10 Tips For Web Success

The webmaster's biggest job is to get their traffic up and keep customers/visitors coming back. Building the site is one thing, but simply building and posting a website does not guarantee traffic. In fact, a website could be beautiful and an example of all the latest technology and still not attract a single visitor if not promoted correctly. Here are 10 tips to guide you to success with your website. (1) The internet is a new medium. At least compared to print, it is. A website is a waste if it simply re-hashes something which could easily be put into print. Don't have the site be just an online brochure. Put up features which take advantage of the internet as a medium of communication. Filter information for them. Provide search capability. Provide interactivity with features like forums, quizzes and tools. Web visitors like to interact. (2) Treat the Customer's Time as Valuable. When a person visits your website, you have their attention for that point in time. You either need to use it or you will lose it - fast. Most visitors have short attention spans, what you need to design your site homepage so that it grabs their attention and provides what they are looking for right away. Its like walking into a restaurant. If you walk in and just stand there and nobody comes to greet you, you might wonder what is happening. But, if the hostess comes and greets you right away and walks you to a table, then you will be there for awhile and eat. The same analogy goes for websites. Don't overcomplicate your website homepage. Best results will be obtained if you make it very clear where to click to find what they need. (3) Design the site for customers, not the company. Your site needs to satisfy the needs of customers, not the company. So, don't post content which is not really useful to the site's customer. And avoid over-flattering marketing hype about the company. It inflates the ego of the company more than it helps your customer. (4) Involve the Visitor. Keep the visitor involved and make them feel like a valuable contributor. Actively ask for the feedback and suggestions. Ask for communication from your visitors and answer that communication swiftly. When getting that communication, capture their email address. This will allow you to communicate with them long after they have moved on and forgotten about you. (5) Keep it Current. You need to have content on your website which is timely and relevant to the customer's life. Posting month-old news is not interesting. Posting dry product information which never changes is not interesting. Yes, you need to have product information and other information on your site that won't change much, but you can also post more timely content. You can, for example, post content about how your products can be used in certain situations in life. Provide tips and techniques - things which are immediately applicable and solve a problem. (6) Pay Attention to Form/Design. Some sites simply over-do it on the eye-candy. Big graphics just for the sake of graphics often impress the site's designer more than the visitor. Do not use graphics that are large and purposeless. Remember, some visitors may still be accessing your website via dial-up. Your site needs to load up quickly for all users. A slow website will cause your users to leave quickly. Also, pay attention to graphic and design size. Many web designers operate on fairly large screen resolutions and sometimes forget that even though a graphic looks great to you, it will appear enormous to somebody on a smaller resolution. On the flip side, don't go too light on graphics. A site which is poorly designed and using the default font and no color is not very aesthetically pleasing. Any web visitor, whether they admit it or not, judges your company by your website unless they have something else to go on. A well-designed site communicates professionalism. A poor design makes the site seem like an afterthought. (7) Promote. When a visitor communicates to you via email, it is best to use a web form. not only will this keep your email address from being picked up by spammers, it will also allow you to ask your customers for their email address and then store that address for later use. Employ the "push/pull" marketing strategy. A visitor coming to your website is the pull, but later you want to push content back to them in the form of a newsletter or other promotional material. Start a mailing list and use it. Invite visitors to sign up. Promotion makes or breaks a business, and as long as you respect the ethical considerations of your mailing list, you should use it. (8) Don't Operate in a Cocoon. The internet is a medium which is shared by millions. When you set up your website, don't operate as if you are a self-contained island. Get out there and keep in tune with what is happening on other websites related to your own. Participate in forums. Post links to other websites and ask for a link in return. Form partnerships with other sites if it is appropriate. When it comes to communication, people like personal contacts. Hiding behind general email address like "sales" and "info" is OK as long as there is a way to also email you directly. A company site which allows email direct to the management is good. Just remember how much you hate calling a company and getting stuck in their phone system. Sometimes you just want to talk to somebody. Give your visitors that ability. (9) Have a Plan to Attract Repeat Traffic. Use newsletters, out-going email, contests, forums, clubs, auctions - anything that will cause people to return to your website. When posting links to other websites, don't just send your visitors somewhere else. They may never return. Provide them an exit page. Give them a pop-up when they try to leave your site. Or at the very least make external links open in a new window. (10) Track Your Visitors Pay attention to your site's statistics and react accordingly. What are people reading? How are they finding you? Do they just come and leave right from your homepage? How long as they are on your website? Do they return? This data is immensely valuable in fine-tuning your website based on customer needs and wants. Remember, the biggest mistake of any webmaster is designing the site for what THEY want. A successful website is designed for the target audience, not to impress the site's owner.

