We see a steady flow of SSL Certificates being bought on a daily basis and installed on our clients websites. Yesterday we saw a 300% increase in our SSL orders that we process on an average day and you may be curious as to why. Yesterday morning Google caused a real buzz in the web hosting and SSL industry by announcing that https:// secured websites (ssl encrypted websites) will now be a “Ranking Signal” in Google Web Search. This as you can imagine has caused a real interest in SSL certificates as people scramble to get their website https:// encrypted in an effort to try to get a higher ranking in Google.
We do not pretend to be experts in SEO and many SEO gurus will tell you this is just one of many ways in which to boost your Google Ranking but from the sales yesterday we know this has definitely sparked interest among our clients.
The first person yesterday to enquire about an SSL for his site is Simon Hunter from the e-business team based in Invest NI Headquarters in Bedford Square. Simon runs a personal website for Windsor Tennis Club (http://www.windsortennis.co.uk/) and I guess there was a lot of Buzz about the INI offices about this new development. He enquired about the process of activating SSL on his website and this will be activated once he makes some changes to facilitate https:// working across his site.
Shortly after Barry Adams a well known SEO expert from Belfast who speaks on the topic at many worldwide events ordered a dedicated IP and SSL for his personal blog that he hosts with us. You can view one of Barry’s websites here, http://www.polemicdigital.com/ Our CEO took this order directly and Barry told us he was doing this on his personal site to get a feel for the install procedure so he could fully understand the process of converting a standard http:// website to an SSL Encrypted website. Anyone who needs to employ an SEO expert should look no further than Barry.
If you want a simple explanation as to what an SSL Certificate is and what it does have a read at the first few paragraphs on this Google Webmasters post. This post also gives Google’s take on Best practice and Common Pitfalls in setting up SSL on your website and we are happy to advise on any of these – just put a ticket in to our sales department, open a live chat on our website or give us a call UK office hours on the number on our website.
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/6073543
So how do we know that Google are using https as a ranking signal in search engines – John Mueller an SEO Analyst for Google stated it yesterday:
Keeping users’ data safe is important, and one of the thoughts behind adding HTTPS as a ranking signal in Google’s web-search. HTTPS protects the connection to the website through authentication and encryption. Find out more in our blog post below.
You can follow his Google+ Page here
Here is a useful website I found when researching this topic earlier today and some slightly sarcastic Tweets on the subject can be found below.
I suspect it won’t be long before we start seeing secure certificate ads with “Get your Google ranking boost with our SSL certs!”
— Jennifer Slegg (@jenstar) August 7, 2014
I now offer a new SEO service! SSL Installation. 5 years of experience installing SSL’s at a major web host. Guaranteed top rankings! — Dan Silber (@Dan_Silber) August 7, 2014
Dear Google, I just implemented SSL and I’m STILL not ranking #1 for ‘cheap plumber in Sheffield’. WTF is wrong with you guys??!
— ♛ ingo ☠ bousa ♛ (@supaswag) August 7, 2014
What SSL Certificates do Bigwetfish Sell?
Through a partnership with a wholesale SSL provider we can actually supply almost any SSL Certificate available. We do only showcase 5 certificates on our website SSL Section as these are the most popular certificates that clients ask for. In summary our two top sellers are listed below:
Domain Validated Comodo Essential SSL Certificate
This certificate is the most popular we sell and 75% of all SSL orders are for this certificate. This certificate is issued immediately. The SSL issuing authority verifies the certificate through sending a simple email to hostmaster@domain.com email address or via the upload of a verification txt file. These certificates are popular and give the top level of encryption available for you.
Extended Verified Comodo SSL Certificate
Extended Verified Certificates can take up to 2 weeks to issue but while you wait your site will be fully protected with a Domain Validated Certificate. EV Certs provide the Green Bar with your company name in the address bar and gives good confidence in your website and brand. The level of encryption is no different to Domain Validated Certificates. The main difference is you will need to complete paperwork and confirm identity to the issuing authority. The benefit is your users see your company name in the browser address bar which will instil more confidence in the site.
What do SSLs Cost?
For this week only we are offering SSLs at a discounted rate. £15 + VAT will buy a Comodo Essential SSL. If you are interested in upgrading to an EV SSL certificate contact our sales team for a range of options available to you (it is heavily discounted on our business hosting so in some instances it will be cheaper to upgrade to business this is why we want to talk to anyone who wants to install an EV SSL and we can get you the complete range of options – we also need to explain the EV process in detail).
In order to get this discount please DO NOT use our Auto Install Product on our website. Rather open a live chat to our sales team or pop in a support ticket.
Take the Stress out of SSL
Talk to our team about your SSL needs. We fully install and configure your SSL for you. We will also offer advice if you need to set up any htaccess redirects to ensure your site loads on https:// all the time. We will help troubleshoot any other issues with your site moving over to https for you. We look forward to chatting.