You may have noticed that on our website, one of the passions we have is making a difference in our community.  As a company, we are constantly seeking out opportunities to give back.  One such way this was lived out recently was by Joe Sandin’s participation in a local entrepreneurship event.

Joe Sandin, President and Business Development & Strategy at Onsharp, serves as a mentor for the Onsharp team on daily basis.  He provides guidance and advice from the viewpoint of an expert in the industry, as well as that of an entrepreneur in the technology world.  During second week of June, Joe served as a mentor as usual; this time for a group of three high school students during the first annual NDSU Research & Technology Park Youth Entrepreneurship Academy. 

The academy lasted for one week, ending in a special event on Friday, June 11 in which the winning team was awarded $500 college tuition vouchers to be used at North Dakota State University.  During the academy, students from Fargo-Moorhead and surrounding areas worked as teams to complete presentations for an array of case studies.  Various area business mentors helped guide the teams throughout the process.

As Joe reflected on the experience, he commented: 

“Participating as a mentor in the NDSU Research & Technology Park Youth Entrepreneurship Academy was an extremely rewarding experience. I always enjoy sharing what I have learned as an entrepreneur with younger generations to encourage them to consider the rewarding but challenging path of an entrepreneur. I only wish I could have had the opportunity they had in this program to learn about what it takes to develop and fund a startup business at such a young age. I look forward to potentially seeing some their faces in the future as fellow entrepreneurs out in the market.”

Joe’s participation and enthusiasm about the event shows yet again that Onsharp is truly committed to driving success in the lives of others—whether it be for a client, employees, or the overall community.

The number of households using electronic billing and payment is quickly growing.  In fact, “According to the financial information management company FISERV, the number of American households paying bills online has doubled …up from 15.3 million in 2004 to more than 36 million last year.” Source. With the number of people using electronic billing and payment increasing year to year, it isn’t a surprise that security becomes a forefront concern.

Even though electronic billing and payment is now very secure (SmartPay is PCI compliant; if you missed our blog on that, check it out here). It is still important to take extra precautions when securing your personal information online.  Here are 5 simple steps to ensure extra security.

1. If you print off statements for your records, shred them.  Even users of electronic billing and payment may print something off every now and then—and sometimes it is hard to remember to shred the information if you aren’t used to paper bills anymore.  But it is important to make an effort to do this, as the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) estimates about 9 million Americans are affected by identity theft every year .   Learn more about identity theft here. 

2. Never respond to e-mails requesting important personal information.  Phishing and hackers are major, valid concerns in today’s Internet-driven society, and any legitimate company with which you do business will never request important personal information via e-mail.  If you receive a suspicious e-mail, be sure to contact a representative of your bank or of the business for which the hacker may be pretending to pose.

3. Check your online accounts regularly.  It is important to keep an eye on your bank account, as well as any online shopping accounts or other online accounts.  Staying on top of your purchases and information will help you notice right away if there seems to be any tampering with or fraudulent purchases toward your accounts.

4. Keep your computer secure.  Make sure your computer and information is kept secure, and try to do all of your online financial business and bill paying at your home.  Don’t take your laptop to a public place (i.e.; a restaurant, the local coffee shop) to do your bill paying, as there is more risk if you are connecting to a network you don’t know is secure or if you are around a lot of people.

5. Make your passwords strong.  Don’t use the same password for multiple accounts, and don’t write your passwords down.  Make them long in length and very unique; using special characters and a combination of upper and lower case letters helps.  Change your passwords regularly.  Every 3-4 weeks is an ideal span of time, and be sure it isn’t a password that someone would easily be able to guess.

Following these and other simple guidelines will help you keep your information more secure, and will make the use of online accounts and online bill paying much more enjoyable!

Where are you on Google? How about Bing? Yahoo? You can easily increase traffic to your site by improving your rank in the organic search results of popular search engines (organic search results are not the sponsored links which are paid for). There are a few easy things you can do to move your site’s listing higher in the search results without spending anything but a little bit of your time. 

Get listed

Each of the three major search engines has local listings.  Think of these listings like a web based phone book. Make sure you have a local listing for each city in which you have a physical location. 