The Best Simple Software For The Busy Webmaster

Here are a few programs I can't do without. They're free, and make being a webmaster much easier. CGI-Telnet http://www.rohitab.com/cgiscripts/cgitelnet.html A cgi script that allows you to run commands on your server, even if your web host won't give you telnet access. Also good for getting at files generated by other scripts that are owned by user 'nobody', instead of your username. Ever tried deleting them? Well, now you can. AXS Visitor Tracking System http://www.xav.com/ A very fine hit counter. Fairly simple to set up, if you use footer files on your site. Gives detailed information. Much better than the stats software that came with your web-hosting account. Swap.pl A Perl text replacer script. Handy if you're not familiar with Unix commands. Make sitewide changes in seconds. The original author's site doesn't list it any more. Can still be found via a search engine (hint, hint). FTP Explorer http://www.ftpx.com The charm of this software is that it looks a lot like the Windows shell, and thus makes FTP'ing a little less intimidating for the novice webmaster. Putty Telnet/SSH Client http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/ A simple-looking, but sophisticated, freeware telnet and SSH client. Can be run from a floppy disk. Useful for the mobile webmaster. Email Remover 2.4 Not currently available from the author's website, but can be found by Googling for a file named 'eremov24.zip'. This is an email account checker. It can be run from a floppy disk and can check multiple email accounts. Allows you to highlight spam and delete it, and download emails if need be. WARNING: It has a bug. Do not change the order of the emails in the software window before deleting; you'll end up deleting the wrong ones. RFTP 32 Version 0.99 Again, not currently available from the author's website. This is a self-contained FTP client that can be, you guessed it, run from a floppy disk. Search around for a file named 'rftp.exe'. If you don't see a pattern emerging, then let me elucidate: the last three programs can all be run from the same floppy disk. You can leave your laptop at home, and work on your your site from internet cafes. The only thing left would be a WYSIWYG HTML editor that you can run from a floppy disk; that would be asking for a lot. However, the Mambo content management system http://www.mambo.com comes with one pre-installed. There's also a WYSIWYG plugin for the blog software WordPress http://wordpress.org/. Either is a useful addition to any website. You can keep it updated while on the road.

Tips For Safer Computing Online

by BB Lee (C)2004 New computer viruses threaten the unwary user everyday. Hackers jeopardize your online security with invasive computer techniques to steal your passwords, personal information, even identity. Unscrupulous marketers bait you with free software that unleashes spyware, trojans, or worms, on your system. While other marketers bombard you with popups at every turn. And others send unsolicited spy emails asking you to click links to unsafe websites that install threating software on your computer, or try to download your private information. These are only a few of the security issues involved while online. Read through the following list to arm your computer and protect yourself against these vicious and often malicious online attacks. 1. Install a good anti-virus software. Here's a good free anti-virus software... Fr** AVG Anti-Virus...... New - AVG Fr** Edition is now available for all single home users worldwide! More detailed information can be found in the AVG Free Edition License Agreement. Click Here To Download: http://www.grisoft.com/us/us_dwnl_free.php 2. Install a personal firewall. This personal firewall is one of the best online.... http://www.zonealarm.com 3. Install a good pop up blocker. Google has a free pop up blocker so does Yahoo. The only drawback is you will have to download and install their toolbar. 4. Know Privacy Policy. Read the websites privacy policy before releasing personal information. Note do they share or sell your information with third parties. If they do you might reconsider releasing your personal information. 5. Passwords. Never use easy to guess passwords like your favorite color, your social security number, your birthdate, words less than six characters. Mix up passwords with combinations of numbers and symbols. 6.Virus Warnings. Don't forward virus warnings you receive in emails. It's not your job to warn others. And you might be circulating a fake warning designed to scare receivers into downloading trojans or removing important files on their computer. 7. Keep It Secret. Don't give your password to anyone. Be wary of emails asking you to give out your personal passwords for accounts online. Or emails asking you to click a link and enter your password on the site. This site might be a fake sent by hackers "phishing" for victims. 8. Primary Email Address. Don't divulge your primary email address on unfamiliar sites. You might be bombarded with unsolicited emails by marketers who sell your address to third parties online. 9. Free Accounts Set up several free email accounts with a psuedo name to handle spam, when you register with unfamiliar sites, or to use on chat and message boards. 10. Chat Line And Message Board Warnings. Don't release personal information on chat lines or message boards. This is one way many identity thefts occur.

