Website security has always been a premier factor that every business watches out for when entering the online world.
But, to most businesses, website security means watching out for passwords and abstaining from sharing sensitive information.
Well, that is true for sure, but that is not all.
There is much more to website security; that is why we decided to prepare a 7-point guide to website security.
Not only will it help you stay protected, but it will help you attain high SEO rankings and boosting your reputation online. So, let us take a look at the seven points:
A 7-Point Guide for Website Security to Attain Better SEO
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Installing SSL certificates
Experts suggest that an SSL or Secured Socket Layer certificate is a must-have for every website.
According to MarketsandMarkets report, the total value of SSL issuing Certificate Authority will spike up to 123.8 million by 2023.
So, businesses have slowly started realizing how important an SSL certificate is for their survival in the online world.
By now, you must be wondering, what exactly is this SSL certificate?
Well, an SSL certificate is a security protocol that encrypts your website’s connection and passes your data over a secure network so that it does not get intercepted by hackers.
You must have seen a secure padlock ahead of any website’s URL that is only displayed when a website is HTTPS or Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure encrypted and complies with the use of SSL.
A website cannot attain HTTPS without SSL. The ‘S’ in HTTPS stands for Secure, backed by an SSL certificate.
So, by now, you must be wondering, where should I buy cheap SSL certs from?
Many reliable SSL resellers and Certificate Authorities offer a host of cost-effective yet excellent SSL certificates such as Comodo Positive SSL Certificate, RapidSSL, or AlphaSSL.
- Avoid getting penalized by search engines.
Search engine giants like Google may penalize a website if they find loopholes in the security.
Penalties can result from search engine crawlers not being able to crawl your website content properly and may end up concluding that the website is suspicious.
To avoid this, you must keep checking whether the security protocols are working appropriately or not.
A malfunction in Firewall and SSL may also result in long-term penalties. The biggest downside to penalties is that your search rankings and SEO takes a dip.
- Stop malicious bots from crawling your website.
There are various types of malicious bots lurking on the web, looking for websites that may be vulnerable.
Once found, they enter the website and steal data. It may bring your entire website down.
The stolen information may include sensitive data like credit/debit card numbers, bank details, passwords, addresses, phone numbers, etc.
If malicious bots make it to your website’s root directory, they can put your entire business at risk.
So, to stop it, you must not leave any vulnerabilities in security. Ensure that your firewalls and SSL certs are up to date.
- Build authenticity
Websites that are not secured by any protocol are marked as “Not Secure” by Google.
The search engine giant will restrict users from visiting such websites, warning them of the consequences.
Some users even enable the notification to know which website can be suspicious and quickly bounce back if they find a red flag.
If you want your website to attain high search results, you need to make customers believe it is committed to their data security.
Trustworthiness takes time to build. If it is absent, there is no way you can stop users from bouncing back.
- Update software
Software updates comprise security patches that are essential for every website’s security.
Every company has its own set of developers who constantly monitor the activities on the web.
If they figure out that there can be a potential loophole in their software, they will fix it and issue a security update to all its users.
Unfortunately, users don’t think highly of software updates. They often ignore them, thinking it is just a waste of data and time.
We take software updates seriously because hackers are always on the lookout for websites using older CMS versions.
- Use complex passwords
Though we all know the importance of passwords in modern-day life, only a few have an idea of what a complex and robust password looks like.
A complex password does not mean that you must create a bunch of alphabets and numbers that you can’t even remember in the first place.
Instead, it is a strategic blend of alphabets, numbers, and special symbols that you can relate to but the hacker cannot.
So, find complex passwords for your admin panel, or use a password manager to sort the password puzzle for you.
- Backup your data
Companies are employing many backup measures, such as opting for clouds over hard drives but, work cannot be called as done here.
Backups should be strategically maintained so that if one source fails to deliver, we can rely on another source to work for us.
So, to create multiple sources, backup your data on multiple locations. Don’t congest entire data on one cloud-based server.
Also, buy a paid version of the cloud if you store business data. Free versions are often accessed by many people at a given time and are vulnerable.
To Conclude
After reading the guide to website security for great SEO, you must have understood how critical is website security to attain high search rankings on Google.
But, knowing them alone won’t give you the desired results. You must implement each of them on your website to secure your information and stay in Google’s good books.
The use of SSL certificates, firewalls, strong passwords, software updates, access policies, and data backups are essential for a website’s success in 2021.
So, it would be best if you employ all these seven points given above to stay out of the reach of cybercriminals.