Security

What would data loss cost your business?

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For many business owners, data protection is an afterthought.

One of the common assumptions is data is secure because it is hosted in the cloud or on a dedicated server.

I’ll be honest with you, nothing has changed because of cloud technology.

Your data is still at risk. Probably more today that at any other time in history. There are simply more people with more access to the Web with bad intentions.

Hackers, malware, and other system invaders try to do one of two things:

#1: Steal your data
#2: Prevent you from accessing your data

Having a bullet-proof data protection and backup solution can help protect you from ‘Ransomware’  and cyber criminals looking to profit from your information. And it’s easier than you think, but I’ll get to that later…

First, let’s discuss how the data in your business is directly effecting your bottom line.

Should your system data become compromised for any reason, it will cost you time and money to restore your business operations to normal.

The only way to minimize the impact of the unexpected event is to have a company backup plan and policy.

For every hour you are offline, you are losing money.

And worse, customers can become angry or frustrated and click away to a competitor.

This is money you can never get back… and the TIME is takes to recover your data is going to be costly.

IT experts charge a fortune to help restore you to where you were (I’ve included some figures on this below).

Imagine a scenario where you lose several days of business. Almost as if you stepped into a time machine and fast-forwarded three days with ZERO revenue in between. Devastating.

A loss of daily revenue can be a death blow to your business.

However, it can be worse… what if your data is lost forever? Could you recover from that?

Imagine if your data was wiped and you were staring at a placeholder for your website. What if your leads were all gone? Customer sales history, addresses, emails, phone numbers… all gone.

Ask yourself how you would handle this potential situation.

Yet, it doesn’t have to be this way and you can protect yourself easily and affordably.

As a business, you already know that standard practice is to justify every expense incurred. When it comes to data backup and protection, here are three clear reasons supported by research that demonstrate the critical nature of data backup.

Consider the following:

1. Data loss + downtime = lost revenue

In this case, the revenue is lost because the amount of time required to recover or recreate the data changes the focus from the day-to-day operations to recovery mode. A certain amount of time will be required even if you have backup systems in place, but the difference in recovery time will definitely impact your revenues. The cost, according to Infrascale.com, is $8000 for a small business and $700,000 for a large business – per hour. Note that these are averages, so the more data dependent your business is, the more it will cost you.

2. Loss of Business Continuity = lost revenue

Business continuity is the ability to continue to make money. Malware or a data breach will grind your business to a halt unless you have adequately prepared for the unexpected event. We only need to remind businesses of the 2012 McAfee antivirus update disaster that affected business and home users alike.

McAfee was not a malware creator but exactly the opposite – a company whose software was supposed to protect your data. The simple truth is that business continuity can always be interrupted.

3. Data Security increases organizational focus

No equal sign here. When an unexpected event shuts down your business, your data needs to be both safe and available. A 2015 Gartner award-winning company reported that 40 percent of IT professionals rated the ability of their company to recover from an unexpected disaster as either fair or poor. Lack of data security will clearly result in employee insecurity, whether it is your own or that of your employees.

What’s the solution?

Most business will fall into one of two groups:

  • Your business has minimal or no data backup plan, or…
  • Your business has a backup system in place

For both groups, the question is if your backup system is adequate from your existing and growing needs.

If your business has no backup plan…

Your business is in dire need of a data backup plan and strategy. Instead of starting with less-advanced technology, begin by using R1Soft as a solution. Data backup technologies employ the same basic framework for saving your critical data, saving it to your server on a period basis by making a duplicate copy. The advantages of the R1Soft solution are more clearly seen once you become a member of the second group… and I’ve got a special offer for you below for implementing a backup strategy with R1Soft.

If your business has a backup strategy in place…

Solutions that were created several years ago and have not kept up with more advanced data backup options should be reviewed. This is common because business owners focus on running their business and presume their current plan is sufficient for their needs. For this group, R1Soft is a solid solution that can be easily added to any virtual or dedicated server.

What is R1Soft?

R1Soft is designed to backup your software continuously as it monitors changes to your system data. The more standard systems backup your data once or twice a day at scheduled intervals. This type of backup requires you to use considerable system resources as it performs the operation, often slowing down the core components of the business.

