This morning I had two new Direct Messages in my twitter account both read -
lol , this is funny (and a LINK) and the other one read Lol. this you?? (and a LINK) Different people and profiles sent them to me but it was the exact same link.
This was a Twitter post from a friend of mine. He opened one of these links, you can tell what happened to him.
Both are most likely a phishing scam since part of the link included a login area. It is a method to try and capture my username and password. Why? … is sometime still beyond my understanding but once they have the password they need then the hacker sometimes sends messages from your accounts to your friends and followers saying they were stuck on a trip and to wire money – so I guess if even a few people fall for it – that may be why the hackers do this. Other reasons, may be simply because they can and some links will include viruses as well.
How do you protect yourself in a world where you can be connected to thousands of people and have no way of personally knowing each person and knowing you can trust every link that come your way.
Be Aware:
Check your own sent Direct Messages on Twitter and Facebook and make certain that any sent messages are ones you did send.
Read messages before clicking. Yes that means slow down your trigger finger and read. If you don’t know the person, use caution – look at the link and make sure it seems reasonable. If it is out of character for that person then be wary.
Contact the other party and ask if they sent you a message that said ” lol is this you?” Don’t include the link or they may click on it – but your note back to them may be the first they realize they may have been hacked.
Checking your own profile regularly should be a part of your weekly tasks on social media. It is something we do for our clients when we manage their social media accounts.
Look at your profiles, messages and posts – make sure it is all correct. If it looks messages have gone out that you did not setup/authorize – first thing to do is change your password. As noted in a previous post, your email password assigned to your social media accounts should always be different a well. If it is not – then you also need to check that account and change its password.
Online Reputation is a big reason why people use social media – having it compromised can bring you down, and you may not ever realize what happened. Be Aware and Keep your Reputation more Secure.
On February 2nd, Twitter put out a status note about a concern they discovered and the biggest message coming from this is: Password Security. Digging into one issue brought up a discovery that many people are still using duplicate or similar passwords on various sites.
Security of social networks tends to be taken lightly as most think that “What can possibly happen if someone were to get my password from twitter or facebook?”
I like to remind my clients that a major reason why they have started using social networks is for Online Visibility and to build an Online Reputation in your area of expertise. In one fell swoop, that could get destroyed or at the very least take time to build back up.
Once a password is captured, the ‘hacker’ may try to lock you out of your account by changing your password. Then they move on to sending messages to contacts/friends/followers. Then comes attempts to try and access the email account attached to the hacked account.
The answer to the question above “What can possibly happen?” is simple…
Your Online Reputation is what is at stake and for many that is priceless – especially if you have worked very hard to build it up.
How can you protect yourself?
The best way is to NOT have the same password for every social networking account profile, and to change your social network passwords often. But one thing many forget to think about is having a different password for the email accounts used with social networks. These emails should ALWAYS have a DIFFERENT password. Always.
Having a separate email password also protects you from hackers changing your twitter or facebook password- both networks send a confirmation email when password requests are made. Nathan Hangen also has some more good ideas at Twitip for protecting your account.
Stop thinking the hassle of managing the usernames and passwords will be troublesome. I manage hundreds of usernames/passwords between my own and my clients. How? I use Roboform to store all my usernames and passwords – and it is worth it. Roboform is a password keeper installed on your own desktop and is very easy to add new ones in. You can also save identities with name, info and contact so with one click of a button you can fill in online forms. It save a lot of time and is not frustrating to manage all the IDs – plus it is faster to sign in when needed. Just click the ID to use and it takes you to the url and signs you in.
Twitter has good info on tips to keep your accounts secure, dealing with phishing and hacking scams all the time they have to keep updated on how to protect their users.
Now. Go change that email password as I know most of you reading this have it set the same! Protect your Reputation!
I’m here in Atlanta at a conference focusing on Social Media Marketing – had a bit of sightseeing in Atlanta with my Cousin Colleen before the start of the conference, the highlight of which was my trip to CNN headquarters!
The conference has been helping me learn many new aspects of social media marketing and new tactics and strategies for businesses as well as an opportunity to meet many of the top internet marketers, bloggers and leaders in this industry.
