PSPINC Official Company Blog

Website Etiquette your Business Needs to Know

2月

13日

image source: pixabay.com

Last week we talked about the importance of having a company privacy policy visible to customers on your website. Today let’s discuss more etiquette to consider when it comes to your website:

1) Is your contact information easy for customers to find?

If you don’t have a customer service or info email on your homepage, have an online form for customers to fill out. It’s actually better to not list your email address on your homepage as spammers tend to grab those.

2) Does your website load quickly?

Do not load your website with too many images or videos. It won’t matter how pretty those images are if your website loads slowly, because people will not wait to see it. We are impatient beings and you can expect your bounce rate to skyrocket. Have a good balance of content and visual appeal without overdoing large files that slow down your load time.

3) Is it easy to navigate through the site?

Be kind to your visitors and make sure your navigation is easy to follow. You may know your business well but your visitors don’t, so be thoughtful when organizing your layout and navigation. It may be worth asking for some feedback from new customers to see how easy it was for them to navigate your site. Again, people have little tolerance and patience for getting lost online.

4) Have you tested your site?

The simplest way to make sure your website is user friendly is to test it with a focus group. Sometimes we’re “too close” to the product to understand how others experience it. Consider asking some outsiders (friends, family, business associates) to check your site and provide feedback so you can update accordingly.

If you would like a professional analysis of your website, contact us at PSPinc. We can do a free evaluation and give you some pointers for improvement. Contact us toll free at 1-800-232-3989.

#Blog #BusinessTips #ENnews #PSPinc #SmallBusiness #Technology #WebDevelopment #Website #WebsiteTips

Have a Privacy Statement for your Customers

2月

6日

image source: pixabay.com

California has a new law regarding how businesses can handle client data online. It’s called California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). EU countries implemented similar rules for handling private data a few years ago called General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

CCPA prohibits businesses from selling their client data. It is very specific about who this rule applies to: any company that operates in California and either makes at least $25 million in annual revenue, gathers data on more than 50,000 users, or makes more than half if its money off user data.

Even if you do not meet these thresholds, it’s important for your business to clearly inform customers how you manage their private information in your website’s privacy statement. A privacy statement explains how you conduct your business online and handle your customers’ sensitive information.

If you do not have a privacy statement, it’s good business practice to review your policies and make a statement publicly visible to your customers. After all, users are getting savvy and they want to know their data is stored safely.

If you are still unsure if any of this applies to your company, PSPinc can help you determine a plan for updating your site. Contact us toll free at 1-800-232-3989 and ask for assistance from our knowledgeable web hosting representatives.

#Blog #BusinessTips #CCPA #ENnews #GDPR #PSPinc #PrivacyStatement #SmallBusiness #Technology

PSPinc What's New Vol.4

2月

5日

INTRODUCTION TO INFORMAKERS

Hello, this is Ken Uchikura from Tokyo. Yes, I am on a business trip to Tokyo. I left Seattle yesterday on a direct flight to Tokyo/Narita on a Japan Airlines flight. I used to fly JAL many years ago but they stopped flying to Seattle so I moved to Northwest Airlines which is now DELTA. For a few years, I used Air Canada and Asiana Airlines but both do not have direct flights to Tokyo. This is the first time I have flown JAL in many years. I found a way to save money on JAL Business Class to Japan. If you are interested, please email me and I will tell you my secret.

Sorry for the long introduction. Today I would like to talk to you about InforMakers. This is software we created to help our customers create custom web forms for their web sites. This is the software we used to create contact forms on many websites. It is easy-to-use and is very secure. If you are a Dreamersi web hosting customer, InforMakers is already a part of your system. You can create your own custom web form or you can ask us to build one for you quickly and inexpensively.

If you are not a Dreamersi customer, InforMakers is available as a SaaS (Software as a Service) to you as well. If you would like to know more about web form creation and operation, please contact us. We would be happy to help make your web site interactive.

Inquiry about InforMakers
Website: https://informakers.com
Email: info@pspinc.com
Telephone: 1-800-232-3989 or 1-425-957-0808

Kenichi Uchikura
President / CEO
Pacific Software Publishing, Inc.

#blog #businesstips #dreamersi #ennews #pacificsoftwarepublishing #pspinc #smallbusiness #technology #webapplications #websites

PSPinc What's New Vol. 3

1月

29日

#blog #businesstips #dreamersi #pacificsoftwarepublishing #pspinc #technology

PSPinc What's New Vol. 2

1月

22日

WHAT IS ML-5?

