It’s another Monday morning at the office, you’ve just turned on your computer and logged in – all of a sudden you start to notice that your “Home Page” is changed, your computer is very slow and finally, the internet connection is extremely slow…. Your IT Network has just been Hacked!

Security in the workplace has been an issue for years yet something commonly thought of as “internal security” such as cameras and locked doors. Today the world has grown and evolved into a computer-driven technology, providing innovative e-criminals the opportunity to take advantage of this situation and they are benefiting from your lack of network security knowledge and use of older technology. Now more than ever, there are important types of security needs such as Firewalls, Network Lockdowns, Key Fobs, Passwords, and so on, that are needed to secure a company’s sensitive records, financial information, and their basic lifeline to keep them in business.

Some businesses don’t know what they’re exposing themselves to, but with an “opened port” on a firewall or router leading to their database or “hole” in the network, the world is able to look at your sensitive material without you even knowing until it’s too late.

Last month a new company signed on with Libra IT for simple “network support” because they felt their old IT provider was not giving them the patience they feel they deserved. When our engineer did a network audit we noticed that the tape backups have not been successful in over 2 months! With that alone, a red flag should have gone up. More problems were found… much more! Every port on the firewall was open allowing anyone into the server which nullified the purpose of the firewall entirely.

And to add misery to suffering… Half the staff knew the Administrator Password!!! (Simple passwords are not enough… did you know that the most common password used today is “password” and the second most common is “admin”? Many users have half a dozen passwords to remember which is why the most common password is ‘password.’ The usual solution is to write it down. But how secure is that?) This oversight allowed anyone into the system to change, delete or add anything they wanted… what if one of these people became a “disgruntled employee” later down the line? Finally, we stumbled upon another serious issue that could have been disastrous… After the previous IT person was “dismissed” they were trying to hack into the system using “old employees passwords” (which worked) and decided to try and delete files as well as “hide” mistakes he made. Luckily we tracked everything they did by backing the system up successfully in case anything like this happened!

Makes you wish we could go back to the old days when we had a safe with paperwork in it or a filing cabinet with a lock on it that held our business’s most prized possessions. Today, this information is resting in your servers, network to the staff, and then on the internet for fast and easy day to day operations bringing business to what we once called “The future of doing business”. With this new system that has treated us well in the past decade or so, we have neglected to see what other possibilities are growing out there such as network hacking, malicious script sent through email in the form of humor from a trusted source, which destroys our data or even worse, a complete breakdown of our network and loss of all information.

Another item I wanted to touch upon was something I stumbled upon last month when a new client came on board and asked simply if we could upgrade their server. The company in this situation changed their IT Firm service to us because they felt like they were not getting the service they needed and wanted more experienced engineering in their technical arena.

When this high security Financial company signed on we had no idea what we were about to stumble on! If you look at some URLs you will notice most of them start with an http:. But then you come across the “secure connections” used by companies like financial or legal institutions which look like this http: where the “S” is to signify that it’s a secure site and no one can get in unless authorized with log in and password. What this financial company didn’t know was that their “secure site” was in no way shape or form secure! Here’s how the previous IT firm did it… To cut corners, their previous IT Firm decided to send all “secure traffic URL” to one web-server housing the main page under the URL https: but then translated this to simple http: to retrieve the requested “financial data” for the client from another server (being the data storage server). The traffic is then sent back to the first server which once again translated the http: to https: to again make it look secure! The information was finally sent to the client unbeknownst to them that their personal financial data has no security whatsoever. This was immediately rectified and security was finally restored but with a lesson… when you have security implemented into your network, get certificates of authentication for your records or you may find that you too are exposed to the world of hackers and prying eyes.

Article By: Joe Miljan

Everyone knows that Google is the most used search engine on the web, in fact Google’s used 90% of the time someone is looking for information on a product or service. If you’re a business owner and you’re not appearing for searches related to your business you are missing out on valuable traffic.

With Google Maps Marketing a local business will:

• Appear for more searches related to their business.
• Increase click volume for searches related to their business.
• Increase reviews for their listing.

Google’s search results appear in four sections: The Pay Per Click Section; The Organic Section; The Local Maps Section; The Carousel. Google displays their SERP (Search Engine Result Pages) based on the types of searches users are performing. The Maps Section and Carousel only display for local searches. The Organic Section shows up on all search result pages and The Pay Per Click displays above The Organic Section with Google’s AdWords plan.

When a user searches for a local business in Google, Google displays The Maps Section which many people think is only based on proximity. The Maps Section rankings are based on many factors and proximity is only one of them. Google wants to make sure that every listing they have listed in their results are correct. If they fail to deliver accurate results users get lost and Google did not deliver.