R1Soft is able to select only the files that require backing up when they change, so instead of having one or two backup points to choose from, you can have literally hundreds.

This reduces load…

Two main advantages to R1Soft is that you will use far fewer system resources during the backup process.

Recovery time will also be decreased when compared to the more traditional backup system software.

There is always a certain amount of time lost during a recovery operation, and R1Soft directly addresses this issue by giving you the largest number of recovery options for your data.

For example, if you need to replicate your data to a remote location it can be done without taking your server offline.

Here’s a simplified process of how R1Soft works:

  • A snapshot of your data is taken
  • R1Soft uses this snapshot as the starting point to continuously monitor changes to the data
  • Backups can be scheduled in increments as short as every 20 minutes
  • Backups can be monitored from a single, web-based console

Best yet, R1Soft is Linux or Windows compatible.

You can add R1Soft Backup to ANY existing Superb Internet Cloud or Dedicated Server.

And right now, if you add the 5-in-1 Manages Services plan, you’ll get R1Soft bundled with the following services and save a bundle of money at the same time:

  1. Vulnerability Scanning
  2. OS Hardening
  3. Cisco Managed Firewall
  4. Proactive Monitoring

You’ll get everything…

… hack prevention
… ransom protection
… data backup
… OS hardening and patch updates
… and a Cisco managed firewall

You get everything you need to SECURE YOUR BUSINESS and protect yourself for a price that’s so low, I don’t want to mention it here for our competition to see.

Login to your customer portal at https://mycp.superb.net or contact our sales team for a FREE Security and Data Protection Assessment by clicking the following link:
https://www.superb.net/about/contact-us

Quincy Solano
Marketing Manager
Superb Internet Corp.

Take a look at the complete list of features R1Soft offers as significant advantages to your company and its current data backup plan.

Continuous Data Protection – Instead of backing up your data through the file system, R1Soft backs it up at the block level, reading the data directly from the disk or volume. This increases the speed of the backup while significantly reducing the use of system I/O resources.

Block-Level Backups – Block-level backups are not affected by the number of files you are backing up. It also enables you to backup open files and snapshot features, so you maximize your available storage space and resources.

Disk Safe Replication – Disk Safe is the feature used to replicate your data to an offsite storage location. Because you do not have to take your server offline to perform the remote backups, you do not have to worry about losing data during the backup process.

Disk Safe Verification – This part of Disk Safe protects your data from corruption through constantly monitoring the transfer. Verification offers considerable flexibility by scheduling it to run either periodically or on demand. Any corruption that is detected will result in a notification to the console operator.

Quick Restore – R1Soft’s Bare-Metal Recovery feature will enable you to perform recovery operations even when you are backing up your files. Complete restoration can be performed in as little as 30 minutes.

Data Retention Policies – You are able to restore data quickly depending on the type and frequency of your backup points. As an example, you can set the backup for every 20 minutes and determine the number of recovery points to retain. The old will be merged with the new, so the storage is recycled.

Control Panel Interface – The online control panel allows you to securely authenticate local of users and give them the ability to backup and restore files. Our CPI integrates with many of the most popular Linux Control Panels, including cPanel, Plesk, and InterWorx.

Multi-Platform Support – R1Soft’s Server Backup Manager supports the following Windows platforms:

Windows
VMware ESX/ESXi
Microsoft Hyper-V
Citrix XenServer
Parallels Virtuozzo
Parallels Cloud Server
MySQL
Microsoft SQL Server
Microsoft Exchange
Linux

The vast majority of Linux variants are supported.

AES-256 Encryption – The AES-256 Disk Safe Encryption technology is available when you create Disk Safes for backing up data and protects your data on the backup and over the network.

If you are serious about your online business, then you need to get a serious online backup solution. An online business that has downtime is much like a brick and mortar business that has its doors locked. Customers cannot gain access, and for an online business that means customers will very likely go elsewhere. R1Soft is the right answer, whether you have no current data backup plan or your existing plan has been ignored and needs a serious upgrade.

