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Hacker Safe button


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I was thinking about buying the hacker safe button from scanalert. I am not sure if it is worth it though? has anyone purchased it? Does it increase your sales?

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I have used hackersafe in the past and have mixed feelings about them. I don’t remember what they charged me, somewhere in the ball park of 20 dollars. This was when they were a new company. For myself, the only reason I would ever use them again is if I was afraid of being hacked.

 

Its hard not to admire the way hacker safe has positioned their advertising. They provide you with case studies which have demonstrated that the increased user confidence their ‘hackersafe’ logo inspires will on average boost your sales by 10%. And on average its true. However, this is in no small part due to the fact that they advise their clients where to place the logo for maximum effect (above the fold in a prominent position of the checkout). Of course if they didn’t do this, the average site owner would place the logo at the bottom of the shopping cart thus rendering it ineffective.

 

 

 

Will hackersafe raise user confidence on the average web site? The answer is yes. However, keep in mind, this is the only thing the average website displays to improve trust: https.gif

 

 

 

Most buyers aren’t as smart as you. They don’t know that https means a secure checkout. There is no contest.

 

Some more sophisticated marketers go the extra step beyond https; they include their security certificates below the fold. Still there is no contest since they aren't in a prominent spot.

moresophisticated.gif

 

 

 

Now compare with hacker safe:

 

hackersafe.gif

 

Why does this make a difference? 1) most customers are paranoid (except when shopping at amazon.com) 2) they get paranoid when they start the checkout process 3) seeing the hacker safe logo first goes along way to assure them that you are legit.

 

 

However, the average paranoid shopper doesn't know a thing about computers. All they want is an assurance of security and privacy to appease their generalized paranoi -something you can do for free. Hackers aren't an issue unless you mention them. Take a look at the same site, but with an SSL certificate in place of the hackersafe certificate:

 

ssl.gif

 

 

I hear the cost of the hackersafe logo is obscenely high and have heard rumors it costs over 100 USD a month. I have no way of knowing if this is true since scanalert's phone lines always seem to be busy. Fortunately, their is always an underdog that provides the same service and is not afraid to publish their prices on the web.

Best Regards,

 

 

Victor Wise

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I have added Hackersafe on our site since last November and I cannot say for sure that I have received 14% of sales increase because of it. On the other hand my average order total has increased; however, it is very difficult to quantify Hackersafe's contribution as I supposed a lot of it should have to do with our web present in the past year from advertising (impression). Also, it seems to me that our customers are about 50/50 knowledgeable with Hackersafe. The only nice thing I could say about HS is when we receive questions from first time online buyers about our security then we are able to tell them the daily tests that our server goes through and that we go the distance to make sure our customers’ data are safe. Now having said that we also had upgraded our server to dual processors and doubled our RAM before adding Hackersafe and we were glad that we did that as Scanalert's daily test could be annoying (btw, we upgraded our server for reasons other then HS). Of course you can always schedule them when to test your site but I probably still wouldn't suggest it to a share hosted site (you may lack the flexibilities to make adjustment to your server). Lastly, we pay $179 per month and it is a month-to-month fee so if you would pay by year then you may receive some kind of discount (at least it was when we joined).

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I have added Hackersafe on our site since last November and I cannot say for sure that I have received 14% of sales increase because of it. On the other hand my average order total has increased; however, it is very difficult to quantify Hackersafe's contribution as I supposed a lot of it should have to do with our web present in the past year from advertising (impression). Also, it seems to me that our customers are about 50/50 knowledgeable with Hackersafe. The only nice thing I could say about HS is when we receive questions from first time online buyers about our security then we are able to tell them the daily tests that our server goes through and that we go the distance to make sure our customers’ data are safe. Now having said that we also had upgraded our server to dual processors and doubled our RAM before adding Hackersafe and we were glad that we did that as Scanalert's daily test could be annoying (btw, we upgraded our server for reasons other then HS). Of course you can always schedule them when to test your site but I probably still wouldn't suggest it to a share hosted site (you may lack the flexibilities to make adjustment to your server). Lastly, we pay $179 per month and it is a month-to-month fee so if you would pay by year then you may receive some kind of discount (at least it was when we joined).

 

 

179$ a month! Thats highway robbery!Why not switch to COMODO? When I used to use scanalert, I was paying somewhere between 20-30$.

Best Regards,

 

 

Victor Wise

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Hi,

 

I think some of you are missing the point with hacksafe, yes $179 is a lot of cash for what you get but put yourself in our shoes, we started to use hacksafe 3 mts ago and we have double our daily sales from the average of 3-4 a day to 7-10 a day, i do not put this purely down to hacksafe logo but it must help by making the customers feel that we are a safe site, but i think the best part is the PR8 directory they list you in really helps, we was placed ok in Google but after getting added to their directory ( takes 30 days or so ) we started to get many more hits because we we listed a lot higher in Google, so the $179 is high but a PR8 directory listing could cost you this a month alone.

 

http://www.scanalert.com/directory/index.html

 

This is only what has happened to me, but its not guaranteed to help all and if your site looks poor or the seo of it is not done well, then i cant see scan alert doing you much good.

