Catchy headline right?

We’ll, in this edition of the Trust Guard Insider, we talk about both of these things in detail. (Unfortunately they’re unrelated, but they are still both great reads!)

Here we go…

Think Your Website is Safe from Hackers? Think Again…

So, for those of you that don’t know, we officially launched our PCI Scanning services back on January 7th, 2009. It’s been a great success so far, quickly becoming one of our flagship services. A couple weeks ago, out of curiosity, I asked Zach, one of our programmers what percentage of new clients failed their initial scan with at least one or more medium, high, or severe vulnerabilities. He ran some numbers and my jaw dropped.

“73% of all our new PCI clients failed their initial scans! That’s nearly 3 in every 4 websites!”

If this number is any indication of the Internet as a whole, that means that most websites have vulnerabilities that are open to hackers, viruses, and more – and most website owners don’t have any idea that they’re at risk. What’s worse is that these vulnerabilities can put their customers information at risk, including names, addresses, phone numbers, emails, and credit cards.

We’ll, these numbers were a wake up call to us that we needed to help our customers improve their security. So, we’ve decided to offer all of our clients a full 25,000+ point, PCI Security Scan (a $47 value) for free!

To run the scan, you simply log into your Trust Guard Member Control Panel, click on the PCI Scanning tab, and then click on the ‘Start Scan’ button. In about 10-15 minutes, the scan will end and you will be able to view both the Executive and Detailed Scan Reports to find out exactly where your website stands. The Detailed report will even give you instructions on how to fix any vulnerabilities that you might find that you can easily send to your server administrator (usually your hosting company).

If you are not a Trust Guard member yet and would like to find out more about how you can start providing trust and security to your customers then sign up today at http://www.trust-guard.com/compare-Trust-Seals-s/1.htm. (Note: If you signed up for Trust Guard before Feb. 2008 and you haven’t migrated to the new system, simply email support (at) trust-guard.com and we will be happy to help you move over so you can start enjoying all the features of the new system.)

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Tags: Free Corvette, Free PCI Scan, Jenn, Michel Fortin, Michel Fortin Interview, PCI Scanning, Russell Brunson, Spencer, Trust Guard Insider, vulnerabilities, Xan

Trust Guard Launches 2 Amazing New Services!

We’re excited to officially announce the launch of 2 valuable new services for all of our Trust Guard members, to help you continue to take your website conversion and traffic to new heights!

Introducing the ‘Trust Guard Insider’!

First off, we’d like to welcome you to our ‘Trust Guard Insider’ newsletter/blog.  You see, for months we’ve been posting great behind-the-scenes split test results, case studies, interviews, surveys and more here on our blog, but we haven’t been actively sharing it with our members.  This got us thinking…

“We’ve got this amazing blog, and we post all this great information.  Why not send out a quick email whenever we make an important post, so our members can stay current on what we’re doing, to help them maximize their investment?”

Sounds like fun, right?  So that’s exactly what we’re going to do!  From now on, whenever we have something really important and valuable to share with you, we will send you a quick email, which will point directly to the latest version of the  Trust Guard Insider.

(Don’t worry, we will only send emails that are worth your while.  And, if you don’t absolutely love what we share with you, there’s a simple opt-out link at the bottom of every email we send you.)

Our goal is to make this the most valuable resource in your conversion arsenal, and based on what we’ve got lined up, we know it will be!

Introducing New Mini Seals!

Second, we would like to announce the launch of our brand new Mini Seals!  The Trust Guard Mini Seals are the newest member to the Trust Guard lineup, and have been over a year in the making.

Measuring in at only 100×40 pixels, these little gems fit almost anywhere on your site, yet still retain your custom website name, current date, and active color status.  (We’ve even created a new Mini Security Video Seal – think ‘Mini Me’ from Austin Powers – coming out shortly.)

The minis’ are sold as a stand-alone basic multi-seal package for $397/yr., but if you’re a Trust Guard member, you get them for FREE!

Simply log into your member control panel and they’re already waiting for you, ready to add to your site.

(Note: If you signed up for Trust Guard before Feb. 2008 and you haven’t migrated to the new system, simply email support (at) trust-guard.com and we will be happy to help you move over so you can start enjoying all the features of the new system.)

So what else are we working on?

So, what other fun projects are we working on here at Trust Guard?  We’ll, we’re currently in the middle of a huge multi-variable split test with Mike Filsaime, owner of PayDotCom, where we’re putting Trust Guard directly against some of the leading trust seals in the world for the ultimate showdown!

