American Horror Story: the Website Edition

You know how when you’re watching a scary movie, you’re constantly thinking, “No, you naive teenaged girl (And why does it always have to be a girl?), don’t look in there!” and “Turn around! Don’t go down that dark alley by yourself?” In the movies, the bad guy is always lurking in exactly the place we would expect him to be. On the web, the bad guys (and gals) are a bit less predictable. That means we savvy business owners need to be that much more resourceful if we want to protect ourselves.

Since it’s October, the scariest month of the year, I’ll be blogging all month about the scariest things that can happen to your website: social media attacks, getting hacked, and becoming the target of a blog or email spammer. (Getting goose bumps yet?) The damage done in these scenarios can be hard to undo; so the best strategy is prevention. I’ll offer tips to help guard your online presence and I’ll talk about what to do should any of these nightmares unfortunately become your reality.

I know, I know—no one really wants to imagine the worst-case scenario happening to his or her business. I too am a big believer in the power of positive thinking, but there’s a big difference between being optimistic and ignoring serious risks.

In my experience, there are two main reasons that small business owners get caught off guard: either they are unaware of what can go wrong or they are aware of potential problems, but are intimidated by the task of finding solutions. It can be overwhelming both to imagine problems and to think about solutions. But the thing is, these scary things are a lot scarier, if you do nothing to protect yourself against them. And once you commit to being proactive, I think you’ll find that the peace of mind is worth the effort.

So make sure to check back each week during October and use my blog as inspiration to develop a security strategy for your website. Don’t allow your business to be vulnerable to these frightening web monsters.