You can add R1Soft Backup to ANY existing Superb Internet Cloud or Dedicated Server.

And right now, you can add R1Soft to your existing server for an insane price… and you’ll also receive:

  • Vulnerability Scanning
  • OS Hardening
  • Cisco Managed Firewall

You’ll get all of that hack prevention, ransom protection and data backup for one low monthly price. So low, I don’t want to place it on here for our competition to see.

If you are interested in adding all of the above at a price that’s hard to believe, just contact our sales team by clicking here:
https://www.superb.net/about/contact-us

Sources:
PC World
Infrascale

Cloud

Quiz: How does your Disaster Recovery plan score?

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How many layers are there to your disaster recovery plan? Each layer should add more security as well as the ability to quickly recover from data loss.

If you answered zero or one, you should consider updating your DR plan to include additional recovery options.

Ideally, you’ll want to score a 4 or above to feel secure. Scoring anything less than 4 layers means you are placing your data at serious risk. I’ll go into more detail on how to score your business later in this article. But first, let’s look at WHY you need additional layers for your DR planning.

Many businesses neglect disaster recovery and treat it as an after-thought. I can tell you first hand that data will be lost, hard drives die, servers will be hacked, and careless (or malicious) employees can ruin your data.

Second, many business owners think that because their servers, email, and websites are hosted in the cloud that they are “safe”.

Although many cloud platforms may be more power redundant, storage redundant, and include more processing power – your data is not 100% “safe”. Keep in mind, not all cloud providers are created equal. Click here to see a comparison chart of the top cloud providers.

Simply, when disaster strikes – disaster won’t care whether you host in the cloud or on an old DL380 in your office basement.

If you aren’t sure of your DR plan, I suggest you have a frank discussion with your IT manager.

The goal is zero data loss and to be operational quickly should any disaster occur.

Ideally, you’ll want to be operational in minutes… not days or weeks. Remaining online is money and reputation when you depend on the Internet for revenue.

That’s why it is more important than ever to institute a DR (Disaster Recovery) plan that exists in several layers.

One backup (one layer) is NOT ENOUGH.

There are many types of catastrophe’s that currently exist, such as:

  • Acts of nature
  • Power outages
  • Hardware failure
  • Network outages
  • Hacking
  • Malicious employees

Imagine for a moment if you suddenly lost your…

  • Customer account and payment information
  • Customer history of invoices, purchases, and communications
  • Emails (sent and received)
  • Marketing emails
  • Website and website data
  • Leads for your sales team

For many, this would be devastating. No cost could be placed on this amount of data loss. In fact, it may even lead to your closure.

So what does a Layered DR plan look like?

Layer 1: Same Server Backup
This allows for quick recovery for web pages should someone accidentally delete an item. However, should the hard drive(s) die, all data would be lost. This is really only to be used to replace individual files that were corrupted or edited.

Layer 2: Local Backup
This is a backup the resides in your local office. This ensures you have a physical copy within your grasp at all times. I recommend doing a monthly backup like this.

Layer 3: Off-Server Backup (same data center)
If you have large amounts of data, you will want to have a backup closer to the server. This could be physically in the same data center or geographic region. This is good, although you should add Layer 4 to your DR plan.

Layer 4: Off-Server Backup (geographically diverse)
This backup layer is removed from the geographic region entirely. For example, you host your data in Seattle. You would then setup a backup node in Virginia or vice versa. This gives you thousands of miles of separation, but yields more data security. You can also recover if one data center is knocked offline for an extended amount of time in a new location.

=> Click Here to Configure a Geographically Diverse Backup Location

Layer 5: Third Party ‘Vault’ Storage
This means a physical copy housed in a vault with security guards. This is the ultimate in data protection, but does not lend itself to speedy data recovery. Further, this is cost prohibitive to many small and medium sized businesses.

Of course, you can add even more layers to your DR mix. However, the ones listed above should be more than enough.

How did you score?

0 -1 layer(s): Your business is at serious risk. It is suggested you add
2 – 3 layers: You will be only be able to recover if the DC has replacement hardware and the facility itself is still online. As data was not hosted outside the facility.
4+ layers: You are in good shape, you will be able to recover from most disasters either in the same DC you are located in or a new facility altogether.

