What are the Brand Guidelines for digital marketing production?

What are the Brand Guidelines for digital marketing production?

Consistency is the pillar of the making your mark as a brand. It should be like if you are searching for something that is your favorite stuff, then people should be able to find you. Brand Guidelines is an essential tool which helps in establishing your brand name. A branding guideline is a document that is the key which allows the content makers to impart a positive message to your crowd, so it’s an extraordinary resource for making predictable, on-mark content.

It takes a lot of time to create a logo, perfect message, website for any company. There is a vast brainstorming involved while curating the notes, logo which is the primary requirement for any company and of course the site it consists of a lot of creative work.  Even the messages that you need for your website which should be catchy and attractive also requires a lot of time to think about the taglines, relevant words that are effective. Rules and Regulation creating involves a lot of stuff in it which is all yours. However, none of this will be consistent and will stay long with you if you don’t have proper guidelines.

What are the brand guidelines?

The brand Guidelines are a usually a set of rules and regulations that are set by a particular company on how to use the company assets or the branding elements. All the big companies MNC and industries follow these brand guidelines. The brand guidelines are a huge help for the designers, bloggers, writers and all those people who will copy your logo so that it helps in creating marketing material.

The Branding guidelines are the tools which have specific rules and regulations about how to the element of brands. Usually, the designers, writers, and anyone follow the Guidelines who get information from you and uses your brand name, logos or any information from your site. The Guidelines are always present in the form of the PDF or a page which is like a book. It tells more about your brand and how your brand works so that you will find your brand identity.

Why are brand guidelines important?

The brand guidelines are fundamental that defines how the elements in your brand that are present should be used. This shows how to work with your brand and can communicate with customers quickly.

Different elements should be unified to have an identity while connecting the different parts that identify your brand name, color, logo, and the typography. Branding guidelines help a lot in rebranding your self and the company name while you are establishing another branch of your company. It is also a way of maintaining communication between the customers and filter out the target customers in the whole bunch of customers.

Consistency

If you are a huge company, then whenever someone is visiting your site and want to use your brand name for any work they want. At, the point of time it is essential to have a set of rules and regulation that are strict enough this shows you professionality and that you are concerned about your brand. This also shows your consistency which makes the brands to be recognizable in the crowd on which the more amount of people will rely. It makes the viewers feel that your brand is genuine and takes all the pride in providing the strict rules and regulations.

Focused

While your company introduces new services and products, the brand name stretched way too much.  By having a list of Rules and Guidelines, you can showcase a consistency to your customers but should have to keep a track on it with all the tools that work quickly and give the desired results in an instant.

Maintaining standard rules

The Style guide usually contains all of the information and all the rules and regulations about how to use all the elements that are present in your brand. Instructions include a lot of things, and one of the most important things is the logo and wordmark, in-depth about the logo and all the words, logo color, typography, logo spacing.

Try to create your brand identity if you already have then try to increase it to more. Rules even help the new employees because you may know about your brand inside out but the new employment may not.

Value

If you have a cohesive brand identity, then it enhances the perceived value of your brand. If you maintain the consistency, then your brand will behave more like the professional and reliable by having a good style guide which makes it immensely easier to preserve the quality and the integrity of the image of the brand.

Major corporate brand guidelines

We present you the brand guidelines of some of the major social media sites that people usually stay active on these days.

GOOGLE

You have to first enter into Google Permission where you can find different Guidelines for various sectors. Like you can see the guidelines for the Logos and the trademark, Rules for entertainment and media, Regulation for the Sponsorship and partnership, etc., similar to this every sector has its guidelines.

Basic, thing that people should always concentrate on is the Logos. The below image shows how the logo should be used. There should some gap maintained above, below and beside the logo. The minimum size should be 24 dp in height.

Google Guidelines

Source: Google

All the Google different types of the logo which should not be used in any cost is mentioned below which involves no different colors, no usage of old logos, etc.

Google Guidelines

Source: Google

The Google can only use Google G, Google Doodle, and merchandise. No one else can be able to use it.

Google Guidelines

Source: Google

Google Guidelines

Source: Google

You quickly get to know more about the Rules and regulation of Google you have to visit Google permission where you can find various sectors which you can read according to your requirement.

WHATSAPP

Below is the different type of the WhatsApp that should be used. The logo mentioned here are to be used as it is. Logos shouldn’t be distorted, or any other changes are not encouraged.

WhatsApp Guidelines

Source: WhatsApp

Brand Guidelines

Source: WhatsApp

The Name WhatsApp when anyone used should always contain W as capital and A capital and must write together. The different ways people usually do use while writing, try your best to avoid these type of small mistakes which may lead WhatsApp to claim copyright infringement.

WhatsApp Guidelines

Source: WhatsApp

The color code should be maintained like mentioned below and should not beyond these colors.

WhatsApp Guidelines

Source: WhatsApp

WhatsApp Guidelines

Source: WhatsApp

However, you can take a screenshot but as just mentioned above and can take a screenshot for all the type of OS present.

