This Black Friday we’re going all in! We’re offering a 90% discount on selected VPS servers + 1 Month free on Acronis Backup or Acronis Cyber Protect.
SoftSys Hosting Black Friday – 90% OFF x 1 Month With Self-Managed VPS Servers
Get a high-performance Linux VPS or Windows VPS for less than $1 during your first month of service.
Save 90% on the first month of a monthly based service, when ordering a new VPS server in our US (Denver/Chicago), Singapore, or UK datacenters (Linux).
All our Linux VPS servers include root SSH access.
All Windows VPS servers include full administrative RDP access and a free SolidCP Control Panel.
Get 90% OFF on Your New VPS server. Use coupon code: BF2020
New and current customers are eligible for this promotion
The promotion code can be applied ONCE per account
The promotion code must be entered at the time of placing the order. Discounts will NOT be applied after the purchase
The 90% discount will be applied to the FIRST order of a monthly-based service! It is not an ongoing discount. After the promotion ends, the services will renew at the regular price.
The discounted price applies only to NEW servers in the listed datacenter locations and cannot be applied retroactively to existing servers or servers in the process of being migrated.
Offer expires 12/01/2020 at 11:59PM EST
SoftSys Hosting Black Friday – FREE x 1 Month Enterprise Backup/Data Recovery Service + Cybersecurity Solutions
More often than not you can find yourself in a situation in which you need to restore your data from a backup. Some of the most common situations that we’ve run into over the years are:
Human Error (#1 reason) – Human error (accidental deletion of files, overwrites, loss of access, etc.) is the most common situation in which users might require a restore from backup.
Corrupt Database – bad updates, file corruption, missing files, etc.
Software Updates Gone Wrong – updating applications and software can often time break a fast website and a restore from backup will be required.
Hardware Failure – incorrect drive information, outages, the drive does not power on, file corruption, etc.
Physical Disasters – hurricane, fire, flood, etc.
Any of these situations can result in a permanent loss of data if you don’t have a backup. We have partnered with Acronis to deliver a reliable and easy-to-use backup solution and cybersecurity solution.
Protect Your Critical Data With Acronis Cyber Backup or Acronis Cyber Protect.Activate 1 Month FREE!
New and current customers are eligible for this promotion
The promotion code can be applied ONCE per account
The promotion code must be entered at the time of placing the order. Discounts will NOT be applied after the purchase
The promotion applies to the FIRST order of a monthly-based service! It is not an ongoing discount. After the promotion ends, the services will renew at the regular price.
The discounted price applies only to newly purchased Acronis services and cannot be applied retroactively to existing services.
Offer expires 12/01/2020 at 11:59PM EST
MORE SOFTSYS HOSTING DEALS
50% OFF x 3 Months With Fully Managed Linux and Windows VPS Servers
New customers can save 50% on the first 3 months of service when ordering a new monthly based managed VPS server. Use coupon code: 50OFF_3Mon
Only new customers are eligible for this promotion
The promotion code can be applied ONCE per account
The promotion code must be entered at the time of placing the order. Discounts will NOT be applied after the purchase
The 50% discount will be applied to the FIRST 3 MONTHS of monthly-based service! It is not an ongoing discount. After the promotion ends, the services will renew at the regular price.
The discounted price applies only to NEW servers in the following datacenter locations: US (5), Canada, UK, Germany, Ireland, France, India, Singapore, Australia, Tokyo & S Korea
The discounted price cannot be applied retroactively to existing servers or servers in the process of being migrated.
Secure, High Performance Shared Windows Hosting – Start as Low as $1
Save 90% on the first month of service when ordering a new monthly-based WordPress Hosting server. Use coupon code: WP90OFF
WordPress Hosting Benefits
Managed WordPress hosting at very accessible pricing
Increased speed and high-performance WordPress with Free LiteSpeed Caching Plugin
Advanced protection from DoS and hacking attempts with free IDS/IPS/WAF
Protect your WordPress website from hackers with on-demand & real-time malware scanning/quarantine
Get peace of mind for your WordPress website with free included backups
Expecting higher traffic? Get free on-demand resource increase for up to 24 hours
We can all agree 2020 has not been the year we had hoped for last December. Far from it!
