The internet really can be a safe and convenient place for you to run your business, take care of your finances and enjoy shopping. All you need to do is encompass a “safety & security” mindset and include some simple but “must do” tasks which have to be part of your continuing daily/weekly/monthly online and offline routine.

As you read the following always keep in mind that with websites on the internet and emails that you receive to your inbox, graphics can easily be copied or forged to look like the "official" real things. So don't be fooled by logos and fancy icons on any page anywhere, they mean nothing. If a site or email seems suspicious for any reason, steer clear of it, you always have options on the internet!

There are several things you can look for when visiting a website and are considering making an online transaction there.

Most eCommerce websites (sites where you spend your money) have some sort of “secure site” verification logos that you will probably be familiar with. These logos are either on the home page, on the individual shopping pages or at least when you go to checkout.

Yes, I know, I just said don't be fooled by logos!

But with “genuine” graphics, you can click these logos and they will bring you to a verification page connected to the security company’s website, usually with information on the page proclaiming that the site you are visiting is certified as secure via their online security system, along with other details. Sometimes the security certificates are expired. If you are on a particular site and need to shop at that specific one, simply be patient and take the time to contact their support and tell them about the security problem. Some sites are owned by small business owners and they may have overlooked renewing their certificates.

When you get to the point of checking out at a site and providing your personal and payment information, there are several things to look for to ensure your specific transaction is secure and safe. Sometimes the URL to the payment page will change to “https://” from the usual “http://”. Also, depending on your browser and your chosen visual theme for your browser, you should get a little icon of a locked padlock somewhere in the bottom (usually right hand side) of your browser’s frame.

As an extra precaution, it is always good to purchase with a credit card or your PayPal or other large online money processing company rather than an eCheck. These types of transactions are nearly always backed up by the processor or credit card company so if you find that you did make a purchase from a fraudulent company, any reputable processor or credit card company will quickly investigate the transaction and if they find it to be bad, then they will refund your money.

Always check out your processors’ and credit card companies policies prior to using them so you will know if the need arises, if and how they will support you in times of trouble.

Smart Moves With Credit Card and Payment Processor Accounts

Here is a REALLY good tip in regards to using credit cards online and using online payment processing companies. Use a separate credit card with a fairly low limit for your online purchases. Why? Because if somehow your credit card number does get in the hands of a criminal, they cannot charge more than what’s on the limit. This should ensure that on top of being a victim of theft, you aren't stuck with thousands of dollars of unsolicited bills to pay in case your credit card or processor won’t back you up.

Plus, make sure it is a credit card that does not allow you to purchase over the limit so a criminal can’t keep charging and charging to their heart’s delight! If you wish to use the card often, just make sure you pay the full balance due each month so that you have your full limit available for purchases each month as you like.

The same goes with online payment processors like PayPal. Never keep a large balance in your PayPal or other online processor's account. And be sure to keep it linked to a bank account with a low balance and no overdraft protection either! Then when the money/balance/limits run out, the criminal who stole your account number can't keep charging to $1,000s of dollars using your overdraft protection — arghhhh — what a thought, but it could happen!

Another smart thing to do is to login to all of your online payment accounts, bank accounts and credit card accounts once a week - at least - to check your recent transactions and balances often. If fraudulent activity has occurred the sooner it is addressed, the better. If you do see that questionable transactions have occurred, act immediately and don't waste time with online support — pick up the phone and call the payment processor right at that very second! Then be sure to close those accounts right away also.

Something suspicious with your online account? If you happen to try to login to one of your accounts, key in all of your login details correctly and the account won’t let you in after repeated attempts on your part and you are sure you are using the correct login information — you NEED to call the company whose site you are trying to login to right away. Do NOT wait! The first thing that hackers do when getting into accounts illegally is change the login details to keep the owner out!

Additionally, as you do your daily/weekly and monthly tracking, be sure to change your passwords often. Create complex passwords consisting of upper and lower case letters, numbers and special characters whenever allowed. They should always be at least 6 characters - more if allowed. Never use the same password for multiple accounts, nor use any common words that relate to your life that others would know like your children’s or pet’s names, phone numbers or addresses.

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Yes, it IS a bit of a chore to track or memorize fancy passwords,
and yes it IS a bit of a time taker to constantly login to all of your accounts
and check them out. But considering what could happen if you don’t do these things and someone hacks into your accounts then uses them illegally — it’s the smart and simple thing to do — thus you CAN have a pleasant and productive online life!

