Another ploy, sometimes deliberate and sometimes “convenient”, is inserting a reference to “legitimate company” anywhere after domain name. Ex. https://www.anydomaindotcom/ebay/aagle/. Unwary victims may overlook fact that “ebay” is not domain, but see it anyway as a directory or file name. Anyone, anywhere can have a file or directory named like that of a company.

To make matters somewhat worse from an “easy to identify” viewpoint, source code of link can be represented as an I.P. address rather than its named counterpart. There are some tools that you can use at http://centralops.net/co/ and you can type in I.P. address and cross reference it with official account domain presented in e-mail, or web page for that matter. Opening a second window for investigative purposes and re-sizing both to be side by side can be revealing, and comparisons be made between alleged source and that of source code. www.ebay.com can be put in one window and www.suspiciouslyspurious.com can be put in other. NOTE; you should be checking domains and ignoring everything that comes after forward slash at end of domain. A similar test can be done for email viruses, where suspicious email addresses can be searched for some degree of authenticity.

If you are phished, try to learn as much as possible about it as phishing attempts and email viruses have some aspects in common. Incorrect spelling is one of them. You must understand that authors can be from anywhere and not necessarily have degrees in English. Legitimate companies can also be from anywhere, with different primary languages, but do perfect their spellings and general grammar.

Attention to upper and lower case can be another giveaway. This is especially true where particular portions of text are design of author, and not just copied and pasted. Typically, these portions are customised to be customer specific in a general sense, and fonts may even be different or out of place. Such “special” additions are to strengthen sense of urgency and call to action.

Should you be recipient of “phishy mail”, you can forward it to spam@uce.gov

The most important thing for small business to recognize is that internet marketing is an ongoing process. The internet is a dynamic medium. It is constantly changing. Sites come and go. Links (which are crucial to search engine success) disappear. Search engines change way they rank websites. The list goes on. In order to be succcessful, an internet marketing plan must embrace this dynamic nature of internet, and be ready to switch tools as situation demands. The thing to keep in mind is that internet marketing, while it need not involve a huge budget, must involve an ongoing budget, if it is to succeed. The days of “if you build it, they will come,” are long gone, if they ever existed.

The great news for small businesses is that it does not have to cost a fortune to get involved in internet marketing. We have clients in several businesses who are spending $100 a month on Adwords, and seeing big ROI. What’s important is to find a good internet marketing consultant, and get started. Internet marketing is unique in its ability to be tracked, monitored, measured, and tweaked. This means that even with a modest budget, a business can keep track of where dollars are going, and whether they are well spent. There is an old saying attributed to an exasperated business owner: “I know half of my advertising works. I just don’t know which half.” With exciting options on internet today, that saying need no longer hold true. You can find out exactly what works, and what doesn’t. For small businesses everywhere, that’s really big news.