June 16, 2009

Search Engine Optimization – or SEO – is a complex science, designed to increase the visibility of a website in the search engines’ natural results through the modification of certain key elements and site attributes. Hotel Traffic Builders’ successful SEO campaigns for hotel and travel websites fully acknowledges and addresses the hundreds of different factors that the search engines use to determine the relevancy of a site to any given term – fro-m its posted content and architectural structure, to the age of its primary URL and affiliation with other high-ranking sites.

Recognizing that copy is just one of many tools that should be engaged in a comprehensive SEO strategy, below Hotel Traffic Builders describes the strategies it uses to increase client hotel website’s natural search engine rankings. The following list of Hotel Traffic Builders tips provides an excellent starting point in the process of increasing any resort site’s visibility through effective SEO copywriting.

1. Begin with comprehensive research of search demand for relevant keyword phrases. Never simply assume that the terms that online consumers might use to find your product will be inherently obvious. Conduct thorough research to determine the exact keyword combinations that should be incorporated into your website copy. Use an online tool such as Trellian Keyword Discovery or Word tracker to analyze the precise keyword phrases that customers enter into the search engines to look for your specific web pages. This research will serve as the focal point of your SEO copywriting campaign – as the foundational piece around which your overall strategy should be built. Analyze the demand for as many relevant keywords as possible, to determine the most effective terms to be used to drive Search Engine Traffic to your property’s Hotel website. HTB completes this process on a page by page basis for entire web site as the search terms will vary greatly by web page.

2. Study the statistically weighted demand for keyword combinations in your property’s geographic area. You will soon see that not all keywords are of equal importance! SEO works best when it incorporates keywords that are geographically targeted, for two reasons:

•  To secure prominent placement for terms specific to an area, your website needs only to compete against other sites within that defined region – rather than every-single hotel in the world with a functional website – making it possible to rank higher and become more visible on a consistent basis; and

•  Because geo-targeted keywords are driven by customers interested in your specific local, they are also much more likely to result in successful conversion than less qualified queries. Research relevant terms within all geographic areas that apply to you as these will include the immediate and surrounding areas. Incorporate terms fro-m these various geographic areas into your site copy to maximize exposure.

3. Identify niche terms that generate significant demand. You might be extremely tempted to target only the most popular keywords that appear within your local market that are relevant to your product offering (e.g., “Bahamas hotel,” “Bahamas travel”). But keep in mind that these terms will also be the most difficult to secure and maintain with consistently prominent placement – especially in major Destination Markets. A much more effective strategy is to balance the most heavily searched phrases with targeted niche terms (e.g., “Bahamas luxury hotel,” “Harbour Island boutique hotel,”) – which have a much greater chance of both ranking and converting. Look for targeted niche phrases actively searched by consumers, as a way of driving more qualified customers to your Hotel Website.

4. Choose four to five targeted keywords for each page of your hotel website. A limit of four or five terms is generally accepted industry-wide, as the maximum number that can be targeted through formal Hotel Search Engine Optimization on any given page. Why? In order for a page to be properly optimized for a term, that phrase must appear in certain key places within the visible copy and meta data. Attempts to inse- rt any more than four or five terms per page will divert the search engines’ ability to recognize the most relevant phrases, and greatly diminish SEO results.

5. Use “themes” to optimize each individual page of your Hotel Website. An exceptionally valuable technique that should be utilized as much as possible during the process of keyword sele-ction is “theme focused” – i.e., the grouping of terms that share a common word or phrase on one page. For instance, you may choose to center the keywords placed on the Home Page around the word “hotel” (e.g., “Rome Italy boutique hotel,” “South Beach ocean front hotel”), while the terms sele-cted for the Spa Page incorporate the word “spa” (e.g., “Miami day spa,” “Boca Raton spa treatments”). When the keywords chosen for a page all include a common element, it provides valuable support to the site’s natural rankings by: (1) allowing the search engines to recognize the individual keywords on the page much more readily, (2) prompting the search engines to consider the entire page relevant to the common theme, and (3) often permitting the site to appear for other terms within that theme that have not been specifically targeted. If the shared theme is also included in the title of the page, the positive effect on the site’s rankings is even greater, because the search engines are more likely to recognize relevancy.