From the way we live our daily lives, to the way we shop for groceries or do our jobs, everything has been disrupted. As more and more businesses move their employees towards remote work, online security is becoming an ever-growing concern.
What started out of necessity is turning into a new business model. And this has been the trend for years now.
According to an analysis performed by FlexJobs and Global Workplace Analytics (GWA), a research and consulting firm based in San Diego, California, between 2005 and 2017, there has been a 159% growth in remote work.
Source: “Remote Work Statistics: Shifting Norms and Expectations”, February 2020, accessed November 9, 2020 at www.flexjobs.com
This trend has accelerated even more as a result of Covid-19.
According to a recent survey by the Global Workplace Analytics (GWA) and Iometrics, a workplace services firm based in Irvine, California, work from home during Covid-19 has increased from 31% to 88%.
Here at SoftSys Hosting many of our employees work remotely as well. I myself have been working remotely for 10+ years now. While more and more businesses are making the shift towards remote work, we are also seeing concerning increases in online security threats.
With this in mind, we have compiled a list of seven tips you should follow to keep your data secure while working remotely.
7 TIPS TO IMPROVE THE SECURITY OF YOUR DATA WHILE WORKING REMOTELY
ONLINE SECURITY TIP #1: HAVE A CYBERSECURITY POLICY IN PLACE
If you are a business owner, you need to have a data security policy for your organization. Your cybersecurity policy should provide you and your employees’ guidelines on how to keep your data and your customers’ data secure. It should also provide recommendations on how to manage cybersecurity risks.
A good place to start is the National’s Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Cybersecurity Framework which includes best practices to help businesses manage cybersecurity risks. The framework has been used by 30% of US organizations, according to Gartner, and the usage was projected to increase to 50% by 2020.
Source: Cybersecurity Framework, NIST 2015, Accessed November 10, 2020, at www.nist.gov | Image Credit: Natasha Hanacek/NIST
The Cybersecurity Framework consists of five high-level functions that are applicable to risk management in general, including cybersecurity risks. The five core functions depicted are: Identify, Protect, Detect, Respond, and Recover.
Start by assessing your organization’s ability to maintain data security. What data is being collected in your company, how are your data stored by your employees (on local devices, on internal company systems, in the cloud, etc.)?
Ensure that your employees are following workplace security policies. There are some self-evident rules that should be followed in any company (don’t use your work computer to access sites unrelated to your work) but you need to state them in a documented cybersecurity policy.
Once you have documented the policy, share it across your entire organization, and make sure your employees understand and comply with the rules.
ONLINE SECURITY TIP #2: SECURE YOUR WEBSITE WITH AN SSL CERTIFICATE
A Secure Socket Layer certificate (SSL certificate) does exactly that! It will encrypt, or conceal if you will, your data from hackers and bad actors. It’s basically a small data file that will digitally bind an encrypted key to a company’s details.
In addition to encrypting data between your browser and the end server, the SSL certificate will also authenticate the server. In other words, it makes sure that your information is shared with the correct server hosting the website and not with a hacker who tries to steal your information.
While there are some free SSL certificates, such as Let’s Encrypt, we generally recommend a commercial SSL for any website that collects sensitive information. There are several reasons for that, but one good reason is free SSL certificates such as Let’s Encrypt offers no warranty if something goes wrong. All commercial brands will include a warranty. The vetting performed for a commercial SSL is also much more stringent.
At SoftSys Hosting we offer several trusted SSL certificate brands including Comodo, GeoTrust, Symantec and more.
Bottom line, if you collect sensitive information on your website, make sure to protect your customers’ data by using a trusted SSL certificate. By the same token, pay attention what website you and your employees are accessing. These days most browsers will show a warning if a website is not HTTPS secure.
ONLINE SECURITY TIP #3: USE STRONG PASSWORDS
Most of us dread setting up a password. We have so many of them and often times, out of convenience, we tend to either use a common word for a password (like our pet’s name) or use the same password for multiple systems.
