There have been a lot of emails being sent as spam lately, but this one really caught my eye and I thought it would be good to start posting some warnings here regarding these emails.

The email below should be ignored and no links should be clicked.

Hello, someone@domain.com.

Thank you for signing up for a domain.com. Please follow the instructions below to confirm that you signed up for this account, or to cancel the account if you did not sign up.

CONFIRM ACCOUNT
To help prevent unauthorized account creation, we need you to confirm your e-mail address. We will use this e-mail address to send you important messages about your account. Also, some domain.com sites and services may require a confirmed e-mail address.

Please confirm your email by visiting the URL

CANCEL ACCOUNT

If you didn’t sign up for the account with this e-mail address and want to cancel the account, select and copy the following link. Open a browser and paste the link in the address bar. Press Enter or Return on your keyboard and follow the instructions that display.

Cancel your email by visiting the URL

Thank you,

domain.com Customer Support

NOTE:
Please do not reply to this message, which was sent from an unmonitored e-mail
address. Mail sent to this address cannot be answered.

Let me first say that this is not written by a parent who has had a terrible thing happen on my computer and I am blaming my kids for it.  Truth be told, my attention to this topic comes from working with far too many parents who end up paying (and paying, and paying) for their kids exploration of the Internet.

In fact, this post comes after someone came to me for help with a machine that would not run any .exe file.  After doing my magic of cleaning the machine, I started to look for the cause.  I will not go so far as to say the absolute cause of this problem was Zwinky, but I will tell you that Myweb Searchbar was identified, by my software of choice for clean ups, on over 100 registry items and files.  I will also point you to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zwinky for a more detailed explanation.

What do I tell parents?  If you are paying for your “work” machine or primary home machine to be cleaned due to entertainment or social networking (game sites, following links from friends, random browsing of any old Internet site) by you or your kids you are causing yourself too much grief.  Buy a home machine for these purposes and do not use “work” machines or the computer you keep all your financial and personal data on. 

I am not saying that having a second or third machine in the house will save you money.  However, when it goes down you may not opt to call a professional for help as often since the use of the machine is not critical.  And, you will go a long way toward protecting your electronic personal data and identity.

Yes, anti-virus, anti-spyware, and other security software can help.  But you and your kids are both likely, while browsing or having fun, to click an OK or Accept when a warning pops up and you have just turned over your machine to the unknown control of rogue software.

And please everyone, backup, backup, backup.  Off site backup is a part of many security suites, hosted services, or just plain old use of flash or usb drives.  Today, there are so many ways to have automated off site backups that you should never feel your data could be lost.

For most all businesses the question is no longer whether or not to have a website, but what kind of website they should use to reach the vast majority of consumers that are searching the internet for products and/or services.

The first thing that you need to realize is that the internet has become the first, and sometimes only, place that consumers go to research and sometimes even purchase their products. This means that companies need to change the focus of their advertising and marketing. On this all of our experts agree.

A website is fast becoming the point of initial contact for the consumer and the actual real physical location is becoming less important than the virtual one making how your website is put together that much more important. Here are 5 things to keep in mind when creating a website.

1. A Good Design

First things first… Design. I don’t know about you, but if I go to a web site that is not visually pleasing, it is a quick turn off. Now that’s not to say that every top website needs an incredible visual design — but if a site looks like it hasn’t been updated since 1994, it’s just not going to be associated with other great websites.

A clean and simple design is usually all you need. Bells and whistles are nice, but I’m one who tends to go with the “less is more” theory. You don’t want your design to be over crowded. You just want it to look good so it can stand out from your competitor(s) in the minds of your potential clients.

Think of it this way, your website is your online “First Impression” and First impressions are key. Although, a good design alone will not keep someone on your site — an eye-catching design will, at the very least, grab their attention long enough to take a longer look around.

2. Simple Navigation

It’s helpful to create an image of your ideal visitor and have them in mind when planning out the navigation for your site. You’ll want to be sure that the navigation is easy to spot and consistent throughout the entire web site. Make it obvious where the user should click both in terms of your primary navigation, as well as for links within your content areas.

Part of having an easy to navigate web site is ensuring that the primary means of navigation — links to the key areas of your site — are kept above the fold. Simply put above the fold describes everything you can see on the screen before having to scroll down.

Items to include here are your logo (which should link back to your home page), as well as links to the main sections of your site. If you can link to sub-pages here that is great, but in most cases that will over-clutter your design For example put “Home | About | Services | Contact” in a very easy to find location at the top of your site. Consistency is key here — be sure to place both your primary and sub-navigational links in the same spot throughout the various pages of your web site.

If you use images (or even flash) for your main navigation, it’s especially important to offer a duplicate set of navigation links in your footer. Even if you use text links at the top, the duplication is still helpful. You want to make it as easy as possible for people to find the content they are looking for on your site.

Often times the footer will link to additional information — such as Terms of Service — as well. Things that should be easy to find, but not necessarily something you want taking up real estate on the primary navigation area of the site.

