HOW TO GET FREE SSL FOR YOUR WEBSITE
Having your own personal website is exciting and can generate revenue for you, people around the globe can easily access your articles and contents, the first step to owning your website is getting a suitable domain, and then purchasing a host from an excellent hosting company such as hostinger.
It is possible to purchase a Domain name and Hosting at a cheap rate, but most times purchasing an SSL certificate is usually expensive and most people are left with websites that don’t have SSL which does not give visitors a secure feeling and makes them leave your site immediately.
What is SSL?
SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer and, in short, it’s the standard technology for keeping an internet connection secure and safeguarding any sensitive data that is being sent between two systems, preventing criminals from reading and modifying any information transferred, including potential personal details.
Why do i need an SSL?
Without SSL, your site visitors and customers are at higher risk of having their data stolen. Your site security is also at risk without encryption. SSL protects websites from phishing scams, data breaches, and many other threats. Ultimately, It builds a secure environment for both visitors and site owners.
Five steps to Get a Free SSL?
When you get to your website and see a not secure message on a browser it means you don’t have SSL, if you want to change this message into the secured lock symbol you need to get an SSL for your website this would make visitors trust your website.
- Create an account on a website called Cloudflare.
- Add your Website to your account.
- Change your Nameservers
- Install the Cloudflare plugin on WordPress.
- Enable SSl in CloudFlare
- How to fix Cloudflare Error 1016
Create an Account on a website called CloudFlare
First, you go to the website Cloudfare, then create an account by filling in your email and password then click create.
Add Your Website To Your Account
This step is easy just add your website name and click Add site, then click next, a list of package options would be given to you, select the free plan.
Change your Nameservers
At this stage, you have to replace your domain name server with the given Cloudflare domain, by logging into your domain provider’s website which is your website hosting platform, after logging in change the name server by clicking on DNS management (Domain Name System), scroll down to name servers and click change, then the select custom option, copy the first values on the Cloudflare then paste it on your domain name servers afterward click save.
After successfully adding the name servers of Cloudflare to your domain, go back to the Cloudflare dashboard and click continue.
To confirm if the name servers have changed click the recheck button, and reload you would get a message with a green icon stating great news Cloudflare is now protecting your website
Install the Cloudflare plugin on WordPress.
To install the plugin go to plugins, click add new search for flexible plugin, install and activate the plugin.
Enable SSl in CloudFlare
On your Cloudflare dashboard click the lock logo, then scroll down to the option of always using HTTPS, then click Turn On, as soon as you turn it on your website would be secured with SSL, go to your site and refresh it you would see the locked padlock and a message saying your site is secured.
How to fix Cloudflare Error 1016
After observing the above steps you may get an error on your site stating the CName record was not found when using Cloudflare, what you need to do is just to check all DNS records manually, if any records are missing on the Cloudflare dashboard you simply add them manually, for that login to Cloudflare & go to DNS section then click on add record make sure you add A record and the Ip address of your server and your website URL, once you have added it click save, now you find that your site is working flawlessly.
To find the cName records from your host, log into your control panel and search for zone editor just copy the type A and Ip address into the DNS section of cloudflare.