6. Develop the meta tags for each page around the sele-cted keywords. Three fields comprise the meta data of a page: The title tag, meta description, and meta keywords. All three fields should be written to incorporate the targeted terms identified for each page.

7. Incorporate the keywords sele-cted for each page into the headings and paragraph text. Mention of a targeted keyword within the visible copy of a page is one factor that the search engines consider when determining relevant results for that phrase. Placement within headings is weighted even more heavily than paragraph text, so be sure to incorporate the keywords in both areas.

8. Use a mixture of both singular and plural forms of targeted keyword phrases. Most search engines display slightly different results for the singular and plural form of a keyword, when entered as search queries. Be sure to incorporate both into the text of your site, to ensure that your hotel website appears for each form.

9. Intra-link pages within your hotel website, and include targeted keywords in the link text. The search engines evaluate the text included in links with far greater influence than standard text. While a hyperlink fro-m a page within the same site does not carry quite as much SEO value as an inbound link fro-m an external URL, it does carry a certain percentage of the weight – and plays an especially important role in Hotel Website Search Engine Optimization when the text of the link includes a targeted keyword. The practice of incorporating links to other pages within your site also provides a secondary benefit, by presenting travelers with the opportunity to explore pages of greatest interest to them – for a more interactive experience.

10. Write copy that appeals to both the search engines and online travelers. During the meticulous process of adding keywords and incorporating various SEO techniques into your website copy, do not lose sight of the end user: Online travelers, for whom all of the standard Internet marketing best practices should be actively engaged. To be truly successful, SEO copy must artfully balance the needs of the search engines and Internet customers, using the text that surrounds the targeted keywords to achieve the desired marketing message, and communicate your best selling points. Format the copy on your site with a well-organized mixture of headings, paragraphs, bullets, and links – to allow online customers skimming the pages of your site to process all content quickly and efficiently. Close every page with a strong call to action, as a means of driving customers toward your ultimate objective(s) – whether that goal is immediate purchase or submission of a request for information.

June 9, 2009

Recent research statistics show that 20 to 25% of the average hotel’s reservations originate from some interaction by the guest through the Internet.

This interaction is either as a part of the sele-ction process or a direct online reservation. This percentage is based on actual bookings and it does not consider the telephone bookings that are generated from Internet searches and references. In the months ahead, hoteliers will realize more than half of all their reservations are a direct result of Internet searches and information.

Will these reservations come through a hotel’s proprietary website, the brand website or a 3rd party website? The answer is yes! Yes, online reservations will be made through all of these channels from travelers, travel planners and secure extranets that are connected to various Internet channels. How you market your hotel on each of these channels and probably some new ones, such as the meta search engines is crucial to your business. Successful hotel marketing requires a solution for each.

Gone are the days when hotel marketing was a bold listing in a directory, a color brochure and a connection to the GDS. The amazing shift in sales channels and buying patterns over the past five years has turned the hospitality industry upside down. I would use the term “paradigm shift”, but that is way too trendy.

Now is the time to re-evaluate marketing strategies! Hotel sales are up, room rates are up and the percentage of guest booking through the Internet is escalating at a record pace. The battle of the heavy weights for the guest bookings is on between the brands and the 3rd party merchant sites. The hotelier has to decide what level of inventory and rates will generate the best return from the brand’s Internet and GDS bookings compared to giving away half of their rate to a 3rd party merchant because they do drive sales volume. Mr. Hotelier, remember when the concern was whether to pay a 15% commission to the travel agencies?

