Do you have a secure website?
The huge surge in cybercrime over the past few years has been well documented by the media, with several high profile companies suffering devastating attacks.
The recent WannaCry attack brought the NHS to a standstill, but also infected computers around the globe causing untold damage. In many cases the immediate loss of your ability to trade is only part of the problem, several large organisations have suffered serious reputational damage in the wake of these types of attacks, which have tarnished their share price and brand image for years to come.
Regulatory fines for failing to protect your systems properly can also exacerbate the problem further. In the case of Talk Talk, they received a record fine of £400,000 for the theft of their customer data in 2016.
Take Action to Secure Your Website
This recent trend has highlighted the need for increased security, with many business owners asking themselves “how do we make sure this doesn’t happen to us”.
With your website so often serving as the entry point to other systems, it is essential that you take the necessary steps to protect it.
One way to secure your website is with an SSL certificate. This Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate creates a secure link between your web server and your customer’s browser, making it far more difficult for hackers to intercept sensitive information like passwords, or credit card details.
Visitors to your site will see that it is secure from the padlock in the address bar, and the fact that you have an https URL, as opposed to just http.
This is a vital part of keeping your customers’ data safe online, and more and more businesses are adopting the SSL standard.
Secondary Benefits of A Secure Website
Beyond the obvious security impact, there are other benefits to installing an SSL certificate on your site:
- Trust and conversion – Trust is a really important part of the sales processes, and customers seeing that your website is secure can increase your conversion rate, resulting in higher sales.
- SEO – Another benefit of SSL certificates is that since 2014 Google has recognised HTTPS as a ranking signal. This means that in some instances they will give preference to secured sites over unsecured ones, thus increasing your search engine ranking and organic traffic.
Consider Security from the Outset
When we’re building digital marketing strategies at AsOne, we look across the end to end customer journey, and building trust with your customer base is a really important part of that.
We know that having a secure website where customers will feel safe handing over their payment details can be a key factor in your success and therefore make this a key consideration from the outset.
We also have experience helping people configure SSL certificates for existing websites, and understand the intricacies of setting them up properly.
Have you taken the necessary steps to secure your website? If you’d like more information on what you need to do, don’t hesitate to get in touch with one of our experts?
