On 14 July 2015 Microsoft will pull extended support for Windows Server 2003. So unless a customer has piles of cash to spend on this antiquated system there will be no more free patches, updates, or security fixes to be had.

There could also be a whole host of compliance issues for any company running SBS 2003 integrated software, including any Microsoft applications which will also no longer be supported. If you are considering NOT upgrading then make sure you have a couple of hundred thousand spare a year to pay for the support.

HP (the largest supplier of Microsoft servers) estimated there to be 11 million machines out there which will need replacing. That's 10's of thousands of machines needing to be replaced each day before the deadline.

According to a Windows survey 62 percent of customers don't have an upgrade plan (or a migration to the cloud plan), or are not aware of this deadline.

Our advise is to start getting ready to migrate or upgrade. Our preference these days is migration to services like MS Office 365 for which we provide high level consultancy, and implementation. To find out more contact us now.

Matt Cutts From Google Announces "Guest Blogging Is Dead" & More On New SEO Malpractises

This is a very bold statement but to be honest we can sort of see why this has come about. If you have a website with a blog you may also have been approached by somebody purporting to be in your industry and offering to write for you. A win win situation it may seem like; you get content, they get a link back.

Does this really add any value to you though? Matt Cutts says it depends who the content writer is. If they are of note, such as a journalist or even a highly regarded blogger, and have high quality content which is highly relevant to you, and provides insights in your industry then there is no problem. These are the kind of people you would obviously want to collaborate with.

However if the person approaching you has maybe been outsourced, is passing the same articles round multiple people then the principals are wrong in the arrangement. Here at Bongo IT we always believed that there was a fine line between creating great content and business affiliations, and blogging for the sake of getting backlinks.

So what else is new with regards to backlinking techniques? Well here’s another thing. If you are a website developer it used to be the case that for every website you make “go live” you would usually have a link back from the footer saying “Designed by Mr So and So http://soandso.www” (or something along those lines). It is now deemed bad practise to do this. You (the developer) haven’t really contributed anything (other than blood sweat and tears) content-wise to the site, so why should the backlink we worth anything? Even worse these kind of backlinks can be damaging to your SEO “score”. We are investigating whether having a link to a private page on the website (from the footer) with your company profile on there is an acceptable way to go about things.

So time to plug myself back into the Matrix and fill my HDD with more Kitties doing something unspeakably cute. Thanks for reading.

You can read more here

Matt Cutts SEO

Or watch this video on what Google think of guest blogging for backlinks

Microsoft Rebranding Of Office 365 Web Apps Confusion

Microsoft in all their infinite wisdom (and partly due to Rupert Murdoch) have re-branded several parts of their (relatively) new Office 365 system, again. Please bear with us whilst we explain:

What was Sharepoint (your secure file storage) was then called Skydrive Pro. Skydrive was just the personal version of this, very much like Dropbox, with 7Gb free storage space. These have now been changed and have been re-branded as OneDrive.

Why did this happen? You may well ask. The renaming is due to Microsoft losing a trademark dispute with British Sky Broadcasting. Whoops, should have seen that one coming really, but hey we can't all be godlike.

Not only have they changed the names of these features but the whole system is now called Office Online. That's a change I'm sure we can all live with.

For more information on how to get onto Office Online or if your company needs  migration to the new Office in the cloud then get in touch with us now. We can be your delegated admin and help you improve your workflows.

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Does Your Business Use Any FREE Software Or Webware?

This is an interesting subject. We all probably use something that is currently free. But how long can that last? As I'm sure you are aware the likes of Twitter and Facebook get heaps of money before some years later being politely told to think about ways to actually MAKE money. 

What about a password manager that is currently free to use like LastPass or something like LogMeIn which allows remote access to your computer?

So what if the "free" service stops.

Well I can tell you from personal experience. Its a massive pain! And guess what LogMeIn have just gone and done? More details here:

LogMeIn Stop Free Version

Top 5 Tips of the Cost Reduction Trade

Indirect, Non payroll cost reduction specialists

1. If you are purchasing or renting a new property make sure you lock in a utility (gas and electric) contract A.S.A.P. From the minute a new owner gets the keys to a property, the utility company, who has control of the meter, will be charging their highest tariff. Most utility companies will back date the new, lower rate which you have signed up for up to 3 months.

