try to log into four things without calling your agency: your domain registrar, your Google Business Profile as owner, Search Console and Analytics. Every one you cannot open is something to fix before you give notice to anyone.

If part of your reason for switching is that you now want AI visibility work alongside SEO, look at what the two cost together before you add a second vendor. Our AEO vs SEO cost comparison has the sourced market ranges. ElytraCo offers traditional SEO alongside AI visibility for home service companies, and we can review what you pay your current SEO provider and show how both could run under one strategy. Keeping the agency you have is sometimes the right answer. Start with the free AI visibility audit.

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