1. Go to getlisted.org

2. Type the name of your business and zip code

3. If you’re not listed, follow the instructions to get listed

Make some links 

Search engines look for how many of your links are on different sites. Create some of your own links by setting up a profile about your business on any one of these sites:

• Facebook

• MySpace

• Twitter

• ZoomInfo

• LinkedIn

Directories

There are a variety of local directories where you can get your business listed as well as industry specific directories. We suggest these directories but you can do a search for “your town local business directory” and get a list of even more directories.

a) Hotfrog.com

b) ShowMeLocal.com

c) MerchantCircle.com

d) MyHuckleberry.com

Ask for Links 

We wouldn’t ask just anyone, though! Ask your local Chamber of Commerce, your Current Clients/Customers, Business Partners, and any reputable site that lists local business but isn’t a directory, you can help them out by providing the html code for your link when you request a link. For our client College Nannies and Tutors their code would look something like this: 

<a href=’http://www.collegenannies.com’> College Nannies and Tutors </a> and look like this on our website College Nannies and Tutors.

Advertise your website

One way to improve your ranking is to increase the number of people who visit your site—so first you need to let people out there know you have a site. Put your web address on every marketing piece: business cards, brochures, ads and everything else including your radio advertisements. 

Things to remember

Keep your info up to date on local listings and update your address, phone numbers, and website address if they change, build your links, and be consistent with your social media updates and blogging. All of these things will help to optimize your search engine rankings. 

Who doesn’t enjoy being happy?  And what is more, who doesn’t enjoy finding ways to lower the stress and expand the happiness in their lives?

Last week, NBC’S Today Show did a story called “Can going paperless make you happier?”.  In this story, the Today Show’s financial editor Jean Chatzky discusses how paying bills electronically can help save the environment, reduce clutter, and relieve overall stress. 

Chatzky also talks about how paying bills electronically leads to fewer bills piling up, meaning less clutter as well as a positive impact on the environment.  In the interview, Chatzky also mentions a study in which users of electronic billing and payment said overall they were both a happier individual and more satisfied customer.

Another element that factors into the happiness users experience comes from the confidence in the safety and security of paying bills electronically.  As Chatzky also points out, users of electronic billing and payment are also better with their money because these individuals are more attentive to their accounts, having the power to check their history, balances and more with the click of a mouse.   What is more, most identity theft happens from “dumpster divers” getting a hold of paper statements, and utilizing electronic billing and payment rids of this risk.

Plus, using electronic billing and payment saves these individuals a lot of time, as well as “at least $60 on stamps” per year on average.  And these people can focus their important time on other things, rather than sifting through bills and writing checks.

No wonder users are so happy.  Less clutter, less time taken, less stress—what isn’t to love?!

Check out the story, as well as some other tips from Chatzky about electronic billing and payment here, and learn more about electronic billing and payment here.

What about the 3D process?

Now that you have an idea of what we do, and how we do it for you with our services, what about that process? We use the 3D process consisting of three phases: Discover, Develop, and Deliver. Get it? Three “D’s” make up the 3D process. 

We always begin each project with a Discovery session. You tell us what you require: a way to place orders online, decrease costs, a more reliable email system… and we will begin the Discovery process of what technologies we can use to meet your requirements. We’ll even be able to tell you exactly what your project will cost based on your requirements before we begin Development. 

Development is where the technologies found in Discovery are implemented. Our developers will code away while our project manager keeps you informed of the progress. Based on your requirements outlined in Discovery, we create a system that functions they way you need it to. Our project manager sends you progress reports (weekly, monthly, or whenever you wish) to keep your project on course. Once initial Development is complete, we put your solution through rigorous testing. Okay, the testing isn’t that rigorous on the testers, but we do make sure everything is functioning and is up to your standards before we launch or “Deliver” your project. 

When we launch your finished project, it may end the project itself but it does not end the 3D Process. We continue to deliver measurable results for your business. The Deliver phase begins with the deployment of your project to the appropriate environment and continues with ongoing user training, technical and user support, and measurement of the solutions’ continued success. 

In one sentence, Onsharp helps businesses utilize innovative web based technologies to reach business objectives by measuring results; all with an unparalleled customer experience. But not everything can be described in one sentence, let alone, one blog. We admit, this wasn’t as fun as some of our other blogs, but we know you probably had questions the site just wasn’t answering. And if you have more, leave us a comment or send an email to info@onsharp.com . 

Missed the other blogs? Here are links to the other two! 

http://www.onsharp.com/blog/post/What-exactly-does-Onsharp-do-Part-I.aspx

http://www.onsharp.com/blog/post/What-exactly-does-Onsharp-do-Part-II.aspx