When creating a website, there are quite a few factors that go into this process. The first and most obvious is presentation. Making the site easy to navigate while also giving it cool features to make it stand out. Second may be to make sure it has buzz-words and phrases for marketing purposes. Third and possibly the most important nowadays is making your website is secure. Otherwise, you run the risk of possibly losing business and gaining a bad reputation on the internet. Now is the time to migrate your site to HTTPS.
Google has said, HTTPS “protects the integrity and confidentiality of data between the user’s computer and the site.” There are three layers to security: encryption, data integrity and authentication.
Now is the time to migrate your website to HTTPS
Google Told Us to Migrate to HTTPS
A few years ago, Google decided to put the message out there that the web needed more security. It seemed as though web developers did not listen to the message because the amount of secure websites out of 200,000 in a 2014 study only showed 0.3% as secure. Google then decided to get louder with the message and announced that in January 2017, all non-secure websites visited via Chrome would be marked.
Google Will Soon Begin Warning Users
Websites that require passwords or entry fields of any kind–including credit card fields, or if the page was visited in Incognito mode, will show a warning on an HTTP website. The warning started off subtle as a grey message, but Google plans to make the warning message louder by making it red. This way, the user will undoubtedly see it and know that he/she runs the risk of exposing personal information by staying on the site.
What this means for non-secure website owners is that your digital reputation is on the line. Eventually, Google will mark non-secure websites on the SERP, so users will most likely not even click on the link and visit the site at all.
Google is not the only search engine aboard the secure site movement. As of January 2017, Firefox also started warning users of being on a non-secure site by displaying a grey lock with a red strike across it. There is also a warning message that says, “Connection not secure. Logins entered on this page could be compromised.”
HTTPS Will Keep Your Users Safe & Build Their Trust
Migrating to HTTPS will not only help your site stay safe from hackers intercepting, manipulating or stealing content, it will also build trust with your users. They will be more willing to give personal information if they know that the site is secure. In addition, having a secure website can boost your ranking, as Google outlined in 2014. This was a big deal because Google had never revealed what the ranking factors were because it could cause website developers to cheat the system. As of 2017, around 65% of websites ranking for high-volume keywords are secure and 75% of traffic on Chrome OS and Mac OS is safe.
BlueMatrix Media Can Help:
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If you have not yet migrated over to HTTPS, you should be considering it by now. The process is fairly simple and takes 10 steps. Click on this link for directions.