Monthly Archives: December 2019

Christmas is coming, don’t let the hackers get fat

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Christmas is nearly here, people are beginning the big “wind down” and it would be so easy to let your guard down too.

Andy, checking out websites as part of his workWell, let me tell you, the hackers and cyber criminals won’t – if anything they’ll be ratcheting up their activity because they know that our minds will be on other things.

You know, things like Christmas parties, gifts, food, television and everything else that’s associated with the season of goodwill.

So, vigilance must remain high, both in the office and when working from home. Keep your eyes open for suspicious looking emails, especially those coming from unexpected quarters, with messages that promise much, such as tax refunds or deliveries of items you don’t remember ordering. Also beware of emails with links to websites that look OK but in reality will do harm.

It’s also a good idea to take a fresh look at your password security. SplashData have just released their ninth annual “Worst Passwords of the Year” list which has been compiled from more than 5m passwords that have ended up on the Dark Web after being purloined by hackers.

Unfortunately, not a lot has changed over previous lists

  1. 123456 (same place as 2018)
  2. 123456789 (up 1 place)
  3. qwerty (a return to the top 5 for this old favourite)
  4. password (slips two places)
  5. 1234567 (up 2)
  6. 12345678 (falls out of the top 5)
  7. 12345 (falls by 2 places)
  8. iloveyou (this perennial is up 2 places from 10 in 2018)
  9. 111111 (yes, people do use this although it’s fallen 3 places from last year)
  10. abc123 (up 7 and breaking in to the top 10)

You can see passwords from 11 to 25 here.

SplashData estimates that at least 1 in 10 people have used at least one of these poor passwords.

Data breaches are inevitable but by using strong, unique passwords for each individual account that you have makes the theft of one password much less of a disaster than if you use the same (or close variant) across all of your accounts.

3 simple tips to make your digital life more secure

  1. Use passphrases (random word combinations) of 12 characters or more with mixed character types
  2. Use a different password for each of your log-ins so if you loose one password you haven’t lost all of the keys to your digital empire
  3. Use a password manager to secure your digital assets, to generate random password combinations, store them securely and make them available across all of your devices

And PLEASE, if this applies to to you – STOP USING PASSWORD or 12345678 and use one of these instead

Top Password Managers (in no particular order)

Have a great Christmas, a happy new year and I look forward to communicating with you in the new year. If you need any help, please, just ask. You can reach me by phone – 01793 238020 – email – andy@enterprise-oms.co.uk or just hunt me down on Social Media.

However, I hope to enjoy Christmas too so may be slower than normal in responding to your requests. I’ll be back in the office on January 2nd.

What’s your Digital Footprint and what is Reputation Management

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What do people see when they search for you and your business? What can they find without looking too hard? What does it say about your business and you?

Are you easy to find, as a business and perhaps as an individual. If not, you might need some help.

Carry out a search on your favourite search and see what comes up.

If the results are not what you were expecting then some work is required.

I couldn’t find anything on the first page

If neither you, nor your business, come up on the first page of Google search then you need some Search Engine Optimisation. Either learn how to do your own or bring in a specialist who will be able to go over your website with a fine toothed comb, identify opportunities for improvement and then implement them. But don’t expect miracles – it takes weeks (at the best) and many months (at the worst) for SEO to take effect.(insert shameless plug for Andy Poulton and Enterprise Online Marketing Solutions here).

If your search results look something like these then you are off to a good start. Google has found a lot of references to the search and you can investigate them to make sure that you can see the type of content you would hope for, and expect.

Reputation Management

If the results are not what you hoped for, perhaps a  negative review appeared or somebody had made a negative comment on Social Media then you need to do some Reputation Management. This will involve mitigating the negative content in some way.

If it’s a negative review then you should

  1. post a rebuttal – if possible and without sounding mealy mouthed or catty
  2. encourage more positive reviews to push the negative comments out of the headlines

If it’s a negative blog post, or similar, then you should start to write similar looking posts, but with a positive spin. The goal being to, again, swamp the search results with fresh, positive content, with the aim of pushing the negativity off page one.

What to do next

If you need help with your visibility or your reputation needs some management then give me a call (01793 238020) or email me, for a no cost, obligation free, chat about your challenge and I’ll see how I can help

Are you missing out on a great marketing opportunity?

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Email MarketingIf you are on my email newsletter list so you already like email marketing but  are you using email for your business? If so, well done, how is it working out for you?

If not, then perhaps you should read the following before you continue to miss out on one of the greatest marketing opportunities.

  • Did you know that 66% of consumers (businesses and consumers) have made an online purchase as a direct result of an email marketing message.(1)
  • There are more than 6.32 billion email accounts and this is predicted to reach 7.71 billion by 2021. Facebook has 1.3 billion users. A big number, for sure, but that’s around 1/5th the number of email accounts.(2)
  • Despite the explosion of Social Media 72% of consumers say that they prefer to receive their news via email than any other means. This is because ti comes TO them, they don’t have to search it out.(3)
  • 61% say they like to receive weekly promotional emails and 28% want them even more frequently! (4)

And here are some more reasons to use email marketing

Hand clicking on "quality"
  • Personalise.
    One of the other great advantages of email marketing over social media is that you can talk personally to your recipients.
  • Delivery.
    90% of emails reach their destination, the in-boxes of your clients
  • It’s easier
    It’s 5 times easier to win more business from existing customers than it it is to bring a single, new, customer on board
  • Great ROI.
    The DMA quote the return on investment of email marketing as 40:1 so for every $1 spent you get a return of $40
  • Calls-To-Action.
    You can easily add effective Calls-to-Action to your emails
    Buy Now
  • Performance monitoring
    You can measure the effectiveness of your email campaigns
  • Popular
    Email is the most popular activity on SmartPhones

How do you write to?

I’m not talking about buying lists of data but sending emails to your existing customers, which is permitted under GDPR, and encouraging people to subscribe to newsletters.

You can do this using pop-overs on your website, collecting data at networking events and business shows, in fact in any place where you cross paths with potential customers.

Next Steps

If you are interested in releasing the power of email marketing and need some help getting started, with creating your messages and/or with making sure your messages don’t get caught by the spam filters then get in touch.

It’s easy to do. Just give me a call on 01793 238020 or email andy@enterprise-oms.co.uk for a free chat about email marketing for your business or organisation.

  1. Direct Marketing Association
  2. Radicati Group, 2017
  3. Marketing Sherpa
  4. Marketing Sherpa