Technology Archives - Page 2 of 3

Tracking in Firefox

Tracking protection in Firefox browser went a bit further than I had predicted. I tried to figure out why certain functions in websites weren’t working and then discovered it was due to tracking.

My first issue was the lack of graphics and videos not showing in my Hootsuite timeline, this is one example where it left a blank placeholder where the picture is supposed to appear:

Hootsuite Missing Graphic

It took me ages to figure out why this was happening then I discovered someone else discussing this in a Mozilla forum. So, all I did was take off tracking protection and all my graphics returned (note, turn on to off after clicking on the purple shield to the left of the address bar).

Tracking Firefox

Then I realised I had a similar problem in WordPress where Twitter embeds weren’t showing up, they were in other browsers but not in Firefox. I saw a placeholder for the embed but nothing was being fed into it.

WordPress Missing Twitter

Same again, turn off tracking then the feed appeared.

My tracking configuration in Firefox is pretty strict which is most likely the reason why some websites are breaking. I want to keep this custom setting but at least now I know how to fix it for certain websites I visit.

Firefox Tracking Custom

Steven2020-08-05T17:33:18+00:005 August 2020|Technology|

Dealing with Spam Email

I have written a few times on my struggles in dealing with spam email and trying to prevent it hitting my account.

Once a spammer has your email address it is circulated widely among bad actors and those companies who sell hosting or domains to them aren’t really going to do much about it, not that they can anyhow. These companies are reactionary to problems rather than put in place something pro-active to stop them from buying their resources in the first place.

At the end of the day, if you want to get rid of the spam, the only solution is to delete your email address and start from scratch again.

The main email address that received spam I’ve had for many years. I had previously used it on social media platforms. In 2012 LinkedIn had a data breach for which many emails and passwords were sold on to Russian crime syndicates, and most likely went further afield than that.

The email was based on a domain I owned, here is the process I went through in deleting it:

Gather information on all those people/companies that had that email address, so I could update my details
Delete the email address
Deleting the email address took some time as it cleared the internet to truly become deactivated. In other words, for a couple of weeks I still saw messages go into SpamExperts until it was truly gone

The worst part was updating my details with companies for which the process was difficult or impossible:

Before deleting the email I needed to log into the account then change the email to my new one. Some systems send a message to your old email account before you can update it to a new one. This is a bit of a nuisance if someone loses the email without any prior warning, in which case they will have to call the company to have it updated that way.
Some systems use the email address in their database as the primary key, therefore totally impossible to change it. Most companies will use a username in which case it’s easier to change the email. So, for some companies I had to delete the account and create another one, part of me just couldn’t be bothered doing that so they have potentially lost a customer just because their system isn’t designed that well.

Going through this process was painful but totally worth it:

I could review all the information the company held on me, and some I noticed had an old address.
I could decide whether I wanted to hear from the company, many times I didn’t so I decided to delete the account
Then, I could change the email according to where I want their information sent to. So, if it was a general email list I would rather send it a gmail account than my own business account.
Even if I wasn’t deleting my email account I might have gone through the process for some of the reasons stated above.

I just hope criminals don’t get my current email address but I fear it’s just a matter of time.

Steven2020-05-18T04:45:39+00:0015 May 2020|Technology|

Coronavirus Email Spam

I am starting to receive Coronavirus related email spam now although the majority of it appears to be the usual stuff from before. I expect any domain procurement company to scrutinise their customers tightly during this time period, many are stuck indoors with they isolate, some spending more time online in a vulnerable mindset. There does appear to be many bad domain sellers as there are spammers.

Here is some analysis over the past week and some tips on dealing with spam.

Analytics

First, here are some analytics from one of my email accounts for the past week. The following is an analysis from an account I don’t use so much but that email address was the one I used on LinkedIn which was hacked. Now and again I do have legitimate emails going through .

Number of Emails Received: 135
Number of Legitimate Emails: 61 (+2 that were marked as spam but went on to be legit)
Number of Spam Emails: 73
Number of Emails Quarantined: 65
Number of Emails Rejected: 8
Number of Emails I Released from Quarantine (not spam): 2
Number of Emails with Domains Registered with Namecheap: 63

In general most of the TLDs (top level domains) I receive email from are the non .com .org domains, the most popular ones this week were:

.work
.london
.cases
.rest
.uno

Namecheap

Why are the majority of spam emails I receive associated with Namecheap? That is a question I have been asking them for a couple of years for which they refuse to answer. What is wrong with their process that allows so many criminals buy on their system? They have blocked the purchase of domain keywords associated with the Coronavirus, which is good but doesn’t provide a solution to criminals using domains that don’t use those keywords from buying domains. I’ve read some minutes from ICANN meetings that include a Namecheap representative but don’t see any discussion on what the company is doing to solve this issue. Maybe they just enjoy the money coming in a little too much.

