Questions buyers ask
Short answers to what buyers ask most before moving or rebuilding a site.
Website migration
Will we lose our Google ranking?
No, if every address is kept or redirected, and we show you the list before launch. Google treats a permanent redirect as the signal that the new page is the one to index. We watch the old addresses in Search Console for 90 days.
The editor
Can our people still edit it?
Yes, in an editor with one form per kind of thing on your site. Every change is saved with a history and can be undone. It is not a page builder, and we say so.
Ongoing care
What does it cost to run?
Hosting for a static site on Netlify is free up to a monthly usage limit and from $9 a month on its Personal plan, with no plugin licences. Care, if you want it, is quoted separately and carries no contract longer than a month. The editor has no fee.
Websites
What happens to our forms and enquiries?
They keep working and deliver to the same inbox. Forms go to a service that holds the message and nothing else, with no forms plugin. We test every form before launch.
Website migration
Do we have to tell our customers?
Not unless they log in. The addresses are the same, the design can be the same, and the site is never offline. If your customers have accounts on a shop, they are asked to set a new password, and we write that email with you.
Websites
What about our shop and customer accounts?
A shop moves in phases, with customers and prices carried across and every price re-checked on the server. Accounts and payment run on services built for the job, not plugins. The OpenThrottle case study shows the pattern a shop moves onto.
Website migration
How long are we offline?
Not at all. The new site is built beside the old one, which serves until the domain is pointed at the new one. We measure both on launch day.
Website migration
What if we want to go back?
Your old site is archived before launch and can be restored. Your content is plain files in a repository in your name or transferable to you on request, readable by any engineer. You are not locked in.
Ongoing care
What if you disappear?
The code, the domain and the hosting are in accounts in your name, or transferred to you on request. Every site ships with a written handover listing where everything is. Any competent engineer can take it on.
Websites
Do we need a cookie banner?
In the UK and EU, not if the site sets nothing that needs consent: Google Analytics, a marketing pixel or a chat widget does need it, and the banner must ask before anything loads. In the US there is no national rule; California lets businesses track first, but larger ones must offer a "Do Not Sell or Share" link and honour the browser's privacy signal. We build to the UK rule and add California's link and signal for US clients; our own site is an example.
Website Risk Analysis
Should we stay on WordPress?
Sometimes. A well-run site with few plugins, a team that knows it and someone patching within 14 days is a reasonable choice, and we look after sites like that. The Risk Analysis tells you which you have.
AI projects
Do we need AI?
Probably not yet, and we will say so. A product finder is not AI, and in a 2025 industry survey 66 per cent of engineers and technical buyers named a product selector among the most valuable tools on a supplier's site, against 9 per cent for a chatbot. When a defined problem with your own data and a measurable result comes along, AI becomes worth doing.
Last reviewed 28 October 2026.