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Tips to Keep in Mind While Conducting Online Business

As you work online throughout your day, always keep in mind the following tips when creating new accounts — anywhere...

First off, remember the password rules mentioned above. Those tips apply to any online account, not just financial institutions. I suggest that what you should do now then, that if you already have accounts set up online whether at your bank or your favorite online store, that you go login to them and update your accounts based on the above tips immediately to all of your current accounts as well.

All full-service reputable online businesses will always allow you to update your personal information quickly and easily any time you wish, usually providing you with online help links, contact links with email addresses, online support forms and/or contact phone numbers.

If you are online at a site and these support options, including the updating of your account information is not available or extremely limited, you should question whether or not you wish to pursue purchasing any services or products from that website. Nowadays the internet is so loaded with options for just about any type of service or product you may need, simply do a search and check out other sites.

Never have the websites “remember” your financial information such as your credit card or account numbers — don't get lazy with your personal and financial safety! Yes, it is easier to have sites remember your account details, but it’s not very easy dealing with an account that has been attacked or stolen.

Never have sites or your browser remember your passwords either. It’s just simply NOT worth the few moments of ease if a criminal gets your login information!

After visiting a site such as your bank, be sure to actually logout of your account, not just simply close the browser window. Logging out ends your online session with that website and causes the next visit to have to be secure and logged into with account credentials.

After visiting a site where you have provided secured information or been previewing your account information, and after logging out completely, then you should completely quit out of your browser. Many sites’ logout pages actually recommend this or to at least close that particular window or tab of your browser. It is really best though to quit the browser completely and not take unnecessary chances with your information.

Email Smarts

We have all heard about the dangerous “phishing” emails and how to NEVER, EVER click a link in a suspicious email. Nor should you EVER send these folks any personal information whether it's your phone number or your social security number.

So how do you know if the email is suspicious? Think about them, many of them are pretty dumb and don’t even make real sense. They are sent by desperate criminals too lazy to get a job and so they will do anything to get your money.

There are several ways to know a fake or phishing email:

• Many of the same types of emails come to you several times a week or even in a day. No reputable company is going to bombard their customers with multiple emails, in that period of time, that you haven’t signed up for.

• Emails come in from strange banks from all over the world. How in the “world” would these banks even know your email address? If they were reputable, they wouldn’t!

• You won the Microsoft lottery. Or the Hyundai lottery. Ha! or how about the London Bridges lottery? Here again, why in the world would a software company or a car manufacturer or some other nonsensical organization even be running a lottery? Let alone, figure out how to even contact you personally to let you know about it since you know you didn’t ever even enter their lotteries.

• Someone claims in the name of God (bless their souls for this one) that you have some long lost amount of money coming to you from who even knows where - a family member you never knew you had died - a lonely military person who lives half way across the world - or maybe some generous old man who is dying of cancer and just can’t find anyone else to give his money away to so he has chosen you. Ha! again — chances are if any of this nonsense even were true you’d get a certified letter in the mail anyway.

• You get a job offer. Some company from a country you have never even heard of picked “you” - out of the blue - to work for them to handle their finances and transfer bazillions of dollars of their funds to the US through your personal bank account. All you need to do is send them your account information and social security number and they’ll get started right away - oh - and you can keep half or more of the money if you help. Well now, does any of that make sense either???? No, of course not.

What You Can Do:

• Keep track of the financial institutions that you do have online accounts with. Know which ones you have signed up for email alerts with. Many of them send the email to you with a salutation using your real name, not "Dear Account Holder" or some other generic title.

• Protect your email addresses just like you do any other personal information. It a smart thing to set up several addresses, using only one special one for all of your real personal and financial transactions so that when an email comes in to that one, you can be almost certain, that email received is legitimate.

• Limit who you give any of your email addresses to, keep certain ones for certain activities, and change them often too. These ideas will help you limit at least some of your spam and phishing emails you receive.

• It is the right thing to do too, when receiving the fake/phishing emails from large reputable companies like Bank of America or PayPal to forward them to these companies so they can investigate and disable them as soon as possible. These companies take spoofs VERY seriously. Usually you can find out from each company’s website who to forward the emails to, such as: spoof@_______ or abuse@_________. Reporting these criminal emails when you can, helps eliminate some additional ones from being sent out by criminals and helps keep everyone safer online.

Keeping Your Computer Criminal Free

• At least once a week or more if you surf and shop online often, delete your browser’s cache, cookies and saved form data. Assuming you don't have your browser save your passwords, you don't need to delete these, but if you do save them, clear those out very often too.

