Human needs have long interested philosophers and psychologists on their way of exploring the concepts of fulfillment and satisfaction. As the digital era takes over our primary psychological processes, much of our needs involve fulfillment online.
That’s what I was thinking while skimming yet another article on the necessity of SSL certificates. Where would Maslow put the SSL certificate in his hierarchy of needs? Could it be that it fits on all five levels? Do I need an SSL certificate?
As SSL certificates become less of a luxury choice and more of a necessity, numerous websites are affected by them.
Earlier this month, Google announced that it will be marking non-https websites as “not secure”, beginning in July. That will be a game-changer for everything we’ve known until now about website performance.
That’s why preparing your website for this new turn of events might be just the right thing to do. Here are Maslow’s five human needs which an SSL certificate fulfills online.
1. Physiology
Your website’s physiology is a little different than yours. Nevertheless, just like the human body, a website has some primary physiological needs which need to be fulfilled in order to strive for more.
SSL stands for Secure Socket Layer and it’s a cryptographic protocol issued for a particular domain name. Its main purpose is to keep communication safe over the internet.
It contains the issuer’s signature, serial number, expiration date, domain name, etc. It essentially enables the protection of important information and is, therefore, part of the undeniable physiological needs of your website.
2. Safety
The biggest advantage of SSL certificates lies in the safety and security they provide to your website.
The certificate helps protect sensitive information during internet communication by encryption. It includes but isn’t limited to cardholder details, login, passwords, and account information.
This basically means that the personal details submitted to a protected website are unavailable to anyone but the web server and the particular visitor. Thereby, sharing sensitive information is secure and encrypted.
As an owner of an e-commerce website or another platform where people share personal details, it’s your responsibility to provide safety to your users. By using an SSL certificate, you’ll ensure that inimical attempts for tampering information by hackers are impossible.
3. Belonging
On a larger scale, most of the activities we undertake aim to fulfill our need for belonging. That inevitably translates to our digital behavior as well.
When it comes to our online life, to belong to a certain community can affect not only the way we feel but also how we’re perceived by others.
That’s why having a personal website means being part of something larger than it. Web communities work together to provide safe online communication essential to the trust and security of your users.
Partaking in the safe web means getting involved with the cause of encrypting the sensitive information people choose to share with you, thus protecting them from hackers and inimical attacks.
4. Esteem
As a result of the fulfillment of the mentioned needs, our self- esteem is affected. Once established as a reliable and trustworthy brand, our website will increase its credibility in the eyes of its users.
Moreover, the assumption that a certified website represents a high-quality brand leads customers to informed purchases. Now, there are more users than ever who know to look for the https:// at the beginning of the domain name and trust only websites who are proven to be certified.
That eventually results either in rising in the sales a company makes online or in doubling the daily visits the website has. Both of these have a positive impact on the overall performance and help improve your rankings.
5. Self-Actualization
Actualizing your website’s goals means various things for each and every website owner. Generally speaking, however, achieving high ranking and a successful search engine performance is an objective shared by many.
With Google favoring protected websites, SSL certificates have become an important link in the SEO process. First of all, websites that are insecure will display a warning once entered. Needless to say, that may impact your bounce rate enormously.
Also, visitors are bound to make purchases and return to safe websites and thus, affect your traffic performance.
Finally, search engines have remained somewhat mysteries throughout the years. One thing we know for sure, however, is that if Google says we need something, we probably do.
How to purchase an SSL Certificate?
We strongly recommend securing your websites by acquiring a professionally-signed SSL certificate. So how to purchase an SSL Certificate?
Usually, when an SSL certificate is issued, it’s signed to secure a single subdomain of your website. In case you need to secure more than one subdomain, a Wildcard SSL will allow you to include multiple hostnames of a single domain. The drawback here is the price which exceeds the other types of SSL certificate multiple times.
The SSL certificates offered and supported by AwardSpace are:
- RapidSSL
- GeoTrust QuickSSL
- GeoTrust QuickSSL Premium
- GeoTrust True BusinessID
- GeoTrust TrueBizID with EV
- GeoTrust TrueBizID Wildcard
Learn more: You can also find out more about the importance of having a secure connection by reading about the SSL Certificates Protection.