Digital marketing is a career that is rising in popularity since most marketing has been moved entirely to the digital space. But along with that change comes the risk of security breaches due to the nature of the job. To ensure that your marketing agency doesn’t become the epicenter of a data breach, here are a few tips to improve your data security.
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1. Email Marketers
Those who market mainly through email face unique data security challenges. Via phishing and spamming, bad actors can hijack email marketing and steal someone’s data once they gain access to accounts through tactics like credential stuffing. That’s why digital marketers should always have email security software installed and should add the appropriate outbound email filters to stay ahead of possible breaches.
What you’re hoping to do with all these precautions is keep your customers safe, because it’s their data that is such a goldmine for hackers and phishers. On your business’s end, a data breach can end up in tons of customers lost and terrible PR. There can even be legal consequences if the business responsible is found to have been negligent with customers’ data.
In general, you should be safeguarding your business data by consistently updating software, installing antivirus, and having a strong firewall in place. Employees should be trained in best practices surrounding data security, and should all have multi-factor authentication in place on any work accounts. Ideally, you want to prevent any attacks or breaches before they ever occur, rather than learning from your mistakes. That’s why digital marketers should always have email security software installed and should add the appropriate outbound email filters to stay ahead of possible breaches. An enterprise secure file transfer software is the way to go if you’re looking for the highest level of security.
2. Social Media Marketers
Social media provides marketers with an excellent tool for gaining a wider audience and successfully advertising to thousands at a time. But social media accounts are often hacked, and when an entire business’s account is taken over by hackers, a lot of damage can be done. Often, customer emails and accounts are available through social media, and if a business is reusing account information, it could wind up with a huge problem.
This is one reason why it’s so important for businesses to consistently update all passwords, and to ensure that they’re strong enough to withstand hacking attempts. There’s even some concern that in the future, social media bots that currently do basic tasks for accounts will be able to completely mimic someone’s identity by cloning their accounts. While social media is absolutely a tool businesses should be using, it should be used with proper caution.
The precautions marketers should take with business accounts are things like changing passwords often, using multi-factor authentication when possible, and reviewing account settings every so often. It’s also worthwhile to check out who’s following your account and avoid sharing too much information in your posts. Also, be aware of what kind of information you’re collecting about customers on each platform – could a bad actor gather enough data to cause problems just by looking at your posts?
3. Blog or Website Marketers
Another common marketing tactic many businesses use is consistently posting on a blog or website to generate more traffic to their business website. Many of these business websites are years old and are due for updates that may not happen, leaving the website vulnerable to attacks and breaches. Marketers looking to shore up their website security should be accepting any patches or upgrades as they become available.
If your website is used solely for posting about your business, it may not be such a big deal, but websites that collect client information or perform transactions can be quite dangerous if they’re left unguarded. Encryption by VPN is also a good way to add a layer of safety to websites, as encrypted data is essentially useless to anyone who manages to steal it.
Digital marketers are constantly sending out emails and links for customers to click through for promotional materials, but they could unwittingly be sending malware or viruses. Ensure your business and your customers’ safety by taking these precautions in your marketing efforts.