There is no doubt that the sales channel for today and even more for tomorrow is the Internet. Hospitality marketing has changed significantly and it will continue to change as the Internet and search engines change. It doesn’t matter anymore whether your hotel is a five star deluxe in Manhattan or a two star at interstate exit 25 or whether you are a mountain resort or an urban conference center. Your website content, search engine position and link affiliations are part of the sele-ction and reservation process by your future guests.

The strategic business decision facing most hoteliers today is whether to take on the personnel and related overhead that is required to manage an effective Internet marketing program, to rely on their brand or to outsource and manage the relationship with a professional Internet marketing agency. There are clearly a growing number of new online marketing tools that can help enable an in-house Internet marketing effort. And, the number of marketing agency choices is overwhelming.

For an effective in-house Internet marketing program, you will need a marketing staff, the demands far out weigh what one marketing manager can do. One person is needed to focus their efforts on managing your traditional marketing programs. Another person, possibly a webmaster, is needed to keep your website current, fresh and appealing. Add an eCommerce manager to manage your daily organic and paid search campaigns as well as interacting with the Webmaster and directing email promotions and broadcasts. And finally, someone has to analyze the Internet data to determine and define the changes and updates that are required so senior management can make an informed decision. Then there is always the risk of a key marketing person leaving the company. This immediately creates an urgent need for replacement by someone who is proficient with the same Internet programs used by their predecessor or you will have a transition delay in your marketing until the new Internet services are implemented, not to mention termination of existing licenses and contracts. Today’s web-based tools and on-line services are great, but they all require a certain technical aptitude, along with time and talent for creative design, system monitoring and interpreting results. Doing your own Internet marketing in-house definitely gives you control. On the other hand, your delays, mistakes or distractions will cost you significantly over time.

One alternative to an in-house eCommerce Department is to rely on your brand to market your property through a page or two for your hotel on their site. We all know the risk factor here. The brand’s marketing priorities focus on selling the brand and not your specific property or market. The strategy with most brands does not take into consideration such property specifics as location, local events and attractions, groups, supplemental services (dynamic packaging) or other factors that are unique to the property.

The brands are clearly improving in their Internet marketing efforts, but their values do not change. Their priority is to generate sales volume across all hotels based on the value perception of the brand, brand specific promotions, brand frequent stay programs and other brand specific programs. The brand is an essential element in any successful marketing plan much like and equal to the benefits from the 3rd party sales channels. But, it can be a mistake to assume the brand is your Internet marketing solution. Another alternative is to outsource your Internet marketing to an Internet Services Agency. But only when there are clearly defined expectation between you and the agency and a measurable set of benchmarks included in the service agreement.

You need to keep in mind, that the basic requirements for a good Internet marketing service are quit different from those that are generally available from traditional advertising agencies. The primary requirement, in addition to a definitive agreement, should be that their core competency is rooted in the hospitality or travel industry. Only those of us in the hospitality industry understand the challenges presented by the variable demands of owners, management companies and the day to day property level business operations. A service as critical as your Internet marketing demands that your supplier(s) clearly understand the unique demands from your guests and the value of each sales channel, including non-Internet channels.

The fundamental nature of the Internet, unlike traditional image or value marketing, is rooted in its ability to enable comparison by the shopper as well as its ability to search for customer/shopper/prospect relational criteria. This is why the importance of the Internet search engines and their peripheral services are so important. The search engines capitalize on the pure nature of the Internet’s ability to empower the customer/shopper to sele-ct a hotel based on key marketing factors (keyword or phrases) other than the brand name and to compare their findings.

The marketing factors include location, personal preferences, price, special promotional offers, property specific dynamic packaging and other property specific services and amenities. To implement a successful search engine marketing program either organic or paid requires elements that are not provided by most brands, marketing services that require constant updates of rich optimized website content, page updates, relevant links and more as the search engines change their algorithms on a daily basis. To create and maintain an effective Internet marketing program requires man-power with experience, an aptitude for automated systems and time or redundancy. The true bottom line for every hotel’s Internet marketing program is measured by its conversion rate. This is the ratio of sales to website traffic and it has a direct impact your true benchmark of success . . . REVPAR and ROI results! In conclusion, Internet marketing is strategic to your overall marketing efforts. Whether you manage Hotel Internet Marketing in-house with online tools, depend on your brand or you outsource, if you are not getting a minimum return of five to one on your invested time and cost, it is time to re-evaluate your strategy. You need a clear strategy with defined measurable expectations as well as some flexibility in your plan to accommodate unexpected changes resulting from new Internet services and opportunities.

