Any SEO agency will tell you that HTTPS is important when you factor the rankings of your SEO. It has been a long time since HTTPS has been deemed as the norm, but there are still lots of websites that support only HTTP. Internet marketing goes beyond the surface level which is why safety is important.
Safety is a major contributor as to why HTTPS has a big impact on SEO. Websites that support HTTPS, especially those that are exclusively HTTPS, tend to get better placement on search engine result pages. The security of the website and how responsible the webmaster is can be reflected on whether or not HTTPS, among other things, is implemented.
What is HTTPS?
HTTPS stands for Hypertext Transport Protocol Security. This means that the website uses an SSL 2048-bit key which protects the connection of the site and the visitor. This happens through encryption and authentication of the SSL itself certificate. This allows the guaranteed safe connection between the web server and a browser.
How does the encryption work?
The encryption is in place to make sure that the website being visited by the user cannot be tracked. Their information cannot be hijacked and stolen as long as the encryption is in place.
How does the authentication work?
The authentication is done through the validation of the security certificate. The green padlock that you see is prioritized by most security-savvy users. A website that does not provide a secure way to authenticate the integrity of the website for the user is sometimes avoided completely.
How does HTTPS affect SEO?
In 2014, Go ogle explained the importance of HTTPS and gave HTTPS websites a minor boost in the rankings. The algorithm quickly changed and we saw a massive rise in the number of websites that served themselves in HTTPS over those that did not.
HTTPS became a way to separate websites which may have been inactive and have not been updated in years. The websites that adapted to the change experienced an increase in their ranking thanks to the complete algorithm change by the search engine giant.
Due to the increase in rankings provided by HTTPS, many webmasters opted to serve their website exclusively on HTTPS. This meant that most websites redirected their HTTP pages to the more secure equivalents.
The overall increase of HTTPS websites saw another algorithm change for Google and other search engines that gave yet another increase in prioritization for websites that served itself on an HTTPS-first basis.
HTTP websites are now tagged as possible insecure by many mass market browsers which may cause visitors who are not tech-savvy to be alarmed and press back. This has proved to be a massive blow to those who refused to adapt to the change as they saw a dip in traffic.
Other than being tagged as Not Secure, websites that do not use the more secure protocol, especially those that mix content (using both HTTP and HTTPS), will now have a splash page warning the user that the website they are going to visit could potentially lead them to lose personal data.
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