You can report abusive or spam emails to Namecheap, however, with 63 emails this is virutually impossible to do when having to include headers for each, which is why they should be addressing their bad workflow issue, but unfortunately they don’t care.

Deciphering A Spam Message

Below is a typical spam message I received. Although the subjects of much of the spam is consistent with the past 2-3 years I am now seeing Coronavirus type spam, in this case for masks which people are desperate to buy.

Spam Mask

Images

You must deactivate automatic downloading of graphics in your email program. In most emails, companies and scammers alike, have embedded an invisible graphic which pings back to the server the message was sent from. This sends a huge amount of data back to them, the worst being that they know you exist, it is sending to a legitimate email account, and that they can send you more scams. Also, your email will likely be sold on to other bad actors, or placed on a dodgy server for nasty people to download and use.

Domain

It is easy to look up a domain in ICANN, just enter the URL/s from the email and you will receive quite a bit of information back if you dig deep enough. You can find roughly the company the site is hosted or the domain supplier. It is possible to report the domain to the supplier so others aren’t victims, however, if you receive so much spam it’s impossible task to do that. If you are receiving too much spam in your inbox, contact your internet service provider or check on their website for instructions about decreasing that, for example, sending into the spam folder or elsewhere.

Unsubscribe

The unsubscribe link at the bottom of the message is most likely fake and just another way for the scammer to confirm you exist then go onto send you more spam. Do NOT click on any links within the email, it could redirect you to a site that will infect your computer will a virus or malware.

Address

Some scammers include an address at the bottom of the message, it is quite easy to investigate what is exactly at that address, assuming it exists. When looking up the address I’ve seen all manner of obscure places.

I looked up the address on the above email, it is a company that rents mailboxes. You can’t get a mailbox without some kind of registration but is the box number real? Most likely not. If it is a legitimate company they are most likely have an office in a real building but if it’s a mailbox then you know any old person off any old street can rent one, assuming it is real.

Just doing a basic search, in Google, on the address, has also bought up some information from the Better Business Bureau. That address is also being used for another fake company “Russian Beauty Online: Online Dating Services”. Even though the emails from the “Russian Beauty” rubbish might be going out with the same address in it, the domain is registered via Enom with a another address.

Final Determination

The majority of people have wised up to these scammers now and can determine what is a scam or not:

Uses a non .com, .org, .edu, .gov etc domain
Don’t recognize who its from (not from a friend or someone you do business with)
Doesn’t speak your language properly, like broken English
Is a cold calling type message
The promises are too good to be true

The most problematic messages are scammers pretending to be from legitimate businesses or government bodies.

It’s best to be extra careful right now as scammers take advantage of people in vulnerable situations such as during a virus epidemic. Don’t expect domain registrars to be your friend, they are either uncooperative or your email has been shared to so many bad actors it will forever be impossible to stop the spam.

Steven2020-04-04T22:27:39+00:004 April 2020|Coronavirus, Technology|

COVID-19 Videos from China

I’ve been watching many videos over YouTube and other online sources of how ordinary Chinese citizens are coping with COVID-19 (Coronavirus). This has given me some insight into what it might be like for us should we face the same issues here in Canada.

Rubbish Collection

In some videos, I’ve seen significant pileup’s of rubbish that isn’t being collected, this has potential health impacts such as vermin infestation, air pollution, affecting those with respiratory issues, poor for wellbeing, can contaminate water and more. However, in more modern apartment complexes rubbish appears to be taken away regularly.

Private Health Insurance

In China, they have universal health care but private insurance for more chronic conditions. I’ve noticed some having difficulty with the online forms for COVID-19 related hospital stays, making claims off their insurance. However, I am wondering about the impacts under a more corporate-run health care system as in the US, whether it will be a barrier to those who are sick seeing out treatment due to cost.

Food Deliveries

I’ve seen a number of options for buying food during the crisis in China.

First, some are given passes every couple of days to go out and buy food from local stores or supermarkets. It does look as though finding an open store can be problematic, however, when people are finding them they do appear to be stocked up well.

Second, some food items are delivered to apartment complexes but the owners must order online. I’ve seen some content in videos where people are stressed out because they are running out of food but not realising, or don’t have the skillset, to order via a website or app.