I’m learning many new skills I can bring back to my clients and also my social networking connections. Today the group created an audio product with 5 of the world’s most successful Internet Marketing masters. I wanted to share it with you since I was so exciting to see something happen so fast – right before my eyes!
You can click here to see more information and learn about the Strategies 4 Social Marketing Success and how to get a copy for yourself as well. If you have any questions, please let me know – I will happily answer them but you may find some of the answers you are looking for directly in the Strategies 4 Social Marketing webpage.
I sent out this month’s newsletter and in it was an article that was inspired by my twitter activity last week. I have gotten a few good comments back on it and thought it would be fun to share my story here – especially one that can show how Twitter can be effective and fun at the same time!! Here goes… (and I apologize to readers who also receive our monthly newsletter for the duplication)
A funny thing happened the other day… I posted a Tweet online with a spelling mistake and one that greatly changed a word. I actually didn’t notice it, I will fix them if I do but sometimes in our life on Twitter small mistakes are missed and I don’t fret about them. We are all fallible and typos will happen, no big deal.
So my typo the other day really changed the meaning of the word I meant to enter. When you use an ‘i’ instead of an ‘o’ in the word hockey – you get the word hickey! Yep! I tweeted about a ‘HICKEY GAME”!
Well… you can imagine what happened next… I got back from the hockey game and had all sorts of replies, comments and tweets about my ‘Hickey Game’.
It was quite amusing, notes and comments were all over facebook and twitter: - What’s a hickey game? Sounds interesting!
- You do mean “hockey” right?
- hickey game? shocking.
- A hickey game? That sounds a little risque doesn’t it? (giggle)
- Oh, leave it to you and @timeontaskva to provide my afternoon giggles! Thanks ladies. watch for flyin’ hickey pucks too!
The reason for my story? It’s an argument to all the people starting out on Twitter, Facebook or even blogging who have the hesitation of “No one will want to listen to what I have to say”. This tends to be one of the top stumbling block for people new to social media. My argument – Yes they will! Everyone has valuable information to share and teach others.
If you use social media properly, people will in fact be listening more than you might think. Properly, meaning stay professional yet adding in your personality, write about what you know, give value to others and don’t cross the lines of ‘Too Much Information’.
So… yes I made a big typo- but look at the afternoon chuckles people had because of it. No harm, no foul and a good example of how ‘being real and being you’ online can bring positive results!
I hope this helps you if you are one of the “No one will listen to me” doubters and make sure we are connected on Twitter and Facebook, I wouldn’t want you to miss out on the next Hickey Game when it occurs. As an added benefit you will find me posting tips to help you learn more about using social media for your business.
Facebook Fanpages for business are the most-requested service right now with our company and for two main reasons:
They are great at helping build your business’s online presence and assist with SEO (Search engine Optimization) as fanpages do get indexed by search engines.
They are complicated to create for most business owners it makes more sense to hire someone to create and setup a fanpage. The savings on time alone are worth it.
When we plan out a fanpage for a client the most important aspect – even more important than the design – is the PURPOSE for the fanpage. Without a purpose, fans will not understand the benefit to them joining your fanpage. Your purpose also helps you gain fans who have an interest in what you offer – Quality connections. Quality tends to be more valuable than quantity.
Fanpages are meant to start out conversations and get a community going. A community based upon your business and how you help your clients via your products or services. This allows fans to see your skills in action and get to know you with the ultimate goal being they ‘buy’ from you or refer business to you; fans help grow your business.
How do you define your purpose? Simple… think of how you help clients, what benefit do they receive from your services or business? That is your starting point.
It always makes sense when I give our fanpage as an example. My specialty is social media, my purpose is to help fans by posting a Social Media tip of the week. It is new information posted there not linked in from another social network. These tips help kickstart some conversations on my fanpage and allow fans to see how skilled I am in this area. Our fanpage is also a place where we share info and I too have learned new things from my fans.
Having a Purpose can make or break your Fanpage success. Without it why should a fan connect to your page? Other than being a number in the fan count, what will your fans gain from your page? Have you stated your Fanpage Purpose clearly and visibly to new visitors? Is it on your Welcome Page? Do you have a Welcome Page?
Feel free to share you Fanpage and it’s purpose here, and if you ever need any help – check our fanpage for tips and info, that is our Purpose!
