Sites running on https are better perceived and better ranked by search engines. If a couple of years ago, transferring the site to https was a recommendation, today it is already a mandatory item in the checklist for optimizing a web resource.
There is nothing difficult or impossible here. However, in order for everything to go smoothly, it is recommended to coordinate actions with the technical support specialists of the hosting company whose services you use.
How to prepare a site for moving to https
About what an SSL certificate is and why to transfer the site to the https protocol, was discussed in a previous publication. And now let's analyze how it is done.
First, you need to perform a number of preparatory works:
- Replace all absolute references within the internal link with relative references. This will save unnecessary problems with the availability of site elements and re-indexing of search robots after the transfer.
- Fix links to media content. If the files are located on your site, URLs are replaced with relative ones, as in the previous point. And if on a third-party portal, then the links change only if that content is available via the https protocol.
- Check the connection parameters of external scripts. If absolute links are used, they should be changed to relative ones.
These three stages are considered the most time-consuming, as a lot of time is spent on their implementation. But in order to transfer the site from http to https, all this must be done in a mandatory manner.
We configure https on the hosting
After the preparatory stage, you can proceed to the main work. Setting https on the site is performed as follows:
- Select and purchase an SSL certificate . They are of different types, so be guided by your needs and financial capabilities:
- Ordinary. Applies to one domain. They are issued in 5-10 minutes, as only the domain belonging to the person who requested the certificate is checked.
- Extended Validation. After purchasing a certificate, a green lock and the name of the organization appear in the address bar. For most users, this is a guarantee of site reliability. To obtain this certificate, it is necessary to confirm access rights to the domain, to provide documents on the state registration of the company. In addition, the name of the company in the Whois data, the main telephone numbers of the organization, etc. are checked.
- Wildcard. Applies to subdomains.
- With IDN support. Intended for sites with Cyrillic domains.
- Install an SSL certificate on the server. This procedure usually only takes a couple of minutes. After all, it is performed in an intuitive control panel provided by the hosting company. If you encounter difficulties, contact technical support for help or hire an experienced programmer to transfer the site to https without losing traffic.
- Check the availability of the web resource. Make sure it opens with two URLs: http and https at the beginning of the address bar. Then you need to specify that when opening the http version, the user is automatically redirected to the secure https protocol.
If the site is not available at one of the addresses, or the redirection does not occur, it means that mistakes were made during the configuration. Or there are some problems on the hoster's side. There is only one advice: look for the cause and eliminate it.
By the way, everyone who uses the services of the CityHost hosting company only needs to purchase an SSL certificate - and the web resource will immediately become available via https. It remains only to slightly adjust the CMS of the site and change the addresses in mySQL.
We configure the .htaccess file and notify search engines
Finally, you need to perform a number of simple actions:
- Set up 301 redirects . To save time, write it in the .htaccess file using the mod_rewrite module. Or contact the technical support of the hosting company for help.
- Find and fix errors. In the process of transition, some nuances are always missed. Therefore, after moving, check everything: the accessibility of each page, the correctness of the links and media files. If necessary, correct it.
- Tell search engines about the move to https. This will help minimize traffic loss. You can notify search engines in Google Search Console and Yandex.Webmaster, respectively.
Now you know how to configure the https protocol. Do it yourself or entrust it to specialists - decide for yourself. Understanding the difference between http and https , you know for sure that the site will get a fat plus from search engines. And with the right approach to promotion, it will be much easier to take high positions in distribution.
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