How to Buy a SSL Certificate for Your Website and Domain

I once was a science major. I had to write lab reports which required concise and right-to-the-point writing. I never learned it. Then I became an English Literature major. In literature, I had to elaborate. Make it fun and interesting. I never graduated as an English major. So my writing is not concise and not interesting at the same time. So please keep that in mind when reading my hubs.

I'm in my mid 20s, and I've used computer most of my life, and can't live without it. I am not a tech-genius. But I know little bit about HTML coding and took a couple of CCNA classes when I was in high school. What is CCNA? I forgot what it stands for, but it is something about computer networking. I took 2 years of that, but I still need to call the Cisco tech support when my router acts out.

I am an online business owner. When someone says online business, some may think internet scammers, or some may think internet millionaires. But when I hear online business, I think of a website, a website that sells stuff. I am an online business owner.

When you have a website, especially an e-commerce website, there are many tech-related things you need to take care of. And if you are an ordinary owner of an e-commerce website like me, you are probably not so good at tech-related stuff. So I hire people to do the stuff for me. Yes, I hire them, so I pay them. But sometimes, the people you pay to do stuff don't know what they're doing. And when you face so many troubles because people who got paid to do stuff screwed up, you learn many stuff while telling them what's wrong and explaining how it supposed to be. So here I was sitting at my laptop tonight checking my emails. Then I saw a email from my website hosting company. A person name "Customer Support" emailed me. Sometimes I find it amazing how those tech guys (or gals) don't even mention their first names when they write to someone. Anyhow, the email said they had problem when they tried to do something for me. So they wanted me to fix something so they can do the job little more easier. Sigh. From that person's email, I could see what might have been went wrong. So I started to write an email back telling him/her in detail what he/she has to do in order to do it right. Yes, I had to do it as if I'm teaching my grandma in her eighties how to turn-on a computer. Then I thought, 'Wait a minute. With the information in the email and a little bit of small talk, I can publish a hub!.' So here I am writing this hub, complaining about bad service, releasing my stress while complaining, worrying if anyone will even read this deep into my hub, and feeling little accomplished for actually writing another hub.

I recently purchased a SSL certificate for my website. I didn't know what it was, but I was told by a "technician" that I need it for a problem I was having.

Here is some backgrond story. I have an e-commerce website. When you have an e-commerce website, you have an account with a hosting company. A hosting company is the one who makes a website for you, or let you use their platform so you can make a website on your own. My hosting company is MARKETECTURE (Remember, I'm not promoting this company. It is as if: Just because I have a checking account with Bank of America, it doesn't mean I like their horrible fees). When I made a hosting account with them, I got a website. And when you have a website, you have a url, or domain name. Mine was "hyunchang.marketecturehosting.com." What a horribly long name! I call it a generic name, a cheap name. So to make my website sound little better, I went to GoDaddy.com and purchased a domain name called "ManyVites.com." And my hosting company linked "ManyVites.com" to my website.

After I linked my domain name to my website, I typed ManyVites.com to my browser more than 100 times a day, fantasizing that someday my website will be like eBay or Amazon. Then I found a little thing my website is doing. Whenever I log in into the "my account" page of my website as a customer, the domain name suddenly changed from "ManyVites.com" to "hyunchang.marketecturehosting.com."

Shocked, I called my hosting company.

"I purchased the the domain name to hide that long and ugly domain name. What's going on?!"

"Oh, that is because the my account page has to be secure, and your domain name is not secure. So whenever someone logs in to the my account page, they will be transferred to hyunchang.marketecturehosting.com.

"Then what do I do?!"

"You'll have to purchase a SSL certificate for your domain, and it won't happen anymore."

"Oh."

So I went back to GoDaddy and bought a SSL certificate.

• It makes your domain name secure. How? I don't know. You have to install the certificate on your server. How? I don't know.
• When you buy it, they give a small cute seal saying that your website is secure.
• Whenever a visitor suffers a financial damage due to security issue while on your website, the company which you purchased your SSL from covers the damage up to certain amount.
• When you pay more money, your visitors are covered up to greater amount of money, and the web browser's address bar turns green whenever someone visits your website, meaning this website is secure.

So, after I purchased the SSL, I called my hosting company, and told them my GoDaddy account information. They said they'll take care of it. Good.

But moments after I talked to my hosting company, I remembered that I had a brother who also is an online business owner. He also has a website.

So I decided to get him a SSL as a gift. I told him its not that much, but its over $250 for 5 years. And yes, I got it for 5 years for him.

So called my hosting company again.

"Hey, please install SSL on my brother's domain, too. Here's his account information."

"In trying to upload your ssl, I have found that both of your ssl's are set up for the same domain name "manyvites.com". That is why only one of them is going to work. You need to get that fixed with godaddy.com before we will be able to get the manyjewels.com ssl installed."

"I know what happened there. I've had the same problem while working with two different GoDaddy accounts. It is a minor website hiccup that GoDaddy has. Here's what to do:

On the "My Account" section of the GoDaddy website, there is the "SSL CERTIFICATES" section. If you click on it, it should slide down and there will be a green launch button.

When you click the launch button, a new webpage opens with a black banner on the top saying "SECURE CERTIFICATE SERVICES."

When you are working with two different GoDaddy accounts, and when you log out from the first account, you are not logged out from "SECURE CERTIFICATE SERVICES" page, only from the main GoDaddy website. So you will need to click on the "log out" link on the top right hand corner.

But you've probably restarted your computer or closed the browser since you last logged in to the GoDaddy website, so it should work fine now. Please log into the GoDaddy account for ManyJewels.com and upload the certificate. I see that there is no certificate and a credit to request certificate.

If you have any questions, please send me an email."

People aren't always the best at what they're doing. But I think people should at least be competent at what they're doing for living. I don't blame the technicians. I just feel sorry for the poor guy who decided pay the hosting company with such technicians. And I will feel sorry for their boss when my contract ends.