May 18, 2009

Whether you call it the Internet or an electronic channel, it’s still an inexpensive and effective means of promoting your hotel. There are some simple tactics which promote success in web marketing. Don’t be fooled by those huge numbers of “hits” on your site. The true measure of your site’s success is the number of reservations it generates.

The most important first step is to make sure your web site is designed for success. What is success? Success means attracting people to your site, then converting lookers to bookers.

Sometimes, web site owners, themselves, are the biggest obstacle to efficient site design; it’s called human ego. Web sites are public instruments and the design or “look” of a hotel web site is often greatly influenced by everyone involved with the hotel. I call it “design by committee”. Design-by-committee generally results in a confusing, difficult to navigate web site. Everyone has an opinion; often an uninformed one, based upon how good it looks versus how well it works.

The design of an effective hotel site involves much more than how it looks; and herein lays the problem. There are basic “rules-of-the-road” so to speak, which greatly affect how well a site performs. The first is its search ability. Techies love movement and flashy design; unfortunately, search engines do not. Savvy designers know how to fool search engines, but they spend more time trying to get around search engine parameters than they spend on the site’s content; and content is king. Search spiders read copy, yet designers devote less time and effort to the “words” and concentrate on making a site pretty with photography. Here’s a news flash for owners, managers, and other interested parties; the site is not being designed for you. It is hopefully being designed to attract new guests. If you really need to be involved in your site’s design, learn search engine parameters and the way they work, before you impose your will on the designer. The next very important requirement is to create a simple navigation scheme. “Buried links”, links accessible only from other links, are very slick looking, but confuse search spiders and, more importantly, they also confuse the site’s users. Your site is not an online brochure; it’s an online sales instrument. If an online brochure is what you want, be satisfied with mediocre sales results.

It’s still amazing to me how many site designers neglect the hotel’s location information on their site. The assets of your location are the most important considerations for choosing a hotel. Your hotel’s address is only a small part of your location. Distance to/from attractions, activities, and businesses play a major role in hotel sele-ction. Accessibility is the next consideration. Accesses to/from major cities and/or airports are important considerations.

We have all heard the old axiom “a picture says a thousand words”; in life this is very true; except when it comes to web sites. Good photography is important but search engines do not read photography. Carefully written copy on your site can boost your site’s popularity by making it easier to find. For many sites, the copy appears to be written simply to fill empty space instead of actually providing important information.

Reciprocal links are those which, by mutual agreement, reside on your site and, in turn, contain a link to your web site from the linked site. Reciprocal links can boost the overall popularity of your web site by borrowing the popularity of the linked site. Good examples are links to blogs, news articles, and attractions. But, caution, your home page should never contain an external link. Would you really want to entice someone to exit your site from your home page? The popularity of the Internet has also spawned a new breed of site designers eager to cash-in on this new income source. Web site designers are not necessarily good hotel marketers. It seems that everyone involved with the Internet have now become hotel web marketers; without ever spending two days in the hotel business. If necessary, hire a hotel sales person to oversee the building of your site. Make sure good basic principles of hotel sales are being utilized.

When shopping for someone to oversee the design and perform the marketing for your site, ask questions. Hotel sales and marketing experience should be a basic prerequisite. Choose someone who understands the principles and methodology involved with hotel sales and marketing. Choose someone who will utilize those principles to meld your Internet marketing effort into your hotel’s direct sales program. Not doing so is sort of like hiring a plumber to fix your electric wiring. Selling rooms is not like selling widgets or designing technical web tools.

