Should you update your website to HTTPS?

By Webgreenit Team | Tuesday, November 14, 2017

Google plans to continue the push in 2018 to make the web a more secure place by encouraging all webmasters to make the switch to HTTPS. Instead of using HTTPS on only sensitive parts of your site, it is now recommended that your small business website just goes ahead and uses HTTPS on the entire website. If implemented correctly performance will not be affected in any way and it’s a great way to hedge your bets against future Google algorithm changes.

What are the benefits with HTTPS?

  1. HTTPS is a form of encryption that keeps site visitors’ information safe. HTTPS is especially important on web pages where users provide their highly sensitive information (e.g., card information and other personal details).

  2. HTTPS helps your site gain a higher level of trust with your users. This ensures that the website is actually what it claims to be. For example, that same person running the Wi-Fi access point could send browsers to a fake website. HTTPS ensures that a website that says it’s example.com is actually example.com. Some SSL certificates even check the legal identity behind that website, so that you know creditcompany.com is actually your credit card company

  3. Google has stated that HTTPS is a ranking signal that can give your site a small organic search ranking increase. The percentage of websites using HTTPS, listed on pages 1 and 2 of search results, is now increasing at a much higher percentage than from just a few months ago. In addition, Google Analytics becomes even more useful when you move your site to HTTPS. Unlike HTTP, with HTTPS, the security data of the website that referred you is saved. When traffic comes to your HTTP site, it appears to be “direct” in your analytics report, which isn’t helpful. On the other hand, when traffic comes through your HTTPS site, your referral traffic data is saved. This means you can figure out where your traffic is actually coming from.

In the fast-evolving SEO world, it’s better to be proactive and keep up with the changes. HTTPS should be one of the areas your small business website considers switching to.  If you are just beginning with a website for your small business, HTTPS is a must. 

HTTPS is the future of the web

Powerful, new web platform features, such as taking pictures or recording audio, or building progressive web apps, require explicit permission from the user before executing. Many older APIs are also being updated to require permission to execute, such as the geolocation API. HTTPS is a key component to the permission workflows for both these new features and updated APIs.

As of today, we are proud to announce that any of our CMS websites have the option to have HTTPS installed. In addtion, this option includes updating all references in web content, templates, sitemaps and modules. By doing this, your website will have that green lock on all webpages, something that more and more customers will be searching for, especially when any type of personal data is asked for.


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