• Make it another part of your weekly routine to scan your computer for viruses and keyloggers among all the other junk that can accumulate there or be put there by others as you try to enjoy your online experience. (Keyloggers are programs that get onto your computer and track your keystrokes thus learning your passwords and user names, horrible I know!!!) Set up your scanning to run while you cook dinner or other chores and then you won’t miss out on your favorite computer time because your virus software is scanning and tying up your computer.

• Keep your operating system, browsers and virus protection as updated as possible. Why? Because most updates and upgrades contain added security features. New viruses and computer threats come to light every single day — you can’t run old software and expect it to be protected against current threats.

It’s always a good idea to go to the software manufacturers’ websites to get updates and fixes rather than clicking links that suddenly appear on your computer desktop, in balloons or links in emails notices that claim you need to update now. Why don’t you want your computer to automatically update itself? Because these lazy criminal hackers create programs to look just like your computer’s operating system requesting you to download updates. When you do, you end up not downloading innocent updates, but the hackers’ viruses and programs they need to ruin your computer, steal your personal information, or even worse — use your computer as a part of their “network” of computers to perform their fraudulent activities!

Some automatic updates are safe such as your virus protection software. But be very careful even about that. Read exactly what the window is requesting you to allow it to do, know if you have that software’s automatic updates turned on or not and track how often it requests to be done. Some software will give you reports of what has been updated and when so you can check to see if what you uploaded really was what you thought it was.

Simple Offline Smarts to Ensure Your Online Safety

Financial and personal information needs to be monitored and protected in other places besides the internet. Most businesses’ systems are run online to some extent now-a-days whether or not you personally access your account that you have with them via the internet. Thus there is still an online threat to your account(s).

• Be sure to read your account statements as soon as you get them in the mail, review the list of transactions and check the balances to make sure they agree with your own activities. Shred important documents you don’t want before recycling.

• Watch your mobile phone transactions too! You are sending your personal and financial data basically via the internet when you use your phones to do this.

• In the same respect, remember that using wireless internet in public places or at home, you are using airwaves to modems that the public are using or can also access if not secured. So be sure any data you send through this process is via an encryption system of some sort.

• You can get online statements emailed to you which eliminates Postal Mail theft threats. Don't leave your mail in your mail box for extended periods of time because of this problem.

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As you can see, the above mentioned items are more common sense
than anything. If you don't get tempted to be lazy and build in these tips
into your routine, they will become automatic and are ever so important.
Each new day brings new threats to our livelihood —
but that doesn’t mean you can’t be secure and have fun online!

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Claudia Beck has been a professional graphic designer & illustrator for over 25 years. She has a vast range of experience in the advertising, branding and marketing fields with worldwide clients ranging from local & state governments to world-class ski resorts.

Now herself a Mom and business owner, she is in the process of combining her multiple online and offline businesses to create one overall Business Promotional Services company specializing in women entrepreneurs.

She loves what she does and can’t wait until each new day to assist other women in the success of their own businesses!

 

1. Update the pages on your website frequently. Stagnant sites are dropped by some search engines. Many website visitors never bookmark places they’ve visited and simply do a quick Search Engine search each time for sites they like.

Did you know? Blogs, a.k.a. “weblog” originally came about as a method to keep websites continually active when the products and or other content really couldn’t be updated very often. You can do this easily - simply create your blog as an extenstion of your website so as you write and update your blog, it will be reflected through to your websites as an update!

2. Encourage bookmarking of your site. Add a link to your primary page with a script ‘Book Mark or Add this site to your Favorites’.

3. Ensure that each page on your website has appropriate titles and keywords so that your customer can find their way back to your site if they have bookmarked your site and lose the bookmark.

4. Offer additional value on your website. For affiliates and partners you can place links to their sites and products, plus ask them to do the same for you. You can also advertise their books or videos, if these products relate to your industry and are not in competition with your own product. Be sure to add “alt” tags when possible so these can help your pages get indexed properly.

Did you know? The internet’s original purpose was for those in search of information. So be sure to offer content in the form of articles and tips that relate your your website’s topic as additional “value”. This also helps the Search Engines pick up your webpages when you have keyword rich written articles within your website.

5. Set up your site for visitors to be able to ‘opt in’ to get discounts and special offers. Place a link on your site to invite customers to ‘opt in’ to get a monthly newsletter or valuable coupons. With today’s modern internet technology you can now create “squeeze pages” to quickly and easily grab your site visitor’s opted-in information.