• With waste collections keep the number of contract collections to a minimum. If you get busy or require more as a one off just call your waste collection company and they arrange for an additional collection. This will save you paying for empty bin collections.
• Keep track of contract end dates and termination periods –Just because the contract end date is July per se doesn't mean that you have until July to move it or cancel it. Some suppliers require 6 months notice to move or cancel a service.
• You don’t get anything for loyalty these days, move suppliers at every opportunity, new business rates are ALWAYS better than renewal rates.
• The termination letter is your best friend, 9 times out of 10 suppliers will find movement on their prices once you have issued it. To find out more contact Lean Cost Management on 01993 846503 or visit www.leancosts.com

Our Top Ten Tips For Starting A Social Media StrategyInformation - Communication  - BusinessThere is a great deal of information out there on the web and its advisable to read around and create a strategy that works for you. There are many statistics about social media and it's impact on businesses and we would advise you to look the latest ones up yourself, we wont bore you with stats in this blog...this time. There are a few basics though that you should definitely think about before investing your time in "going social".

    1. Your brand. it's important to get your company logo and color schemes incorporated into your online profiles. In this way you can more easily be recognised across your digital real estate at a glance. Your brand should also have at least one key message such as "we are 100% organic carrot farmers"...so long as its suitable for your business. Your message should be included in your regular communications. It's what you want to be known for so tell people about it! 2. Gather and list your sources of information. This will allow you to keep sharing informative material quickly and easily. There is a wealth of news and general information available to you to choose from but you might want to pick those with which you are most familiar and knowledgeable. For example if you are into IT you might want to share and comment on items from The Register, BBC Technology News, New Scientist Technology and so on. Four or five sources of information will suit most people. Check these every day and keep them as bookmarks for quick access. 3. Find where your audience are located. There are more than 450 social media sites catering for almost every topic, age group or personality you can think of. The most popular sites you will have heard of such as Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, Blogger, Wordpress. Find the stats on each one by searching the internet and study how you can engage with the most relevant to your audience.  4. Understand where social media fits into your marketing plan. Social media should almost always be complimented with more regular types of marketing activity such as advertising, PR and business networking.  5. Recognise your objectives. Social media is there to engage, communicate, research and connect you with potential clients and other businesses. 6. Set a schedule for creating the plan and delivering content. If you spend one hour a day doing marketing then at least set aside part of that time for social media. Your most regular updates can be automated using social media management tools giving you more time to just engage with your audience.  7. Get others involved. If you have employees the chances are they will already be using social media in some format. Provide them with the access and some short guidelines on how to act. Find who your industry influences are and engage with them whether that be groups or individuals. 8. Get tooled up! There are some great, inexpensive social media management tools out there. Find one you can work with. We would recommend: Sprout Social, MarketMeSuite or Hootsuite. 9. Measure. You can use the tools mentioned above as well as your own website statistical package. Tools like TweetReach can give you some great feedback for free.  10. KISS. Keep it simple stupid; yes it's an old adage but it rings true. If you have a simple set of procedures to follow you can more easily measure the results from them. Treat each part of your strategy as an experiment, know your apparatus, methodology, predictions and results. And finally engage with your audience as much as possible. Social media is a two way conversation. Please comment on this post, add your own thoughts. You will receive a free PR2 backlink for your trouble!

Our Favourite Ways to Use Adobe Illustrator

This start-up guide is intended to help new users get to grips with the way that they use this design software. Illustrator is an incredibly powerful program and when you first start looking around you might feel overwhelmed by all of its functions and working tools.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7c/Adobe_Illustrator_CS6.png

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Company reports and brochures

Illustrator is the perfect software to help you put together brochures and annual reports for your company. You can create styles, save them, and apply them to title, subheadings, and paragraphs, to allow you to quickly make changes across the whole document. The intelligent text boxes within Illustrator allow you to easily move your text around your documents. You can also insert picture objects within your text that nestle in your text and you can also choose how the text reacts to the object.

