Anyone have experience with using HTTPS compared to HTTP and how it could affect rankings?
-
Are there any negative or positive effects of using https over http when it comes to rankings?
-
If you have users register for anything (like comments for example) then I would use https, or any kind of ecommerce.
Other than that, I don't think you pick up an advantage.
-
https is slower, as it encrypts your data, and has to be decrypted at the other end. if you have no reason to use it, then just use http
-
Mike's right - Matt Cutts is a huge HTTPS fan but there are no direct benefits yet. If both versions of the site are available, you need to make a decision about which one you want to use and stick with it, either redirecting the other or pointing to the preferred version with a canonical tag.
We used to say that only pages requiring secure connections (payment pages, or pages where other sensitive information is passed) should be secure, but since Google can clearly handle these pages and some high-ranking people within the search team prefer them, I'd say you're definitely safe to use them if you want to.
-
At this point, no - there are not positive or negative effects you'd need to worry about.
If you are wanting to switch from one to the other, you will want to make sure you you have the proper redirects/canonical tags in place.
One way to choose which option is best for your situation would be to check your analytics and see which site is getting more traffic (if both the http and https versions of your site are accessible).
Matt Cutts did make a comment earlier this year that he personally would want to give a boost to secure sites - but that is not currently in place.
Depending on your audience https may be more appropriate. For instance, if you Google "banking" - you can see both http and https websites ranking - savvy users will probably notice the secure sites and visit those. I guess it all depends on your industry and your audience though.
Hope this helps.
Mike
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Is "Author Rank," User Comments Driving Losses for YMYL Sites?
Hi, folks! So, our company publishes 50+ active, disease-specific news and perspectives websites -- mostly for rare diseases. We are also tenacious content creators: between news, columns, resource pages, and other content, we produce 1K+ pieces of original content across our network. Authors are either PhD scientists or patients/caregivers. All of our sites use the same design. We were big winners with the August Medic update in 2018 and subsequent update in September/October. However, the Medic update in March and de-indexing bug in April were huge losers for us across our monetized sites (about 10 in total). We've seen some recovery with this early June update, but also some further losses. It's a mixed bag. Take a look at this attached MOZ chart, which shows the jumps and falls around the various Medic updates. The pattern is very similar on many of our sites. As per JT Williamson's stellar article on EAT, I feel like we've done a good job in meeting those criteria, which has left we wondering what isn't jiving with the new core updates. I have two theories I wanted to run past you all: 1. Are user comments on YMYL sites problematic for Google now? I was thinking that maybe user comments underneath health news and perspectives articles might be concerning on YMYL sites now. On one hand, a healthy commenting community indicates an engaged user base and speaks to the trust and authority of the content. On the other hand, while the AUTHOR of the article might be a PhD researcher or a patient advocate, the people commenting -- how qualified are they? What if they are spouting off crazy ideas? Could Google's new update see user comments such as these as degrading the trust/authority/expertise of the page? The examples I linked to above have a good number of user comments. Could these now be problematic? 2. Is Google "Author Rank" finally happening, sort of? From what I've read about EAT -- particularly for YMYL sites -- it's important that authors have “formal expertise” and, according to Williamson, "an expert in the field or topic." He continues that the author's expertise and authority, "is informed by relevant credentials, reviews, testimonials, etc. " Well -- how is Google substantiating this? We no longer have the authorship markup, but is the algorithm doing its due diligence on authors in some more sophisticated way? It makes me wonder if we're doing enough to present our author's credentials on our articles, for example. Take a look -- Magdalena is a PhD researcher, but her user profile doesn't appear at the bottom of the article, and if you click on her name, it just takes you to her author category page (how WordPress'ish). Even worse -- our resource pages don't even list the author. Anyhow, I'd love to get some feedback from the community on these ideas. I know that Google has said there's nothing to do to "fix" these downturns, but it'd sure be nice to get some of this traffic back! Thanks! 243rn10.png
Algorithm Updates | | Michael_Nace1 -
If my article is reposted on another blog, using re=canonical, does that count as a link back?
