Developer Pre-Launch Responsibilities

We put a lot of effort and emphasis on best practices and the security of our sites, but these efforts are often undermined by careless or sloppy mistakes that could easily be prevented. Ensuring these items are completed will prevent common errors from being made, as well as set the site up for success as it transitions from active development to a production site in ongoing support.

Responsible Team Member: Lead Project Developer

  • WordPress and all plugins should be up-to-date
  • Deactivate and remove all unnecessary plugins used during development (829 BulkPress, Bulk Page Creator, WP All Import/Export, etc)
  • Confirm redirects are implemented and working properly
  • Screaming Frog scan
    • Check for 404s
    • Check for other environmental domains (829dev.com showing on clientname.com site.)
  • Verify WCAG scans have been completed and resolved.
  • Verify Lighthouse speed tests have been conducted and resolved.
  • Verify admin email is set to dev@829llc.com, NOT wordpress@829llc.com.
  • Obtain the GTM script from the SEO team (or find it in the source of the current client website) and install using the Heads/Footers/Post Injections plugin.
  • Confirm /robots.txt is in place
  • Confirm /sitemap_index.xml is in place
  • WP Rocket should be installed and activated at least 1 week before launch to prevent any unforeseen issues with caching
  • 829 Gravity Forms AntiSpam plugin installed and configured correctly
  • Scrub any users or references belonging to 3rd-party development vendors.
  • Ensure all necessary logins are stored in the proper vault in 1Password.
  • Build search index (if Elastic Search/Relevanssi is being used)

Responsible Team Member: Project Producer

  • Screaming Frog scan
    • Check for 404s
    • Check for links to draft/unpublished posts/pages
  • Verify all Gravity Forms notifications have a defined client email address as the recipient. It should NEVER be set to {admin_email}
  • Verify 404 page has been populated correctly
  • Confirm cookie consent notice is active and working correctly (Jan and Caleb currently discussing if the language/format we use for cookie consent notice is logical and not misleading)
  • Confirm cookie notice is activated
  • Confirm privacy policy exists and has been added
  • Confirm metadata is populated
  • Deactivate and remove all unnecessary plugins used during development (bulk page creator, bulk user creator, WP All Import, etc)
  • Go through every post type and identify that all published posts SHOULD be. (Ex. Is the blog being used? If not, it should be hidden from indexing and the site and any example posts should not be published)
  • Check for 404s after we’ve implemented redirects in case the client has removed pages (post-launch?)
  • Check that all CPT categories are appropriate and no “sample” categories/taxonomies are remaining. Remove any that have zero posts associated.