 

Regards

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Hi,

 

I think some of you are missing the point with hacksafe, yes $179 is a lot of cash for what you get but put yourself in our shoes, we started to use hacksafe 3 mts ago and we have double our daily sales from the average of 3-4 a day to 7-10 a day, i do not put this purely down to hacksafe logo but it must help by making the customers feel that we are a safe site, but i think the best part is the PR8 directory they list you in really helps, we was placed ok in Google but after getting added to their directory ( takes 30 days or so ) we started to get many more hits because we we listed a lot higher in Google, so the $179 is high but a PR8 directory listing could cost you this a month alone.

 

http://www.scanalert.com/directory/index.html

 

This is only what has happened to me, but its not guaranteed to help all and if your site looks poor or the seo of it is not done well, then i cant see scan alert doing you much good.

 

Regards

 

This is a very very good point! PR8 is a very scarce page that is able to list your site on it! What is the PR of your site now? Before was?

Best regards,

Koh Kho King

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I think some of you are missing the point with hacksafe,

What point are we missing? You have to understand what each tool does. This particular one you're using will give you more info about the server configuration and server vulnurablities than for osc. If you install a contribution for example that does not filter properly some form input parameters and blindly writes to the database the tool you mentioned won't do anything. Or if someone manages to upload a php script to your site.

 

Now the irony is you're already paying your host for the server part. To keep it efficient and secure. So what's the point of having this tool report to me that some server ports are open for instance? Or so many other details my host should handle them in the first place. Because you see no matter how good and secure your osc store is, if someone gets in from a different account then all bets are off. So choose your host wisely.

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I totally agree with what you wrote, and it is really your host responsibility to cover security and so on BUT customers do not see this nor understand this, but what they do see is a logo is becoming trusted and used by many large companies like sony, shopnbc, cafepress, toshiba and many thousands more, and the more you make the customer feel safe the more likely they will buy something.

 

"so this was the point i think some was missing".

 

When people say to webmasters here that "Hacker Safe button can fool dummies but experts know what it is all about" so the likes of toshiba, cafepress, America red cross, black and decker and so on must have dummies working for them that just like to overload their sites with gifs, i think i know who the dummy is hey Nirvana ; )

 

 

Its not what it does or doesn't do its about what others think it does, so if anyone else can show me a trusted logo (other that an SSL logo) that also gives you a listing in an PR8 directory that is being use by big companies, i will keep paying the $179.00 PM.

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yea, instead of paying just fora logo you could spend your resources advertising your store which, theoretically at least, will lead to more sales.

 

Check for example the oscommerce forum itself. It has a banner advertising and osc has a solid PR10 and better exposure than even ms. Of course it depends on the type of merchandise you carry where you advertise, but I am sure there're suitable sites for this sort of thing.

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  • 1 month later...

I agree with Enigma. Selling PR as a benefit is just a step above spamming forums (or hiring someone to get a few posts and defend your product).

 

Anyways, the situation is moot. Even if link juice was life, you aren't getting much link juice because their PR is substantially less than a of PR10.

Best Regards,

 

 

Victor Wise

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  • 5 months later...

i've considered getting this myself (but rather the comodo version). i think it's all a mentality thing. just having it on ur site just makes people consider your site to be safe and won't second guess the safety.

 

if you have the money to spend then go for it. but if u don't i think just as long as you show SSL security, and verification for your credit card payments .. i don't think customers will be detracted from your site.

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Personally believe that hacker safe button is waste of money as they not monitor you security of your website for 24x7x365, useless button, waste of money & time.

Please read this line: Do you want to find all the answers to your questions? click here. As for contribution database it's located here!

8 people out of 10 don't bother to read installation manuals. I can recommend: if you can't read the installation manual, don't bother to install any contribution yourself.

Before installing contribution or editing/updating/deleting any files, do the full backup, it will save to you & everyone here on the forum time to fix your issues.

Any issues with oscommerce, I am here to help you.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Here is a good answer at Trust The Seller. The site is dedicated to site or trust seals and talks about having a third party verification and hacker safe and some other companies out there and some of the benefits that come from it.

 

Hope I can help someone.

 

I must admit that as a new store, I did look into hacker safe....but the cost is massive! To be honest, you would expect with a company charging what they are for a service, they would at least come up with a decent logo.

 

There are several other options in my opinion.... I noticed an increase in sales as soon as I added the SSL certificate logo to my site (depending on who you purchased it from). I also use shopsafe.co.uk (who are free) which also seems to boost customer trust.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Shouldn't we be rating HOSTING companies and not web sites?

If you want to spend that kind of money, spend it on monthly hosting from a company with a good rating.

 

If you're using 256bit encryption and password protected the admin and secured the data on YOUR end, then you've done all you can.

I display on MY site, the secure 256bit encryption to secure their data. Everyone seems to be totally confident in this.

I've hosted with a reputable company with very high recommendations.

Then I don't have to spend $175/month to let people know it's safe.

I've used my money for better resources to gain visitors. I mean we're talking $2,000/year.

I'm not saying the company isn't good, or it's not worth it, but I think there are things that we should look at FIRST imho

Wally

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I'm not sure why the wide variation in pricing quoted here and elsewhere. Could it be the level or type of service (PCI compliance vs. hackersafe and how often it scans)? My host offers the scanalert PCI compliance free for 1 year, then $19 per year after that. It's just quarterly scanning and supposedly is normally $149 per year.

 

-Tim

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