Once a company has their business information listed properly on Google and they earn a great amount of local citations, Google rewards them with better results on the SERP. Google is looking for consistent information on all the websites/directories that have your business citations listed. It’s very important to make sure that your business Name, Address and Phone Number (NAP) are all listed properly.

If you don’t have time and need help with Google maps marketing Good On Maps has great tutorials and offers a results driven campaign to get you results before you pay a monthly retainer.

Google wants to make sure that you are providing users with a good user experience (UX). If your business is not giving users a good experience Google will not present your listing as often. The best way to test user experience is with A/B testing, A/B testing will help make testing different variations of each of your pages to make sure that your users are finding what they where looking for.

Google’s Maps Marketing is more economical and more efficient when it comes to getting rankings. The cost for Local SEO is about four times as much as Google Maps Marketing and in many cases the The Maps Section results appear above all The Organic Section.

The Carousel always displays over all results including The Pay Per Click Section. However, when The Carousel appears it’s pulling results from the The Maps Section. Also, The Carousel results only appear for specific broad terms such as “pizza” and “restaurant” for now.

Article by: Donnie Strompf

Article by: Mike Keesan

Any business would rely and rest on communications be they for official purposes or for enhancing and upgrading their client base and support to flourish their business. For ANY business to develop there has to be a regular, proper as well as a transparent channels of communication hierarchy so that the work flow does not in any manner get hampered and the business happens as a regular occurrence. And business communication is a continuous and an ongoing process- one that speaks volumes about the How’s as well as the Why’s of communication and communication hierarchy both within as well as outside the business enterprise so as to facilitate and augment the work flow even better and faster. As, without an effective, efficient and eloquent channels of communication between the Managers and the staff, or the employees and the external clients, the very business matrix would get null and void. So, in other words, Business Communications form the fundamental edifice of any business functionality.

HOW DO WE ENSURE A GOOD BUSINESS COMMUNICATION IN BUSINESS?

Communication is said to be an art and especially so, if it were Business Communication as this is pivotal for any enterprise to function as well as flourish. Here are a few ready pointers this to happen easily, effectively as well as empathetically:

• ANY business communication, be it oral, written, or a mailer should be logically structured which means that it needs to possess a good opening, a logical content that supports the opening and a proper as well as an apt conclusion- one that summarizes the entire written as well as the spoken topic presented. It has also to be reckoned with that the language spoken has to be lucid and the jargon needs to be easily comprehended and appreciated by the audience of all genres and they get to fathom what is expected of them and they participate thoroughly and comprehensively and get to understand the jist of the entire presentation delivered or written.

• Communication especially Business communication needs to be simple, precise and concise as if it is not articulated properly and if there is an ambiguous usage of words then, it dents the whole meaning and purpose of communication as well as communicating. Choice of words would have to be such that they overcome the cultural barriers and topographies and do not slander the sentiments and the sensibilities of the audience on the whole.

• Business communications should be comprehensive, influencing, persuasive, cogent as well as cohesive. One that follows a set pattern and is sequential apart from being one that is simplistic and easily appreciated.

• One other aspect of Business Communications is that the language adopted be polite, courteous, empathetic apart from being succinct, so as not to offend the sentiments of either their staff as well as their clients.

• It also needs to be remembered that the body language during presentations needs to be positive and approachable. Simple etiquette like maintaining the eye contact during the entire presentation, smiling genuinely and warmly and maintaining a general atmosphere of bonhomie and camaraderie would go great lengths in spreading a positive cheer around.

• Any Business Communication would be negated IF the feedback given would be left unsaid as well as unspoken. For feedback is the ONLY yardstick that would assure the presenter whether the message had reached the audience as it was meant to be intended to reach.

• The usage of more of “You’s” as well as “Why’s” during presentations more than the “I’s”, makes the audience understand that they have been given more value and importance and would also help in facilitating them in participating better during future presentations apart from being more involved.

• One of the most important components of Business Communications is listening. Some of them have this as an intrinsic and innate trait and some others adapt and acquire it over a period of time. Whichever way we look at it, this is again another art that we are either born with or, could cultivate over a period of time. Feedback and Listening go on most occasions hand on glove. The more patient the listening, the more positive that we would accept the feedback as ‘Listening’ jumbled would give us the other simple word ‘silent’. And the more silent we are, the better the listeners that we would be and the more positively we would accept and appreciate the feedback. It goes without saying that, a good speaker would always be a good listener and vice versa.

• The other important factor to be remembered is that we should divest ourselves from being biased, prejudiced and parochial while placing our facts as any biased or partial statement would cloud the entire facts and the receiver could get mired in confusion and the powers-that-be might end up taking a wrong action if the facts are or do not seem complete and comprehensive.