What you can see below the WhatsApp logo should be used as it is, it should never be altered. Check the image down.

WhatsApp Guidelines

Source: WhatsApp

To know more about WhatsApp and WhatsApp rules and regulations you can get a full detail about it in WhatsApp brand guidelines.

TWITTER

Twitter is one such social media sites that are used by a lot of people all over the world. We just provided some of the basic guidelines of the Twitter. It is a potent symbol and worldwide utilized section — some rules and regulations that everyone should follow for sure.

Twitter Guidelines

You can see above the twitter logo and the spacing. The size of the logo must be minimum 16 pixels wide. There should be a clean and clear spacing for the logo. However, the space around the logo should be 150% of the width of the logo.

Twitter Guidelines

The logo for Twitter should either be blue on white or white on blue, and the integrity of the Twitter logo should be maintained. Changing the background to some other colors or image is not encouraged. Similarly, the changing in the color of the logo is not supported.

Twitter Guidelines

Source: Twitter

If you are writing any username or hashtag then should maintain the above format. This is a strict rule which everyone should follow for your username and hashtag.

Try to avoid all the mistakes that people usually do while using the Twitter logo. Below is the format which you must prevent strictly according to the Twitter Guidelines.

Brand guidelines

Source: Twitter

Twitter Guidelines

Source: Twitter

In Google, the detailed list of Twitter Rules and Regulations can be found you have to search Twitter guidelines here you will have everything in brief.

INSTAGRAM

Instagram has strict Rules and Guidelines while using the icons and symbols. However, the user can use only the images that are allowed by the Instagram which are mentioned below. Not just the Instagram icon when people can take the screenshot and use it when the Name Instagram should be kept consistent. The letter “I” should always be capital and the word Instagram should ever be written together and should not be written as Insta or gram, or we can’t even connect it with your brand name or any other name.

Instagram guidelines

Source: Instagram

Instagram guidelines

Source: Instagram

Like the example as mentioned above, the screenshot and the broadcast templates should be used. These some of the essential guidelines, to know more and all the Guidelines specified by Instagram follow the Instagram guidelines you can find all the rules there.

These are the guidelines of some of the important and mostly used Social media. Maybe you are violating some of the Guidelines please cross check and try to rectify it.

You can contact us any time you like to connect we are available 24*7 and will surely help in all the issues that you have.

Google Holiday mapping for Thanksgiving Day

Google Holiday mapping for Thanksgiving Day

The happy, amused and pomping holidays have started. Holidays are full of friends, relatives, having fun together, good food, lots of  holiday shopping, dinner and enjoying. For most of the American, Thanksgiving actually means turkey, having dinner parties, friends, parades, road trips that’s all. However, people have different choices like some take a trip to other places, some want to be at home and have a family get together, people have turkey feasts, look for amazing black Friday deals.

Not just the party and dinners people will be eagerly searching for the yummiest pumpkin Pie from the Grandma’s recipe book to impress the guests in the home. This guide tells something like these amazing things that people look for in this holiday season. People are also eager to know what is going on this holiday like about the places which people like to visit and where people are investing more time, all the insights about this is being analyzed in details by Google trends that all the things are mentioned in details below.

Most Popular Searches in Google

To have a deeper analysis and understand what people exactly intend to visit, during the holidays and all those places which they are dragged to in this season. It is however analysed clearly from the number of times people ask the Google Maps about taking to a place or showing the direction towards a place. Google had really did a hard work in finding out the exact statistics where the people are preferring to go during their holidays. Then showcased all the statistics in a visual representation about the most visited sites in Google maps. So, the below image shows the amount of searches.

American All state map

Source: Google Maps

Searching Trends in Google Maps National

POPULAR SEARCHES

During the time of Thanksgiving the most popular stop where people stuck to get something in the holiday season are the local shops. All the places which would be crowded during the holidays and we showcased you the peak time when it would be crowded is mentioned below. You just have to hop on when it is not crowded or else you will find yourself stuck in midst of a lot of people. This gives a brief idea about the period of time when it will be crowded, which area will be crowded more and at what period it would be free so that you can go and  buy whatever you want without having to face the problem, you can go straight in without have to make your way in between the crowd. The below images shows you clearly about it.

google popular search

Source: Google Maps

GAMING ZONE

When we have a look at the United States trending holiday mapping for Thanksgiving and the whole nation search trends on this day. People here love video games a lot. We will represent you a data which will show the shopping pattern of the people in the United Nation. During the holiday season, most of the people buy different video especially the teenagers take the advantages of the holiday season and importantly the sales during this time. As the sales are on, so people take it as a chance and buy all the video games which they like. November end December is the season when people get amazing offers through which people can buy everything that is there in their checklist.