Hey all! My company blog is interested in letting another blog repost our article. We would ask them to use "re-canonical" in the mark-up to avoid Google digging through "duplicate" info out there. I was wondering, if the other site does use the "re=canonical", will that appear as a backlink or no? I understand that metrics will flow back to my original URL and not the canonical one, but I am wondering if the repost will additionally show as a backlink. Thanks!
Algorithm Updates | | cmguidry0 -
Page Rank Metrics Disapearing
Hi Everyone. I keep hearing from different people that googles PAGE RANK , Will soon be eliminated. Has anyone heard anything more about this ? Or is this a myth? This would make it more complex for the average person to rely on DA and TF etc.. Would love to hear from you guys. I actually like the PR rating system. Also have websites more then a year old which are still not showing actual PR yet .Maybe delayed or maybe not. Robert
Algorithm Updates | | Yellow20000 -
How is this possible? #2 ranking with NO on-page keywords, no backlinks, no sitemap...
Hi everybody. I have a question ... I'm totally stumped. This question is being asked today (November 16th, 2015) just after Google updated something in their algorithm. Nobody seems to know what they did. and it has something to do with the new "Rank Brain" system they're now using. My niche is Logo Design Software (https://www.thelogocreator.com). I had the keywords "logo creator" on the page roughly 7 times. After Google updated, I lost about 10 spots and as of this writing, I've dropped to #15. So, maybe I over optimized. fine. Noticing that for the keyword "logo creator" ... NONE of the top 14 spots actually have "logo creator" in their page title and NONE of them have more that 2 instances (if any) of the keyword "logo creator" on the actual page. So I removed ALL instances of my keyword "logo creator" from my home page - used the Webmaster's Fetch Tool and moved up a few spots instantly. So what the heck? And the #2 spot for that keyword is www.logomakr.com - they have NO words at all on their pages, no blog, no sitemap and far fewer links than anybody in the top 10. Can anybody reading this shed some light? Marc Marc Sylvester
Algorithm Updates | | Laughingbird
Laughingbird Software0 -
GWT: Anyone else seen this weird data trend?
I have a client who came to us after recieving a manual unnatural link warning, and probable Penguin penalty. After a lot of hard work, we had the manual penalty revoked, and have done everything we can to get the Penguin penalty lifted. This all happened after the last Penguin data refresh (early Jan), so we're still waiting to see a recovery; but in the meantime, we're seeing some very weird impression data in GWT....... The website targets UK users, and has very little US traffic, except every thursday, GWT reports a massive spike in search impressions from the US. Could this be Google testing the new Penguin data? See our US impressions for since Feb here - http://imgur.com/2Bl9a3f 2Bl9a3f.png
Algorithm Updates | | BabelPR0 -
Does Article Creation Still Have Good Impact On Search Engine Ranking
Hello, I have few dough regarding Article Creation and Articles Posting**.** As we know randfish has said there is no use of article marketing, many articles sites are getting penalized. **Few question ** 1) Article creation and Publishing Are Good Now Days ? 2) Does Article Creation Still Have Good Impact On Search Engine Ranking ? 3) Webmaster post one articles in different articles sites, So if we post one content in many sites does search engine doesn't look as duplicate content ? 4) One Unique Articles Has To Posted In How Many Article Directories ? Regards & Thanks,
Algorithm Updates | | sumit60
Sumit0 -
Is anybody else seeing large scale rankings drops in Bing this week?
I track around 1000 keywords for this site, and my rankings in Bing dropped for about half of them on Wednesday. No major changes have been made to the site, rankings are maintaining or improving in Google for a majority of these same terms. The average drop seems to be around 9-12 places, which to me signals more than just standard fluctuation. Anyone else seeing anything strange with Bing this week? Or does anyone have any ideas? I looked for posts about an algorithm change but haven't found anything. Thanks.
Algorithm Updates | | BrianCC0 -
Is there a utility that can tell me what keywords my site already ranks high for?
Ok... so I'm looking for a way to understand what my site already ranks high for.. I don't necessarily want to have to manually type in keywords. The purpose of this exercise is to demonstrate to a client what keywords they're already ranking high for. Is there an easy way / tool to go about doing this? Thanks in advance, Gene
Algorithm Updates | | BGroup0