IMPORTANCE OF EFFECTIVE BUSINESS COMMUNICATIONS:

Communication forms the crux of any business functions as well as functionalities. All areas be they Marketing, Human Resource, Business Development, Sales need very good as well as glib talkers who possess the gift of the gab to convince and communicate with the customers as well as the clients and acquire the business for their respective organizations. When the Managers fail to communicate with their employees, then it results in a great deal of miscommunication apart from there being serious lacunae in their staff’s understanding and performance leading to under performance or worse no performance by the employees.

Ineffective or retarded communications would lead to the employees becoming isolated from the Management and this then paving the way for conflict and crisis. As the Managers would find it increasingly difficult to communicate with their ideas, circumstances as well as demands cogently as well as cohesively, it would become increasingly irksome as well as difficult for the employees to continue or perform better at their jobs.

A FEW POINTERS FOR EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION AT WORKPLACE:

• BETTER PERFORMANCE BY THE TEAM:
If the leader is able to perform better and is both cogent as well as cohesive in his communication, then the team would be able to analyze as well as assess what is expected of them to do and how best to reach there more faster and with a little more clarity of thought and action.

• INCREASES THE PERFORMANCE LEVELS
Effective communications augment the process of better performance levels, enhancing client as well as customer loyalty thereby increasing the revenues as well as the client support and base for the organization. This clarity of communication between the different levels of hierarchies fosters the attainment of the short term as well as the vision, mission as well as the goals of the organization.

• Communication style as well as the channels has to be both positive, effective apart from being encouraging.
The channels of communications or the hierarchies of communications have to be straight, circumspect as well as transparent so that the immediate hierarchy to resolve the outstanding issues and turn the problems to solutions.

• Any urgent problems of the company should be communicated to both the staff as well as the managers as everyone is involved in the process of decision making or giving their opinions. This process would also make the employees appreciate the simple fact that the employee’s opinions are paid heed to by the Management and that they have a say in the decision making process.

• Organizations must encourage effective communications at all times and at all levels of hierarchy. This would foster and make the employees understand as well as appreciate the need, role as well as the importance of communication especially in the business contexts.

• Any communication is a two way process. Transparency would only be made possible when employees are encouraged to ask questions as well as participate in the problem resolving the problem solving process asking questions and suggesting ideas to resolve issues.

• Effective Business Communications help companies in increasing their productivity and thereby avoiding delays and leads to successful business practices.

CONCLUSION

Life is all about communicating and communication. This could be made possible in business environments only through articulation, free speech and a hierarchy that is welcoming of accepting both ideas as well as suggestions from the employees and one that encourages a pro-active participation between both the employees as well as the Managers to facilitate a faster business growth and an ever increasing and expanding client base that would fetch the organizations both revenues as well as reputation.

Article by: Varrah E

There comes a time when you find yourself facing trouble with a given file extension after downloading a software. The file is an executable file but you are not able to do anything with it. The reason may be a malware attack that will not allow you to even get rid of it. Another trouble would be not being able to run it. In this case if only you know how to fix the issue, you will be easily able to take care of it.

Given here are some useful tips that will help you fix issues with executable files:
When you try executing a file or say run it then a dialog box will appear saying:

“Windows can’t open this file”

File: [name.exe]

This is the trouble that often shows up when your system is not able to recognize the file and prompts you to open the .exe file using another operation. This clearly indicates that the file is corrupted and you will not be able to run any programs until it is duly executed.

The most important thing is that .exe issues need to be fixed as then only you will be able to use the registry editor and other such tools that can be utilized for fixing broken extensions if you have any.

Command Prompt

The most essential and the initial step that you need to take for fixing is that of using the Command Prompt. This comes handy for fixing errors related to .exe files. It would not be able to launch it due to the error as it requires entering cmd.exe in Run. For all this your efforts would be thwarted and you will require looking for an alternate method.

This would require using the following tricks:

• Use the usual trick that requires you to simultaneously press the “Ctrl+Shift+Esc” that will help launch the Task Manager

• When you see the Task Manager appear then go to Process tab-> Show Processes if not this then you might already have admin rights, this works for Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8

• Alternatively, if you are running system on XP then you might get an Access Denied command. At this point you need to go to File-> New Task-> Run, hold down Ctrl key + clicking New Task this should reveal the Command Prompt

Using a Software

After taking the above mentioned steps if you are not able to get rid of the trouble then you can use any software like FixExec that helps in fixing your .exe file error. This program is compatible with Windows 8 as well as Windows XP. All you need to do is download, install, and run this tool and it takes care of the rest. It will not only detect the file causing trouble but also help fix it.

Things to remember

You need to remember that when you use the “Ctrl+Shift+Esc” this launches the Task Manager that comes handy for killing any rogue program. It helps in killing a program that creates troubles. You can even launch a new program using the New Task option that will help you in executing an .exe file. Remember that Task Manager is the best defense against a rogue antivirus program and it often helps in killing suspicious processes.

Article by: Polly M Quinton