Food

I’ve seen people donate ready meals to hospital patients, and those owning farms donating their own products to communities. Recipe videos seem to have increased, these are from established vloggers and others who are demonstrating what they are cooking when you can’t access the food you wouldn’t normally buy ie less meat.

Medication Shortage

Not seen a lot of this but in one video a vlogger had to go out to the hospital to buy medication on their health insurance, I couldn’t see any examples of supplies being delivered to an apartment block. I’ve seen vloggers discuss how family members became sick with a non COVID-19 issue but didn’t have access to a pharmacy to get advice or medication, it could be the case of not thinking straight during a stressful situation.

Face Mask Shortage

I’ve seen many videos where ordinary citizens donate face masks to hospitals, the police and other emergency services. At the beginning of the crisis, I heard some concerns where people couldn’t buy face masks however not heard anything recently. People appear to wear basic masks, not the N95 standard ones with filters. I’m not convinced the basic ones provide people with adequate protection but everyone should find out via their own health care practioners.

Family Separation

I’ve seen a lot of upset people that they cannot be with their families and are very concerned for their wellbeing. Many cancelled their plans to be with their families for Chinese New Year by the request of the government so this must have added that additional stress. I saw a video where a Mother caught the virus and decided her child should live with the grandparents until she is well. This creates another issue where grandparents are looking after their grandchildren and I don’t know if they are receiving the support they need to perform that function. The parents feel guilty since their children don’t understand what’s going on and hope they will forgive them as they get older.

I have seen a number of parents wish for their children to become doctors or health care workers so they can help people should another crisis in the future.

Boredom

The more time people have on their hands the more they tend to think the worst. From what I’ve seen there are moments like this for vloggers, they record video of themselves crying and showing their desperation. They do seem to be able to pick themselves up as the situation improves. Would everyone be able to cope with staying at home for a long time? I always have things to do so I don’t think it would be a problem for me but for some, it will be a big issue.

Hair Cut

People can’t go out to get their hair cut as the stores are all closed, so I’ve seen people trying to cut their own. This has created a lot of amusement for those recording the videos as they make a complete mess of themselves. I saw some guy try to use a beard trimmer on his hair which kind of worked out ok. There are many services like this that we will miss while being stuck at home.

Technology

In some respects, China does appear to be more technologically advanced than Canada. People are using technology to keep in touch with each other particularly through WeChat and Weibo. Most people seem to pay for things via WeChat such as online-shopping. Some vloggers have set up a PayPal account to ask for a donation to help in the production of their videos. I noticed some people are a little suspicious of donations to China.

Cold Apartments

In every video, I saw vloggers and their families wear winter jackets in their own home or can even see their breath when speaking. This was my greatest concern as I would think they should keep warm to prevent related illnesses, it’s also a better environment to get better if you are sick. I wonder if heating is too expensive in parts of China or whether this is what citizens are used to.

Summary

Most of the videos are more pro Chinese government as vloggers could be arrested if they said anything against them but reading between the lines I’ve got so much from these even if it’s just to learn about their day to day life. I certainly have a better idea of what I need to do if and when the virus hits Canada.

Steven2020-02-27T23:13:28+00:0027 February 2020|Health Care, Technology|

HP Customer Service

OfficeJet Pro 9015 This is just a random review of HP customer service as I thought I had an odd experience today.

My current printer died and it’s not worth updating given that it doesn’t have all the groovy features you would expect in 2020. So thought it was about time to buy a new 4 in 1 model. I struggled to find one that is compatible with the latest Mac OSX. HP still seemed to be the best for my needs but I did have a slight trauma in contacting them.

STEP 1

I wanted to find a list of Mojave compatible printers, the HP website had misleading information on that, so I attempted to contact customer support.

Went onto the HP website to find the Canadian support homepage.
Called the 1-800 Canadian number
Got through to a representative very quickly, was pleased about that. I told her what I needed.
I asked if HP had a list of Mojave compatible Inkjet printers similar to the LaserJet one on the website. She didn’t answer.
She asked if I was in Canada. I said I was in Vancouver, British Colombia. She then asked again whether I was in Canada. It seemed she didn’t know where British Columbia was.
I asked if I had been redirected to the US call centre, she didn’t want to answer. Thinking about it now I’m not sure if the rep was based even in North America or even if she worked for HP, maybe an outsourcing company?
Basically, she had no idea what I was talking about, the call started to deteriorate.
I decided to end the call as I wasn’t getting anywhere.

It was an extraordinarily odd call. I noticed the rep wanted to adhere very tightly to a script that was most likely on her call centre application.