6. Add a link ‘Recommend this site to a Friend’ so that the visitor can email your website link just by clicking on it. Use a prewritten title such as “Thought you might be interested in this”.

7. Brand your website so that visitors always know they are on your site. Use consistent colors, logos and slogans and always provide a ‘Contact Us’ link on each page. Read related article right here on this blog.

8. Create an ‘Our Policies’ page that clearly defines your philosophy and principles in dealing with your customers. Also post your privacy policy as well so that clients know they are secure when they visit your site.

9. Create a FAQ page which addresses most of the doubts and clarifications about your product or your company that are likely to be asked. This helps to resolve most of the customers doubts in their first visit to your site.

10. Never spam a client who has opted for newsletters with unsolicited emails. Later if they decide they want to ‘opt out’ of the mailings, be sure you honor their request and take them off the mailing list. They may still come back if they like your products. But they will certainly not come back if you continue to flood their email box with mails they no longer wish to receive.

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Claudia Beck has been a professional graphic designer & illustrator for over 25 years. She has a vast range of experience in the advertising, branding and marketing fields with worldwide clients ranging from local & state governments to world-class ski resorts.

Now herself a Mom and business owner, she is in the process of combining her multiple online and offline businesses to create one overall Business Promotional Services company specializing in women entrepreneurs.

She loves what she does and can’t wait until each new day to assist other women in the success of their own businesses!

“Getting my boys motivated was tricky!”

With my first child, I started early when he was a young toddler. He was expected to clean up his toys when finished playing. As I sang the “Barney” clean up song, I would help him to put away his toys, thus modeling for him the expected behavior. As he got older, so did his chore list, and I used a chore chart. This was like a checklist so that he could track his progress, and it also served as a daily reminder for him, which prevented me from having to nag! If he did his chores, all was well; if he did not do them, then he had extra duties assigned. I did not link allowance to the chores because I wanted him to learn that part of being a family is that we all pitch in to help with the household responsibilities.

At the start of the preteen years, I would give him the opportunity to earn money if he completed extra chores for me. This worked well especially in the summer when he was home from school and had extra time. Sometimes as a reward for especially good behavior, I would do his chores for the day! That was a real incentive for him to be on his best behavior.

Now that I have two toddlers, I am starting over with learning how to teach my boys how to cheerfully and obediently complete their chores. I found a really neat website: http://www.homeorganizeit.com that has a wealth of information for organizing your home. It also includes a section on how to get your kids to happily do chores.

Here are some of their suggestions:
• Clearly set the expectations. For example, the kids in my house know that they are expected to make their bed right after breakfast.
• Start early with setting up cleaning routines with young children. For me, it was sometimes easier to clean up myself, especially when I had just one child, but this does not help the child to learn how to be responsible. Now that I have 4 children, it is critical that each child pitch in. For my 28 month old, one of our routines is that all toys are cleaned up before heading up to bed.
• Give clear instructions and break large tasks into smaller chunks. For example, I may expect my son to clean his room. If it is a big mess (which it usually is), I may say, “Today I want you to put all the clothes on the floor away and dust the furniture”. Tomorrow he may be expected to vacuum and bring down his laundry. With older kids, you can set a timer for 15 minutes and have them clean up as much possible. When the timer goes off, they are finished with that task until the next time. I also will set the timer for younger children; they love to see if they can “beat the timer” and get all their toys put away before the timer goes off!
• Make chores fun! The above timer idea makes doing work fun. The other thing that I did with older kids was to write specific task on a slip of paper. I then put them into basket and each child would select 2-3 slips of paper out of the basket. These were their assigned chores for the day. They liked the unexpected, and the chance that they may select an easy chore. My son and step-daughter also would trade chores too. If one got a chore they didn’t like, I would allow them to swap.

Chore charts help to keep you and your kids organized, on track, and to be responsible. You can use stickers with younger kids, and just a check mark with older kids.

There are many more ideas at homeorganizeit.com.

You Dream

Do you DREAM about owning your own business? Many women do, from all walks of life, and any type of woman CAN become an entrepreneur.

Whether you are a stay-at-home Mom with young children wishing to help out with the family finances; or maybe a Mom whose kids are older, possibly in high-school and you are preparing yourself for the day they leave the nest. Maybe you are a single woman working for someone else and you desire to be your own boss, develop and sell your own products or services, drive your own sales and simply be in charge of your own income.

All of these reasons and millions of others are the first step to becoming an Entrepren“her”. These DREAMS are what places the DESIRE deeply into our inner selves and DRIVES women to become DISCIPLINED to achieve their goals of owning and running their own businesses.