3. Meaningful Content

You know the saying… “Content is King” — you might have a pretty web site which will catch someone’s eye, but if the content is no good, I will be willing to bet that they won’t  stick around for long.

When writing the copy for your web site, it’s important to provide helpful, knowledgeable information about your company, products, services, etc. If you’re running a blog, informative articles related to your area of expertise are incredibly helpful as well.

While it’s important to sell yourself or your company, you also don’t want to oversell, either. Particularly in a blog setting — people reading a blog don’t want to hear all about “me me me” — they want to know how you can help them.

4. Separate Design from Content

Long gone are the days of using html tables for layout and design. The best developed sites use a combo of XHTML and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), which create a separation of design and content.

With use of tags you can create containers for various areas of text and images on your page. Without a corresponding CSS file you’ll see just the basics – text – which is what the search engines want to see, which in these times is most important. By linking to an external CSS file in order to separate your content from the design, it leaves your html page with mostly nothing but actual relevant text in your source code. The separate CSS file is what specifies the fonts, colors, background images, etc. for your site design.

 With this separation of content from design, the search engines no longer have to wade through all of the excess code to find out if your content is relevant, either. And with separate files, the content can load quicker, too – always a good thing in the mind of visitors to your site.

5. Statistics, Tracking and Analytics

There are many services that offer tracking of web site statistics which include information such as:

• How many hits does my site receive?
• How many of these are from unique visitors?
• How are people finding my web site?
• What search terms are they finding me under?
• What web sites link to me?
• What are the most popular pages on my site?
• Who is my average visitor (platform / browser / screen resolution)?

It’s actually quite amazing what kind of information you can keep track of with a good analytics program. Perhaps the most popular site for this is Google Analytics which offers a very robust (and free) tracking solution. If you want to monitor your web site’s performance and figure out how you can improve your site, having a good stats package is key!

Yes, I’m one of the 400 million members (at the time of this blog) that logs into Facebook everyday to see what my “friends” are up to.  Aside from the usual Farmville and other novelty games that seem to have taken over the site, I do find it somewhat useful to keep in touch with some people I actually know.

Today, however, I noticed something new when I logged in.  Apparently Facebook has incorporated something that they call “Open Graph” and it looks like this will pull information about the websites you are visiting and share all of the information with your Facebook friends.  Really??  Do we really want people we know…and more importantly don’t know, but have added them on because we need more people for our “mob”, knowing every intimate detail of our lives?

I did mention I log in, but I failed to mention that I don’t generally put out any posts or share intimate details of my life every moment from a cell phone so that all of my “minions” know what I’m up to at any given moment.  I really don’t need them knowing where I’m going when I’m not logged into Facebook!

I have read that there will now be “like” buttons scattered all over the Internet.  Great…more electronic litter.  Just what’s needed.

I’m sure there will be security measures in place, but it sure will be interesting to see what happens next.  I’d love to hear what opinions are out there about the next “big thing” on the Internet.

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As a reseller of Authorize.net we recently received some important information concerning changes to processing requirements from MasterCard and Discover and wanted to pass them along to you.

MasterCard and Discover are modifying their rules concerning the processing of debit, prepaid and gift cards thru online transactions. This post includes important information about the new requirements and the timelines regarding our support of the requirements, so please read it thoroughly.

MasterCard’s rule changes go into effect May 1, 2010, and Discover’s rule changes go into effect April 16, 2010. However, if you are using Authorize.Net; MasterCard and Discover have worked together to extend these dates until June 30, 2011.

What are the requirements?
MasterCard and Discover are requiring that all merchants support the following:

Balance response transactions
For prepaid and gift cards, once the card has been used, the remaining account balance will be transmitted along with the authorization response. The remaining balance must be printed on the customer receipt, displayed on the Web page or point-of-sale terminal, or both.

 Partial authorization transactions
When a customer’s transaction amount exceeds the balance available on their debit, prepaid or gift card, instead of declining the transaction, a partial authorization for the amount available to the customer will be returned. This will allow the customer to pay for the remaining amount with another form of payment. This is called a split-tender transaction.

Authorization reversals
An authorization reversal is a real-time transaction initiated when the customer decides that they do not want to proceed with the transaction, or if t

he merchant cannot complete the transaction for any reason. Authorization reversals free up the customer’s available balance on their debit, prepaid or gift card.

What do your merchants need to do to support the requirements?
The steps that your merchants will need to take to support the requirements depend on how they connect to the payment gateway. For example, if they connect using a shopping cart, point-of-sale device, or other solution, they will need to contact their solution provider to confirm that they will be supporting the requirements. If your merchants connect using a direct integration, they should contact their Web developer for assistance.

 Do merchants have to support the requirements?
MasterCard and Discover are requiring all merchants to support the requirements with the exception of merchants that exclusively process transactions via batch uploads, mail order/telephone order (MOTO), or recurring payment transactions. Your merchants should contact their Merchant Service Provider (MSP) to determine if their company is exempt, as their MSP is ultimately responsible for determining if the requirements apply to their business.

