Introduction:
For people looking to unleash a herokuapp to the real world they will need to make some necessary configurations to their website. This involves purchasing a domain and linking it to your herokuapp and purchasing an SSL certificate for your domain. Heroku allows you to link up your domain free of charge, but the same cannot be said for SSL - in fact, SSL is slightly more complicated because of recent changes that Heroku have introduced.
Previously...:
First you would have to purchase an SSL certificate for your domain, but this is no easy step. A quick Google search will lead you to several prices. GoDaddy currently offers an SSL certificate for £3.99 for your first year (a 91% saving), and this is what I have used in freelance web dev. Hold on a second, why do I have to spend money paying for the security of my website - these costs are a surprise. Yes, these costs may appear as a surprise for someone new to real world web development or for someone who is non-technical. But once you spend some time thinking about it (and reading through what an SSL certificate is), it makes sense to be paying for it, as it will protect the users of your website - providing some kind of insurance.
But wait... this isn't the only cost when trying to add an SSL certificate to your website. You need to pay Heroku $20/month - yes per month - just to link the certificate to the herokuapp. Where do you go from here - particularly a small business / startup looking to create an online presence. This cost seems way too high.
FREE SSL, but at a compromise:
If you are particularly strapped for cash, then you can piggyback on Heroku's SSL certificate free of charge. The only compromise you have to make is that you cannot setup a custom domain with your website i.e. example12399123.herokuapp.com needs to be the domain for you to be able to use Heroku's certificate.
What happens if I have a custom domain setup and piggyback on Heroku's SSL certificate? Great question, your website will continue to function as normal, but the user will be presented with a warning when first loading your website. This is because the browser has figured out that the certificate is coming from a different domain i.e. herokuapp.com, which is different to your custom domain i.e. example.com! Now users can simple press continue to dismiss the warning, but in this day of age that warning is likely to put off 90% of traffic to your website.
FREE SSL, but at a price?!?:
Recently, Heroku announced that they will be providing free SSL link up to your herokuapp for people who have upgraded their 'dyno'. This is big. The cheapest 'dyno' upgrade per month is for $7/month, which will noticeably increase the speed of your website. And yes you are reading that right - instead of paying $20/month for just linking up SSL, you are paying less than 50% AND getting a faster website, a total win-win for the consumer. This is definitely something I would recommend for people that are able to spend some money on web development.