Comic book art

For all budding comic book artists and illustrators, Illustrator helps you to convert your pen and ink artwork into editable vector artwork. From here on, once you have a vector drawing, the world really is your oyster. Edit the line thickness and style, apply colour schemes and swatches, and place your story panel into a neat framework. There really isn't much you can't do.

Social media experts

When you want to create a distinctive visual identity for your community, you can turn to Illustrator to create stunning banners, buttons, icons, and graphics for your page. The ability to save styles and preferences within Illustrator, alongside all of the smart guides, means that creating a contemporary and exciting brand identity is a cinch. You can start off by creating a logo or even designing your own font style. Next, search the web for pre-created templates by designers who have made it easy for you to create your own Facebook timeline cover or Twitter banner.

Typographers

If you've always had an interest in graphic design, and in particular typography, then Illustrator is the industry-standard tool you need to know. Illustrator allows you to perform minute adjustments to text such as kerning. This is the art of defining the distance between individual letters in a piece of text. The font is not perfect for every task. Sometimes, as you increase the font size (to fit into a large banner for example), the distance between the letters obviously needs adjustment. Use the kerning tool to set this to your own preference. These adjustments are usually made by eye.

We hope you found these tips helpful. When learning a new piece of software, the initial learning curve can seem incredibly steep. That's why it's important to read any literature you can get your hands on that will help you unlock all of its potential before you get frustrated and give up. Don't be afraid to refer to online training videos posted by Adobe, Lynda, and other publishers on YouTube. You can also pick up the official training books and buy magazines, which feature tutorials on how to get professional results. Source: www.visopix.com 

The Windows XP Operating System Is About To Become Obsolete

You Need To Read This If You Are Still Using Windows XP

Microsoft have been saying for a while now that they are going to stop support for Windows XP. The time has finally come. As from April 8th 2014 support for Windows XP is over. This means that Microsoft will no longer provide automatic fixes, updates, or online technical assistance. 

Do you remember what you were doing on on the 25th of August 2001? I'm not sure I do but the guys at Microsoft were busy releasing Windows XP. Yes this operating system really is 12 years old. In computer years that's a century!

So why do you care?

Windows Vista is the successor to XP. Vista will still be receiving patches for security vulnerabilities and bugs. The details of which will be public knowledge as soon as Microsoft release the patch details. This will give hackers insight into flaws allowing them to break into Windows XP, and nobody is going to fixthem.

What Is The Solution?

It's time to upgrade your computer, or at least your operating system, preferably to Windows 7. Contact us for details on the options you have available. Don't delay, this is important!

Search Engine Optimisation Basics - How To

Understanding What SEO Is And Making The Most Of It

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is the holistic approach to improving your websites ranking within search engines using well positioned, targeted keyphrases and the use of HTML/HTML5. Or to put it in very simple terms SEO is the window dressing for your online business/shop front. 

It helps attract visitors and search engines like Google to come into your website. SEO can be broken down into six main activities. This brief guide will help you understand what is involved in SEO.

• Keyphrase Research Keywords/phrases are the things that people look for (type in) when they search on the net. To research keywords/phrases you can use the Google Adwords keyword research tool (free with a Google account) or another similar tool such as the SEO Moz keyword tool which is paid for by subscription. Keywords should relate to your commercial objectives. An example of a keyword phrase for our company, Bongo IT is “IT Support Oxford”. This is a highly competitive keyphrase though as there are many IT companies competing for this space. An easier keyphrase for us to rank well for in the search engines is “PCI DSS experts Oxford”. This is a much more specialised industry and therefore the competition is lower. The above mentioned tools will give you an indication of what is competitive and how many people (traffic) are searching for a given keyphrase. Using the Google search to judge and know your competition is also a very good idea. If you are planning on advertising; using SpyFU to check what your competitors are spending on online advertising may also be an option you want to take up before spending any of your own money.undefined

