Member Avatar for wisedave

Hello,

We had an EV SSL certificate added to our website but now looking at the GWT Analytics, our search traffic has flat lined (litteraly!).

From the day it was installed, the graph bounces down, then literally flat lines.

Also, is there anything we need to do in our GWT dashboard?

Is there something that was missed here?

Thanks for the advice.

Cheers,

Dave

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by almostbob

Dani AI

Generated

As noted, switching to an EV SSL moved the site from HTTP to HTTPS which creates distinct URLs that Google treats as separate properties in Search Console. That often explains a sudden “flat line” in the old HTTP property: impressions and clicks can appear under the new HTTPS property (or vanish if redirects/verification are incomplete). Add and verify the HTTPS version (or a Domain property that covers both protocols) so search data is being viewed in the right place. . ()

Practical checklist to troubleshoot the drop:

  • Verify an HTTPS Search Console property (or a Domain property) and check ownership across all accounts.
  • Implement site-wide 301 (permanent) redirects from every HTTP URL to its HTTPS counterpart; avoid 302s and redirect chains.
  • Update rel="canonical" tags and the XML sitemap to use HTTPS, then resubmit the sitemap.
  • Replace internal absolute HTTP links and update CDN or third‑party references.
  • Quick tests: curl -I http://example.com to confirm a 301 to https://..., and use URL Inspection / Fetch-as-Google on key pages. Site-move / move-to-HTTPS guidelines. (developers.google.com)

Common pitfalls to check: certificate that doesn’t cover both www/non‑www, mixed‑content (blocked JS/CSS) preventing proper rendering, robots.txt or meta noindex accidentally blocking the HTTPS site, and Search Console properties owned by different Google accounts. Google’s guidance also explicitly warns not to block the HTTPS site from crawling. HTTPS best practices / ranking signal note. (developers.google.com)

When redirects, canonical tags, sitemaps and verification are fixed, performance data normally reappears for the HTTPS property as Google re‑crawls and re‑indexes; short-term traffic fluctuations are common during that window. Monitoring both the old HTTP and the new HTTPS properties in Search Console will show progress while the migration finishes. (developers.google.com)

Member Avatar for almostbob

the uri of the pages have changed
http and https are different uri,
have you checked the scores for the https pages, as well as the ceased-to-exist http pages

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