As an online business owner, you are responsible for safely collecting, storing, and using your client’s data. You probably enforce strict rules for the passwords clients can use with their online account and use payment integration, but do you have a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate?
Why Use An SSL Certificate?
Once you add an SSL certificate to your website, visitors will see a padlock next to the URL. The URLs will also start with HTTPS instead of HTTP. These are signals that most Internet users are familiar with, and visitors will instantly feel more confident about using your website. Adding an SSL certificate to your website is very easy and it will show visitors that you care about online privacy and security. It's more important than ever nowadays with cybersecurity threats lurking and data privacy so crucial.
But just as importantly, it portrays an additional level of trust and professionalism for your website with visitors and Google. Now everywhere shows sites that are or aren't secure including Google search results and Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Opera, and Safari browsers. If your website doesn't have a valid SSL certificate, all visitors and crawlers know it.
How Do SSL Certificates Work?
An SSL certificate is a small file that you install on your web server so that a safer protocol is used when information is sent to the server or requested by visitors. This protocol uses two cryptographic keys to protect the data sent and received. This is one of the most efficient and convenient ways of protecting login credentials, personal information, and payment details. It also protects the privacy of visitors since it hides some of their browsing habits and software preferences from their Internet Service Provider.
How Do I Get An SSL Certificate?
There are different online services that sell these certificates at a low price and handle validation process. You will need to validate your certificate to prove your identity.
There are different types of SSL certificates with different validation processes:
DV Certificates
This is the most common type of SSL certificate. You will only need to prove that you own your domain name to validate it.
OV Certificates
These certificates require you to use your business name to validate them, which makes them more trustworthy.
EV Certificates
You will have to go through additional steps to validate one of these certificates, and the name of your business will appear in the browser bar along with a green portion that indicates your site is highly trustworthy.
A DV certificate would be suitable if you only need to protect log in credentials, but visitors will probably look for the signals associated with EV certificates if they are shopping online.
Do SSL Certificates Affect Ranking?
Google uses SSL certificates as a ranking signal. Note that there are several other signals taken into consideration and that adding an SSL certificate might only have a small impact on your overall search result rankings. However, visitors will be more likely to spend more time on your site and to visit it again if they feel that it is trustworthy. For both of these reasons, your Google PageRank, domain authority, and organic traffic will both increase and your bounce rate / pogosticking rate will most likely decrease.
The downside of implementing an SSL certificate is that your URLs will change. You can avoid losing traffic by setting up 301 redirects so that your old links bring visitors to newer HTTPS pages.
Get An SSL And Sell Sell Sell
Adding a Wildcard SSL certificate to your website is definitely worth it since most Internet users know they should look for the HTTPS and padlock signals to determine if a website is safe to use. This will have a positive impact on how often visitors check your website, how high Google ranks your sites, and could result in more sales.
I hope you enjoyed this article about how to increase the trustworthiness and SEO value of your website by going to HTTPS SSL.
Interested in more articles about search engine optimization and websites?
Read My Blog Posts:
- Tips To Optimize Your Websites For Alexa & Google Home
- Bootstrap Business Basics: SEO
More Bootstrap Business Blog Below