Hello, this is Ken Uchikura again from Pacific Software Publishing, Inc. We are very privileged to be chosen to take care of your Domain, Web and Email needs. We have been working very hard to make sure the services that you use are secure and stable. You probably did not feel it, but we had a massive DDoS attack to our servers lasting an entire week. We were able to reroute all DDoS traffic to the abyss and run the entire service on one side of our network without causing any service outage. This took place from January 5th - 11th this year. We are now redesigning our network to mitigate more incidents like this. I will keep you posted.

Note: What is DDoS attack?

A distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack is a malicious attempt to disrupt normal traffic of a targeted server, service or network by overwhelming the target or its surrounding infrastructure with a flood of Internet traffic.

Here is what we are working on.

When we started our Internet service back in 1996 (23 years ago), there was no email software we could use to provide reliable service with. So we created our own POP email server system called ST Mail. It was designed to run on a Windows Server. We have upgraded ST Mail and it is currently on version 4.0 supporting POP and IMAP.

2 years ago, we started to design and build a new email server based completely on a new codebase running on a Linux server. We are happy to say that we will be starting internal tests of this new email server (codename PSP ML-5) this quarter. We are hoping to start using this new server to provide Dreamersi email service by this Summer.

ST Mail, running on Windows servers, is still one of the most stable and fastest email servers in the industry. However, ML-5 is going to be even faster and more stable. Plus, ML-5 will have one more feature that no other email server has. With ML-5 you will be able to host your email server at your own facility and it will be backed up by our datacenter. You will be able to install and run your email from your office with no limitations. When the server in your office is offline, your email service will automatically be handled by PSPinc - there will be no down time.

This is one of the products we are currently creating. I will continue to write about other exciting things that we are working on. Please let me know what you think.

Kenichi Uchikura
President / CEO
Pacific Software Publishing, Inc.

#PSPWhatsNew #PSPWhatsNewNewsletter #businesstips #pacificsoftwarepublishing #pspinc #technology

Does your Business Need Opinion Stand?

1月

16日

image source: pixabay.com

Have you ever wanted to give a review (bad or good) of a company on the spot? Perhaps you just finished dining at a restaurant and you’d like to recognize the top notch service you received. On the contrary, maybe you experienced long wait times and unfriendly service at a retail store or a sporting event.

These are often the moments where you feel a strong desire to give some feedback to management, but you don’t have time to wait for a manager, and once you get home, you’re too busy (or forget) to send an email with your complaints or accolades.

Good, constructive feedback for a business is often lost because that instant review hasn’t been available. Until now. PSP offers a service called Opinion Stand. It’s designed for your customers to give instant feedback about their experience at the time of service. It’s extremely simple, easy-to-use for customers and customizable to your business’ needs.

Opinion Stand comes in a physical kiosk for your brick and mortar location as well as digital formats for your online store. It’s a great way to monitor activity and view customer satisfaction trends, so you know what’s working and what needs to change.

Get all the details, options and pricing on Opinion Stand here: https://www.opinionstand.com/eng/.

#Blog #BusinessTips #CustomerReviews #ENnews #OpinionStand #PSPinc #SmallBusiness #Technology

Update your Website's Copyright Date, Among Other Things

1月

9日

image source: pixabay.com

It’s a new year and most of us have a new set of goals. One business goal you should consider this year is giving your website an update. At the very least, make sure the copyright year is updated to 2020 on your homepage (usually in the footer).

As important as it is for your website’s content and graphics to be refreshed, it’s equally as important you keep up with the security upgrades to your servers and backend tools on programs such as WordPress. Not all content management systems have automatic updates, and your site can get infected without you knowing if you don’t keep up with security updates. Unfortunately, there is no perfect software protection and those open source programs such as WordPress are often the primary target of hackers.

When a hacker searches and finds vulnerability in old WordPress installs, they can hack the site and “inject” malicious code in the SQL Database used for WordPress. The hackers’ goal is to steal important data, so most commonly seen cyber-attacks involve the hacker redirecting links on your site to links on the hacker’s fake site. It’s hard for a business to know they’ve been cyber-attacked unless they have a trusted web hosting company or developer who will scan their data and maintain their latest WordPress security upgrades.