According to a study performed by Digital Guardian on password security habits, 10.8% of the responders reuse the same password across all their accounts.
Source: Uncovering Password Habits: Are Users’ Password Security Habits Improving? (Infographic), 2020, Accessed November 11, 2020 at digitalguardian.com
However, I’ve heard of numerous cases where online systems were hacked due to weak passwords. According to a 2020 research by PreciseSecurity.com, 30% of ransomware infections in 2019 were caused by weak passwords.
I myself have been the victim of this when a hacker got into my Netflix account and changed my password. I guess the need to binge-watch Netflix can drive people to do strange things?? Luckily, I was able to fix that issue within minutes and none of my data was stolen.
I got lucky that time. Lesson learned!
Both NIST and the FBI recommend using passphrases over passwords for enhanced security.
“A passphrase is a memorized secret consisting of a sequence of words or other text that a claimant uses to authenticate their identity. A passphrase is similar to a password in usage but is generally longer for added security.” NIST Special Publication 800-63 Revision 3, Digital Identity Guidelines
As a business you need to ensure your employees use passphrases or long passwords with at least 8 characters in length, when accessing your systems. And if you have a lot of passwords, like I do, you might want to use a password manager. Some examples of password managers are 1Password, KeePass and BitWarden.
ONLINE SECURITY TIP #4: AVOID CONNECTING TO PUBLIC WI-FI
You can work remotely from anywhere if you have a quiet place and a good internet connection. Access to public Wi-Fi has been an enormous aid to remote employees these days. You can find free public Wi-Fi in coffee shops, restaurants, hotels, sometimes even in outdoor public spaces. But the truth is they’re not always secure. Sometimes though you might have to travel for work, and you might not have any other options but to use a public Wi-Fi.
In those cases, try to avoid Wi-Fi networks that don’t require a Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) or WPA2 password. Between the two WPA2 is more secure. You should also ensure that you have logged out from your systems when you finish working.
If you regularly use public Wi-Fi you can have a secure connection, even when using public Wi-Fi, by using a VPN service. A VPN can be configured in multiple ways. One popular way to configure a secure VPN service is as a Remote Client VPN (also known as Remote Access VPN).
This type of VPN configuration will encrypt traffic between your local device and the system/business software that you are accessing. Note that a Remote Client VPN won’t encrypt everything that you access through your computer. Only those specific systems for which the VPN has been configured will be secured.
The VPN will create a secure tunnel all the way, regardless of what Wi-Fi connection you are using.
There are multiple popular VPN solutions like SiteLock VPN, VyOS, Vyatta, OPNSense, and more.
SoftSys Hosting customers can activate a high-speed secure VPN with military-grade encryption. Using our high-speed VPN solution you will be able to:
hide your IP for secure anonymous browsing.
access blocked websites in 40+ countries.
protect your data when using public Wi-Fi.
watch streaming services anywhere & more.
Be aware though that some VPN providers might be the target of cyberattacks themselves. That is the case with unpatched Pulse Secure VPN servers who have been the target of malicious attacks.
ONLINE SECURITY TIP #5: KEEP YOUR COMPUTER SECURE
In today’s technological world we use our computers, laptops, smart phones every single day. In fact, what are you doing right now?
Most of us store work-related information on our local devices: client proposals, website descriptions, accounting information, login credentials, you name it! Hackers, scammers and other bad actors are becoming more and more clever these days. It’s almost as if their only purpose in life is to find new ways to steal your data.
From malware and ransomware to spyware, hackers will try anything to get their hands on your credit/debit cards, PayPal accounts, and other sensitive information.
According to a survey by Positive Technologies in the last quarter of 2019 credit/debit card information made up 32% of all information stolen. In other words, one-third of the information stolen by hackers was payment card information!
Source: Cybersecurity threatscape: Q4 2019, Figure 1. Attackers’ motives, Accessed November 11, 2020, at www.ptsecurity.com
What can you do to prevent hackers from gaining access to your sensitive data? Start with an antivirus. Some popular antivirus solutions are Malwarebytes, Avast, and Bitdefender. You should set up regular automatic full system scans using a reliable antivirus solution.