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• On-site SEO This relates to the architecture and content of your websie. In the SEO world meta tags (identifiers) are used to tell the search engines what content is important and therefore what the website is about. When people are searching for something your site is about you want to come up in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERP’s) so make sure this information (keyphrases) is researched well. Meta tags are created from HTML/HTML5 code which is a programming language. The Meta tags themselves will identify text which is important to your website and business. For instance at Bongo IT we want to show up in search results for “IT Support Oxford” so we need to have a page title tag (

  ) which also includes these words. Have you ever heard the phrase "content is king"? In SEO this relates to your written content. The better the content (and its layout) and the more informative and original it is the more the search engines like Google like it. New or updated content will also be of greater interest to the search engines that content which hasnt changed for months. This is part of the reason why blogs are so popular.

• Off-site SEO Creating relevant backlinks to your site is important. An example of this would be posting a comment on a forum which relates to your business activities. The comment is not only informative but also has your website address for people to follow if they want more information. this will help increase traffic back to your website and can help increase your position in search engine rankings over time. There are many ways to create backlinks, directory sites for local businesses, social networks, reciprocal links, blogs, comments and squeeze pages on alternative domains to name the most common. Anchor tags can also be used to maximise your SEO potential. Put simply they are keyphrases which have the dual purpose of also being a hyperlink. An anchor tag example for our company would be "Web Design In Oxford" and would link to our web design information pages.
• Search Engine Indexing If you do nothing at all your website will eventually get picked up by Google and their “spider” programs will crawl it, and log its content. A better way of getting found more quickly by the search engines is to manually submit your content to them. If you are not a Google or Bing Webmaster then you can still “submit website URL” to either search engine, and many more besides. Websites should all have a page or file which is a dedicated site map, usually in the form of an Xml file. If you don’t know how to generate this there are many web based programs which can help, or you can just contact us.
• Adwords/Advertising Paid for advertising can greatly increase traffic to your website. Due to the targeted nature of the advertising you can reach clients in specific locations with your message when they search for the chosen keywords/phrases in your campaign..
• Analytics To find out if your SEO is having any effect you will need to monitor the traffic to your site. There are a plethora of ways to do this but most commonly Google Analytics is used. We use PIWIK to monitor traffic to our website as it allows us to look at all our historical data for comparrison. Websites like Ahrefs can provide free insight into the backlinks to your site as well.

A Few Key Terms Explained:

The Meta description tag - this tag does not provide any SEO value however; it is important that this description accurately describes the content of your selected site page in a manner which makes clients want to click through to the page. 

HTML5 - As of yet there are no clear guidelines on how much the use of HTML5 will improve your search rankings.

Panda Algorithm - this looks at the "quality" of content on your website. Does not eat bamboo.

Penguin Algorithm - this checks to see who is linking to you, what content is being linked and its relevance to your website. If you have lots of links from "spammy" websites it will affect your ranking in the search results and the Page Rank (PR) of your page. Having good contextual links to your website is the best way to go.

Hummingbird Algorithm - semantically connects people, places and things through the Google knowledge base to provide "better" search results.

Top Tips

Use Long Tail Keywords (in Meta tags) - these are long phrases containing many of the keywords you want to use about a particular subject. e.g. "SEO basics for beginners, a guide to SEO and Semantic Searches" could be a good title for this article. 

Semantic Searches - this seeks to improve the accuracy of search results using the contextual meaning of words and how they link together. Use of synonyms for some keywords can help improve your SEO and give you a wider spread of potential words to be found by. 

If You Can A/B Test - If you have several domains available do experiments to see what works best. Change one thing at a time and be patient to see the results.

Thats all folkes!

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FREE Business Support and DevelopmentTo Help Support New And Growing Business In OxfordshireBongo IT are proud to announce they have joined Partner? and can offer FREE support to SME businesses, in Oxfordshire“We are delighted to be joining PARTNER? the new business support group that provide servicesto small and medium (SME) sized businesses in Oxfordshire”, commented Justin Smith Director of BONGOIT Ltd (www.bongoit.co.uk).Justin added that “the range of IT support services, web site design and development, and the Microsoft products provided by BONGOIT, complement the services already available through PARTNER?, in support of start-ups and growing SME businesses, in Oxfordshire”.

