Why Does My Website Say ‘Not Secure’?

Why Does My Website Say ‘Not Secure’?

If you’re a Google Chrome user, you might have noticed your updated browser is now telling you that some sites are “Not Secure” in big red letters. If you’re a business owner with your own website that’s being flagged this might be even more concerning to you. If you’re wondering what this means and how you can fix it, read on for the full story about SSL and You!

Dealing with Not Secure Website Warnings?Google announced in early 2018 that starting in July their Chrome browser, the most-used desktop browser by a wide margin, would start flagging unsecure sites that aren’t using HTTPS encryption. HTTPS in plain English is the secure version of HTTP, which is one of the basic ways websites are accessed on the internet. HTTPS normally uses SSL for encryption, one type of security certificate that keeps private information transmitted on your site safe from snooping middlemen.

Think about it this way: imagine HTTP is the front door of your business and it has a standard doorknob with a regular old lock on it that you keep locked after hours just in case. HTTPS is that same door but with extra deadbolts added on to beef up your security and keep criminals out.

That’s not to say that any site without HTTPS encryption is automatically in danger of door-kicking hackers! If your site isn’t using outdated contact forms to send private information such as Social Security Numbers, financial information, etc., your site and its users probably aren’t in any real immediate danger without an SSL certificate protecting your site. The reason Google is enforcing this new rule is to encourage site owners to make the switch to HTTPS to create a more secure web with secure and encrypted sites being the default, not the other way around. It’s a great idea in theory, but the only problem with that is many security certificates can be expensive and difficult to install and maintain, many requiring yearly renewals.

If you’re a small business owner who needs a website and you’re scratching your head about all of this, that’s where ITD Interactive comes in! Our standard hosting package for WordPress sites includes a 100% free SSL certificate that we install and maintain for you. You’ll be automatically upgraded to an HTTPS site without any hassle or yearly renewal fees. Your site will be more secure and your users who visit your site in Google Chrome won’t get that annoying message that implies that your site is not safe to visit.  We can also offer more heavyweight worry-free SSL certificates for eCommerce and medical websites that need added protection for an added cost.

If you’ve already got a website you’re happy with, you can still take advantage of this offer. Switch to ITD Interactive hosting and we’ll move an exact copy of your WordPress site to our ultra-secure servers and get your free SSL certificate up and running in minutes. Click here for pricing and more information.

New Design & One Hour Website (April Fools)

NOTE: This was an April Fools Hoax. If you are a prospective client evaluating our work, we wanted to make that very clear. 🙂

ITDiNew

Many of you are familiar with our One Week Website initiative. It has been a huge success and we’re not done innovating, iterating, and reinvigorating!

E2F21F84-1A33-47C2-AAF7-686F882BA21DWe recently worked with the Silicon Valley hiring agency “NerdHunters” to land the top front end developer in the world. Bill Rambo is now on staff and the result is that we can put the One Week Website process into hyperdrive. More on that below.

The first thing Bill did when he walked into the building was to get ITD Interactive up-to-date from a design standpoint.

SEE THE NEW SITE NOW (INCLUDES MUSIC)

Then we looked at the One Week Website offering and found ways to cut the turnaround time down drastically.

INTRODUCING ONE HOUR WEBSITE

Here’s what the new One Hour Website process looks like . . .

  • The client gives us design guidelines based on the Rorschach Test (otherwise known as the inkblot test). – 3 minutes.
  • Bill designs the first draft in Corel Draw by using a nokia 7650 and taking pictures of objects around the office. This drastically increases the speed of design by keeping us from looking for stupid stock images. – 11 minutes.
  • Bill develops the approved design in the MSDOS development environment and delivers test site for proofing. – 22 minutes.
  • ITDi runs the new site through a gamut of rigorous tests including having a chimpanzee jump up and down on the website which is loaded onto a Commodore 64. – 9 minutes.
  • ITDi launches the new site and registers it with the Alta Vista search engine. – 15 minutes.

Shazzam! Bam! It’s done!

Please let us know what think of the new website design and One Hour Website!

Website Development Timeline Reinvisioned: One Week Website

One Week WebsiteThe web has been around for almost two decades now.  And for 20 years, web designers and their clients have struggled to get a grip on the website development timeline.

We’ll show you how we’ve developed a process to design, develop, and launch a small business website in one week (guaranteed) below, but first let’s look at the problems most web projects invariably face.

The process is littered with potholes.

  • Small business decision-makers generally have too many other tasks to make developing content and giving design feedback a high priority. (more…)

Top-Ten Reasons You Need Website Maintenance Services

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website maintenance servicesThere is nothing worse than having a website with a bunch of out of date information on it.  Not only will you be penalized by Google in search results, but occasionally – potential customers DO stumble across your old page and that doesn’t make a very good first impression.  Finding a source for website maintenance services will help ensure you don’t suffer from website embarrassment.  Below we’ve created a list of top-ten reasons you need website maintenance services.  Yes they are humorous, but the sad thing is – for a lot of people, they are true! (more…)

Fuel Your Lead Generation Engine with Inbound Marketing

eCommerce Sales FunnelIf you’re in sales, how does your inbound sales funnel look?  Are you struggling to fill it up, or is your lead generation process working, giving your more prospects than you have time to call on?  If you identify with the latter, congratulations!  You can stop reading this and fire up solitaire.  for the rest of us, keep reading.  After all, why.   Why not fill the funnel up so you can take a vacation for once right?

Turn The Funnel Upside Down

It is easy to calculate stats after the fact – but when we are in the planning stages, it is useful to predict percentages, in order to give us the best probability of success.  For this funnel visualization, we are going to operate off of 2 assumptions:

  1. Lead Closure Rate:  You’re a very persuasive salesperson – You close, on average, one out of every five leads you talk to.  This is a 20% closure rate.
  2. Site Conversion Rate:  For every 100 people that visit your website or landing page, 10 of these visitors fill out a form and become a lead.  This is a 10% conversion rate. (more…)

Small Business SEO Part 4: Blogging for Traffic

In our Small Business SEO Part 3, we dug a bit deeper into Keyword Research and how to make sure you are targeting keywords that will bring quality traffic as opposed to broad traffic that will bounce in and out of your website without stopping to say hello.

We mentioned in Part 1 about the ability to blog from your business website. In this post we will get into exactly why this is crucial and why you should be doing it.
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