But an antivirus is not enough! It will not protect your computer against malware and other types of malware attacks. You need a solution that’s specifically designed for that.
At SoftSys Hosting we have partnered with Acronis to bring you Acronis Cyber Protect, a security solution that integrates backups, disaster recovery, a next-generation anti-malware and cybersecurity into one single affordable and easy-to-use solution. The Acronis Cyber Protect solution can be enabled on any local computer, mobile device (Android/iOS), Virtual Machine, cPanel/Plesk Web Hosting Servers and more.
Lastly, when thinking about the security of your local computers you should make sure all your software is up to date. Software vendors often time include critical security patches when releasing a new software version. If you use software that’s no longer supported or End of Life (EOL) as it is often called, you are only increasing the risk of getting hacked.
ONLINE SECURITY TIP #6: BEWARE OF SOCIAL ENGINEERING ATTACKS
A social engineering attack is a type of email that aims to manipulate users into giving up sensitive information like passwords or bank account information. It typically aims to create a sense of urgency, fear, or manipulate emotions, and prompts the user to take some sort of action. This action could be clicking on a link or downloading a file on your computer.
Two common types of social engineering attacks are:
1. Phishing – where the attacker pretends to be a legitimate business, like your bank or a popular retailer.
The term “phishing” was first used on January 2, 1996, and it’s an analogy to the popular sport of “fishing” because the attackers try to “lure” users into disclosing sensitive information. Since Covid-19 phishing emails have been on the rise as well.
In April 2020 Google disclosed that they’ve blocked over 18 million phishing emails and malware per day!
2. Email spoofing – is similar to phishing, except the attacker will “spoof” the email header. The email could appear to be from your bank, except the email domain will not be the bank’s email domain. In other words, the sender’s email will not match the sender’s name.
The Ohio Graydon-Toole Group has a great comparison between the two.
As a rule of thumb, your bank will never ask you to provide sensitive information via email. Most of these bad actors also have a lot of grammar errors, so pay attention! Most importantly you can configure an anti-phishing solution. If you use a commercial email service such as Microsoft 365 (formerly known as Office 365) there are multiple solutions available including Microsoft Office Advanced Threat Protection (ATP).
ONLINE SECURITY TIP #7: ALWAYS HAVE A BACKUP PLAN
You should always have at least one backup of your critical data! I cannot reiterate enough how important this is.
Most of us live hectic lives. There are so many things on our daily to-do lists, we often time forget (or ignore) the really important ones. Having an automated backup solution is not something that should be taken lightly!
But I never had a backup before and nothing happened! Why should I get one now!?
I’ve read about and seen countless cases of people losing their data and they would give ANYTHING to get it back. There are some fortunate cases, where they might find an old backup amongst their files, but I’ve also seen situations where everything has been lost.
If you get so unlucky to fall victim to a ransomware attack you might lose years’ worth of work if you don’t have a backup.
At SoftSys Hosting we offer Acronis Cyber Backup both as a standalone solution or bundled with our managed service package. Acronis Cyber Backup is a trusted backup and recovery solution that allows you to configure automated backups with an hourly/daily/weekly/monthly retention. And because backups are incremental you can take more backups without running the usage/costs high.
If you are interested in a managed backup solution, contact [email protected].
Imagine, hundreds of users are rushing to your website at the same time to purchase products which you actively marketed for this holiday. Your ads are now running, you are getting visitors more than you calculated or more than your server can handle. So what is going to happen with this sudden traffic spike?
Prepare for the Worst or If You Want Peace, Prepare for War
You should be always prepared for the worst (means best for your business) during this holiday shopping fest. Because the year 2020 proved to be one of the toughest years so far. But this might be the good opportunity for your online business because people will hesitate to go out in malls during this Covid-19 pandemic and you may expect getting more online traffic than ever before. In that case you should be prepared to avoid 2 major disasters. So how are you going to be prepared?