May 12, 2009

For many hotels and other online businesses it is crystal clear that search marketing is every bit as important as online advertising, e-mail marketing, banner ads, link sponsorships, and a hotel’s own web site when it comes to achieving success online. With media allocation priorities coming into focus, it’s time for hotels to think more critically about search in the context of integration within all of their marketing activities.

While the tools and technology available to search marketers have grown in depth and sophistication, too many hotels still seem to believe that an effective campaign can be boiled down to bids and clicks. The reality is that the key principles of advertising –relevance, clarity, and cross-media consistency–apply to search just as much as they do to any other online format. Any hotel can submit its site to search engines and directories. Any business can launch and manage its own basic paid search campaign. And, getting the coveted click is easier than you might think; it’s incorporating search into your overall marketing strategy that takes some far greater doing.

Start with a simple concept such as cross-channel message consistency. In many cases, search campaigns are planned in a vacuum, with little regard for associated messaging in online advertising programs, 3rd party sales channel activities, link sponsorships, or even properly integrated into the Hotel Web Site.

This segregated approach to search invites a host of problems. First and foremost, it compromises the uniformity of a campaign, and the integrity of the message that’s being delivered. How can you maintain a consistent brand experience when your ad placements are all being planned, created, and managed separately? This especially true when hotels find themselves actually price competing with their own 3rd party intermediary sales channels and these sales channels actually do a far better job at search marketing than the hotel that does not make this a priority item. The end result is that these hotels are actually training their guests to look anywhere but at the hotel’s website when they are ready to book their room reservation???? A second opportunity exists at the intersection of search marketing and Web site optimization. Hotels that miss this vital connection will never produce the kind of fully successful campaign that true integration allows. Qualified site visitors can be hard to attract in general, but producing a quality hotel site visit is even harder.

From search engine placement to copy, site landing pages, reservation booking process, and even how easy it is for potential guests to find hotel information on your site all become critical factors to hotel online booking success. There are just too many critical factors that invalidate a fragmented approach to hotel search marketing.

Analytics is another often missed integration point. But integrating your search marketing program into a comprehensive analytical framework such as the on the Hotel Traffic Builders client hotel dashboard can greatly increase your chances of going beyond the coveted click to secure the most valuable consumer action-room bookings! While many hotels equate traffic with sales, there are, in fact, countless other measures of search campaign quality: post-click e-mail campaign registrations, brochure requests or downloads, photo content interactions, and hotel locator searches, to name just a few. By applying integrated tools and analytical techniques, hotel search marketers can track and assess the quality of visitors’ behavior from the very moment they click–on the search engine, on your site, and beyond.

Interactive marketing integration is a simple concept that isn’t nearly as prevalent as it should be. Cross-channel message consistency, Web site optimization, unified analytics and reporting, and a single vantage point from which to assess the impact of individual campaign elements relative to one another, are all ways to start practicing campaign integration. It’s a progressive approach to online marketing, but one that is far more achievable–and necessary–than you may think.

Hotel Traffic Builders provides and manages all of these solutions for progressive hotels in a completely turn key environment.

You hear this often in advertising, especially for exercise equipment.  There is something to this principle at least as far as working is concerned.  Beginning your workday with a plan could mean you finish early and with less effort. 

Use that noggin to make your work more structured.  Perhaps you’ve been in the situation before where you have several deadlines looming and a desk full of work that still needs to be done.  You want to pull your hair out but don’t relish being bald.  What you want more is a system to keep this from happening every month. 

One solution is to work smarter.  One tool you have is a calendar.  It can be a desk calendar, virtual calendar or a day planner.  Log all of your due dates for work in the calendar.  Virtual calendars give the added benefit of alarms and pop-up reminders to keep you on track.  For those who travel, PDAs and planners keep you aware of looming deadlines, meetings and paydays. 

