When organisations first implement Confluence, it often starts as a simple collaboration platform. Teams create documentation, share knowledge, and collaborate on projects.
Over time, however, Confluence becomes much more than a wiki.
It becomes the organisation's institutional memory.
Policies, procedures, project documentation, training materials, knowledge articles, internal communications, and operational processes all accumulate within the platform. Eventually, Confluence becomes so embedded in daily operations that even a few hours of downtime can have significant business consequences.
This was exactly the situation facing the Rainforest Alliance.
Their Confluence Server environment had grown into a business-critical knowledge management platform used daily by more than 1,000 employees and containing hundreds of gigabytes of information. With Atlassian Server reaching end of support, the organisation needed a clear path to Atlassian Cloud while maintaining business continuity.
The challenge wasn't simply moving content.
The challenge was ensuring that users could continue working effectively throughout the migration process.
Many organisations underestimate the complexity of migrating Confluence Server to Cloud.
At first glance, it appears to be a straightforward technical exercise. Export data, import data, test, and go live.
In reality, enterprise Confluence migrations often involve:
Migration tools can move data, but they cannot decide:
These decisions require business engagement, planning, and experience.
One of the most overlooked aspects of a Confluence Cloud migration is communication.
Large migrations involve multiple audiences:
Each group has different concerns:
This was one of the reasons Rainforest Alliance selected BDQ.
As Senior Knowledge Management & Standardisation Officer Cintia Rivera explained, many of the alternative providers they evaluated were highly technical but struggled to communicate with non-technical stakeholders.
Successful migrations require the ability to translate technical complexity into business language.
This is particularly important when gaining executive approval, securing budgets, and driving user adoption.
“Would I recommend BDQ? For sure! For me, an indicator was that when I was busy with other projects that needed more of my attention, I was confident that I could step back and prioritise those other projects because I was reassured that the project with BDQ was going well.”
Cintia Rivera | Senior Knowledge Management & Standardisation Officer, Rainforest Alliance
One of the most effective ways to reduce migration risk is to avoid treating production migration as the first migration.
Instead, organisations should perform multiple migration rehearsals before go-live.
For Rainforest Alliance, BDQ implemented a cloned migration approach that allowed repeated test migrations to be performed without impacting the live production environment.
This delivered several important benefits:
The cloned environments could be refreshed throughout the project, ensuring that testing remained representative of the production system.
Rather than hoping everything would work on migration weekend, the organisation already knew what the outcome would be because they had effectively rehearsed it multiple times.
For large Confluence Cloud migrations, this approach significantly reduces uncertainty.
Many migration projects focus heavily on technical testing.
However, technical success does not automatically create user confidence.
A migration may appear perfect from an IT perspective while still creating frustration for business users.
This is why User Acceptance Testing (UAT) is so important.
The challenge is that many users have never participated in structured UAT before.
Questions often include:
Rainforest Alliance recognised this challenge early.
To support adoption, BDQ provided:
This enabled users to participate confidently and helped identify issues long before production cutover.
Marketplace apps are frequently one of the most complex aspects of a Confluence migration.
Many organisations have spent years enhancing Confluence with apps that support:
The problem is that Cloud and Server apps are not always identical.
Some apps:
This is why Marketplace app assessments should be conducted early in any migration project.
According to Atlassian Marketplace data, thousands of apps are available across the Atlassian ecosystem, demonstrating how important extensions have become within enterprise environments.
The larger the Confluence environment, the more important app planning becomes.
Many organisations assume migration projects only occur when moving from Server or Data Center to Cloud.
Organisations migrate for various reasons:
For example, we've helped organisations migrate work management solutions such as Monday.com into Jira, enabling teams to consolidate reporting, reduce tool sprawl, and create a single source of truth for project delivery.
→ Case Study | BDQ Monday to Jira migration for PartnerHero
Although every migration differs, the same principles apply:
Whether the destination is Atlassian Cloud or another platform, migration success depends on balancing technical execution with business change.
Every migration is different, but several best practices consistently improve outcomes.
Before planning the migration, understand:
Migration rehearsals reduce uncertainty and identify issues before they become business problems.
Training, communication, and support often have more impact than technical migration activities.
Migration projects create an ideal opportunity to improve:
The goal should not simply be to recreate the old environment in Cloud.
The goal should be to improve collaboration, governance, usability, and knowledge sharing.
A. It depends on the size of the environment, the number of Marketplace apps, governance requirements, and testing activities. Large enterprise migrations often involve several rounds of testing before production migration.
A. Not always. Some apps have direct Cloud equivalents, while others require alternative solutions or redesigned processes.
A. With proper planning and migration rehearsals, downtime can often be significantly reduced compared to traditional migration approaches.
A. Yes. Migration projects are an excellent opportunity to archive outdated content, improve permissions, and simplify information architecture.
A. Yes. Atlassian has continued to invest heavily in Cloud scalability and enterprise capabilities, making Cloud suitable for very large environments.
The Rainforest Alliance migration demonstrates that successful Confluence Cloud migrations depend on much more than technology.
Planning, communication, user adoption, governance, testing, and transparency all play critical roles in reducing risk and achieving successful outcomes.
For organisations with large Confluence Server or Data Center environments, migration is an opportunity not only to modernise infrastructure but also to improve the way knowledge is managed and shared across the business.
If you're considering a Confluence Cloud migration and want to understand the risks, app compatibility considerations, governance opportunities, or migration approach that best fits your organisation, we'd be happy to help.
Book a Confluence Cloud Migration Assessment and start building a roadmap for a successful migration.