Once again, these requirements will not be enforced for MasterCard’ until May 1, 2010, and Discover’s on April 16, 2010. However, Authorize.Net merchants have until June 30, 2011.

Like millions of others, I admit to having one vice…World of Warcraft.  I even have a machine dedicated solely to this game, but just the other day I ran into my first “issue”.

When I boot WoW up I get a C++ runtime error that seems tied to Internet Explorer and it appears that the downloader has a problem.

I’m running Windows XP 64 bit and Internet Explorer 7…just don’t want to upgrade since this is only a gaming machine.

Fortunately there are a lot of other users with this same problem and because of them here is the solution:

     1.  Right click “BackgroundDownloader.exe” and select properties.

     2.  Select the compatibility tab.

     3.  Check the box that states “Run this program in..” and choose Win98/ME

I will have to wait until the next download, but it appears to have solved my issue and I hope this can help others.

The web is filled with “Under Construction” pages, usually with small graphics of construction signs and traffic cones. The web has moved on and designs have improved dramatically. Designers are using these pages to make an impact and to provide more relevant and interesting information about what’s coming.

A Coming Soon page is used to get the attention, and ideally the email address of your visitors, and let them know that pretty soon you are going to be launching your new web site. It’s similar to putting up a billboard, where you have a very short period of time to engage your visitors, give some information and let them know they’ll be missing out if they don’t come back. And teaser pages are not just for new sites either. If you’re going through a re-design of your site you can use them to let your visitors know “I’m still here, just re-decorating” and will be back with something new and exciting.

So what are the main characteristics of a successful coming soon page?

• Obviously, it should show you’re branding.
• It should include a form where visitors can sign up to get notified when your new site will launch.
• It should give a brief overview of what’s coming.
• It should create a level of intrigue. Why should I as a visitor come back to this page if you have nothing to show me now?

To conclude, the main focus when designing your coming soon page is to engage your audience and have them talking about you before you even launch!

Here is an example of a coming soon page for a new client of ours:

What can Search Engine Marketing do for me?  That is the question that I get constantly and a truly valid one at that.  You are a small business with a limited budget, but your business is doing ok so why spend the extra money on Search Engine Marketing when you have other higher priority expenses.  Traditionally, Marketing in general has been the Cinderella of the business market.  In other words, the budget for Marketing has been the last to get approved and the first one to be cut when times are hard.  Times have changed, however, and Marketing, namely Search Engine Marketing is absolutely, unequivocally necessary if you want your business to not only succeed, but also simply survive.

Let’s take a step back for a moment.  What I am talking about here when I say Search Engine Marketing, includes Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising, Social Media such as Facebook, and Blog linking strategies and advertising.  Traditional Marketing has you looking for your customers with brochures, direct mail, etc.  Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with those methods.  However, in the age of technology in which we live, we have the resources and wherewithal to allow opportunities for customers to look for you and that technology is Search Engine Marketing.

With SEM, customers are searching for a product or service that you offer.  From appliances to plumbing to restaurants and beyond, the information superhighway has become an information continent filled with those with wants and needs and asking for someone to help them.  As a business you can take charge and provide the service and products that your next customer is seeking before your next customer becomes the next customer of your competitor.

To put it simply, unless your business has all the customers it needs, you may want to consider an SEM plan of action because I can guarantee you that if you are not using SEM to its fullest, your competitors are.

Looking at the link that Google was sending me to I noticed that all of the links contained: searchclick8.com

After countless research and people telling me to post log files I came across the very simple solution.

The virus changed my DNS settings and was redirecting me to a server that was controlling my internet connection.  Here is the very simple fix (based off of an XP computer, but the end result will be the same).

1. Go to the Control panel.
2. Go to Network Connections.
3. Right click on “Local Area Connection” and select properties.
4. Scroll down in the center area and select “Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) and click on the properties button.
5. Look for “Obtain DNS server address automatically” and make sure that is selected.  I am aware that some users do have specific DNS servers and/or IP addresses so be sure to verify this with your IT/computer specialist.
6. That should solve the redirect issue.

For reference, the IP addresses my system had follows:

193.104.110.38 and 4.2.2.1

When people ask us what we do the easy answer is we are an IT, web design, and web marketing company. The real answer is we are there for client needs which require time and project management.

Over the decade or so we have been consulting, we have become the primary point of contact for things such as t1 or dsl lines, phone systems, copiers, and cell phones. These all seem logical points for an IT consulting firm. However, many people are surprised to learn that we have handled full office moves from design, through construction, to move day. They are further surprised to find that we can help with selecting a phone provider, cell phone contracts, or even setting up video conferencing in a board room.

One of our latest build out projects was with a local fire department. Our assistance included help with training room equipment, coordination of point to point T1 installs, and wireless access to vehicles which have laptops configured for GPS and central tracking of each unit.

The truth is, technology is our business but being a trusted advisor to our clients is what has kept many clients with us since we started. If your company is facing a transition in technology or just in how you do business, ask if one of our project managers has experience which can help.