Check your Website Performance
You can check the current performance of your website easily with the online tools such as Google PageSpeed Insights. Open PageSpeed Insights, enter the URL of your website and hit the Analyze button. This test will show you result for both mobile and desktop versions of your website. And you will get the detailed audit of your website code and receive suggestions on how to optimize it. But still if you don’t have enough computing power to run your website easily during this traffic spike, you may get time-out errors and your customers will flow away without making any purchases.
Use Content Delivery Network (CDN)
The best way to cope with the traffic load on your website is not follow all traffic to your single web hosting server. CDN can do it very effectively by storing the cached content of your website on multiple CDN servers located around the globe. But you will have to implement CDN before the traffic starts hitting your website because it will be very difficult to implement the CDN once your website is under heavy traffic load.
Opt for the Scalable Hosting Solution
The most straightforward way to deal with increased traffic is to upgrade your hosting account. For example, if you are using shared hosting you can go with VPS which will give you isolated resources like RAM, CPU and storage at a more affordable price if compare to dedicated solutions. You should contact your web hosting provider before your customers start contacting you. And if you are a Softsys Hosting client then you can directly get in touch with our support team and we will provide you the most suitable VPS plans or you can choose on your own from our extensive range of cloud-based Windows VPS, Linux VPS or Special eCommerce (nopCommerce, Magento) and CMS (WordPress, Joomla, Umbraco) hosting solutions.
We are thrilled to announce the availability of an affordable, enterprise-grade customer support system with complete data-privacy for your organization.
As a 24/7 business with customers all over the world, we understand first-hand the importance of a reliable help-desk solution.
We’ve been using multiple customer support software for the past 14+ years. We know a thing or two about what benefits should it deliver to your business and your customers.
There’s an extensive list of features a help desk solution should have. But we have found these seven customer support system features to be an absolute must-have:
It should provide a shared and unified inbox.
It should allow you to measure customer satisfaction.
It should have good performance reporting.
It should allow customers to help themselves (aka support a knowledgebase).
It should be easy to set up or migrate to.
It should provide privacy for your data and your customers’ data.
With these in mind, we have bundled a reliable customer support software, powered by SupportPal with our scalable and fully managed cloud environment, to address all your needs and more.
Oh! And by the way, we are using this solution ourselves internally.
That’s right!
We would not try to preach you anything we haven’t used ourselves first. If you are a SoftSys Hosting customer, you have already seen the customer-facing side of the help desk software.
HOW YOU CAN GROW YOUR BUSINESS FASTER WITH SOFTSYS HOSTING
Our Customer Support System as a Service delivers the following benefits:
24/7 Monitoring of your environment’s availability
Daily backups of your cloud environment with multi-day retention period
Affordable pricing
WHAT MAKES OUR CUSTOMER SUPPORT SOLUTION BETTER THAN OTHERS?
Three key aspects:
1. Data Privacy – You have complete control over your data.
2. Private Server – Your help desk system is hosted on a private server, not shared with any other customers.
3. Transparent Billing – there are no “per user” charges or any other limitations on the number of support requests. Start for as low as $75per month.
Let’s look at the features included with the help desk software solution.
HELP DESK SOFTWARE FEATURES & BENEFITS
Keep All Messages in One Place With a Unified Inbox
Deliver excellent customer service across multiple channels with a unified inbox:
Get requests through Web forms, API, Email, Facebook, Twitter or Help widgets.
Automatically convert support requests from multiple support channels into tickets.
Group Tickets Together With Multiple Filters and Tags
Easily organize your tickets with the use of filters, priorities, tags, and more. Recognize important conversations or prospects right away!
Enhance Team Collaboration
Create department groups and operator roles for easier communication across departments.
Manage all customer conversations in one place with a shared inbox for each department
Avoid agent collision by seeing in real-time if another agent is looking or replying to a ticket
Add private ticket notes and internal messages.
Support Multiple Brands With One Installation
Increase efficiency by supporting multiple brands with a single help desk installation.
Customize the look (colors, logo) for each brand according to its needs.