My Emails Are Not Being Delivered. Black Lists and White Lists Explained.

Please consider the following article for publication. My Emails Are Not Being Delivered. Black Lists and White Lists Explained. by Karen Fegarty Over 40% of all emails within your marketing campaign are not being delivered. You may not even be aware of this, as many ISPs will not send back a bounce message. In fact if you are sending messages to AOL customers, AOL is now blocking over 80% of the messages that come into their servers. One of the main reasons that this is occurring is that your IP or Domain may be Black Listed. All major ISP's and many corporate email systems now check against Black Lists and will refuse to deliver any emails that come from an IP that is Black Listed. But what exactly is a Black List? DNS black lists are lists of domains and IP's that are known to originate Spam. Many anti-spam software programs used by corporations and ISP's use these lists to control Spam by refusing any email that originates from one of these domains or IPs. Unfortunately there are many instances of false positives as there are few checks and often little objectivity when listing a particular IP. In order for a black list to know that a domain is sending Spam, the offence must be reported . It may take only one report via a web form for you to be listed. You may be listed maliciously through one complaint of a client, or that of a competitor. Many Black Lists, as well, will list not only the IP that is suspected as spamming, but will list any IPs in that range of addresses. If someone using the same Internet provider as you is accused of spamming and is placed on a Black List, you may be listed as well. DNS blacklists are usually maintained by anti-spam organizations or by individuals. What are some of the most popular Black Lists that ISPs are using? Some of these include: MAPS - http://www.mail-abuse.com/ Spam Cop - http://www.spamcop.net/ SpamHaus - http://www.spamhaus.org/ SPEWS.org - http://www.spews.org/ ORDB.org - Open Relay Database - http://www.ordb.org/ How do I know if I am on a Black List? Unfortunately, you really can't be 100% sure if you have been black listed. You may be on someone's black list and not even know it. There are, however, ways to check most of the lists. One way is to check your server log when sending your campaigns. You will often see an email bounce notice indicating that the message has bounced because you are on a particular black list. Many of the major black lists also allow you to enter your IP into a form on their site. These checks will tell you whether you appear, or not, on their list. A useful tool, is the Black List Monitor. http://www.blacklistmonitor.com - It automatically checks your IP against most of the major Black Lists and tells you which ones you are listed on. It also gives you help in getting removed. All your IPs are constantly monitored for any changes, listings, or delistings. But what is a White List and how can this help? Many corporations and ISPs will create a white list. This is a list of trusted IP addresses that they feel confident will not send spam to their customers. If your IP is listed on a particular white list then your email messages will be delivered to the destination email address. It is important for reputable marketers to work with the major ISP's such as AOL to ensure that you are on their white list. For most, it can be a lengthy process, but well worth your efforts. Other third-party email certification programs now exist. Bonded sender www.bondedsender.com is one such agency. By joining Bonded Sender, senders improve deliverability rates and differentiate their brand. Senders go through a formal application process, adhere to email standards and post a bond against potential complaints. Major ISPs such as MSN/Hotmail now check against Bond Sender's white list and allow these email to pass. Knowing if you are on a black list, getting removed if you are and getting established on white lists is critical if you are email marketing. The more messages delivered equals more sales!

