Here is a quick checklist that I use as a starting point for my Optimizely projects that are slated to Go Live.
Product Development
Optimizely development complete
500/404 page
Forms
Http -> Https Rewrite
Reverse Proxy Development (if applicable)
Product Testing
QA Testing complete
Regression Testing complete
CMS User Acceptance Testing complete
Performance/Load Testing is complete, and performance is at an acceptable level
Content Migration (If Applicable)
Content Migration complete
Run the Link Detection Application and fix broken links
Release Tasks – Pre-Go-Live
Ensure 404 and 500 pages are created for the site
DNS verification record – start Opti request for the domain
Delete the admin account in UAT
Publish the final build to Production and validate changes
Content in Production is validated
Ensure form emails can be sent “on behalf of” – SPF record
Ensure client wildcard SSL cert is submitted to Optimizely OR client is using Cloudflare SSL cert
Update redirects using the Go-Live domain
Robots.txt/Sitemap.xml updates ready for Go-Live deployment
Release Tasks – During Go-Live
DNS Switchover – The client/DNS Owner would be doing this
Set TTL as minimal as possible
Bind the actual prod domain as the primary domain
Reindex Optimizely Search after DNS switchover
Run Optimizely Jobs for Sitemap creation
Update Robots.txt/Sitemap.xml to crawl the site
Release Tasks – Post Go-live
Run Link Detection Application and fix broken links (if applicable)
Validate redirects
