March 2016 WordPress Meet-Up

The low down on free SSL certificates

UPDATE: Due to Rick helpfully pointing out that the Amazon AWS SSL Certificate is only for sites hosted on EC2 AWS instances, we’re going to scale back a touch on the AWS portion of the talk, and replace with some discussion on the Free SSL Certificate provided by Let’s Encrypt. We’ll also briefly discuss the Free SSL provided by Shopify even though this isn’t WordPress related.

Very recently, Google has announced that all websites not running on HTTPS will actually be receiving an SEO penalty, a change in their Algorithm that will be implemented sometime in 2016. Combined with the fact that a majority of E-Commerce Payment Gateways already insist on sites using HTTPS as a condition of usage (ie Stripe), plus Facebook insisting on HTTPS for most higher-level FB Applications, it is abundantly clear that anyone with a website needs to make HTTPS part of their routine…which means you NEED to know about SSL Certificates.

SSL Certificates are not new of course, they’ve been around for years…and unfortunately cost money. However, another recent announcement from Amazon AWS has informed the world that they offer SSL Certificates for FREE. When compared to the state of the SSL industry in the past, this Free SSL product from Amazon AWS is a real game-changer.

At this Meetup, we’re going to go through the ins-and-outs of an Amazon SSL Certificate, and set one up LIVE on a website right at the Meetup. This is one talk you do NOT want to miss, especially if your work is in the E-Commerce field. Our speaker, Jordan St Jacques, will be doing all the research ahead of time, and deciphering it in easy-to-follow steps. After this talk, you’ll feel more confident in dealing with the AWS SSL product, and be able to save yourself a pile of cash!

Jordan St Jacques is an Ottawa and Boston-based best-in-class Digital Marketer and intermediate (still growing!) coder. Formerly from the Concert Industry, Jordan worked independently and also for LiveNation and Viacom during a 20 year run that ended in 2013. His entry into the digital world started in 2004, when he became one of the first people in the world to take a MySpace profile over 1,000,000 Friends, and he’s been delivering similar digital results ever since.

Agenda

6:00 – General announcements

6:05 – Presentation(s)

7 ish – Questions

7:30 – Open help session “Happiness Bar” – get answers to your WordPress questions.

Meeting Details:

LOCATION NOTE:

We have a private space reserved downstairs. Enter the main doors, turn left, and down the stairs.

No donations for this meeting!  If attendees buy enough food etc. from the pub it covers our tab.  (We normally ask for a $4 donation to help cover the cost of the room and our Meetup fees, which total about $150-450/year)