Examine your week at a glance.  With one or two deadlines, plan the projects you will work on each day accordingly.  To avoid boredom, divide your time into blocks.  Timeboxing is a technique that works this way.  During each block of time, work on a different task.  Keep adding blocks throughout your week until that task is finished.  At the end of the day, you’ll find that you completed work on several projects and spent less time evaluating what to do.

Limit the amount of work you take on at any one time.  It’s nice to be able to accommodate your clients but let’s be realistic.  There are only so many hours in the day and all of them can’t be spent working.  You are allowed to have a life. 

To that end, don’t stack the deck against you.  Give yourself the time you need to finish a project.  Some will be short and require less time than others.  Don’t work yourself into a corner but handle only what you can successfully cope with.  As your skills and speed improve, you can add a few more projects.

Take a break to refresh.  All work and no play as they say…  Schedule in time for socialization.  A person who is well-rounded enjoys their work.  Work is not their entire life but a small part.  Even if you own your own business, taking a breather lets you unwind from the pressure and jump back in with fresh ideas and more energy. 

End each day with a tentative plan for tomorrow.  We all know that life happens, but without a plan, work doesn’t happen.  Give yourself and your clients your best by planning ahead and making the best use of your time each day to work, laugh and live.

Hotel Traffic Builders

www.HotelTrafficBuilders.com

Hotel & Resort Internet Marketing & Website Development by Hotel Traffic Builders

Stress can kill you.  Most people think this is stretching the truth a bit, but it is not.  Stress causes unhealthy changes in your body.  Manage stress before it gets out of hand with these three simple techniques.

Stress is our response to outside forces exerted on us.  It sounds like a lesson in physics class.  If someone makes us angry, how we handle it affects our entire life.  Some people hold it in which puts pressure on their mind.  Others let the anger dissipate in order to keep it from affecting their lives.  You want to be the latter. 

Have you ever noticed that you get headaches when dealing with certain situations?  How about that stomach-ache that comes on when your boss walks in the room?  Learning to manage these stressful situations makes all the difference to your body and your health. 

Technique #1 – Take a time out.  No, we are not talking about sitting in the corner facing the wall.  Time out means distancing yourself from the situation in order to get a fresh perspective.  People have many different ways to take a time out and you can choose a few that work with your schedule and lifestyle.

Go for a walk.  If you work from home, going for a walk can break up the work of the day.  Getting fresh air and sunlight, as well as exercise, increases the oxygen flow to the brain.  Working an exercise session into your day on a regular basis is the perfect time to sweat out all your problems and increase the feel-good endorphins in your system.  A body in good shape can combat physical changes due to stress.   In fact exercise reduces stress levels.

Technique #2 – Communicate with others.  Some stressful situations are caused by what we perceive to be the truth.  We do it all the time.  Interpreting a look or a gesture without verbal confirmation leads to trouble.  If you think your boss is unhappy with you, go and ask him.  He may be having a bad day which has nothing to do with you, but you are getting a stomach-ache because of a faulty assumption.

When you are offended or have a problem, talk it out with the appropriate person.  Clearing the air goes a long way to clearing the mind of toxic thoughts and the body from harmful effects of those toxic thoughts.  Also communicate positive words to others to create a sense of well-being for yourself.

Technique #3 – Spend time doing something for yourself.  Every person needs to have time to pursue their own interests.  Maybe you like to sew, read or paint.  Whatever your passion, it is an important part of who you are and it is important for maintaining your sanity.  When the pressure gets to be too much, making yourself the number one priority can soothe your soul.

Stress is manageable with a few techniques.  Before you head towards the deep end, keep stress under control:  communicate, incorporate “me” time, and keep your body healthy.

Hotel Traffic Builders

www.HotelTrafficBuilders.com

Hotel & Resort Internet Marketing & Website Development by Hotel Traffic Builders

Does it always seem like you are under the gun to get things done?  Time seems to get away from you and you don’t know why.  Maybe what you need is a way to effectively manage your time.

