If you are moving your website from HTTP to HTTPS because Google is considering them as a ranking factor, you are avoiding one very important point here: Website Security- a backbone of your business.
As Google has started considering SSL as ranking factor, website owners must start considering the importance of their customer’s online security. This announcement proves that the visitors and customers on websites will get utmost security if the website has moved from HTTP to HTTPS. It is obvious that SSL will add the operation cost of a website, but it will also help the businesses in the end. Currently, it seems quite hard for any website owner to select between customer’s security and search engine ranking. However, it is quite graspable that many organizations and web marketing geeks judge it as a positive sign as well others were seen on the opposite side. The question is what you prefer as a website owner- Customer’s security or Ranking.
Response on Social Media:
With Google announcement, there emerged hype among online marketing industries, digital marketing executives, and other associated persons. There is a lot of discussion going on different social media platforms about Google’s priority to customer’s security.
Many SEOs, enterprises, security experts have shown their reaction on Google’s decision. Some of them are positive, pessimistic, serious, predictable, and funny. We have categorized the reviews in three classes: Positive, Negative and Neutral reactions.
Positive Reactions:
@AuthorityLabs @ScottVann @RonellSmith @seo_theory I moved my site to HTTPS for one simple reason: trust. Not because I sell stuff.
— Bill Hartzer (@bhartzer) September 16, 2014
Should have invested in the SSL company instead of sinking all my money into that lousy Google authorship photo service.
— Cyrus Shepard (@CyrusShepard) August 7, 2014
Negative Reactions:
Ooh burn!! @gfiorelli1: Google gets SEOs to do something: just needs to call it a ranking factor #HTTPS Next? A Google domain? #seo #sem
— Jumblerant (@jumblerant) August 7, 2014
@rustybrick it’s just added cost for small businesses, and many have no idea what SSL requires if they don’t run e-commerce sites
— Derek Edmond (@DerekEdmond) August 7, 2014
Neutral Reactions:
@gfiorelli1 They claim it only impacts 1% of queries. How big of a deal do you think #HTTPS will be in time? Seems it will stay small.
— Tommy Landry (@tommy_landry) August 7, 2014
Currently, it seems that no one is clear about Google ranking, but it is clear that customers would get benefit with this HTTPS migration. I have collected a summary of most shared discussions from different social media platforms about Google’s announcement, which is as under.
- They believe that SSL only needed for online shopping website, financial transactions or any payment industry.
- It adds an additional cost of purchasing and renewal SSL every year, which is quite unbearable for content-based website.
- Some of them believe that it will not change the ranking in the near future, even if you go for SSL.
- Some of them believe that if all sites are equipped with SSL, then it is quite difficult to choose a single site for ranking booster.
- SSL should not be a standard to gauge the website ranking as each and every website is different.
- SSL will help to reduce bounce rate of a website as visitors feel safe over the site.
- Google is selling its own SSL and with this announcement, it will help to enhance Google business in the near future.
HTTPS Everywhere:
If you are a content-based website, you always wish that your readers would get continuous fresh and the same content as you place since the inception. For example, many blogs offer medical and financial advice on their blog. If you run such a blog, then you would ensure that the content provided on the site is genuine and not altered by a third party. Google has published an excellent video about “HTTPS Everywhere” that demonstrates the correlation between HTTPS and content based website. Data traveled on insecure channel may cause someone’s interception and modify the content, which could put the credibility of your site at risk. Therefore, make your website HTTPS by default and search friendly.
Customers Security or Business:
After such a hot discussion on SSL, it is clear that with the evolving cyber threats and attacks, the whole cyber security experts, researchers, security firms are hoping for a single solution that can remove all concerns about online security. Google has made a little step in that direction by enabling websites over SSL. It is a responsibility that customer’s security should be a primary focus of any organization. You cannot put customer’s online security at risk just because of your business ranking.
Just Think Apart from Google Declaration:
Carefully observe the below two situations, and you will know why SSL is a favorable option.
- If someone is spying on your customer’s web transactions while interacting with your website. How will you and your customer feel?
- On the other hand, your customer is transmitting data in an SSL secured environment. How will you and your customers feel?
The more your customers feel secure, the more they will try to interact with your website; hence, SSL would be a great support for those businesses who are still guessing about SSL certificate.
If we think for a while that your website got a ranking in a Google’s SERP anyhow, but your customers, still do not feel safe over your website. Then, what will you do? To make them secure, you will probably go for a robust solution that keeps your growth evolving together with customer’s confidence. Even, SSL ensures that your content based website is legitimate, and the content is pure and not altered since it has been written.
A single penny you spend on your SSL purchase or renewal is much less than your customer’s trust for your business. Once the trust is broken, it cannot be built. Remember, when your customer’s put trust in your website, you start earning. On the other hand, when they go away, you start losing your battle. A simple security padlock is enough to ensure your customer about their safety. What do you wish for then?
SSL is a Future:
50% cyber crime happens due to the web user’s unawareness about online security. Daily millions of people lose their confidential information in the data breach. Millions of web users make online payment, access different account with login credentials in daily life, but how many of them really know about phishing, data snooping, and man-in-middle attack.
If we look at most brutal cyber attacks of 2014, we can see that security is really badly needed. Even many users put blindly trust while interacting with the website. The only way to ensure your customers is SSL that encrypts the data transmitting between websites and servers and keep cyber vectors out of the business. Many SSL providers even provide different types of SSL certificates at cheap rate with standard encryption, relentless customer support, amazing features. It is fact that SSL is one of the strongest weapons against cyber-crime.
Conclusion:
At last, it is certain that ranking always swings, but the security is lasting and inevitable. Google statement regarding “HTTPS as a ranking booster” should be considered in an optimistic way also for the sake of your valuable online customers. It might happen that you will have to pay extra for SSL certificate, but it is certain that your customers will love it at all.
Still confused? Don’t worry, contact our customer support team or checkout our FREE SSL certificate offer. I am sure you will find it very handy to move your website from HTTP to HTTPS without spending more time and money at all.