Screenshot popular thing

Source: Hubspot

The specific list of video games that the people look for is the other end of story. While, you can’t ignore the fact that the VR or the Virtual reality which was discovered to make the gaming, watching video’s look very much virtual people are wishing to buy it a lot. However, the company Oculus launched a new VR headset which is start studded Campaign that came up this Thanksgiving day. This will influence the way of playing the video games so it is thought to be the game changer in the world of Video Game experience where VR or the virtual reality has become the mainstream in technology.

Searching Trends in Google Maps locally

SHOPPING

One of the biggest day for the deals and offers that comes after the Thanksgiving day is the Black Friday still now there are a lot of stores and outlet which have already let out a lot of Black Friday deals, offers, exclusive discounts etc.  People shop on this day like anything and this day can also be called as the shopping day. Shopping doesn’t only involve just clothes, footwear, accessories etc it also involves the other kind of things also. This is the period of time when every shop and store gives exclusive offers and discounts. While shopping tops the list, we show you the image in which we are mentioning some of the google search results which people search in maximum amount during the holiday season.

holiday shopping

Source: Google Maps

FOOD SEARCHES

A lot of people at this holiday time search a lot about the food, drinks, Recipes to cook, where they can find the good discounts or offer on food, Restaurants to go for etc. However, when it comes to Thanksgiving or Black Friday it is all about good food and yes it also about turkey. People in the United States still need a lot of guidance in selecting the variety of drinks and food which they will opt for the day. and take the help of Google for it.

Thanksgiving food

Source: Google Maps

ENJOYMENTS

On holidays people want to relax and enjoy the festive mood. It is the best time for a entertainment, people at this time look for the matches of their popular sport or want to watch their favourite movie. Entertainment is not just limited to a movie or a favorite sports match instead of it also includes a lot of things like someone want to go party, someone wants to relax in an SPA or maybe some like to enjoy in the entertainment zones. Below we mention you the popular places which Google users search for or look for.

Entertainment thanksgiving

Source: Google Maps

Crowded Areas

Every week even you go to some place you must be habituated with the crowd that you face in the normal days, But that is not same in case of Holidays because during the holiday season the crowd even in your nearby places also increases. People travel on different day and time so may be when you go at a point of time but you find your favourite place to be crowded. Not just shops and area even if travelling to some other city, country, anywhere it is will be crowded at the holiday season. In the below diagram we show you all the busiest and the crowded areas, that you may want to visit but it would be good if you schedule it before or postpone it.

Google Mapping

Source: Google Maps

This statistics shows clearly when to avoid a trip and when it is  best to schedule it.

With this note, we come to an end. You get to see in brief about the people searches in the Google during the holiday season.

It is you who should consider all these factors and act accordingly. However, it is the best chance to grab one of the best deals during this holiday season and purchase all those things which you wanted buy could not but can make a purchase with the ongoing exclusive offers.

Happy a safe and happy holiday’s!

Mass marketing Vs Niche marketing: Which is best for Businesses?

Mass marketing Vs Niche marketing: Which is best for Businesses?

There is always a debate going on between the Mass marketing and the niche marketing to select which is the most effective way of marketing that will help in advertising in both the ways: in digital media simultaneously it should work out in the traditional marketing technique. However, mass marketing is inclined more towards Offline media or traditional marketing. Whereas, niche marketing is lent towards the digital platform or digital marketing. The marketing predominantly is of two types till now so as the methods, which filters out to be Niche marketing or Mass marketing.

Let’s have an in-depth analysis of the marketing method and know more about it.

What is mass marketing and niche marketing?

Mass Marketing

Mass marketing
Mass marketing is the full opposite of Niche Marketing. Here, a single person deals with the whole and larger group of people or a company. On the other hand, we can say mass marketing as something which can be denoted as the marketing strategy that incorporates mass media and the huge distribution. Which directly gives a conclusion that you are targeting each and every sector and all the demographic regions.

The mass marketing only targets a group of people or you can say the mass, this derives actual meaning that relies on its name. Reaching to a huge number of audience, exposure of the product in the market to as many customers as possible, the sole aim is to target all the users and have a larger amount of sales or buying for the products. Its motto is a huge amount of sales at a low cost and providing all those kind of services which will appeal to everyone who is in the market as well as the customers.
This strategy is usually included by all the big and top corporate companies and some of the well-known brands such as Coca-Cola, FedEx.

Niche Marketing

Niche Marketing

Niche marketing focuses only on a specific product first. So, the niche marketing strategy targets the small, specific and well-defined portion of people which you target include only those who are already in your list and are the target people. Organizations adopting these techniques are known as the concentrated or focused way of marketing. It first identifies a specific segment and then makes a strategy according to the market need, habits and preferences.

Niche marketing is very precise you can target all those people whom you want to reach. You can get the customers under different categories like based on the demographics, habits, hobbies, occupation, interest, digital platform searches etc. all these factors help you knowing who are your target customers. Every single Niche marketing supports specific features of the product which includes things like design, the price of the product, the quality of the production and all the demographics that the company wants to reach.