If you scored lower than a 4, here’s what we recommend:

=> Click Here to Configure a Additional Backup Solutions

Add a geographically diverse location to your DR plan. A geographically different location will bring you peace of mind knowing your data is secure in the case of any local DC outages or regional issues.

In fact, Superb.net is one of the most affordable providers in this market. When you factor in the reliability of SSD drives used on our ThunderCloud platform – your data has never been more safe. SSD’s also deliver the highest performance available for read/write at 6Gbps… that’s double the speed of conventional SATA drives!

=> Click Here to Configure a Additional Backup Solutions

When your site is offline, you want immediate and FAST access to your backups. Superb delivers blazing fast upload and download speeds with our ThunderCloud configurations and enough storage for most applications. Our network has been rated #1 for the last ten years!

Better yet, your ThunderCloud instance is always available with automatic failover. This means you can access your data at any time. This is crucial if you are suffering an outage.

Superb Internet provides geographically diverse, blazing fast, and redundant solutions that are a must for creating peace of mind for your data storage needs.

=> Click Here to Configure a Additional Backup Solutions

In fact, you can chat with an expert today who will help you build out your very own Disaster Recovery plan with all the layers that are right for your business.

Why don’t you chat with a Disaster Recovery expert now?

Marketing and PR

Black Friday Bootcamp

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5 Tweaks To Your Facebook Page That Can Increase Black Friday Sales

Yesterday, we learned how to create buzz for your black Friday sale.

If you missed that article, you can read it here:
Creating Buzz For Your Black Friday Sale

Today’s article on upgrading your Facebook page for Black Friday shouldn’t take you more than 15 to 20 minutes to complete.

The next step is to setup Facebook so we can generate even more buzz through social media channels.

Let’s start with sprucing up our Facebook cover image…

#1 – Create a custom Facebook cover image

According to recent research conducted by EyeTrackShop for Mashable.com, participants spent less time looking at your Facebook Wall posts and more time looking at the cover photo on timelines than the old Facebook Walls.

The new Facebook Timeline restricts branding space, and the cover image needs to be well designed.

Example of a great cover page:
facebook-tweaks-9

In fact, if you don’t want to hire a designer, click here to buy the above template for $2.

Key points to this cover image are:

  • Black Friday is dead center, easy to read, and • the date is clear
  • The images are inviting and represent the brand
  • 50% off is at the top of the cover, so it’s clearly visible

Once you have you cover image setup, it’s time to setup a ‘Call to Action’ button.

#2 – Create a Post and Pin It

You can now ‘pin’ a post to the top of your timeline. This will ensure the post is read first.

In fact, pinning a post results in higher views.

The folks over at Buffer reported that, “For pinned updates on Facebook, we noticed 30 extra views, three extra likes, and three extra shares in a 24-hour period. This would mean an extra 150 views, 15 likes, and 15 shares were a post to be pinned throughout the workweek.” – Buffer

TIP: Add a Picture to Your Post

Make sure you include an image on your pinned post. Hubspot discovered that posts containing an image resulted in:

• 104% more comments
• 54% more likes
• 84% higher click-through rates

In addition, mention the specifics of your sale in the post, such as:

• Date of the sale
• Percent Discount
• List of item or items
• Picture of Item or Items

Once you have created the post, you can now pin it, here’s how:

facebook-tweaks-5

Next, let’s add a ‘Call to Action’ on your Facebook Page…

#3 – Create Your Call to Action Button

Facebook has created a new Call to Action feature you can implement on your Facebook page.

This is great because it allows you to employ a few lead generation tactics like:

• Book Now
• Contact Us
• Use App
• Play Game
• Shop Now
• Sign Up
• Watch Video

In fact, Facebook uses the Dollar Shave Club as an example. Here’s a screenshot of the Call to Action at work:

facebook-tweaks-10

As you can see, the ‘Sign Up’ box is highlighted above.

