Forum Discussion
Advice/Guidelines for launching new modern site to replace company intranet?
Hi everyone!
I'm looking for any advice, guidelines, best practices, experiences, etc. on updating our company intranet. When I started working here 7 years ago, we were using classic SharePoint and our company Intranet home page/site was built in a classic site. The path for this site is also our tenant: companyname.sharepoint.com.
I want to launch a brand-new modern site I have created and want to reuse/point the tenant name/original intranet site URL to show this new modern site. And I honestly don't know how to go about doing this so I don't break a bunch of stuff. I self-taught myself so much as it pertains to SharePoint that I just want to make sure that I'm doing this correctly.
Is it as simple as renaming the current site with something different and then taking the current name and giving it to the new, modern site? I know a ton of our users have bookmarks saved and I don't want to break any of those.
Any help/advice/guidance you can provide is most appreciated.
Thanks,
Beth
I understand your concerns about updating your company's intranet, and I'm here to help ensure a smooth transition! Here are some advice and best practices from my experience:
1. Create and Design Your New Site:
- Start by creating a new Communication site and design it according to your specifications.
2. Prepare for Transition:
- Communicate with your users about the upcoming change, providing them with an overview and timeline.
- Consider running a pilot test with a small group of users to gather feedback and make necessary adjustments.
3. Site Swap:
- Once your new site is ready, go to the Site Admin section in SharePoint.
- Perform a site swap to make your new site the default at your tenant URL (companyname.sharepoint.com). The previous site will be moved to a new URL, typically /sites/Archived-xxxxx.
- The site swap feature is designed to handle transitions smoothly, ensuring that your old site's content is archived and accessible if needed.
4. Redirection and Bookmarks:
- Ensure that important data is replicated on the new site to accommodate users' existing bookmarks.
5. Post-Launch Support:
- After the transition, monitor the new site closely for any issues or user feedback. Conduct surveys or use tools like Microsoft Clarity for user insights.
- Provide support and training resources to help users adapt to the new site.
Checkout this link:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/modern-root-site
And if you have any question don't be afraid to ask! Just quote me or post here
3 Replies
I understand your concerns about updating your company's intranet, and I'm here to help ensure a smooth transition! Here are some advice and best practices from my experience:
1. Create and Design Your New Site:
- Start by creating a new Communication site and design it according to your specifications.
2. Prepare for Transition:
- Communicate with your users about the upcoming change, providing them with an overview and timeline.
- Consider running a pilot test with a small group of users to gather feedback and make necessary adjustments.
3. Site Swap:
- Once your new site is ready, go to the Site Admin section in SharePoint.
- Perform a site swap to make your new site the default at your tenant URL (companyname.sharepoint.com). The previous site will be moved to a new URL, typically /sites/Archived-xxxxx.
- The site swap feature is designed to handle transitions smoothly, ensuring that your old site's content is archived and accessible if needed.
4. Redirection and Bookmarks:
- Ensure that important data is replicated on the new site to accommodate users' existing bookmarks.
5. Post-Launch Support:
- After the transition, monitor the new site closely for any issues or user feedback. Conduct surveys or use tools like Microsoft Clarity for user insights.
- Provide support and training resources to help users adapt to the new site.
Checkout this link:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/modern-root-site
And if you have any question don't be afraid to ask! Just quote me or post here
- Thank you for this...so are you saying that by simply using the site swap feature, I can take our old site and archive it and have the brand new site (which currently has a URL that contains our tenant name plus /sites/XXXXXX.aspx) and have that be what is seen when people type in our simplistic tenant name?
- Yeah! 🙂 so Tenant.SharePoint.com would be the landing page
Also check in Viva Connections so they can access the intranet via Teams!
I'll probably write a blogpost this week on how to design a intranet and what to think about 2024, I can link it when I'm done 🙂
