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Secure Sites Receive Boost From Google In SERPs

Aug 22nd, 2014

“Security is, I would say, our top priority because for all the exciting things you will be able to do with computers – organizing your lives, staying in touch with people, being creative – if we don’t solve these security problems, then people will hold back.” – Bill Gates

The internet provides a certain uniqueness in that every time we log on, the way we use it is completely different. Some use it to shop or to contact a friend, others to check out restaurants, movie trailers, games or the latest football scores. The user experience therefore, is undoubtedly one which is enhanced by the sheer amount of data and pages within the SERPs. For businesses, this means that the need to feature as high as possible on the SERPs ladder is more important than ever before, if they are to attract and retain their users and traffic.

As with everything internet and search related, you’d be right to assume that the big players (Google, Bing, Yahoo) are constantly seeking ways to develop their offerings and reward those sites with ethical linking strategies and good all-around optimisation. Google, however, has taken things further this week after announcing that they will start to take site security into consideration when ranking pages in SERPs. This is a bold move that will see those sites who have paid and upgraded to a HTTPS as opposed to HTTP rewarded for the part that they play in keeping the internet free of malware.

Ever since Google introduced HTTPS to Gmail by default in 2010, it has been hailed for its continuing advancement of encryption and ensuring the privacy and security of its end users. Although companies are not obliged to make the switch, the consequences for not doing so are unknown. It is however, highly likely that those sites ranking highly on the search engine, especially the first page, will make the switch to avoid risking their prominent position.

Google have offered information to all website owners about how to make the change. Additionally, the set of quick tips below will help you to start the process…

Decide on the kind of certificate you need: single, multi-domain, or wildcard certificate
Use 2048-bit key certificates
Use relative URLs for resources that reside on the same secure domain
Use protocol relative URLs for all other domains
Check out our site move article for more guidelines on how to change your website’s address
Don’t block your HTTPS site from crawling using robots.txt
Allow indexing of your pages by search engines where possible. Avoid the noindex robots meta tag

If you have any queries regarding organic search and where your site sits within SERPS then feel free to contact us. Our dedicated team of experts can take you on a journey through search. Our 100% track record in terms of link auditing and removal should give you the confidence to book a consultation and see how we can help you perform at the highest level.