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1ShoppingCart Hit by Dreaded DoS Attack
Many of you may know that 1ShoppingCart (and it’s many “white label” versions) was down for most of yesterday afternoon. When I logged into a client’s 1ShoppingCart account today, the following message from 1ShoppingCart popped up.
(1ShoppingCart has many “white label” versions/”private resellers” such as KickstartCart, Cartville, 1AutomationWiz, PracticePaySolutions, and others – anything that starts with “https://www.mcssl.com/” in the URL when you log in.)
Yesterday, July 14th 2010, we encountered a service interruption from approximately 3:18PM EDT until 7:20PM EDT.
We apologize for yesterday’s service interruption. We understand that it is our responsibility to ensure best-in-class service availability. We take this responsibility very seriously and therefore want to share with you the facts. It is important to note that throughout this outage, your data remained entirely safe and secure.
Yesterday’s service interruption was caused by a denial of service attack, which was aimed towards our systems. A denial-of-service attack (DoS attack) is an attempt to make a computer resource unavailable to its intended users. Although the means to carry out, motives for, and targets of a DoS attack may vary, it generally consists of the concerted efforts to prevent an Internet site or service from functioning efficiently or at all. As you may know, every major provider is attacked every single day, and on occasion perpetrators achieve some or all of their goals. Even some of the biggest websites on the Internet are not immune to these types of attacks.
Our monitoring systems alerted us of a potential issue at 3:18PM EDT and immediately our Engineering teams began work to defend against this attack. We are confident that this outage, while it may have seemed lengthy, was mitigated as quickly as possible. During the entire time, our Client Services team was posting constant updates to our Twitter account in an attempt to keep you informed on our progress. We appreciated your support and understanding while we worked to get you back online.
The nature of these attacks are constantly evolving and each attack is different. We will continue to invest in our systems and continue to work endlessly to regain your confidence in our system and make 1ShoppingCart the most reliable and stable shopping cart solution available. We commit to you, our customers, that there is nothing more important to us than ensuring 1ShoppingCart is there when you need it.
If you would like to discuss this in more detail, please call 1-888-792-1961.
Podcast Marketing Success Strategies
While podcasting has been around for about seven years, there has been a stigma that podcasts are only viewed by Internet Marketers and technology people. Well, that might have been true initially, but times have changed! One of the greatest catalysts for the rapid growth of business podcasting in 2010 has been the iPhone. Waves of people have purchased new smartphones over the last 12 months and are readily downloading podcasts more than ever before! In fact, 70% of all podcast downloads comes from the iPhone, if you can believe that.
Podcasting is a highly portable and easy-to-implement communication tool for businesses to effectively build brand, connect with a target audience and increase their customer and client base.
Of course, business owners often lack the time and skills to effectively set up, produce and promote their podcasts. It is for this reason that VAClassroom has created this innovative and timely mini-course.
Registration is now officially open for the PODCAST MARKETING SUCCESS STRATEGIES Mini-Course.
The two-week mini-course officially gets underway on Monday, April 5, 2010, and is priced at a very reasonable rate ($147) for the first run of the program.
Please visit this direct link to the VAclassroom Podcast Marketing Success Strategies Mini-Course (click the name) to learn more about the course.
And, as always, if starting a podcast is something you’re interested in, but don’t want to mess with the “behind the scenes” part of podcasting, schedule a consultation with me so we can discuss how I can help take that off your plate!
Reading Clients’ Minds
Sometimes I might as well be having the following conversation with a client when it comes to their projects.
Client – I need you to find someone to build me a fence.
Me – Where?
Client – Out around my property.
Me – Do you have a lot layout/dimensions of where you want the fence?
Client – Um, I’m not sure exactly where I want it yet.
Me – OK, moving on…What’s the fence for?
Client – Why does it matter?
Me – Um, well, is it going to be a decorative one, a tall one to keep stuff out, for livestock, chickens, kids, etc.?
Client – Oh, I just want something around the perimeter to define my property.
Me – OK, so, chain link/hurricane fencing, barbed wire, chicken wire, picket, privacy, split rail, stone, brick…???
