If you have purchased a certificate from our company and you want to activate your hosting, you can take the following steps.

Bear in mind that our certificates can also be installed to hosting plans that are not necessarily from Top.Host, while you can find instructions about the different web server types in the following guide.

1. Creating a CSR

In order to begin the certificate activation process, you need to create the CSR, which contains encoded information and is created in your server with its keys.

You can find instructions to create a CSR on different web server types and control panels below:

Instructions to create a CSR in Plesk Onyx

Instructions to create a CSR in cPanel 11

Instructions to create a CSR in Apache

NOTE: The private key is unique and in case of loss or accidental deleting of the SSL, it will be completely lost and there is no possibility to retrieve it from the issuing authority compared to other keys, so the SSL will have to be reissued with a new private key.

2. Creating an administrator email

Having an administrator email is an essential step to activate your certificate in order to make the required confirmation from the issuing authority.

In this step, the issuing authority will send you an email to confirm the certificate activation.

The acceptable administrator email structures are the following:

admin@your domain

administrator@your domain

webmaster@your domain

hostmaster@your domain

Here, you can find instructions on how to create an administrator email through Plesk. 

3. SSL Management

Once the purchase has been completed, your SSL will be added to myTophost Panel, where you can manage it and proceed to the activation, by taking the following steps:

a. Once you have created the CSR, you will have to log into myTophost Panel.

b. In My Services in the SSL Certificates section, click on Manage for the certificate that you want to activate.

c. Select your type of hosting (Linux or Windows) and enter the CSR in the corresponding field.

The CSR must begin with

—–BEGIN CERTIFICATE REQUEST—– 

And end with 

—–END CERTIFICATE REQUEST—–

Next, fill in the Administrator contact, Billing contact, Technical contact and click on Continue.

NOTE: In the email field, enter your personal email address.

d. On the next page, click on the desired email from the drop down menu where you want instructions about the last activation step of your certificate to be sent by the issuing authority. Click on Send to complete the process.

4. Confirm the process from the email that you received to your admin email

Once you have clicked on Send, you will receive an approval email to the address that you entered. Click on the approval link that you will receive. The keys will be sent to the admin email within the next two hours from the moment you clicked on the approval link.

5. Contacting the issuing authority

In case the SSL that you purchased is Organization Validated or Extended Validated, the corresponding issuing authority (Symantec, GeoTrust etc.) will give you the required instructions in the approval email, in order to proceed with the issuing process. You will find the documents that you need to send so that the organization you requested the SSL for can be certified.

You can find information about the documents that you will be requested in the following articles:

Which supporting documents do I need for Thawte?

Which supporting documents do I need for Geotrust EV?

Which supporting documents do I need for Comodo OV Instant?

Which supporting documents do I need for Comodo EV?

Which supporting documents do I need for Comodo OV?

Important note! We advise you to keep the documents, as the issuing authority will ask you to submit them again when renewing your Organization or Extended Validated SSL.

6. Installing SSL in Plesk

If you have issued the CSR and have received the certificate from the issuing authority, you will have to install it on your server. You can find instructions about installing it on Plesk here.

Additional information

In case you have installed an SSL on your site and the green lock does not appear on the top-left corner of your browser, there is a possibility that some URLs of your site do not have a green lock, even though you have carried out the tasks previously described.

In this case, you can type, right-click on your browser and go to Inspect >> Console so that you can see the changes that you need to make in the content of that specific URL (mixed content). Otherwise, you can use whynopadlock, a reliable analyzing tool that will massively show you the changes that must be made.

The content might be, for example, a picture or a link which is served with HTTP instead of HTTPs.

– If you have built your website with WordPress, follow the instructions described here.

– If you have built your website with Joomla, follow the steps described here.