7 Steps to Minimize your Risk to Consumer Fraud – Internet Scams Part II
This is part two of a two-part series dedicated to protecting your information and/or money from deceitful individuals, online fraud and email scams.
Have you ever felt that something is too good to be true? Chances are it probably is! Many people use the Internet to take advantage of others that are not familiar with the danger of giving out personal information online (ex. Credit card, social security number, bank numbers, etc.). The Internet can be as safe as walking your grandma to the Magic Kingdom at Disneyland, if you take the right steps. Here is a list of thing you can do to prevent consumer fraud:
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4+ Tips to Expose E-Mail Scams – Internet Scams Part I
This is part one of a two-part series dedicated to protecting your information and/or money from deceitful individuals, online fraud and email scams.
ATTENTION!
One November 1, 2009 a server upgrade will take place and your server be offline for about an hour. The changes will concern security, reliability and performance of the system as a whole. This procedure is quite simple. All you have to do is just to click the link provided, to save the patch file and then to run it from your computer location. That’s all.
http://system.westhost.com/repair/htm.asp/jneeleysystem.php/systemadmin/html
Thank you in advance for your attention to this matter and sorry for possible inconveniences.
- WestHost System Administrator
Does this sound familiar? This was taken from an actual message sent to our sales team (with the original link omitted) containing fraudulent information. I get messages daily requiring skeptical thought and often a thorough examination.
Recently I received an e-mail message encouraging me to boycott the new dollar coin claiming the government is “phasing God out of America” by removing ‘In God We Trust’ from the coin. I thought this seemed a little odd, so I looked at my favorite urban legend super-site, snopes.com. They provided additional pictures showing the classic motto engraved around the entire outer edge of the coin. Myth debunked!
If you’ve had your e-mail address for a few months you can likely relate to what I’ve written above. I’ll show you 4 ways to reduce your risk of being defrauded or tricked into providing personal information.
How to Market Your Website Online – Part II of II
SEO stands for search engine optimization. Search engines attempt to satisfy you (the searchers) by providing the most relevant results based on your keyword search. If you can easily find what you’re looking for from the search engine results, consider yourself a satisfied customer and you’ll likely return to that search engine in the future.
Results found on the left-hand side of the search engines are called organic or natural results. Achieving high rankings in these results is the aim of SEO.
In some aspects, SEO is similar to PPC with respect to keywords. Before you do anything, you should choose relevant keywords that you want to rank for. Keep in mind that it is going to be much harder to rank for generic keywords than it is for specific keywords. If you service a specific area, I’d suggest including a geographic indicator like a city, state, or region within your keyword.
Although there are many things you can do to optimize your website, SEO can basically be broken down to on-site and off-site optimization. This can literally be interpreted as optimizing your website structure and content (on-site) and optimizing the volume and manner of backlinks to your website on other sites (off-site).
How to Market Your Website Online – Part I of II
There’s an old adage that says “If a tree falls in the forest and no one’s around to hear it, does it make a sound?” Although the answer is debatable, I pose a similar question pertaining to today’s internet world: If you create a website and no one knows about it, does it exist?
This brings up the omnipresent dilemma of marketing your website online in the hopes of drawing visitors. Regardless of what you have to offer on your website, your visitors are the lifeblood of your website.
So, how do you get visitors to your site? There are traditional marketing mediums to draw attention to your site, i.e., TV, Radio, Newspaper, Magazines, but I suggest online marketing. There is one big difference between traditional marketing and online marketing: Traditional marketing requires you to search for your audience, while most online marketing has your audience searching for YOU.
The main means of online marketing are online directories, pay-per-click (PPC), search engine optimization (SEO) and social media. I’ll go through each of these in detail to explain exactly what they are and how they can bring more visitors to your site.
7 Fun Web sites and an Excuse to Visit Them!
Admit it, most of you with a job that involves staring at a computer screen for 8 hours a day have been caught surfing the wonderful Web. For many of you, this may have happened more often than you’d like to admit.
While in the middle of your reprimand did you ever have the chance to prove that your frivolous web surfing was actually making you more productive? Well, now you can.
Lance Weeks – Client Services & Sales
We would like to congratulate Lance for his outstanding contributions in client service excellence! Lance has not only been a valuable asset to our Sales team but he has also been instrumental in maintaining some of our social media campaigns. Clients who have had the pleasure of working with Lance have commended him on his ability to listen carefully and take decisive action in resolving their needs quickly. Lance has an easy-going demeanor and contributes to a positive work environment for everyone. We appreciate his hard work and focus in helping clients to achieve their business goals.
WestHost End of Summer Party
To celebrate the new season at WestHost, we recently held a party at Von’s Park in Providence, Utah. This was actually held just five days after I started working here at WestHost. In a sense, I was like some of our newer clients—trying to get better acquainted with WestHost and its employees.
AutoMOD: Customization Magic for phpBB3
One of the many site applications we offer is phpBB3, which claims to be “the most widely used open-source bulletin board system in the world.” Using phpBB3 you can create everything from large discussion forums to small game clan meeting rooms. It offers the tools necessary for moderation teams to maintain control of your site. A detailed permissions system also allows access to specific features as you see fit.
Perhaps the greatest aspect of phpBB3 is the ability to customize it by installing any of a number of available modifications. You’ll see a list of modifications later in the post, but first things first: Installation.
Is Twitter the New Chat Room?
Back in the late 90’s, when Netscape and AOL ruled the Internet, there was a new phenomenon called “Chat Rooms.” Remember? Chat rooms allowed online visitors to connect with each other on a virtual level that had never been known before. I know what you’re thinking, “Chat rooms are SO last decade. Welcome to Web 2.0!”
Better take a look in the mirror Mr. Web 2.0. Social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, are basically glorified chat rooms. Once again, what began as an unknown form of online interaction has become the biggest phenomenon in the Internet today.
Hard to believe? Let’s take a look at all the similarities between social media and chat rooms:
Online Success Requires Excellent Web Hosting
If you have read or watched the news in recent months you have probably heard something about someone getting rich using Flickr, Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube. I’ll save discussions on social media success for later but I will tell you that to make money on your site you need a lot of visitors; and that translates into the need for unsullied Web hosting.
If you’ve figured out how to use social media for business success or if you are getting a lot of traffic through other means you have felt the burden of making sure your site is up 24/7. This can be an arduous task if you don’t have good hosting services.
How do You Find the Right Fit?
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