PSP offers a WordPress option of Dreamersi.com, our popular website building tool. With our program, every three months the latest security version of WordPress is installed, and all the major plugins are automatically updated. Even then, we advise customers to login to their content management systems and check for any security updates.

Start fresh in the New Year. Make sure you’ve updated your website’s copyright year, update outdated content and banners, as well as login and make sure you don’t have any strange activity going on without your knowledge! If you have no idea where to start, you can always contact us at PSP for help.

#2020 #Blog #BusinessTips #Dreamersi #ENnews #NewYear #PSPinc #SmallBusiness #Technology #WebsiteCopyright #WordPress

Presenting at the first SEA Luncheon of 2020

1月

9日

Today Mayumi Nakamura, Director of Business Development, was one of the chosen presenters for the first Seattle Executives Association meeting of 2020.

She spoke about some of our successful deployments of websites, web servers and mobile applications we have made recently.

As a part of her presentation she also discussed and credited other Seattle Executives Companies that have, and continue to contribute to PSPinc’s success.

We are excited for what 2020 has in store - stay tuned!

#PSPinc #PacificSoftwarePublishingInc #Technology #WebApplications #Websites

What is TLS 1.2 and what does it mean to be compliant?

12月

27日

Lately there is a lot of talk going on around Internet Security. Much of the talk are about supporting TLS 1.2, but you are asked to buy an SSL Certificate. You must be confused like I am. You need to support TLS 1.2 to be considered secure, and soon the newer browsers will enforce that. Starting sometime in March of next year, new browsers will not even display the content if your website is not TLS 1.2 or later.

When you read up on the Internet, you'll learn that TLS is a successor to SSL. So, what is a TLS certificate? Why are you still asked to buy SSL when SSL is replaced by TLS. What is going on?

It is really confusing and stupid. I learned there are two meanings to SSL. (1) SSL is a certificate you buy to verify your company's security. “SSL Certificate”, (2) is the encryption method called SSL. The encryption method SSL is the one that is succeeded by TLS. The versions that are available for TLS are 1.0, 1.1, 1.2 and 1.3. And starting March 2020, anything below TLS 1.2 will not be considered safe. Of course, all SSL excretions are obsolete.

Here is the confusing part: To use TLS, you need to be verified by a third party as an existing business or organization. That certificate is still called SSL. So you need to purchase an SSL certificate to activate TLS. Was I able to clear up this confusion? I hope I did. If you are not SSL certified or using anything less than TLS 1.2, or if you do not know which version you are using, please give us a call. We will be happy to look it up.

#pacificsoftwarepublishing #technology #webhosting

Office New Year’s Resolutions

12月

26日

image source: pexels.com

Another year down, another set of resolutions is forthcoming for 2020. While you may already be thinking of some personal goals for the New Year, why not consider making some resolutions for your work life as well? We’ve come up with some ideas for office New Year’s resolutions that you can customize to your level of comfort:

For Management:

If you’re in management, consider designating a monthly or quarterly staff appreciation event. This can look like surprise donuts showing up in the breakroom all the way up to a full-blown catered lunch event. It can be setting up an employee of the month program or department of the month program to recognize individuals who have gone above and beyond. Decide what works for your company as far as frequency and budget.

Is it time for a website overhaul in 2020? Need a responsive-design site your customers can view on all devices? Maybe it’s time to start some email marketing in the New Year and extend your reach? Contact us at PSP (800-232-3989) for all your web hosting, design and marketing needs.

For the Individual:

A cluttered workspace makes for a cluttered mind. Start the New Year off fresh by cleaning and organizing, not only your physical desktop but also your PC desktop as well. Then move onto emails, sorting, filing and deleting as you go.

Make an in-office health goal. This could mean walking on your lunch break or drinking a certain amount of water per day. Maybe you want to cut back on cola or coffee. Maybe it involves some personalization, bringing in framed pictures of your loved ones and a potted plant to bring your workspace to life.

For the Company:

Come up with an annual company volunteer day and give your staff the option to devote a workday to giving back to your community. This might involve picking up litter at a park or volunteering to organize shelves at the food bank. It may be volunteering at a career day in school. Determine what kind of charity work aligns with your company values and take lots of pictures of your staff in action for the social media campaign to follow.

#2020 #Blog #BusinessTips #ENnews #NYE2019 #NewYearsResolutions #OfficeGoals #PSPinc #SmallBusiness #Technology