Technical - Do you provide security to your website visitors?

Google has confirmed that they use HTTPS as a ranking signal, so it’s important that your website is secure. It also helps your users feel safer when using your website especially if they must supply any sensitive data. This is especially true when they are shopping with a credit card.

To stay secure, you will require a website security certificate. A website security certificate is a validation and encryption tool, part of the HTTPS protocol, which secures and encrypts data going back and forth between the server and the client browser. It is issued by a trusted certification authority (CA) who verifies the identity of the owner of a website.

Previously you have had to pay for this service, but there is now a free CA called Lets Encrypt that issues free security certificates for 3 months. Renewing every 3 months might be a pain, so we recommend using a certification tool like Certify the Web which will do this for you if you go the free route.