How Spammers Fool Bayesian Filters - And How to Stop Them

Effectively stopping spam over the long-term requires much more than blocking individual IP addresses and creating rules based on keywords that spammers typically use. The increasing sophistication of spam tools coupled with the increasing number of spammers in the wild has created a hyper-evolution in the variety and volume of spam. The old ways of blocking the bad guys just don’t work anymore. Examining spam and spam-blocking technology can illuminate how this evolution is taking place and what can be done to combat spam and reclaim e-mail as the efficient, effective communication tool it was intended to be. One method used to combat spam is Bayesian Filtering. Named after Thomas Bayes, an English mathematician, Bayesian Logic is used in decision making and inferential statistics. Bayesian Filers maintain a database of known spam and ham, or legitimate email. Once the database is large enough, the system ranks the words according to the probability they will appear in a spam message. Words more likely to appear in spam are given a high score (between 51 and 100), and words likely to appear in legitimate email are given a low score (between 1 and 50). For example, the words “free” and “sex” generally have values between 95 and 98, whereas the words “emphasis” or “disadvantage” may have a score between 1 and 4. Commonly used words such as “the” and “that”, and words new to the Bayesian filters are given a neutral score between 40 and 50 and would not be used in the system’s algorithm. When the system receives an email, it breaks the message down into tokens, or words with values assigned to them. The system utilizes the tokens with scores on the high and low end of the range and develops a score for the email as a whole. If the email has more spam tokens than ham tokens, the email will have a high spam score. The email administrator determines a threshold score the system uses to allow email to pass through to users. Bayesian filters are effective at filtering spam and minimizing false positives. Because they adapt and learn based on user feedback, Bayesian Filers produce better results as they are used within an organization over time. They are not, however, foolproof. Spammers have learned which words Bayesian Filters consider spammy and have developed ways to insert non-spammy words into emails to lower the message’s overall spam score. By adding in paragraphs of text from novels or news stories, spammers can dilute the effects of high-ranking words. Text insertion has also caused normally legitimate words that are found in novels or news stories to have an inflated spam score. This may potentially render Bayesian filters less effective over time. Another approach spammers use to fool Bayesian filters is to create less spammy emails. For example, a spammer may send an email containing only the phrase, “Here’s the link…”. This approach can neutralize the spam score and entice users to click on a link to a Web site containing the spammer’s message. To block this type of spam, the filter would have to be designed to follow the link and scan the content of the Web site users are asked to visit. This type of filtering is not currently employed by Bayesian filters because it would be prohibitively expensive in terms of server resources and could potentially be used as a method of launching denial of service attacks against commercial servers. As with all single-method spam filtering methodologies, Bayesian filters are effective against certain techniques spammers use to fool spam filters, but are not a magic bullet to solving the spam problem. Bayesian filters are most effective when combined with other methods of spam detection. The Solution When used individually, each anti-spam technique has been systematically overcome by spammers. Grandiose plans to rid the world of spam, such as charging a penny for each e-mail received or forcing servers to solve mathematical problems before delivering e-mail, have been proposed with few results. These schemes are not realistic and would require a large percentage of the population to adopt the same anti-spam method in order to be effective. You can learn more about the fight against spam by visiting our website at www.ciphertrust.com and downloading our whitepapers.

How Spammers Fool Rule-based and Signature-Based Spam Filters

Effectively stopping spam over the long-term requires much more than blocking individual IP addresses and creating rules based on keywords that spammers typically use. The increasing sophistication of spam tools coupled with the increasing number of spammers in the wild has created a hyper-evolution in the variety and volume of spam. The old ways of blocking the bad guys just don’t work anymore. Examining spam and spam-blocking technology can illuminate how this evolution is taking place and what can be done to combat spam and reclaim e-mail as the efficient, effective communication tool it was intended to be. Heuristics (Rule-based Filtering) One method used to combat spam is Rule-based, or Heuristic Filtering. Rule-based filters scan email content for predetermined words or phrases that may indicate a message is spam. For example, if an email administrator includes the word "sex" on a company’s rule-based list, any email containing this word will be filtered. The major drawback of this approach is the difficulty in identifying keywords that are consistently indicative of spam. While spammers may frequently use the words “sex” and ‘Viagra” in spam emails, these words are also used in legitimate business correspondence, particularly in the healthcare industry. Additionally, spammers have learned to obfuscate suspect words by using spellings such as "S*E*X", or "VI a a GRR A". It is impossible to develop dictionaries that identify every possible misspelling of "spammy" keywords. Additionally, because filtering for certain keywords produces large numbers of false positives, many organizations have found they cannot afford to rely solely on rule-based filters to identify spam. Signature-Based Spam Filters Another method used to combat spam is Signature-based Filtering. Signature-based filters examine the contents of known spam, usually derived from honey pots, or dummy email addresses set up specifically to collect spam. Once a honey pot receives a spam message, the content is examined and given a unique identifier. The unique identifier is obtained by assigning a value to each character in the email. Once all characters have been assigned a value, the values are totaled, creating the spam’s signature. The signature is added to a signature database and sent as a regular update to the email service’s subscribers. The signature is compared to every email coming in to the network and all matching messages are discarded as spam. The benefit of signature-based filters is that they rarely produce false-positives, or legitimate email incorrectly identified as spam. The drawback of signature-based filters is that they are very easy to defeat. Because they are backward-looking, they only deal with spam that has already been sent. By the time the honey pot receives a spam message, the system assigns a signature, and the update is sent and installed on the subscribers’ network, the spammer has already sent millions of emails. A slight modification of the email message will render the existing signature useless. Furthermore, spammers can easily evade signature-based filters by using special email software that adds random strings of content to the subject line and body of the email. Because the variable content alters the signature of each email sent by the spammer, signature-based spam filters are unable to match the email to known pieces of spam. Developers of signature-based spam filters have learned to identify the tell-tale signs of automated random character generation. But as is often the case, spammers remain a step ahead and have developed more sophisticated methods for inserting random content. As a result, most spam continues to fool signature-based filters. The Solution When used individually, each anti-spam technique has been systematically overcome by spammers. Grandiose plans to rid the world of spam, such as charging a penny for each e-mail received or forcing servers to solve mathematical problems before delivering e-mail, have been proposed with few results. These schemes are not realistic and would require a large percentage of the population to adopt the same anti-spam method in order to be effective. You can learn more about the fight against spam by visiting our website at www.ciphertrust.com and downloading our whitepapers.

