Why You Should Protect Your Website with SSL Certificate from Semalt
Thinking of all the ways you can boost the SEO value of your website? While we are sure you must have grabbed all the low-hanging fruits already, there is one element that often gets sidetracked. And that is website data encryption.
In other words, the installation of an SSL certificate on your website that promotes a secure, encrypted connection to your users and their data. With Semalt, you can ensure that all communication on your website is encrypted and secure. Our affordable SSL certificates are widely used across websites that make them more secure, Google-friendly, and popular.
Having strong HTTPS encryption can be a great way to take your website’s SEO level a notch higher in the eyes of search engines. Especially so if your website deals with payments (e.g.: shopping cart).
Let’s take a deeper look into why SSL is an important element in SEO in 2020 and beyond.
What is an SSL Certificate?
Before we get into the specifics, let’s first understand what an SSL certificate is. If you are new to websites, a more basic question would be: what is website encryption? Or, what does HTTPS mean?
The answer is simple. SSL, which stands for Secure Sockets Layer, is an internet security protocol that allows for data encryption, authentication, and data integrity in modern websites. It converts the regular hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) into a secure one (HTTPS), giving protection to your data and reliability to your users. Any piece of information that goes through your website’s server is encrypted so that it cannot be stolen or tampered with during transmission.
SSL can be installed on a website as a certificate (which is a combination of codes) generated by a provider like Semalt. This SSL certificate encrypts all the data that goes in and out of your website. It does this mainly by three actions:
- Encrypting all data
- Initiating an authentication process between the devices (your computer and the server) to confirm that these devices are what they claim to be
- Digitally sign the data for better identification at both ends.
In online security, the technical term for SSL is TLS, which stands for Transport Layer Security. It is the successor of the original SSL 3.0 protocol that was launched in 1996. Today, it is better known as SSL/TSL encryption. Google likes to call it HTTP over TLS or simply HTTPS.
For example, when a user visits your website and enters their credit card information on the checkout page, that data should ideally be encrypted. With an SSL certificate, you can ensure that it is. This secures your user’s critical personal information as well as projects your website as trustworthy. Making your users come back and transact again at a later time.
This SSL certificate is also what provides the green lock symbol at the beginning of a URL on Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox. Since our inception, Semalt has serviced hundreds of clients across the globe. All of our clients depend on one of the three SSL certificate plans that we offer. The Premium package (which also supports subdomains) is naturally our best-seller among SSL/TSL certificate offerings.
It helps us that Semalt personnel know several languages such as English, French, Russian, Ukrainian, Italian, Turkish among others. This aids in better communication and helps us provide the best services to our users.
Figure 1 - The secure symbol in Google Chrome
Now that you have a fair idea of what encryption can do for your website and your web visitors, let’s take a look at it from the SEO angle.
Why is an SSL Certificate Important for Your Website’s SEO?
At Semalt, being a premium SEO services provider and a holistic digital marketing agency, we have high regard for security products. Our SSL certificate offering is one of them, which can help you boost the SEO of your website.
We have already learned how the presence of an SSL/TSL certificate on your website can be a boon for you. It will not only protect your website as a secure entity but also protect the information of your users. But more than that, it will aid in your search engine optimization (SEO) efforts. Let’s find out how.
Google Encourages HTTPS
In 2014, Google announced that it would begin considering ‘secure, encrypted connections as a signal in its search ranking algorithms’. Over six years since then, Google has increased its weightage to SSL/TSL encryption so much that today it affects most search queries, and especially those leaning to financial transactions. Ecommerce sites, payment gateways, and social networks are examples of website types that need encryption. This is because they deal with user’s personal information such as credit card details, social security numbers, and personal identification details. For instance, if you have your own dropshipping business, SSL should be on top of your SEO checklist.
Other search engines like Bing and Yandex have also begun to use website encryption as a standard signal of better standing.
According to Google’s Transparency Report, 88% of webpages loaded on Google Chrome globally (via Windows desktop) in April 2020 were encrypted with HTTPS. That’s a huge number because Chrome still has the highest (and maximum) market share among web browsers.
Figure 2 - Percentage of pages loaded over HTTPS in Chrome
The same report suggests that mobile devices account for a majority of unencrypted user traffic. This shows that there is enough room for improvement for websites around us. Is yours one of them?
In that regard, here are some pointers from Google on why HTTPS is important:
- Protects against eavesdroppers and hijackers
- Prevent cyber attacks
- Improves data integrity
- Acts as a standalone security system even when software and hardware security may not be enough
A website with SSL/TSL encryption signals search engines that it takes user information and data integrity seriously. Along with other factors such as relevant content, content silo, strong internal linking, and high-authority backlinks, encryption has also emerged as a significant factor for SEO improvement.
As you already know, SEO is all about improving the visibility of your website on organic search. With encryption as a significant factor, you can simply install an SSL certificate for a small fee and stand out from the crowd of unencrypted, non-HTTPS websites out there.
How Can HTTPS Improve SEO?
If you are an internet marketer, you already know that no action has an instant impact on SEO. You can optimize all your website content and map each page to a certain relevant keyword. And search engines will still take time to re-index, cache, and consider your web pages for better rankings.
It is known that nothing can magically boost your SEO rankings overnight. The same is the case with activating HTTPS on your website. You should not expect your website to have a better standing on organic search engine page results (SERP) just by installing an SSL/TSL certificate. When a lot of your actions come together over a period of time, you can start reaping their benefits.
Figure 3 - This is how a non-HTTPS website looks to a user
A great example that will give you a clearer picture is this: consider the TSL encrypted website of Semalt and a non-encrypted website of another competitor agency. If you are searching for a relevant digital marketing topic, and these two websites are competing for the top position, Semalt’s site will rank higher. Why?
Because Semalt not only has better, relevant content about that topic you are searching for but also has the SSL certificate installed. In a way, it’s just one of the things that search engines will use to compare different results for a query.
If you want to pull all the stops in pushing your website on top of organic search, installing an SSL/TSL certificate is one of the easiest actions. All it takes is for you to purchase the certificate depending upon your requirement, and you’re good to go.
How to Install an SSL Certificate with Semalt?
With Semalt, installing an SSL certificate on your website is as easy as online shopping. You can go to our SSL certificates page and choose from one of the three plans. They are:
- Basic – Only installation, no certificate
- Standard – Positive SSL from Comodo plus installation
- Premium – Best-selling Positive SSL Wildcard with support for subdomains and installation
As noted above, our Premium plan is popular amongst our existing customers. It gives them a hassle-free setup so that they can focus on more important tasks like web content and user management.
Once you have chosen a suitable plan, make the purchase via a safe and secure payment gateway. Once you have bought it, you can easily integrate your website with our service and turn your website secure. In case you face any issues during the setup phase, our customer care will guide you and answer your queries.
Semalt’s SSL/TSL certificates can provide you five key things in your digital marketing journey. They are:
- Higher security of your website
- Instant green secure symbol in Google Chrome and other web browsers
- Privacy protection for your website users
- Quick installation
- Higher volume of organic web visitors from search engines
As noted by several of our past and existing clients, installing SSL certificates can help you turn your website into a private portal that your users can trust and regularly deal with.
Don’t let potential customers turn away from your website after looking at the ‘not secure’ symbol on Google Chrome. Bring them in with a Semalt SSL certificate today. Click here to purchase one now.