  PARTNER? provide small and medium sized businesses with a range of products and services  that can help their client’s business find funding, handle employee issues, reduce costs, improve efficiencies, grow sales, and more. The PARTNER? team have extensive experience in business  including, business start-ups, internet trading, franchising, exit planning, acquisitions, and more. A unique aspect of the services PARTNER? provide is the ongoing FREE support and advice,  subject to agreement. Having an experienced Partner? available to provide advice and support  can and will save a business thousands of pounds. To find out more e mail This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or check out the website http://partner-in-business.co.uk ABOUT PARTNER? (editors note) Partner-in-Business LLP, trading as PARTNER?, is a group of experienced business managers  and professionals who provide a wide range of services to small and medium sized businesses. Based in Oxfordshire, a unique aspect of the services PARTNER? provide is the ongoing FREE  support and advice, subject to agreement. PARTNER? in Oxfordshire will comprise of up to 30  business partners working together to support local SME’s in this region.  For further information visit www.partner-in-business.co.uk E Mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. Contact telephone: 01280 706683 Mobile: 07798 653 139 Partner in Business LLP Registered in England OC385856. Halstede House, Hinton in the Hedges, Northants. NN13 5NF

Personalise Your Outlook Emails And Add A SignatureYour brand is your advert to the world. It should be consistent, evolving and engaging. Using a signature and Office Stationary is the standard for most businesses.Keeping a consistent brand image can be made easier by using some of the simple tools available to you. Email is a primary form of communication for many companies and should contain your branding material. Information in the footer of your email, also known as a signature, should at least contain: your name, website, telephone numbers, fax, social media links, perhaps even your latest news. You may wish to also include a disclaimer such as this: "CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: The information transmitted, including attachments, is intended only for the person(s) or entity to which it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged material. Any review, re-transmission, dissemination or other use of, or taking of any action in reliance upon this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. If you received this in error, please contact the sender and destroy any copies of this information. Have a nice day". 

  Moving on quickly let's look at how we set up a signature to put all this information into an Outlook (Desktop) email. This is the same process for the Microsoft Office 365 version of Outlook too.  Open a new mail Look in the middle of the top bar (of the new mail) for the signature icon and click it Chose signatures Click new and name your signature (it is possible to have multiple signatures) Click ok In the text box provided type in your full signature starting with the usual end to your mails such as "Kind regards, Fred" and add the other details afterwards. You may wish to add a logo to the top of your signature too. Click ok, it is now the default signature, and close the window Now when you create a new mail your signature will appear. The next step is to create Office Stationary to really personalise your messages. In the Outlook main program window go to File Options Mail Stationary and Fonts Theme, and pick your theme. Try a few different themes to see what suits you and have a play with the other settings.  Right that's all folks, have fun :-)

Bongo IT Are Office 365 & Cloud Consultants.

Bongo IT Have Completed Multiple Types Of Cloud Migrations Quickly And Efficiently.

What Do Bongo IT Do?

Educate you and your staff on the how's, why's, and when's; and help you to get an ROI in terms of productivity, not just a product.

For more in depth information please see our product page Office 365 Information

Bongo IT have helped organisations in Education, Retail, Charity/Not for Profit, Manufacturing, and SME's unlock the power of the cloud. From a business of 1 to 22,000 people we are the go to consultants.

Computers and the City

This blog post is simply us sharing some of our recent inspiration of Oxford based business with you. Times have been difficult recently but we believe in a bright future. If you get overly sentimental then read no further!

EU Cookie Law

What is a cookie?

A cookie is a small text file placed on the user's machine by a website. This file allows the website to keep track of activity on the site during visits, and access that information on subsequent visits. The information includes login and personalisation preferences, as well as analytics information. 