The products or the items that people usually include in Niche Marketing basically include things like dermatitis, dandruff or acne, the products related to fitness in which some products that are only related to a specific body part, it also includes clothes which involve clothes for a specific body part or clothes for a specific occasion like wedding, party, officewear etc. and for all those customers who are budget conscious.

Mass Marketing and Niche Marketing- which is good for Advertising

Mass Marketing is hugely incorporated by those companies which are big or we can say it as the MNC’s, all those companies who are huge and can invest a lot of amount in Marketing in all the channel’s possible. The FMCG’s, consumer durables, all these types of services usually use this mass marketing method.

Advertising aspects of Mass marketing

Even the smallest things like pens even have a brand like Parker, Fountain etc. not only this company most of the pens company do mass marketing to reach the people. This involves all those small items such as Detergents, shampoos, soaps, toiletries etc. these all are the basic needs of a human which hugely do mass marketing to reach a lot of people. A lot of Deodorants, perfumes and some of the personal hygiene things use mass marketing to reach all the people. But it requires a lot of money to be wasted for all the advertisement on the TV, hoardings, banners etc. Mass marketing requires a lot of money to be invested, as it for the large scale and the whole market use it.

statistics of e-retailing usa

Source: Statista

The big company like WalMart, Amazon, Kruger etc incorporate these services. Until 2016 Walmart was leading in Mass marketing followed by Costco, Kroger, Amazon, and Walgreen’s. In the year 2017, Amazon tightened the seat belts and started investing more in mass marketing and stands in the first position in Mass retailing all over the world. Amazon topped the board and became the top company to invest in Mass marketing followed by WalMart, Liberty Interactive Corporation, target corporation and so on. These are all the top companies who have that much capital which they can invest in Mass retailing to get results from all sectors.

On the other hand, we can say that Mass marketing is like the traditional way of marketing, however, Niche marketing is majorly digital marketing. Mass marketing is usually opted only by those companies who have a lot of capital to invest. Which is not possible in case of the small industries or those companies which are still budding and are in a long run to reach that place. These type of companies can’t invest so much in Mass marketing that then these companies have to turn towards Niche Marketing.

Niche marketing aspects in advertising

Niche marketing needs very less amount to be invested in the advertisement these days it can be achieved only through Digital Marketing. While we say digital marketing this includes a lot of things involved like having websites online, content marketing, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) etc. These all are a lot of things that create a hype for you in the market. Digital marketing doesn’t involve a lot of capital to be invested, you can promote your brand according to your budget. There is no limitation, here you can target the users according to your budget.

Niche marketing

This type of marketing is being incorporated by all the Business people nowadays. It is similar to investing in those where you have to believe that people will revert back. Digital marketing and investing in digital marketing will increase the audience rate at a huge range. It is the best way of investing and getting back a lot of traffic. However, this also includes a lot of strategies and tactics that should be incorporated to get the desired result.

A smart way of investing and grabbing the audience attention and making them permanent users is not that much easy, it includes a lot of marketing strategies to be done. Eventually, if you have to go to Digital marketing agencies to fulfill this whole Digital Marketing aspect. Digital marketing agencies are the right place who can deliver you the result. While the top companies already have their in-house Digital Team ready, who grab the audience attention in the online or the digital medium.

Targeting the audience and making them into the permanent subscribers is what the niche marketing does, with investing as much is your budget is and according to your need. So, it is advised to have a niche marketing for any scale of the company not necessarily small or big it is open for all. However, Mass marketing is just for the big companies who can invest a lot.

How to differentiate mass marketing and niche marketing?

Niche marketing and mass marketing can be understood much better when both are compared and explained together because niche marketing is the complete opposite of Mass Marketing.

Lets us know more about these both with Examples of Mass marketing and Niche marketing!

mass marketing

Example of Mass Marketing

Niche marketing targets only small groups of people and all those people whom they think to be loyal customers and will get the returns for sure. However, when we come towards the Mass Marketing it is like burning all your money in advertisements. Mass marketing is like the standing smack in the middle of the huge park. Then you pile up all the denomination of the currency in the large ground and then the mass marketing person comes and sets all the currency pile in the fire. This huge fire lit in the middle of the park will grab the attention of a lot of people and those people will start thing something huge and big has happened and get curious about it.

In this lit fire, the mass marketer will try to make the users more curious about the fire, just by spreading the rumors that: burning the pile will generate a huge amount of smoke which is very good for health release a kind of gas which cures some kind of health issues. This scenario is what the Mass Marketer showcase the customers, to which people get excited and fight to try it first. This smoke plus rumors spread slowly and capture the whole park and everything becomes smokey. Similarly here the park is the whole area that the marketer targets, smoke is the ad of the product that the marketer sells. This is the whole way how Mass Marketing works.