Dollar Shave Club is a big fan too, here’s their Director of Acquisition praising it:

“Over the course of a three-week test, the Sign Up call-to-action button delivered a 2.5x higher conversion rate versus other comparable social placements aimed to drive new user acquisition.” —Brian Kim, Director of Acquisition, Dollar Shave Club

Here’s how you can implement the Call to Action:

facebook-tweaks-4

Next, you need to make sure people can reach out to you for questions they may have…

#4 – Activate Your Messenger

Facebook has even made it easier for shoppers to contact you to ask questions.

This is important because it gives you an extra channel to reach out and complete a sale.

But first, you must turn on the Messenger feature inside of your Facebook Page.
That’s easy…

facebook-tweaks-3

The faster you respond, the better your rating on Facebook. Here’s an example of badge that Facebook will post on your Page if you respond quickly:

facebook-tweaks-1

Pretty cool!

You can achieve this rating by:

• A response rate of at least 90%
• A response time of 15 minutes or less

The next item is more of a tip, but it’s an important one you should consider…

#5 – Cover Images with faces get more attention

Make sure your cover image has people and faces. Here’s a few examples of highly rated Facebook pages:

Example 1:
facebook-tweaks-8

Example 2:
facebook-tweaks-7

You’ll notice the Dollar Shave Club we used as an example above doesn’t use an image with a face… maybe they should show a man shaving and that would help boost their views?

I hope you take just a few minutes and implement one or all of these tweaks. They are easy and shouldn’t take very long at all.

Quincy Solano
Marketing Manager
Superb Internet Corp.

P.S. Tomorrow’s article will cover “Turning the old to new again – using pixels on your site to bring back old traffic and customers for cheap”…

References:
https://creativemarket.com/cooledition/102757-Black-Friday-Facebook-Cover-1

https://blog.bufferapp.com/best-practices-how-to-pin-tweet-facebook

http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/33800/Photos-on-Facebook-Generate-53-More-Likes-Than-the-Average-Post-NEW-DATA.aspx#sm.00000rbjg10r26dzbqye72t3bu86d

https://www.facebook.com/business/news/call-to-action-button

https://www.facebook.com/business/help/312169205649942

Marketing and PR

How to Make It Rain – Creating Buzz For Your Black Friday Sale

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People love a deal… and they EXPECT a deal on Black Friday.

One big retailer, in particular, is a master of Black Friday sales… and sales in general. In fact, they created their own holiday sale! This retailer offers amazing deals to shoppers, but more than that, they utilize superior marketing tactics.

Mirroring marketing tactics used by a big retailer like this can result in a nice boost in sales if done properly.

The retailer I’m writing about is Amazon.com. One of the best marketers on the planet, if not the best.

Amazon.com knows how to sell… and they know how to promote a sale by generating tons of buzz.

Today, I will break down some of the tactics used by Amazon that you can use for your own Black Friday sale… or any sale for that matter and create ‘buzz’ in advance.

Amazon even created its own shopping holiday called Amazon Prime Day… as a way to reward their Prime members. This makes me chuckle because you have to pay to be a Prime member.

Amazon sold over $2.5 billion worth of goods during Prime Day 2016!

It just makes good sense that we should mirror what Amazon does to create a buzz in advance of our Black Friday event.

Let’s break down Prime Day.

Not everything was on sale.

And Amazon utilized several ‘scarcity’ tactics during the Prime Day sale:

  1. Countdown Timers When Certain Products Would Be Available
  2. Advanced Notice This Is a 24 Hour Sale
  3. Limited Availability For Each Product On Sale
  4. Countdown Timers When An Item Would Expire
  5. Amazing Price Cuts Guaranteed Certain Items Would Sell Out (by design)

Further, this was an event geared at BUILDING THEIR PRIME MEMBERSHIP numbers (currently $99/year). By requiring you to have an Amazon Prime membership, they virtually guaranteed they would grow their membership for their 2017 event.

Absolutely genius!

Suffice it to say… Amazon knows what they are doing.

Here’s a look at their homepage during the sale (click to expand the full image so you can scroll):

amazonprimeday

As you can see, countdown timers are being used at the very top. Below that, Amazon is placing items most likely related to your past browsing history. I will be shocked if they are not.