Meanwhile, I’m finishing up our brand new Privacy Policy Monitor that will make a great addition to our industry leading privacy services.

Dave is working on getting S.C.O.R.E. ready to release to the public (if you don’t know what S.C.O.R.E. is, think about how cool it would be to have a program that could submit your content to article directories, social sites, micro blogging sites, Wordpress blogs, and any other type of site you can think of, with just a few clicks)!

Garrett is personally training Alex Mandossian (one of the top internet marketers online) and his staff on his brand new ‘Building Social Equity‘ step-by-step video course on how to dominate the search engines and social media/Web 2.0 websites, which is rolling out this summer.

In the Next Edition of the Trust Guard Insider…

Our next edition of the Trust Guard Insider coming out on June 10th is a real eye opener!

Most people think that their website is safe from hackers, but you won’t beleive how many medium, high, and severe vulnerabilities we’ve found on new signups since launching our groundbreaking PCI Scanning services in January.

We’re going to reveal some jaw dropping statistics, along with a special FREE gift that will help every one of our members to protect their website and their customer’s information from hackers and vulnerabilities.

From all of us here at Trust Guard, we look forward to continue helping you with your online success!

Sincerely,

Scott Brandley, CEO
Dave Brandley, President
Garrett Pierson, Operations Manager
and all the Trust Guard staff!

P.S. Congratulations to Garrett on the launch of his brand new book that just came out, “What Success Takes”!

For those of you that don’t know, Garrett went out and personally interviewed 30 highly successful people from all different walks of life, and asked them to share their stories and experiences of how they became successful.  If you want to get inspired, it’s a great read.  I hope you check it out.  Go to http://www.whatsuccesstakes.com

Tags: Insider, Launched, Mini-Seals, New, New Services, Services, Trust Guard, Trust Guard Insider, Trust Guard Members

It’s always fun to watch our client’s increase their conversion rate by adding Trust Guard seals to their website. One of our recent client’s to do so was Mark Griggs at Gray and Holt Inc. ( http://www.grayandholtclothing.com), a dry goods supplier in business for over 75 years, who embraced the internet and were looking for a way to improve trust and credibility online. After learning about our flexible monthly fees and our Double your Money Back Guarantee, Mark signed up for our Multi-Seal Package with Daily PCI Scanning and ran a split test to see if we could ‘deliver the goods’. Okay, that was a bad joke, but their results were anything but – they saw nearly a 12% increase in online sales by adding Trust Guard seals.

I did an interview with Mark to find out more about his experience with Trust Guard, and most importantly, what type of impact the 12% increase in sales meant to his company. To watch this 7 min. interview between Mark and myself, click on the play button below.

Scott: Hi, this is Scott Brandley with Trust Guard. I’m here today, with Mark Griggs. He’s one of the owners of Gray and Holt, Inc. He is actually a Trust Guard member and he recently finished a split test and had some pretty good increase in his conversion. I asked Mark if he would do an interview today, and just kind of get some feedback from him on his experience with Trust Guard, how his split test went, and what that means to his company. Hi Mark.

Mark: Hello Scott. How are you doing, today?

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Tags: 11.9%, Client, Increase their sales, Trust Guard

A recent article from Tworkshb.com states on the subject of Trust of Small Online Businesses,

Survey Finds 81% of Consumers Don’t Trust Small Online Businesses

“Alessandro Hatami, managing director of PayPoint.net, says: “Small online businesses lack the resources of their larger competitors but have an even greater interest in ensuring their customers have the safest possible experience on their site.

“This situation has led to a haphazard approach to managing fraud – which is in stark contrast to what larger businesses are able to do.”

In addition, PayPoint found that among 1000 consumers, just 3 percent of online shoppers are likely to trust a small online business with their money, preferring to shop with larger online brands. A further 81 percent say they have doubt about the security credentials of small, unknown companies.”

I am sure most of this sounds familiar in these days of technology and the internet. If you own a business whether online or offline, we are sure you have asked yourself this question before, “Do my customers trust my business?” And if you haven’t asked yourself this question, then now is the time.

Two National Consumer Reports Surveys show that…

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Tags: BBBonline, Business, Consumers, Control Scan, McAfee Secure, Online, PCI Scanning, Trust, Trust Guard, Trust Seals, Truste