How you read the web - and 5 ways to improve your copywriting

I’ve got some bad news for you. Of all the brilliant, titillating and engaging online content that you are writing for your website, only 28% of those words are read by your audience. Web users don’t gorge over every word when they read the web, they scan for the information that they need. To optimize your copy, you need to understand how people read the web.

Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS)

The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS) is an information security standard for organizations that handle cardholder information. All merchants, whether small or large, need to be PCI compliant. The burden of compliance can be daunting at first, but at Bongo IT we are here to help.

You may have noted that in 2018 some of the Payment Service Providers e.g. Barclacard have tightened their regulations and are now providing more difficult questionaires. If you now find yourself stuck, please speak to one of our team.

What is involved

Our first step is to document the cardholder data flow. This allows us to understand how sensitive data flows through your systems, and which parts of those systems need to be scanned. We will then look at reducing the number of systems involved in the flow of cardholder data, to lessen the compliance task.

After filling in the correct questionnaire for your level of interaction with cardholder data, we initiate the scan. The scan tests all the systems through which data flows for basic security vulnerabilities. After rectifying any vulnerability, and re-running the scan until no vulnerabilities remain, compliance is achieved. We will then inform your Payment Service Provider (PSP) that you are compliant. The scan will automatically run every 3 months, and will inform you if you ever drop out of compliance.

How can I get a blog?....

....is a regularly asked question. Around 124,000,000 searches are done every month on Google to try and find out this information which struck me as an awful lot of searches for which there should be a really good answer. Thing is there are so many pieces of blog software out there now its difficult to know which one to pick if you are just starting out. Heres a few of the sites which you might want to use starting with the most popular...

This is a quick post on how to optimise your Facebook (FB) account for your business

I'm going to assume you have a Facebook account set up and that you have gone to Facebook Pages and created a page for your business or organisation. If not then that's where to start. Some quick information on Facebook that should interest you.

• There are 300m photos posted every day
• Circa 2.2 billion interactions a day
• 1000 real fans can equal 185% increase in traffic to your website
• 92% of professionals have had a customer from Facebook

Useful Tips On Optimising Your Facebook Profile... Finally! 

How To Optimise A Twitter Account For Business

Hello there, hope you are all enjoying the weather around Oxford at the moment. We have had a couple of inches of snow and it’s still going!

So … Twitter. Why use it? 

How To Set Up Pinterest For My Business

Hi All, recently I have been asked by a few clients to help them with their current Pinterest accounts or to set up a new account for them. Why do they want to do this you may ask? It’s because they want to engage with their audience in a visual medium, drive more traffic to their site and/or make more sales. Pinterest is one of the fastest growing sites in history. To get an idea of who is using Pinterest and how it’s being used I’ll give you some stats:

• Pinterest shoppers, yes it’s the ultimate in window shopping if you’re just browsing but Pinterest shoppers actually spend more money, more often, and on more items than any of the other top 5 social media sites. (Source: comScore).
• Pinterest pins which include prices receive circa 36% more likes than those which do not. (Source: Shopify).
• The number of daily Pinterest users has increased by more than 145% since January 2012. Pinterest users are 79% female which is extraordinary! (Source: Shopify).
• Pinterest leads in both awareness and visitation among social image sharing sites, with 36% of online consumers aware and 19% visiting. (Source: BizRate Insights).
• Pinterest generates over four times as much revenue per click as Twitter and 27% more revenue per click than Facebook. (Source: Converto).
• Of online consumers in the US 47% of have made a purchase based on recommendations from Pinterest. (Source: BlogHer).
• Pinterest generates traffic like you wouldn’t believe, more than YouTube, Google+ and LinkedIn  combined. (Source: Shareaholic).

OK so ask yourself this. Do the stats above appeal to me? Do I have (or could I have) a lot of great photos or graphics that relate to my business or products? Do I want to easily improve my web visibility? If the answer to one or all of these questions is YES then a Pinterest account is almost certainly for you. It really won’t take long to setup we promise but if you need our help just holla.

Ok so I want an account. How do I set it up for my business?

Follow this step by step guide!