Example of Niche Marketing

However, on the other side when we come towards Niche Marketing, here the marketer takes all the currency piles and goes to all those customers who are his loyal customers and make sure the customers purchase their product at any cost, and then the Niche Marketer will set the pile of currency on fire. He does all the previous research about the customers and their interest, hobbies, and habits, then targets those people who are someway related to the product that they want to sell. Which means here the marketers will target those people who want the smoke to have good health and cure all the health issues. As the marketer here targets people and usually are smaller in size, people who want the smoke will get it.

We easily get to know which is the best marketing technique is best for the type of business. But according to me for any type of business, it may be but Niche Marketing is the best way to get a huge result out of a small investment.

Advantages of Niche marketing and Mass marketing

Niche marketing

It is considered the best way of marketing and it is one of the cheapest ways of marketing. Marketing strategy differs with the money you want to invest for your business branding. The audience gets trusted emails and endorsement for the brands. However, this also involves a lot of background of investigation like in Niche Marketing the digital agencies target those people who will for sure buy the product, or those who have the keen interest in the product. In that limited investment which you can spend.

Mass Marketing

This is basically for the Big MNC’s those who can invest a lot of money in marketing. This includes all type of marketing strategy starting from hoardings, billboards, TV commercial etc. This includes all the FMCG items like daily use items soap, detergents, toiletries etc. all these things have a huge branding and extract a lot of traffic from the Mass Marketing. The marketing facility here holds a good hand in advertising the daily used items as people will obviously buy it. So, the top companies target every sector people and opt Mass marketing for this.

Conclusion

At, last we can conclude that Niche marketing is for all the brands and companies who want to make a mark and want to drag the customer’s attention and which can only be achieved through Digital marketing. On the other hand, Mass marketing is incorporated by the big MNC’s who can do the traditional way of marketing.

It is up to you what you want to include in your marketing technique to grab the audience attention. But my personal suggestion is Niche marketing which saves both your times and money!

What are the top Google My Business mistakes to avoid?

What are the top Google My Business mistakes to avoid?

While you are searching for something locally for any business place, shop or mall etc. Usually, where do you turn up? First, you will choose either the recommendation from friends and family or will go for the online media and go to a search engine for searching the place. The most loved search engine all over the world is “Google”.

According to Google Statistics, one-third of the Google searches are related to local searches and 90% of them are using mobile phones for searches. There are more than 500 million people searching for the local places using the online platform every day.

The local searches are increasing 50% faster than the other searches in the Google. Local searches are making its presence felt in the search results and showing how important the local businesses have become and how people are searching for it.

Google my business is cost effective and perfect for the local SEO business, it can be used effectively to increase the presence of the business in the Google search engine rankings. If you notice everything closely while searching anything in Google you will also know that there will be a “snack pack” results displayed on the right side of the screen. All these things are controlled by Google My Business.

Listing in the Google My Business and enrolling a company in Google My Business is very easy moreover, it is free of cost and is pretty straightforward. It is for all those also, who find that Google My Business is very difficult to handle or those who don’t know what is Google My Business is or those who don’t at all hail from the technical Background.

To help you in all those types of situation and difficulties that you may feel. We list out some of the important points that you should take care while you are going through Google My Business or opening an account in Google My Business:

How to start to Google My Business?

It is the best tool for marketing in the online media and is the perfect tool those who have limited resources but want to make it big in the market. However, this tool is fully free you don’t have to pay any charges for anything.

This is not a rocket science you have to first go to the Google My Business page then directly sign in with your account details. After the sign up you will be redirected to the Google My Business dashboard here you have to enter your business name, phone number, the category of the business that you are doing, website link etc. I would suggest you fill up all the things that are mentioned and are asked about, avoid to skip even one parameter. This will help you in all the way because while you complete it Google will make the suggestion to other users regarding your company if you include all these things this will give the viewers a broader aspect of your work.

When you go the Google My Business official website you will have to sign in directly. The page will be like the below one. To know about Google My business you can also check the option How it works in the front page only. It gives you brief information.

Google my business

(Source: Google My Business)

The picture below shows the sign in page where you have to enter the business name that you have of your company, shop, place etc.

GMB sign in page

(Source: Google My Business)

After the sign in you will get the verification information about the business. It will showcase you various options which you have to abide by.

GMB terms

(Source: Google My Business)

As soon as you abide by the terms and conditions you will have to choose a verification way like through the mobile numbers that you have given, or email ids. You can choose the ways you are comfortable for verification. Google carry on this verification process as it is very important to know that whether your company is genuine and eligible or not.  It is usually done using the postcard in the emails if you are new to Google my Business. Or else it can be done using the phone calls if it is being transferred to previously using a person.

 

verification page

(Source: Google My Business)

That’s all you end up having your account in Google My Business. Then you have to update, post all the things that go on in your business and all those things that will enhance your Business presence in the Google search engine.

If you are still getting confused about how to use the Google my Business then you can go to Google My Business help where you can find in details about how to get through.