Time management is an age-old problem.  Remember Wimpy in the old Popeye cartoons?  He’d pay on Tuesday for a hamburger today.  Why not pay now?  Procrastination is the enemy of all who try to manage their time.  If you have been bitten by the procrastination bug, it’s time to take an antidote.

Time management issues can be dealt with in three stages:  planning, tracking and assessing.  Just like with other issues in life, the best way to handle them is head on, before the problem gets to be too big for us to even want to look at it.

1.  Planning – Those who fail to plan, plan to fail.  We’ve all heard it and it’s true for the most part.  You have to have somewhere to start or you’ll spend half of your day deciding what to do.  Planning begins with the end – deadlines.  Know how much time you have for each task you have to accomplish.  Within that timeline, you can break down the larger goal into more manageable pieces. 

This method is less of a drain on your resources and your brain.  Use a planning tool like a calendar.  The calendar, preferably a computerized one, needs to have the capability of looking at a several views:  daily, weekly, monthly and yearly.  Use the calendar to map out work and personal tasks so that nothing gets overlooked. 

2.  Tracking – How are you using your time?  Use tracking software to monitor how much time is spent on business projects and how much is devoted to each project.  Tracking lets you see where time is being lost.  Maybe it takes too long to do the research for a project or the final organization of it. 

If your desk is unorganized, you could be losing what amounts to hours just trying to find what you need.  Time tracking software allows you to create categories for the way that you spend your time so you can easily follow.  If you don’t want to make that investment, create a time tracking spreadsheet in Microsoft Excel to prioritize tasks each day and track the time you work on them.

3.  Assessing – So, where did the time go?  Are you spending more time on minimum priority projects and less time on high priority ones, or is it vice versa?  Take a look at where you are developing black holes of lost time.  On your logs, choose a place for comments about what exactly you did during the time spent on each category during the day.  If writing up a proposal is supposed to take two hours but it is taking you four, what is being missed? 

It is easy for time to escape us.  For a business, time is money that you are losing.  Re-evaluate how you spend your time and tighten up on projects that are taking too long.

Hotel Traffic Builders

www.HotelTrafficBuilders.com

Hotel & Resort Internet Marketing & Website Development by Hotel Traffic Builders

Identity theft has cost companies and victims hundreds of thousands of dollars.  For major companies the cost could be in the millions.  One way that identities can be stolen is through the use of spyware.

Spyware are programs that can come bundled with other programs but operate on your computer out of view.  The user has no idea that the spyware was downloaded with their program.  In many cases, even if the naughty program is uninstalled, the spyware can remain. 

Spyware programs corrupt data and damage the operating of your computer system.  Computer applications begin to run slower or not at all.  When you get online, you may find that the spyware program has hijacked your browser.  This means that no matter where you try to go on the Internet, you are redirected to a certain site and nowhere else.

The purpose of spyware programs is up for debate.  Some sites want to record data on the people that use their program.  Their intention may be for statistical purposes but they have gone about it the wrong way.  If their users knew, they may not agree to this intrusion even for the best of intentions.  Hence, they resort to spyware.

Some spyware programs can steal your personal information by mimicking security pages and asking you to pay for and download fraudulent anti-spyware programs.  When your computer is opened up to a spyware program, your information can be transmitted to a third party who can steal your identity.  Keylogging is a technique used by spyware programs to track every keystroke you make to see where you go, and to gather any personal and financial information. 

Identity thieves have gone hi-tech and they are using your innocent web surfing against you.  Spyware can be disguised as toolbars, anti-spyware or add-ins for other programs.  When we click on the program, we don’t notice that other items are also listed to be downloaded as well.  Just because those programs are listed doesn’t mean they are needed for your application to run. 

Some sites like Kazaa are bundled with adware.  Adware in and of itself is not necessarily bad.  It is a way for companies to offer their program downloads for free by selling ads.  But, some of those ads could hide or be connected with sites that harbor spyware. 