The promotions would begin and end in certain timed intervals, with new timed promotions appearing after one expired.

Shoppers could plan ahead by seeing what was coming up.

Buyers could add items to their shopping cart that were coming up. Shoppers just had to wait until that promotion began to get the discount.

Amazon even changed their homepage so that it is more of a ‘Landing Page’ than their regular store page.

Brilliant.

You most likely do not have the resources or technical abilities that Amazon does, but that’s ok. We can still prep our website and our shoppers for the big day.

To accomplish awareness and boost sales on Black Friday, we will borrow a few of Amazon’s tactics.

Prepping Your Website

Promote the sale in ADVANCE.

Letting people know in advance is crucial to your success on Black Friday.

Consumers will have countless options to make purchases. It is our job to get shoppers to visit you first and even place items in their shopping carts in advance.

There are many ways of preparing shoppers for Black Friday, and you should be employing as many of the following tactics as possible.

Here’re a few ideas for you…

Tip #1 – Place a Ribbon On Your Website 7 Days In Advance

Here’s an example:

amazonprimecountdown

The entire top bar announces the Prime Day sale.

Each day, have the day decrease. If you can, have the actual amount of hours drop like a stopwatch.

Here’s an affordable countdown timer:
http://countdownmonkey.com

And here’s a free one that allows embedding but isn’t as nice as the Countdown Monkey:
https://www.tickcounter.com

If possible, link your countdown timer to a particular landing page…

Tip #2 – Create a Landing Page

If you only have a few items to promote you can have a web designer create a unique landing page. I would suggest just copying the layout of the Amazon Prime day page.

You’ll need at least three compelling offers.

If you don’t know what to offer, I suggest reviewing your sales figures. Determine the top 20% of products you sell.

The idea here isn’t to get rid of old inventory… it’s to sell.

You want to offer what you have the best chance of selling. This offer ensures you profit the most from Black Friday.

Sticking your old inventory that hasn’t moved in years won’t cut it. Your sale will flop. Those items are not selling for a reason.

Further, place ‘Add to Cart’ buttons under each item. Make it clear they can put these items in their shopping cart now… and that you will notify them immediately when the sale begins.

This allow’s buyers to secure the offers and reduce the risk of losing out if there is minimal inventory. Don’t drop the price though until the minute the sale begins.

And don’t forget to place your countdown timer on this landing page. Countdown timers are critical as you wish to create a sense of urgency on this page.

Further, if you have an email system, place a ‘Notify Me When The Sale Begins’ form on this landing page.

Capturing emails from prospective customers will allow us to build up the buzz in advance. We can then also remind shoppers who have added items to their shopping cart the day the sale begins.

In short, your landing page should have:

  1. Countdown timer
  2. Email capture form
  3. Your best selling products with discounts for each
  4. ‘Add to Cart’ ability so shoppers can save the items for faster checkout
  5. Refer a Friend and Social Sharing buttons
  6. Easily readable and clear with what actions you wish them to take

Once you have all of this in place, it’s time to generate a little buzz…

Tip #3 – Grow the Buzz

Amazon.com utilizes emails, their website, and ads to grow buzz before their big event.

You should run your Black Friday event no differently.

My advice is to promote at least seven days in advance of Black Friday to announce your specials.

Promote via a combination of Facebook posts, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram (whichever you use) along with your email list.

Seven days isn’t too close, and it’s not too far off.

  1. Tell shoppers what you will be selling.
  2. Tell buyers what the discount will be.
  3. Show buyers the landing page URL so that they can visit it.
  4. Ask shoppers to add their email address to your opt-in form.

Don’t be shy. Black Friday is the time to promote.

If you are going to stand any chance of cutting through the clutter… you need to promote.

Promote early and promote often.

Now that you have that done… what can you offer as an upsell?

Tip #4 – Have Upsells Ready

If possible, follow up every purchase with an upsell item. This will allow you to maximize revenue inside of the shopping cart.

I would recommend making the upsell item a Black Friday special as well.

Tip #5 – PROMOTE. PROMOTE. PROMOTE.

When Black Friday hits, shoppers will be up EARLY. I recommend sending your email announcing yourself at the stroke of MIDNIGHT.