GBM help

(Source: Google My Business)

Images in the listing page is a must and should because:

  • First of all, Google checks your Internal and External view of the office and verify your workplace, it is like a business verification. So, if you include the image of the building, internal workplace image, staff, signage etc. It will assure Google that you are far more unique.
  • Secondly, Users, these days check the place, area, the company after which they will think whether to invest time or not. It is mandatory to add the necessary and only the relevant images which gives an overlook of your business and company. Assure that all the images are of High Definition or HD quality.

Once all the things are done and set up nicely then you can get into Google my business whenever you want and can make the changes.

How to fix outdated and wrong information?

The information that you give in the online media should be up to date. While having a consistency in the information that you give in the Google My Business is important, this includes the things like NAP which includes Name, Address, Place- this is considered as an integral part when someone is searching about you or found about you.

With the help of your Google My Business account, you can change everything like- your time of opening and closing, the holiday dates etc. One of the biggest mistakes that people usually do is forgetting to keep all these things in Google my Bussiness listing which becomes a black mark to the company whenever a user is searching about it. People while searching something expect to get all the information about the company or the place that want to get to. If they don’t get all these information it upsets them or on the contrary if you don’t mention anything and the customers show up in your office while you are close it will create a bad impression about you in customer’s point of view. There is a 100% possibility that they will never turn up for your services.

To avoid this type of future situation it is important to have an updated information in your Google My Business account from time to time. So, that whenever a customer searches about you and your services he will land up in the right page with correct information.

Handing over your work to an agency a big NO!!

If you think like “this is a very tough task and I can’t take it and it is better to hand over some agency” then for this situation the straight answer is a big NOO!!!!! because it is not at all tough to be handled. Once you have an account you have to update it only when there are some changes in your business profile.

Google My Business provides all the means through which you can connect with the users just by having the relevant keywords related to your business. It helps in all means to make it easy for you. At last, it is you who knows about your work and services, whereas no other person can describe yourself better than you do.

As you the right person who knows all about your business it is just you who can handle the business page. While coming towards maintaining the business listing it is not necessary because you just have to update all the things and changes that you made in your business and add the innovative thing that you are incorporating presently in your work, that’s all, however, it is not a rocket science or brain surgery.

Rather than the keywords, the local search results get influenced by a lot of other things also like having backlinks for your website, reviews that have all the target keywords related to your work, click- through rate and a lot more. This provides a lot of positive results and turns out to be most effective if you incorporate the search engine marketing strategy.

TOP MISTAKES MADE IN GOOGLE MY BUSINESS

Wrong Pinnings

While updating the Google My Business one of the crucial points which people usually forget is the map pinnings. This is considered to be more important because these days digital marketing has taken over the world. People use digital media for every purpose. Customers want to go those place’s where they can easily reach through the help of Google maps who shows the direction to reach the place without any trouble.

Google map pins

If you are missing this simple point then it is the biggest mistake that you are doing. Google maps pinnings are important and it is the one on which most of the people rely on. Without the mapping, consumers will not take the trouble of searching you here and there and maybe getting lost in unknown places. Time is a pretty valuable thing and no one wants to waste it. Customers will think it is worthless or you are not up to date according to the budding technology and will not consider you in any way.

There are some cases found in which the businesses pin their location but the pinning ends nowhere. Like the Google map pinning is wrong, sometimes it shows as if the place in on the middle of the street or on the other side of the place or somewhere else. This is completely wrong pinning or it is like giving an unknown person a wrong address to go for. Here, also either the customer has to search you everywhere and get irritated at the end and will start thinking as if you don’t know the normal basic thing in the online channel, so you are worthless in their point of view.

It is advised to Pin in the right place, in the right direction exactly where your- company, shop workplace is there. This saves people’s valuable time and they will for sure appreciate you.

Located In

google location

(Source: Google)

Google recently has added this feature through which the users can edit the location or the exact place of the business in the Google My Business. For example, if you have a business listing in Google my Business, however, the information in it like the opening and closing hours are missing and the address is wrong. You just have to perform a google search to check the exact hours and the address. Or else you can even say the users that you have moved from that place and you are in some other place. Users can even post this on your business site through which the other people as well can be benefitted. You can even tell them that you have located to a particular place, location, shop, mall etc. this extra effort makes the users happy and make them think that you care them and your priority is the users.

Reviews in Google

The business owners usually get confused and get into a spider web while coming to the Reviews. Most of the business person ignore or don’t give any reply to the reviews whether it is positive or negative. A business only works when you talk to people or communicate with people. If you don’t reply to them then people will think you are rude and don’t care about them in any way, this will make you lose your target customer.

It is advised to reply to each and everyone who send you the review whether it is a positive or negative one because people will attract to it and Yes! this works like wonders in dragging people’s attention towards your business.

Eventually, reviews are of two types positive and negative. Replying to a positive one is good and joyful. If someone comments like he “enjoyed with you and your company and would like to visit again” it is great you should message him personally and acknowledge his interest. It becomes very difficult while coming to negative reviews most of the time it is seen that business people lash out the negative comments and answer in a rude way. This is not at all recommended you can answer them say like- This is not what we want our trusted customers to feel or We will acknowledge it and make sure that this will not happen in future or You can feel free to contact us so that we can discuss clearly.

