When we are setting up a new website, there are many challenges we may face. We need to think about how our site fits with our brand, how accessible our site is for visitors, and how to make sure our site is secure. Often, we choose to use a range of software to help make running our website go more smoothly. Keeping our website secure includes building a secure site from the start as well as developing good user protocols.
Why Is Website Security Important?
We have seen many large organizations dealing with customer data breaches. It can feel like every few months there is another major breach that makes headlines. This means if we do not stay on top of our data, we will quickly lose the customer loyalty we have worked so hard to build over the years. While one data breach is not the end of a company, those who have had multiple breaches tend to see their clients or customers disappear. The good news is there are several steps that we can take to reduce the likelihood of such data breaches.
How Can We Protect a Website From The Ground Up?
When we are developing our website, it is important that we start with security. Oftentimes, this looks like focusing on the hosting platform we use. For example, if you’re running a website on WordPress, choosing the right enterprise WordPress hosting company can go a long way towards keeping your website safe. A good hosting company will reduce security risks with the latest technology. This is important because an attack on your site could cost us energy and money to correct.
How Can We Develop Good User Protocols?
Pay Attention To Passwords:
Once we have created a secured website it often comes down to training our visitors in best practices. The first place to start is passwords. It is important that we require customers to pick secure passwords for accessing certain parts of our website. Customers often use simple passwords that can be easily hacked. For this reason we should require customers to use a combination of characters, numbers, and symbols creating a password that is hard to break.There are several plugins that we can use to encourage visitors to create secure passwords. In addition, there are plugins that make visitors change their passwords regularly which adds another level of security.
Carefully Collect Contact Information:
If we have a website, visitors will want to contact us. The best way to do so is to create contact forms. These forms allow visitors to contact us without them getting our email or phone numbers directly. Typically, visitors fill out a form including their contact info, and their question, and we receive the info through a secure email. Using such a form has the bonus of helping decrease the likelihood of us getting lots of spam messages. Such spam messages can contain viruses or other malware that makes our data vulnerable. Using a contact form helps protect both our website visitor’s data as well as our own.
Communicate When There Is an Issue
While we can do everything in our power to secure our website, we might still face a data breach. Sometimes these data breaches are out of our control. No matter why there is a breach it is vital that we clearly communicate what happened and what types of data might have been taken. No one wants to find out about a data breach from a report on the nightly news or in a headline floating around Facebook.
Building a secure website is vital if we want to succeed as a business. This means we need to start with a secure hosting site and create systems that encourage visitors to create secure passwords. No one wants to be known for having multiple data breaches. While data breaches can be outside our control, we can plan to minimize the chances they occur. Keeping our data as safe as possible will help us stand apart from our peers in the marketplace leading to greater sales.