Tips For Creating And Launching An Online Store

Building your own online store from scratch may seem to be a rather daunting task. Sometimes starting an online store is a great way to kick in a second income, or maybe you have a dream to fulfill.

Whatever the drive behind launching an online store, there are a few basic pieces of information you should commit to memory before you begin the journey. Check out this brief breakdown of some of the most vital tips towards creating and launching your own online store. Continue reading

Originally posted on September 1, 2017 @ 9:01 am

The SEO Benefits of Search Forms In Website Design

Search engine optimization techniques that receive the most positive scores change on a fairly regular basis. However, one regular feature of many websites that consistently will help your SEO score is going to be if you include search forms within your web framework. Anymore, it is particularly easy to set these up, as very little coding knowledge is required on your part.

Four categories look into in particular with respect to these search bar benefits include the benefits to the web surfers themselves, how the tags involved in forms can help you, how the positive interaction with forms will make your web scores better, and how the inclusion of focused words will also make you more competitive. Continue reading

Originally posted on July 4, 2017 @ 5:28 am

3 Ways To Use Instagram For Marketing Your Business

Many business owners are turning to Instagram as a marketing platform. Since there are millions of users each day it can be a great place to get your business seen and heard. Some businesses have had so much success marketing their business on Instagram that they have decided to run their businesses entirely on Instagram.

There are a lot of ways to make it work for you if you know how to work the right angles. All it takes is a little creativity and knowing how it all works. Here are the basics for getting started on using Instagram for marketing your business. Continue reading

Originally posted on August 31, 2017 @ 5:22 am

6 Things You Need to Do When Your WordPress Site is Hacked

6 Things You Need to Do When Your WordPress Site is Hacked

6 Things You Need to Do When Your WordPress Site is Hacked

Getting your WordPress site hacked may be one of the worst things that can happen especially if your website is a business that cannot just pause its services. Installing security plugins and doing the best practices on trying to make your site unhackable won’t stop hackers from doing their thing. What should you do when your website has already been hacked?

1. Restore backup

When hackers attack your WordPress site, their purpose is to manipulate, if not destroy, your files. This could be the death of your online business especially if you use your site to transact with online customers and engage with your audience.

Therefore, to minimize the problems caused by online attacks, you should always prepare a backup copy of your site that you can easily upload onto your hosting if the damage is irreparable. You can use the UpDraftPlus plugin to manually create a copy of your site that you can save to the cloud or your hard drive. For the paid version of this plugin, you can set it to create copies of your site on a regular basis automatically, so you don’t have to do it by yourself all the time.

2. Use Sucuri

sucuri

Use Sucuri to recover your site to its state before getting hacked. It has ‘Post-Hack Security Actions’ which walks you through the three steps you need to do after your site has been compromised.

Keep Sucuri installed to protect your site all year-long. Aside from fixing your compromised website for you, it also has a lot of security actions that will help you block off hacking attempts and continue to monitor and scan your website proactively.

Even if your site gets hacked without Sucuri installed, you can still reach out to them to get your site fixed. It may cost a bit more than getting protection before the hack, but such is the price that you have to pay.

3. Use WordPress Hosting

Once hacked, you also need to identify if it’s one of the reasons of your website being compromised. Although most web hosts can support WordPress, getting a host that’s specifically tailored to cater WordPress can be an advantage. Automatic updates, built-in mechanisms, and dedicated support are just some of the services these top managed WordPress hosting boast.

4. Change Login Details

If someone has hacked into your site by stealing your password, they can still access your website if you don’t change your login details immediately. Avoid the most used passwords like “123456” or “qwerty” and update your WordPress site, cPanel, FTP and all the other accounts you’ve used this password on straight away.

While you’re at it, remember that you must change the default “admin” username too. It just makes hackers one step closer to hacking your site if you don’t.

5. Scan Your Computer

In some cases, hacks on websites start on your computer. This means that whatever’s on your computer could be stolen, not just your WordPress website but also some of the sites you frequent. Scan your computer immediately using malware and virus scanners and make your computer up to date.

6. Hire A Professional

Although DIYs have been a common practice to most website owners, if you’re not comfortable dealing with codes, hiring a professional to take care of your hacked website would be the safest option. Some of them may charge more than what you expect, but if your site is your primary source of income and you cannot afford to mess it all up by doing it yourself, it’s best to leave it to professionals to take care of.

Some hackers use brute force attack where they try all the possible login detail combinations until one finally work. Limiting login attempts would prevent hackers from obtaining access to your website. Many plugins on WordPress specifically try and protect your site by adding an extra layer of protection by limiting how many times a user can log in. Also, once you’ve properly cleaned your WordPress site, always prepare yourself for another possibility of an imminent attack.

Originally posted on June 15, 2017 @ 10:42 pm

3 Ways To Better Communicate To Your Target Audience With Your Online Ads

With the number of people spending hours and hours each day online, it only makes sense for businesses to spend a larger portion of their marketing and advertising resources on online prospects. However, knowing you want to attract people to your business using the Internet is a lot easier than actually getting in touch with those people and getting conversions. So to help businesses struggling with this exact dilemma, here are three ways you can better communicate with your target audience through your online ads. Continue reading

Originally posted on April 21, 2017 @ 6:46 pm