Web Site Security – Oops

Really, this is 2011 and major sites are still playing games with identity theft.

I came across a notable HR/insurance web site that tries to  request social security numbers.

Seriously, don’t you think the business could get the social security number after the fact – like if someone wants to show any interest in the company’s services.

I imagine the site used to have proper security that just lapsed. The copy before the form says it “will be sent over the Internet encrypted and securely.”

No, not today.

Even when the security works securely (I’ll point it out to them), I doubt they’ll remove the social security request. It’s not one of the required fields. At least the you can skip it if you want to – as everyone should.

Online Ad Spending to Increase

In a recent report, industry analyst eMarketer projects that the U.S. online advertising market will grow a great deal in 2011 – with spending increasing 20.2% to $31.3 billion by the end of the year. That’s a significant jump from last year when spending reached $26 billion – a 14.9% jump.

Although future increases aren’t expected to be as high, it’s a strong reminder about the power of the Internet in a down economy. People want opportunities, relevance, targeted marketing and measurement. Internet advertising delivers at all levels.

But the key isn’t to just spend the money and measure it. Businesses that look at these opportunities need to think long and hard about what they’re doing. A misstep along the way can doom the campaign.

Here are some tough questions to ask:

What is my brand?
Who am I trying to reach?
How will I measure success?
How does that affect my marketing objectives?
Will this impact my company’s bottom line? Can I prove it?
What am I promoting that’s better than what the other guy offers?
Who is making my creative? Does it really work?
What happens when they reach my landing page? Is it new or something refined?

“The internet has become as fundamental as television to advertisers,” said eMarketer principal analyst David Hallerman. “As consumers continue to increase their time spent online and as the resurgent economy continues to bolster ad budgets, we’re going to continue to see an influx of dollars toward the internet. More ad formats, such as video, and more channels, especially social media and mobile, are also key contributors to the spending gains.”

How to Choose a Proper Web Site Hosting Service

To Pay or Not to Pay; That Is the Question.

The first consideration when choosing a web site hosting service is simple: free or paid service. Free service providers have restrictions. Maximum file sizes, ad banners, limits on file types, and some deploy frames. SEO proponents counsel avoiding frames because they can be a rank-killer with search engines; others argue that properly used frames make no difference. A link about frames follows this article. The bandwidth of free providers varies and is known, at least for some of them, for crawling to a literal halt at times. Paid providers offer more bandwidth and storage space, better tech support, and numerous customization options free providers lack.

Server OS and Languages

The operating system and the programming language that is used by a web host matters. If you code Windows-only apps with VB, ASP and similar languages, Windows servers are necessary. UNIX-based hosts outperform its Windows counterparts across the board. As far as languages, PHP, Perl and Ruby are some of the most common to work with web site hosting. Ruby on Rails hosting with a Ruby language base, is very beneficial to work with, as it can help optimize website speed and customize configurations, two important aspects to have with web site hosting.

Bandwidth, Space, Access Options

How much bandwidth does a new site need? Estimates range from 2.5 to 3.5 gigs. Do you expect your site to have a visitor explosion, higher search engine ranking, and increased sales? Upgrade to four or five gigs. Sudden spikes in web traffic increase your costs with paid providers, so scalable bandwidth plans are a must for those who wish to grow.

Disk space: How much is optimal? That decision depends on the content hosted. What will be hosted, text, audio or video files, or streaming services? A tight estimate to extrapolate from: 1MB of disk space equals about thirty pages sans A/V files.

Downloadable content is handled by FTP or anonymous FTP. If you have apps or files for others to download, add this option to your checklist. UNIX-based hosts (including Solaris, Linux and BSD distributions) require the use of Telnet or SSH for access. If you have never used SSH, fear not. If you can program or script in any language, learning SSH is a breeze.

Sites that sell services or products need a way for customers to pay. Security of these transactions is a must, and handled by SSL. However, SSL is unnecessary for non-commercial blogs or sites.

Additional Web Site Hosting Service Concerns

Variants of SQL communicate with databases. This is imperative for running a good blog or implementing content management systems (CMS). Some CMS scripts modify XML and text files, while others work with databases.

The quality of tech support service is critical. Are they available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, especially on holidays? Holiday customer purchase spikes happen. It makes no difference if a business is brick-and-mortar or click-and-order. Prompt and competent tech support availability is crucial during holiday purchasing sprees. Other major determinations must be made regarding tech support. Can you modify passwords, email accounts and other critical settings without having to wait for the approval of tech support? You should be able to perform such common tasks on your own site without permission.

Show Me the Money

In this type of investment a dichotomy rears its ugly head: You don’t always get what you pay for, and, you get what you pay for. Establishing your site’s needs renders these diametric quips trivial. Client review is a decent tool for aiding a decision about how much to pay. Compare satisfactory reviews with unsatisfactory. Keep an eye out for scalability in pricing plans. You will need a flexible plan when your site tops the search engines.

Handy SEO and Web Site Development Checklist

I came across this awesome list of reminders for any web site online marketing project.

Check out “SEO Checklist: 60 essential checks before launching a website.”

It’s an interesting look at SEO and how it goes well beyond the keywords you target for a program.

Companies tend to focus on what search terms they want to do well for on Google, Bing and Yahoo! But quick a bit goes on behind the scenes, including how fast a web site page loads.

With web site online marketing, it’s not just about an eye-catching design or sound programming. You can’t just plan some appropriate calls to actions like “Schedule an Appointment” or “Download the Guide.”

It’s about how well you’ve planned out the navigation, whether you have a robots.txt file and basics like having the right web site analytics in place – on every page.

Doing the right thing doesn’t require extra training in most cases. It’s about remembering to do what you already know and paying attention to details. If web site online marketing is going to be successful, you need to make sure the basics are in place before you can move onto more sophisticated techniques.

Get your team together and review your own protocols. How well are you doing? What do you need to work on to get your web site in shape?