7 Ways Email Can End Your Business Relationships Before They Start

Too often, people forget they're anonymous in the internet world. Your friends and colleagues might know you as being a tireless worker, a great friend and loving parent, but I don't know that. To me, you're just a font. You're a font in an email, or in a forum post. If you give me access to your website, then you're whatever impression the website creates. But largely, you're anonymous. So if you want to establish trust in your internet business dealings, make it your goal to paint a professional image via email. I'm a copywriter, so I'm constantly combing the web for possible clients and cohorts. Recently I've encountered some internet personalities who have left me scratching my head in puzzlement. Might we have had a fruitful business relationship? I'll never know, because within days of crossing paths, they managed to display one of the "Scary Seven" - that is, the seven quickest ways to scare people away by email. Let's review them now. Scare Tactic 1. Send an email from a cryptic address. There's nothing that says 'unprofessional' like an email inquiry from "Binky24" or "Shanaynay_7". Email addresses like this strike me as being one of two things: 1. someone young and foolish, or 2. a spammer. I understand if you don't have a website up and running yet; after all, as a writer, many people contact me to help them get their businesses started. But at the very least, reveal your first and last name. Provide contact information, and a brief background. If no one knows who you are, it's not likely they'll do business with you. Scare Tactic 2. Send an email that contains virtually no information. Yesterday I responded to a post on Craigslist that requested an editor. In my email, I gave my name, contact info, a little background information and directed the potential client to my website. I asked a few questions about their needs. In response, I got one line, and a very uninformative one at that. Do you see why I don't plan to contact this person again? Scare Tactic 3. Send too many emails! Want to make people think you have absolutely zero going on? Then send someone a barrage of email after having just met. I recently got an onslaught of emails from a potential client - NINE in total, over the course of a day. YIKES! This is a busy world. People don't have time to pore through your information. Organize your thoughts, and send in ONE email- maybe two, max. Scare Tactic 4. Send emails of a personal nature. Never, EVER send email jokes or personal anecdotes to someone you plan on doing business with over the internet. I don't care how promising the initial phone conversation was or how "friendly" they seem. This behavior screams unprofessional, and can even be a bit disturbing. Many marketers swap information, and this is fine. But it should be done in moderation. There's a fine line between helpful information exchange and email harassment. Don't cross it. Scare Tactic 5. Send out a group email, and forget to blind copy. I recently signed on to work for a company that contracts out writers. I liked the spirit in which business was being conducted and the site owner's honest approach. But there is such a thing as too much honesty. The first project came through via email - and I could see the name of EVERY writer who was competing with me for work! Not only does this have trouble written all over it, but no one wants their email address shared. A Privacy Policy is the hallmark of a real business. Implement one, and assure people their information is safe with your company. Scare Tactic 6. Send an email that you haven't proofread. We're all in a hurry, it's true. But haste makes waste! If you request information on "barbecue girls," you might just get some unexpected feedback! Double-checking your message can ensure that the recipient can respond properly. Ultimately, you'll get an answer to the question you asked - and not one you didn't. Scare Tactic 7. Send an email that's either too enthusiastic, or too austere. People are people - and I've encountered personalities from both ends of the spectrum. Those who are "SO EXCITED to make your acquaintance that they CAN'T STOP SHOUTING!!!!!!" and those who apparently are so wrapped up in themselves that they can't spare a courteous hello. My advice: take the middle ground. Keep it friendly yet professional, and don't go to extremes in your correspondence. Don't want to frighten people away with your email? Then avoid the "Scary Seven!" Above all, discuss the who, what, when, where, how and why of your message, and be sure to include any information that will help your future colleague get to know you better - a website link, some articles you've written, your resume, etc. Don't be overly pushy on email, and avoid over- or under-communicating. In time, you'll get the feel for the type of emails people respond to. And once that happens, you're on your way to cultivating fruitful internet business relationships!