Yeah, that conversation could go on and on, but I think you get the idea. Seriously, clients and potential clients, KNOW what you want when you ask your VA to do something for you – and SHARE that information with him/her. Don’t give just half the information. If you KNOW you’re going to want a 4″ natural stone fence, pass that information on. It’s very costly for YOU (and frustrating to us) when we have to drag it out of you and end up on a snipe hunt!
Services for QuickBooks 2007 to be Discontinued
After May 31, 2010 many of the services for QuickBooks 2007 will be discontinued by Intuit. Affected services for QuickBooks 2007 will be: Assisted Payroll, Basic Payroll, Enhanced Payroll, Standard Payroll, Employee Organizer, Merchant Service, Billing Solution (formerly QuickBooks Online Billing), QuickBooks Email, Bill Pay, Online Banking, Credit Card Download, Technical Support Plans and Services. If you are using any of these services and want to continue, you will need to upgrade.
HTML Editor on a Budget
If you do minor editing of your clients’ web pages, html ezines/newsletters or like to tweak the coding in wordpress blog posts & pages but are on a budget, you may only be able to drool over Dreamweaver. Many people don’t know there are options out there other than hand coding in Notepad. Have you seen any of the products from Coffee Cup? I’ve used some of their products and have found them to be easy to work in and far less complicated than Dreamweaver. And best of all, they have a load of free stuff! And, what you do buy from them is much less expensive than their “name brand” competitors! For instance, as of the writing of this post, their HTML editor software is $49. For those of you who don’t even want to mess with code, they have a Visual Site Designer for $49 also. Of course, this isn’t going to turn you into a stellar web designer, but it can certainly make things a little easier for those of us who are not web designers!
Off-Site Backup Solution for QuickBooks
I was researching something earlier and ran across an interesting idea for backing up your QuickBooks file.
Set your QuickBooks to automatically backup every time you close it (make sure you’re using the data verification!!) and set it to save in your DropBox folder!
I don’t know why I didn’t think of this sooner, as I use DropBox and LOVE it! The free version comes with 2 MB of storage space, but honestly, I’m not anywhere even close to that right now (only using about 6% of my space).
Virtual Events Training
It is always exciting to uncover hot and profitable new niches to tap into for your Virtual Business. Well, Internet Marketing, Ecommerce Support and Social Media Marketing continue to be very in-demand” services niches and will continue to be for quite some time, I am particularly excited about this new niche emerging in the Virtual Event Industry.
I personally believe that the “Virtual Events” field is one of the hottest avenues to building your business right now, especially in this down economy. The statistics are clear: There is currently a significant increase in the number of participants attending virtual events such as webinars, tele-events, live podcasts and web TV shows. However, there is a corresponding decrease in those attending offline events and conferences partly due to the economy, but for a host of other reasons as wells. The reality is that Virtual Events are more cost-effective to deliver and attend, have the capacity to reach a larger audience and can be re-broadcast for continued exposure.
Businesses are keenly interested in running Virtual Events right now, but many lack the knowledge and time to effectively set-up and implement the Virtual Events successfully. As a result, this has presented a very timely and unque opportunity for Virtual Professionals to position themselves as a “Virtual Event Specialist”!
On September 16th, VAClassroom will be hosting a “must attend” event with Craig Cannings and Virtual Event Expert, Michelle Schoen titled,
“Building a Profitable Niche as a Virtual Event Specialist (Even in a Down Economy)!”
They will be exploring the crucial skills required to effectively deliver Virtual Event Set-up and Management services to your clients.
In addition, they will be sharing some exciting news on our upcoming training program: The Virtual Event Specialist Certification.
So, go ahead and click on the below link to watch a short 5 minute video and then sign-up to receive some special bonus information including more details on the upcoming event on September 16th!
Click Here: http://www.vaclassroom.com/virtual-event-specialist/
I Was in Napa Valley getting drunk over the weekend?! Really?!
I just had a conversation with a client who said she was happy to see that I was back from Napa Valley safely. I was confused and told her I hadn’t gone to Napa Valley. She said she thought she read on her Facebook page that I’d gone to Napa Valley and drank too much this weekend…and she was wondering why I went to Napa Valley for the weekend when I live in South Carolina!