So if you are a woman possessing this first “D” to becoming an Entrepren“her” then you can start, build and run your own business. If you have doubts about your capabilities, scribble through that “d” word crossing it out completely! Then I encourage you to read on, because you may surprise yourself and find out that you are really VERY capable of becoming a woman business owner.

For you to successfully start up your own woman-owned business is simply a matter of you paying attention to you, to your heart, your soul, your mind! As you experience these steps one by one they will systematically funnel you into the next one, and the next...

Then You Desire

Following your dream, you begin to experience DESIRE. This deep, inner feeling is a direct result of your dream, and is your second step in the process of you becoming a woman business owner. It means you are lusting for, craving, yearning, are longing for, ownership of your own business. These are very strong words and they are inside of you, they are your feelings and you don’t take them lightly for they are what is truly in your heart.

It is your desire that begins to eliminate, not the dream, but the dream roadblocks and paves the road to reality for you. It is your desire to own your own business that positively forces you to the next step of Entrepren“her”ship which is “drive”.

Next You Are Driven

Because your desire to become a woman business owner is strong, it automatically takes you to this next step. Your DRIVE is what will move you to begin taking action. Your new found drive is crawling around under your skin and pulsating through your bloodstream. Your drive is what molds your dream into reality for you.

Your drive sparks your thoughts about what you like to do, reminds you of what you can do, and builds upon your new reality by giving you ideas about what type of business you would like to own, start and run yourself.

Your drive enhances your dream of becoming a woman business owner thus encouraging your inner self to plan and think and research. Your drive will excite you, inspire you, force you unwittingly to take your dream and start putting into your real life.

And You Become Disciplined

Your drive brings you to the final step of turning your dream into reality — becoming DISCIPLINED to get the things done you know you need to in order to start and run your own successful business. This final “D” does come automatically because you have been funneled through the previous steps, but also takes some work and effort on your part.

But because you have traveled across the previous business creation plateaus, you now know not only in your heart, but also in your head, what you can and need to do in order to start your own “Woman-owned Business”. You now know specifically what is possible, what is needed and what there is for you to do in order to complete the final process of turning your dream of owning your own business into a reality. Your trip with and through yourself have caused you to self-generate ideas, resources, tools and so much more all laid out in front of you, thus your final “D” can be met with ease.

So now is simply the time for you to be disciplined, not discouraged (cross out that “d” word too) and start doing the tasks and processes your other “Ds” exposed for you. And you CAN do it because you have traveled your dream’s road to reality by following yourself! Whether you go through these stages over a period of two months, or two years, is not important. The fact is that when you get to the end of this word list you will be very close and very ready to start, run and own your own “Woman-owned Business”!

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“If space is limited, you need to be creative
to make the most of what you have!”

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Use the Space You Have - Don't have an extra room to use as your office? Look around your house for “empty” space that you can use. In my previous home, I used the closet in my guest room. The closet was deep and could accommodate my desk, computer, printer, chair, and books. I could then close the bi-fold doors when not in use! Some use a space by the landing of the stairs, or a corner of the living room or dining room. Using an armoire makes an attractive work station that can house your computer, printer, supplies, etc. When not in use, all your supplies are neatly tucked inside!

Great Gadgets to Make Your Office
Fun and Fabulous!

One of the things that I do to prepare for the long trip, whether it is two hours, or twelve, is to make goodie bags for each child. If they are still in diapers, as are two of mine, I use their diaper bags. I place plenty of diapers, wipes, hand sanitizer, and extra clothes in the diaper bags. I use small canvas bags for each child that is placed on the floor in front of them. If one of the toddlers needs a change of clothes, this prevents me or my husband from having to locate and dig through a suitcase! Each child has their own stash of favorite snacks. We always pack licorice for trips. This was a tradition my mother started and still continues it to this day!

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“With some preparation and by packing a few fun things, traveling with small children can be bearable and even enjoyable!”

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Promotion is the overall umbrella to all of your efforts to keep your product or service in the minds of your customers, and to gain potential new customers, clients and sales. It is an ongoing process and includes a variety of activities. This usually encompasses your overall company vs. a specific product.

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Public Relations - The dictionary defines this term as: 1.) the act of establishing and promoting a favorable relationship with the public 2.) the methods and activities employed to establish and promote a favorable relationship with the public

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For Your Work-at-Home Business

• Develop routines for cleaning, organizing, filing, etc. and stick to it! This way big projects don't pile up!

Make the Most of the Time With Your Kids