Social Media networking can be a great boon to your business, but one thing many people need to always keep in mind is that what you say/do online IS your online presence and it is important – if you are networking for your business – to remain professional.
I’m not saying you cannot have a good time or that everything you say on your networks has to be 100% happy and upbeat at all times. Trust me, I am never 100% positive, but I am professional.
I can be seen airing my frustrations of the day – but rarely anything that could be construed as an unprofessional. My gripes tend to be technical-related ones or ones that don’t offend people but make them see how ‘real’ I am.
A software program causing issues in my email program is okay to complain about – but you will never hear me venting about a client or frustration related to my clients. That crosses the line and I would never want people thinking – “Is she talking about me?”, or “That seems mean.”.
This is my number one lesson with clients.
Never say or do anything online that you wouldn’t do in person.
Pretend you are at a business networking event and act according to that. You will find this keeps it fun and professional and makes your time on social networking sites useful for your business and great for building relationships.
Sometimes the simplest of things can appear more complicated. That is what I find happens when clients start using twitter, especially when you begin directly on twitter which is what I recommend. I start clients off this way because then they develop clear understanding of how Twitter works and how others view what you post.
The Home page and Profile page difference is usually the first lesson. Your twitter homepage is what you see when you sign into Twitter – it shows all the updates from the people you follow.
The profile page (seen here to your left) is “All about YOU” This is where you find all your own updates and information and when other users click on your twitter username this is what they see – your profile.
The confusion appears when clients ask “Where is my tweet that I just did?” Well, if you follow many people the homepage will change and update with all the new posts from those you follow. Your own updates will get pushed farther down the list.
If you are looking to check what you posted, then it is found on your profile page.
Well, I finally took the plunge and finished my first ever eBook. I wrote it, formatted it, found some people who had real-life examples, created a sales page, setup an online product to sell and now it’s ready.
It took me a while and I learned many new things and met some new people (virtually of course!) while going through this process, but I think it was definitely worth it! I even have an idea for a second book.
What I did was take many of my client-training sessions on Twitter and compiled it into an easy-to-read eBook to help beginners understand better how to talk on Twitter – the end result… Talking on Twitter!
What you will learn from this eBook is how to :
Learn the basics of Twitter – understand what a DM, RT and Hashtag are and how to use them
Understand what the Settings are on your Twitter profile and how and why to change them
Know the difference between your home and profile pages and what everyone else sees about you on Twitter
Learn the Art of Conversation on Twitter and how to engage others
Follow a typical schedule that will help you remain efficient and effective with your time spent on Twitter
Build up your followers and connections when you start out on Twitter and how to find people.
You can read some testimonials from others who have bought and read Talking on Twitter… it’s a good alternative to try out before investing hundreds of dollars in a training program. Many of these programs are fabulous, but you still need to understand the basics of using Twitter and that is what this eBook is all about.
I have found with most clients, once they understand how to navigate twitter and how others view what you say, the lightbulb goes off and they comprehend how it is possible to bring in new contacts, and ultimately business, from using Twitter. Get your copy today and see if you notice a difference in your level of engagement on Twitter!
Well, the holiday season is here and I always find I have time to pick up a new book. Yesterday on Mashable, there was a great post about 10 must-read eBooks for people into Social Media. It’s a list complied and supported by the New York Times Reader – a downloadable app that gives you the New York Times directly on your computer.
The list compiled has some top names from social media on it – Seth Godin, Gary Vaynerchuk and Chris Brogan. I’ve heard lots of good things about Crush It by Gary Vaynerchuk so that will be top on my reading list.
With these eBooks, you can buy them direct from Amazon and purchase a hardcover or Kindle edition. For those who have not yet heard Kindle – it is a wireless reading device that allows you to read eBooks and pdf files. It is quite small and can hold up to 1500 titles, it provides a way to read electronic books and can also read the book to you.
I think the Kindle is going to head onto my “Wish List” for my birthday. I read a lot of eBooks, and I cannot read them from my monitor, so I end up printing them and reading that way. I suspect the kindle will save me a bit of money in paper and ink for my printer… not to mention a few trees!
What’s on your reading list for this year? I always love getting book recommendations.
As an added benefit you will find me posting tips to help you learn more about using social media for your business.
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