Monday Marketing Minute Series
The Stingray Branding Team releases a weekly Monday Marketing Minute video on our Facebook Page every week. Each month we focus on a different topic, exploring it and providing you with practical, simple, and actionable information. Tune in every Monday at 3:00 pm EST for these quick Facebook Live sessions from your team of Stingrays. In case you’re busy on Mondays though, we’ve got you covered. Twice a month we recap the information from these sessions in our blog, as well as posting the videos on our YouTube Channel.
This post will complete our series on Website Tips and Tricks, covering the topics of Improving the User Experience and Tips for Website Security. If you have any questions, or comments, or just want to see what our team can do to help you, contact us here. Our team would love to hear from you!
Improving the User Experience
Your website is the anchor of your digital marketing and your business. With a poor user experience (how the user interacts with and their experience on your page), you will lose website visitors and potential customers.
Help users do what they want to do when visiting your website by designing an attractive, simple, and effective user experience with these tips:
- Improve the look and layout of your homepage
- Break up content by segmenting key information
- Use images
- Have a clear Call to Action before the fold – before the first scroll of your website.
- Put the most important and most used information on the home page and make sure it’s easily found
- Include hyperlinks to other pages on your site to keep visitors on your website longer
- Track your page speed. How long does it take your website to load? This can dramatically affect site traffic
- Be responsive and mobile friendly – your website should easily and clearly adjust from desktop view to mobile view and others in between. Most local searches occur on a mobile phone, so you want to make sure your site is just as easy and appealing on a phone as it is on a desktop.
Website Security Tips
The impact of digital security breaches is all over the news. It seems that not a day goes by without a data breach from a trusted source. In the case of larger companies, they seem to weather the storm and return to business. But can you, a smaller business owner, weather the same? Here are seven tips to prevent help you with your security.
- Tip #1 – Keep software up to date
- This is pretty low-hanging fruit, but it’s vital for the security of your site. Many of these updates deal with potential security problems in the current software and are designed to close those loopholes. So please, take a moment, and ensure that all related software is up-to-date.
- Tip #2 – Enforce Strong Password Practices
- We’ve all heard about the need for complex passwords, but we don’t always do so. Even more importantly, we often let our users utilize whatever password they want for the sake of convenience. This makes security compromises that much more likely because it’s easier to crack passwords. Not only should you utilize complex passwords, but you should also make your users do the same.
- Tip #3 – Use HTTPS
- HTTPS is a security protocol used over the Internet. This protects your users by ensuring they are talking to the server they think they’re talking to. It also prevents intercepting and changing the content seen in transit while they browse. This is one of the best ways to protect data for your users and is vital if you are collecting any kind of private data from them.
- Easy and often free. Google has even announced that it will rank you higher if you are using it.
- Tip #4 – Research and Get Website Security Tools
- There are many great commercial and free tools that can be used to test your system for, identify, and correct any vulnerabilities. Utilizing these tools can add another layer of effective security.
- Netsparker, OpenVAS, SecurityHeaders.io, and Xenotix XSS Exploit Framework are all examples of tools you can utilize.
- Tip #5 – Limit User Access
- Human error can cause a ton of problems. Limit the number of users able to make changes to your site in order to limit the potential for these problems.
- Tip #6 – Practice Basic Computer Security
- The basics are often the most effective practices. Keep your devices physically secure, ensure security software is up to date, practice good email and download discipline, and review your personal practices for any holes.
- Tip #7 – Backup your Website
- In the end, it’s always a good idea to be prepared for the worst. So backup your website with a reliable service, just in case.
Stingray Branding is the number one source for your digital marketing needs. Our team of subject matter experts brings a vast array of knowledge and experience to drive your marketing to the next level. No matter the size of your business, or your industry, we can help you. If you have any questions or just want to see how we can help, contact us here. We’d love to hear from you!