Increase brand recognition with custom domains and email signatures.
Offer Multilingual Support
Support you customers in their own language!
Create translations for your own text (knowledgebase and email templates). The software will display the correct version will be displayed to the user automatically, based on their selected language.
Increase Productivity With Automated Tools and Tasks
Create canned responses to common ticket replies
Run multiple actions on tickets with a one-click or automated macro
Create follow-ups with multiple actions
Set escalation rules on overdue tickets
Manage Customers Efficiently
Create ‘organizations’ for customer accounts.
Add users with multiple email domains to an organization.
View ticket history for your customers individually or at the organization level.
Support Your Customers the Way They Need It
Set priorities for customer tickets
Help your customers find answers easily by creating an online library of information (Knowledgebase, FAQ, Policies, etc.
Always Know What Your Customers Are Thinking
Allow customers to comment on, or rate your articles
Gain insightful feedback from customers with feedback forms on tickets
Use Data to Improve Performance and Customer Service
A powerful reporting dashboard allows you to track staff performance and customer activity, gain insights into customer feedback and ratings, and more. Improve the performance of your staff by knowing:
What are the busiest times, days, or months? Do you need more staff on some days?
What types of requests are more frequent? Create canned responses to improve response time.
Which support channels do your customers use?
Learn which user guides or articles are helpful to customers and which need to be improved.
How are your customers rating your support? What kind of feedback they provide?
And more.
Make It Your Own!
Customize the help desk system to match your company’s look and feel. Built your own custom plugins or use our available plugins and integration:
Available Plugins: Blesta, Slack, Time Tracking, WHMCS, WooCommerce. Existing Integrations: Blesta, LDAP, SAML, TrackingTime, WHMCS, Zapier.
All things aside, our goal is to help your business succeed!
You know that saying? Happy clients, happy us!
A reliable and easy to use customer service software will improve the performance of your staff. But more importantly, it will help improve the relationship with your customers.
We went through a lot of information, I know!
But if you’re only going to remember a few things from this blog post, remember these five takeaways on how to deliver excellent customer service through your help desk software.
TOP FIVE TAKEAWAYS TO DELIVER EXCELLENT CUSTOMER SERVICE
Manage all your customer conversations from one place with a unified inbox
Enhance customer service with the use of ticket tags, follow-ups, and priorities
Help your customers get information or learn about your service on-demand with an external knowledgebase, FAQ, or blog
Get input from your customers with feedback forms and article comments
Use built-in reporting tools to improve performance and customer satisfaction
LET’S TALK MONEY – HOW MUCH DOES IT COST AND WHAT’S INCLUDED
The service starts for as low as $75 a month. There are no hidden fees, user caps or limitations on the amounts of tickets.
The $75 fee includes:
Managed cloud environment with complete data privacy
Your SupportPal help desk software license
Installation of your help desk software
Daily managed backups of your cloud environment
24/7 availability monitoring of your cloud environment
If you are looking to do a self-migration there’s a migration script included with the help desk software.
The following migrations are supported with the migration script:
ArcticDesk v1.3.3
Blesta v4
Freshdesk
Kayako v4
Quest K1000
Sirportly v5
WHMCS v7
Zendesk
Are You Ready for an Affordable, Enterprise-Grade Customer Support Solution with Complete Data-Privacy?
Click to button below to schedule a free consultation and demo today!
SoftSys Hosting was born in 2006 when President Ruchir Shastri, back then a web developer, wanted to help software developers by offering them free of inexpensive hosting.
Since 2007 we provide a complete suite of web hosting and related business services from our 4 datacenter locations: Denver, Chicago, London & Singapore.
Our primary goal is to help your business succeed. When you’re doing great, so are we!
With a team of 24×7 in-house experienced sys admins we can take care of your entire IT requirements so that you can focus on growing your business.
But don’t just take our word for it! See for yourself what our customers are saying about SoftSys Hosting support and services:
If you are looking for a great customer service software or web hosting services, please get in touch. We’d love to learn more about your business and provide solutions that will empower your team to accelerate growth.