Also, I would send another email at 5 AM and another around 2 PM.

Finally, send another email reminding shoppers the sale is going to end around 8 PM.

Buyers want to see your offers; they want to know if they can save money.

Don’t be shy.…you are helping them if your specials are indeed money savers. Money is tight for many shoppers, and Black Friday is a way shoppers use to save money.

Quincy

P.S. I’ll be back tomorrow with 5 Tweaks To Your Facebook Page That Can Increase Black Friday Sales

 

Marketing and PR

Don’t let 33% of customers fall through the cracks

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superb-wordpress-header

Today we continue our Black Friday Bootcamp to show you how to make sure your website is mobile-friendly and fast.

The reason we want a mobile-friendly website is because mobile devices accounted for over one-third of ALL sales transactions in 2015.

The name of the game for Black Friday and holiday shopping is to maximize every single visitor. This means we need to ensure our website is optimized for mobile devices.

In addition, Google reports that 77% of mobile searches occur at home or work, places where desktop computers are likely to be present. And I think it’s safe to assume that people will be shopping from the office for this holiday season.

If you’ve not updated your website in a few years, my guess is that you could use a few tweaks to be mobile friendly.

Step 1 – Check Your Existing Site(s)

The first thing we need to do is head over to Google and run a check on your existing website.

You can do that here: https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly

With any luck, your website will already be mobile-friendly and you’ll see the following message per screenshot below. If so, I’ll see you in our next Black Friday Bootcamp article!

superb-awesome

If by any chance you were hit with the following message, there’s a few things we can do to make it mobile friendly.

superb-not-friendly

Assuming that your website is not mobile – think we can remove this line entirely.

Step 2 – How Did You Create Your Site(s)?

In order for us to fix the mobile-friendly problem, we need to know how your website was built.

How was your website built?

  • Content Management System (CMS) like WordPress, Joomla!, or Drupal
  • Someone else built the website
  • I built the website myself and understand coding

I’ll go over a plan of action for each of the above.

Assuming you used WordPress (the most popular CMS), your road to becoming mobile-friendly is rather easy.

WordPress Mobile Websites

First thing you need to do is make sure your WordPress installation is fully up to date. Contact the Superb Internet’s support guru’s if you need help updating WordPress.

If you wish to update WordPress on your own, login to WordPress for the website you wish to make mobile-friendly.

Once logged in, look under the “Home” link for “Updates.” This will be in the top left corner of your WordPress dashboard.

Once you have located the “Updates” link, click it.

superb-wp-dashboard

You will then be taken to a new page where you will be told what updates you need.

superb-wp-update

Once you are up-to-date, your website should be mobile-friendly.

You can re-check your website using the Google Mobile check:

https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly

If you still don’t pass, we can install plugins that will fix everything for us.

Generally, updating WordPress should resolve it. But if your website is still not mobile-friendly then your theme is most likely causing the problem. We can perform a work around by installing the following plugins:

And most current theme’s (if not all) are mobile-friendly for WordPress.

Now, if you are using an alternate CMS, you can visit the following links for more help:

You may ask, “What if someone else has built my website?”

Website(s) Built By A Web Designer Or Programmer

You’ll need to contact your web designer to see if they are capable of making your existing site mobile-friendly. With that said, there are a few things you need to keep in mind when choosing a web developer for this project:

  1. Make it easy for customers. Show them what they want and make it easy for them to take action.
  2. Design for all devices using responsive design. Tablets, phones, desktops.
  3. Use the same domain, don’t place your mobile site on a sub-domain. This just increases work and confusion.
  4. Ask for references and a portfolio of mobile websites.
  5. Make sure your mobile site loads quickly. 4 seconds or less is the general rule of thumb given to us by Google.

But what if you built the site yourself?

I Built The Website Myself

If you understand HTML coding, congrats! You’ll be able to knock this all out on your own.

The good thing is, Google has a checklist you can go over when designing your website here.

I’ll be back in a day or two and we’ll start doing the fun stuff and I’ll give you a few idea’s so you can organize a plan for Black Friday so your sales don’t evaporate.