These are some of the important things that should be kept in mind while going for a Google My Business listing. As previously mentioned it is easy for the even the non-technical guy and is open for everyone. Try to avoid the important mistakes that people usually do to deliver the best result to the customer.

Still found any issue while using the Google My Business you can feel free in contacting us or you can leave a comment below.

Thanks for your valuable time!!

Cathay Pacific data breach: 9.4million passenger data is unsafe

Cathay Pacific data breach: 9.4million passenger data is unsafe

Yet, another data security breaches of the Famous International Airways- The Cathay Pacific. Alas! This seems to have become a trend – yes we are talking about data security breaches and the frequency with which they are happening. Get up in the morn, switch on your TV, browse your favorite news channel, and in the highlights, you find fresh news related to a fresh data breach of big and famous multinational companies.

Alarmingly alarming! Yes indeed!

On October 24th, it was flash news that data related to Cathay Pacific Airways data had leaked. The news announced that some unknown hackers had got access to the details of the clients of Cathay Pacific, and the personal information of nearly 9.4 Million passengers was breached.

Cathay pacific

source: twitter

In its defense, Cathay Pacific said that initially, they did discover some suspicious activities in the network way back in March 2018 and started investigating it. In May 2018, they confirmed that a data breach had occurred and the personal information of passengers had been hacked.

After this incident, the airways informed about this huge data breach to the police. A thorough check took place, in which it was found that the personal data included information like passenger’ names, date of births, phone numbers, nationalities, email ids, addresses, passport details, identity numbers, travel histories, and the number of times they were contacted by the customer service. In the case of a frequent flyer, the membership details that he/ she had opted for – All these sensitive details of 9.4 million trusted passengers of the Cathay Pacific were leaked.

Further, Cathay Pacific made it clear that a total of 840,000 passport numbers were accessed, and 245,000 identity card numbers of the Hong Kong citizens were accessed. In addition to this, details related to 403 expired credit cards and 23 credit cards along with the CVV Numbers i.e. the card verification number had been leaked.

However, the company was clueless as to whether the data hacked was being misused. It is found that each passenger succumbed to a different kind of data breach, the combination of the data breach for every passenger was not the same. The IT system of the Cathay Pacific Airways was also affected, this was the reason why Cathay Pacific kept its flight operations far from it. Thus, this ensured no impact on the flight’s safety.

Cathay Pacific is still in the process of contacting the passengers who are affected by this data breach and has been explaining in detail that the account, though accessed completely by the hackers, none of the passwords were compromised on.

CEO of Cathay Pacific, Rupert Hogg, personally apologised to the affected people about the incident that took place. He assured the people that they have taken all preventive steps towards cybersecurity. They are working upon the issue with a leading security firm, to strengthen the security, He promised that nothing of this sort would take place in the future ever again.

Not only Cathay Pacific, few weeks before this incident, data of the British Airways also got leaked. Airways are not the only victims to these breaches. Various other social networking sites also faced these threatening data breaches. The recent data breach related to Facebook, where personal information pertaining to 50 million users got hacked, and password reset messages were sent to 90 million users.

Later on, another big news hit the screens – Alphabet shutting down Google+ in the near future, due to the recent data breach. Here, the information of 500,000 people was exposed, which was due to the vulnerability in the application.

After facing these many data security breaches, the first question that arises in the mind is, Are the people giving their important and personal information, so that it gets hacked? Obviously not! People should be more careful towards all the information they provide and have more security checks. Even while signing up, they should opt for all the security options. It is recommended to add your mail id and password manually, rather than inputting them automatically and include 2-3 security questions. These meticulous practices, will prevent such attacks to the personal information, to some extent at least.

Customers/Users Beware!

Brands lose their users trust due to Data Security Breaches.

Brands lose their users trust due to Data Security Breaches.

Every morning, as soon as we wake up, we hear the alarming news about Data Security Breaches or the recent data breach that occurred or some MNC data that was breached or hacked. This is the scenario that occurs every second day. This causes a sense of insecurity in the minds of people and tends to scare them no end. People are now worried about the secured data that they provide in online media. People need to be extra cautious and extremely careful while providing their personal information and data in the digital platform.

cyber hacking

What is data security breach?

Data Breach occurs when the personal data of a person gets accessed by some other person also known as a hacker. When the data of a person or an organisation geta accessed by these hackers without their knowledge, then the situation is referred to as data breach. The data which the hacker gets access to, is very sensitive and the personal information gets into the danger zone, when the hacker gets access to it. This threatening situation is possible in two different ways:

  1. By the hacker personally accessing the computer or network of the user and stealing the sensitive data and files.
  2. By the hacker, sitting at the comfort of his/her home and getting access to the target person’s computer data, or rather, by bypassing the network remotely and getting access to the desired data.

