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A Newbie’s Guide to Making Your Site More Secure With SSL: What Is It & Why Should I Care?

Learn how SSL certificates and HTTPS protect your website’s connections, what they do not protect, and how to check connection security.

Written by
Hannah Collins
Published
Person working on a laptop at a desk.

Website security helps protect visitors and their information. HTTPS is one important part of that protection.

Let’s Start With The Basics

A website’s address can start with http:// or https://. The second indicates an HTTPS connection.

What is commonly called an SSL certificate is used with modern TLS to support HTTPS. TLS protects data while it travels between your browser and the website.

Browser indicators vary. Chrome replaced its address-bar padlock with a site-controls icon in Chrome 117. Use the browser’s connection information to inspect the certificate; the icon is not an endorsement of the site. 

HTTPS helps prevent others from reading or altering information in transit. It does not prevent someone from creating a fake website, guarantee that the website is trustworthy, or protect information after the website receives it. Chrome explains why HTTPS should not be mistaken for proof of trust.

What Else Does An SSL Certificate Do?

Google has described HTTPS as a lightweight ranking signal. Using HTTPS is good practice even when your website has no login or checkout, but a certificate alone does not guarantee higher rankings.

How Do I Get SSL On My Site?

At Second Mile Marketing, we understand how tech-heavy these things can be, and we want to go that extra mile by taking this off your plate! Our team can issue a certificate followed by installing and activating it on the website’s origin server. 

Once configured, the website can load over HTTPS. Redirect HTTP requests to HTTPS and make sure page resources also use secure connections. A certificate is one part of website security, alongside updates, access controls and secure handling of stored data.

We care about making sure your information is secure and safe on the world wide web, so please reach out and we’d be happy to help you with all of your tech and development needs. Check out HubSpot’s FREE website grader to see how your website stacks up among the rest when it comes to performance, SEO, mobile, and security.

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