Carefully read everything about downloads you are about to introduce onto your computer.  Use a high security pop-up blocker so that any site that involves a download will first ask you and will mention that the site wants to download other controls.  Install known and reviewed anti-spyware on your computer.  Any rogue program will then be flagged, and so will dangerous websites. 

Identity theft is a serious problem and no one wants to be a victim.  Be careful what you download or what sites you visit on the Internet so you don’t leave yourself open to spyware and subsequent identity theft.

Hotel Traffic Builders

www.HotelTrafficBuilders.com

Hotel & Resort Internet Marketing & Website Development by Hotel Traffic Builders

It has been said that employees that are appreciated work better.  What separates these businesses from others?  It could be that they are motivated to do their best on their job.

Motivation can spur us on to do a number of things.  Kids are motivated by the big man in the red suit to be good all year in anticipation of his Christmas Eve visit.  Teens are motivated to do well in the driver’s education class by the possibility of getting to drive a car.  Many are motivated to get a job by the fact that they get a paycheck.

On the job, lack of motivation can lower the productivity of your employees.  Issues with co-workers, morale, or working conditions can outweigh the need to get a job done in the most efficient way or timeframe.  How can you change this scenario if it exists within your company?

One idea is to offer incentives.  Before you have a coronary, incentives don’t always mean money.  You might have to spend some money, but what you offer to your employees to show your appreciation could be worth more than a little extra in their paycheck.

Incentive #1 – Institute a company fitness program.  It doesn’t cost much.  The American Heart Association has a program called Start! At Work that is geared towards getting employees off their chairs and onto their feet.  Getting out in the fresh air does a lot to change a mood.  Don’t count their walking time as a break or their lunch.  Offer a walk break separate from that in the name of good health. 

Incentive #2 – Offer employee recognition.  If an employee has been working at or above standard or going the extra mile with their work, let them and the entire office know.  A monthly recognition program goes a long way towards showing your employees that you appreciate all that they do. 

Incentive #3 – Hold monthly meetings.  Meetings are for more than talking about the status of projects in the office.  Set aside time for employees to openly talk about concerns that they have.  You may have to set rules for these meetings such as confidentiality of everything said.  If you have several departments in your company, the meetings can be a departmental exercise to keep it small and private.

Incentive #4 – Be flexible with employees.  We all have issues that come up at one time or another.  For example, if an employee needs to come in an hour later due to a childcare issue, instead of reprimanding them for it, offer another schedule that they can work with.  You might find that these conditions allow for more to get done during the day when some are in the office early and some later in the day.

It is the little things that mean so much.  Employees that feel their work is commended and their efforts appreciated will go above and beyond to get the work done for their employer.

Hotel Traffic Builders

www.HotelTrafficBuilders.com

Hotel & Resort Internet Marketing & Website Development by Hotel Traffic Builders

Book: Conquer E-Mail Overload with Better Habits, Etiquette and Outlook 2003
Where to buy: www.amazon.com
The book “Conquer E-Mail Overload with Better Habits, Etiquette and Outlook 2003” was written by Peggy Duncan.

Peggy Duncan is a personal productivity expert who teaches people how to work smarter and use their time more efficiently. She is a speaker, trainer, consultant and author of many books on time management.

Her book “Conquer E-Mail Overload with Better Habits, Etiquette and Outlook 2003” features strategies and lots of useful tips on how to manage your overflowing email inbox. It teaches you how to use Outlook efficiently and gives tips and strategies for managing email, contacts, appointments, calendar and other tasks. The step-by-step instruction manual includes lots of snapshots of how the screen should look like at each stage for easy learning.

In her book, Peggy Duncan answers the most frequently asked questions from her seminars and relates them to the reader. She also offers lots of practical and useful information for every user of Outlook.

If you are looking to get on top of your e-mail, this book offers highly practical advice and you will refer to it time and again as you battle email overload.

Hotel Traffic Builders

www.HotelTrafficBuilders.com

Hotel & Resort Internet Marketing & Website Development by Hotel Traffic Builders