The second means i.e. by remotely having complete control over the data has become one of the most widely used techniques employed by the cyber hackers. This is one of the reasons for data breach – the data gets breached and the identity of the hackers is not known.

data breach

How data breach occur?

Below are some of the ways in which data breach occurs:

Background Research

The cyber hackers always carry out the background research and act accordingly. For any hacking to be a success, background research is mandatory. Importantly, the cyber hackers look for weaknesses or a weak link of the target person or the target company. When they find this weak link, they use it against the person or the company. In other ways, this is the strength that the cyber hackers get and they use this for data breaching.

Take Action

The cybercriminal slowly comes in contact with the users’ system or network and gains an upper hand on it. First, he/she tries to make a contact in the social media site of the user, then slowly digs into the details and gets full access to the user data. The time of the attack is not sudden, instead, it is very slow and he/she obtains the full data of the target user or the company.

Attack on Network or Social

When a hacker gets access to the company’s infrastructure, system, applications and also gets a hang of all the weakness of the company, he/she filtrates them to get access to the company completely. This is a network attack. On the other hand, social attack means tricking the employees of a particular organisation and getting all the data from him/her, like extracting information about- “How to get access to the organisation network?” This can lead to a situation wherein the employee is tricked and his/her user credentials are taken. They may even be asked to provide access to the attachments. This is a strategic malicious move, that can lead to a data breach in an indirect way.

Exfiltration

Once the hacker gets complete access to one system in the network of the organisation, he/she can easily attack the whole company’s software system and gather all the essential and confidential data. If the hacker gets all the data successfully without any hurdles, then the mission of the hacker is accomplished. The company’s data is hacked and the data breach is successful.

Few of the biggest data breaches of the decade:

Below mentioned companies faced some of the biggest data breaches of the era:

Yahoo Security Breach

In the year 2013, a lot of Yahoo accounts-approximately 3 billion were hacked. Yes, you heard it right – 3 billion Yahoo accounts were hacked. It is considered as the biggest data breach of this era. All the users, of Yahoo, were affected by this data breach. The reason behind this mishap, has not yet been found. The US government suspect Russia to be the hacker behind this breach.

yahoo hacked

eBay

On March 2014, around 145 million customers of eBay received an email to change the password or reset the password. The data breach usually includes encrypted passwords that connect directly to the personal information of the person. Like all other data breaches, the cybercriminals got access to the users to account through the stolen login credentials. The twist here is, the hackers didn’t gather the credentials from the users, whereas they got it from the employees of eBay. Thankfully, the payment option of the users was safe, as it was linked to PayPal, which needed an encrypted password for completing the transaction. So, the users were just asked to change their passwords.

Equifax Security Breach 

The Credit Bureau, Equifax was breached in the year 2017, due to which 143 million Americans and many other people from different countries got affected. The unique identities of thousands of people were stolen. Data Breach in Equifax took place several months before it was announced publicly. Equifax had a vulnerable open source software “Apache Struts”, from where the hackers got easy access to the customers’ accounts.

Facebook

The recent data breach that took place was in September this year, when the world’s most used social media site, Facebook got hacked. Around 50 million Facebook accounts were hacked all over the world and 90 million people were sent emails for password resets. This was caused due to some technical glitches at Facebook’s end. Through this, hackers gained access to the private and confidential data of the users. The European Government has taken strict action against it, Facebook had to face the trial in the court and CEO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg had to be present in the court trials to testify himself.

Google+

The most recent one, on October 9th, Alphabet, announced that they are going to shut down Google+ soon. This was after the incidence of the data of 500,000 people being exposed. The reason here also was similar – the data got leaked because of the vulnerability in the application which made it easy to gain access for the hackers and the app developers to get into the personal data of the users and exploit it. The data actually was leaked earlier in March 2018, but it was reportedly leaked in October 2018. After a thorough check with the Google employees, it was found that the developers had no clue about it. Presently, all the user data is safe. Following this, a news came that the Google+ will soon be shut-down by Alphabet.

Social media outrages

All these kinds of data breach and the recent data breach that keep surfacing every now and then, make people worry about their valuable personal and sensitive information. People now are facing a big dilemma whether to feel secure with these digital sites or to avoid these sites.

October 16th morning-6:41 EDT: YouTube was down and the network was lost for almost two hours. Not only YouTube, Slack – a professional site for office usage got network Glitches on June 27th this year and lost its network for almost three hours, and people were not able to connect to their workplaces. Those three hours were said to be the most difficult time for the employees and the organisations.

What are all these things leading us to? Whether to believe social media or not? In my view, the data which is much sensitive and important should not be shared in any social platform. Instead, it should be kept at a place where the information would be safe. To secure your social media site, always use several options like double check while login, having security questions, connect to email and access only when scrupulously checked by you. These steps will help in making your information safe in the social media or in the digital platform.