Just goes to show that your clients, potential clients and colleagues ARE watching – but sometimes they are watching someone else! What if that client was totally put-off by the thought that I really was out boozing it up in Napa? What if that ONE message (that I didn’t even post) made them decide to cut me loose as their assistant because of what they THOUGHT I was doing because she was “skimming” her social network updates?
I’m glad she and I were able to have a laugh about this one, but it could have turned out differently. Scary.
Have you ever had something like that happen to you?
Alternate Office Locations and Living Life
There has been some conversation recently in my circle about “why I love my life”. Here are some of the reasons I love doing what I do.
I can work from my satellite office (deck) when the weather’s nice (like this morning) or the kids want to swim, auxiliary offices (kitchen table & couch) when I need to work but not necessarily without distraction, and my headquarters (upstairs office w/ desk, desktop computer, fax, scanner, laser printer, the whole 9 yards) when I really need to get down to business! And let’s not forget my alternate locations at my kid’s school, the library, Starbucks, McDonald’s, Books-a-Million and my father-in-law’s house in another state just to name a few! (Gotta love wi-fi!)
I can take time “away” to volunteer for the PTO/PTA, watch TV with my husband, go to my kid’s soccer game/practice, run errands, go to a doctor/dentist visit or just sit and play with my kids without having to ask for time off.
I get to do all this while helping other entrepreneurs be able to take the same time “away” to live THEIR lives without worrying about THEIR businesses. How great is that!?
Email Marketing No-Nos
I received an email today from someone I had gotten a service quote from in the past (for my house). I received it in both my business email and my Gmail account (because I have my Gmail set up as a “back up” for my business account). I didn’t even look at it in my Outlook…simply deleted it because there was NO TEXT in the body of the email. However, Gmail has the thumbnail preview of attached images at the bottom of the emails, and I saw it was possibly a “legitimate” email, so I opened the full picture. As a result, I sat down and wrote the following email:
Hi [removed],
I received your email today with your [removed] Sunroom information. However, if I may offer some suggestions…
Sending an email to 436 people in a way where anyone receiving the email can view and save the email address of everyone else the email has been sent to is bad email etiquette. It’s very easy for someone to simply right click on a name and get the email address for every single person on your list. For example, I know that [removed name]’s email address is [removed]2001@aol.com simply by using that technique. And in Gmail, I don’t even have to go through all that trouble…I can just click on the “show details” link in my email and it will show the email addresses of everyone with a single click. Some people just don’t want their email addresses out there. And if someone has the option checked to “automatically add recipients to my contact list” in their email program and they click on “reply all” to your email…guess what, now all those people on your email are in that person’s contact list and are more susceptible to viruses and those incessantly forwarded email jokes and chain letters.
Sending that many emails at one time will many times get you flagged as a potential spammer by your Internet service provider as well as raise your SPAM score in SPAM filters…so your email might not even get seen by your customers and potential customers because it is much more likely to get filtered out by their SPAM filters.
Subject line. Most people do not open email where they do not understand the subject line. Your subject was “Emailing: Page Title”. That has no call to action and does not give the sender any information about what’s in the email.
No body text. There was not TEXT in your email stating WHO the email was from, what company, etc.
Only graphics in the email. Most email programs no longer show graphics unless the sender is added to your “safe sender” list or unless you physically click on the “show pictures” option. Again, if no one knows who it’s from and there’s no text in the message of the email to say who you are or what the email is about, so the odds of someone clicking on the option to see the picture to see what you have to say is slim since almost all the emails that have no text and only graphics are ads for “cheap pharmaceuticals” and porn.
Do you have a mechanism in place to see how many people actually opened your email, or are you just going on blind faith?
So, if I have all these reasons why no one would open the email, why did I open the email? I’ll tell you why…because this is what I do for a living…I manage email marketing campaigns for small business and entrepreneurs. And I’m interested in what even the “spam” is like. I learn from every email I receive – good and bad.
If you would like to continue with email campaigns, I would be happy to talk with you about how you can continue to send emails, track who opens them, and increase your “open rate” in the process, I’d be glad to talk with you to discuss how I could help [removed] Remodeling accomplish this.
Will I ever hear from this guy again? Will he even read my email? Will he take any action to help ensure his emails get read in the future? I don’t know.