STEP 2

I managed to reach out to someone on Twitter. They managed to redirect me to a page on their site that had a list of Mojave compatible printers but didn’t list the one I was considering.

The social media person said he didn’t know if it was compatible as there had been a lot of confusion over this issue. Well, the confusion seemed to be mainly with HP. The guy gave me a technical support number to call, I suspect it was in the US.

STEP 3

I called the technical support number as provided.

It was difficult to get through their telephone workflow as it kept wanting to direct me towards the “virtual assistant”. At this stage, I was not patient enough to speak to a computer. The first call was dropped as soon as it redirected me to a human. Sigh. I called again and finally managed to get through to someone.

That call started in an odd way, the rep first asked me for an issue number, I said I didn’t have one. Then she asked me if I was “such and such” person, I said I wasn’t, maybe she was expecting someone to call her back. Finally got to ask her the question I wanted answering and got an immediate “yes it is compatible, via an app in the Apple Store”. She tried to get me to order the printer from her but it would take up to 6 days via a courier and just couldn’t be dealing with that.

Finally got there in the end.

STEP 4

I wrote feedback to HP about the above so they were aware of the process in getting an answer to a question stating that it shouldn’t have taken that long.

I was impressed with an immediate call back soon after I write that email. That was nice of them.

STEP 5

The final step was buying the printer which we did from a very hard salesperson in Staples Canada, that was a bit troublesome too.

I bought an HP OfficeJet Pro 9015. I got it fixed up at home and it works perfectly with Mojave, as they said, via the app.

Some features I like about the printer:

Nice bright design
Easy to read/touch front panel
Duplex printing and scanning. Two-sided scanning is a huge bonus for me.
Mobile friendly

Some bad points:

Seems a little noisy when printing
Doesn’t do larger size paper formats

Steven2020-02-13T23:12:46+00:0011 February 2020|Customer Service, Technology|

Notion Productivity App

I had never heard of the productivity app Notion before this week but a video with an enthustiastic user appeared on my YouTube timeline so I thought I would look into it a bit further.

What is it?

For my perspective, it looks like an all-in-one productiving app to replace many others that are on the market. It has calenders, wiki’s, databases, tables, task management, and a growing range of templates you can use on your pages. It is set up in a similar way to a website, I guess, you have your front page and create other pages that drill down to tools that are various aspects of your personal and working life. It’s like a GTD (Getting Things Done) app on acid.

Why are people raving about it?

The community that are on Notion are extremely exicted about this app, they share their setup on videos and screen dumps around the internet. They are like kinds in a candy store, that have never tasted chocolate before.

I suspect people love it because it is an all-in-one solution of tools they already use but in this case you can integrate your work from section to section. For example, in one section you can have a database of books you want to read but in another section a calendar bring in one of the fields, say title, to record that you have read it on a particular day.

What stage am I with it?

I am at the AARRRGGGHHH stage with it as it’s quite consuming when first getting into it.

Created an account
Installed Mac Desktop application
Installed iPad version
Setup some pages and structure

Notion

What are the negatives?

I am finding the following:

When you create an account you basically have a blank sheet and don’t really know where to go from there. I hear it takes some people literally months to get to a place where they want to be with it.
There isn’t much integration with external tools, and I mean APIs.
There is a free account that has some limitations and most users will need to be on a subscription. The ‘personal subscription’ is only USD4.00 a month, not bad for what you get. However, I ask myself whether I want to get into another subscription, most people have enough of them already.
Where my data is stored is extremely important. I have 2 cloud services and a web hosting provider all of whom I feel confident with. The data on Notion is placed on their server with no backup to your own cloud. I understand they use Amazon Web Services. You can export each page, one at a time, into PDF or csv format, but haven’t found a feature that can back up all your dataset.
There are a couple of things in their Privacy Statement that made me a little bit nervous.
There is always a chance that people will become bored of Notion when the next toy comes along. So, what is the longevitity of the company/app? Once your data has been input I don’t think I want to re-enter it somewhere else.
I’m not that keen on the iPad app mainly due to responsive design, it has scalled down to look more like how the iPhone size screen might behave.
Can it compete with the other tools I have? I use a CRM all the time, I love it, it’s structured and disciplined as I am. The CRM is on my web host and I control it’s development plus look/feel. As I test Notion out that is what I will most likely be comparing it to.

Online Resources

The best resources I found are YouTube videos of champions of the product.

Keep Productive | YouTube Home | Website | Twitter

Ali Abdaal | YouTube Home | Website | Twitter

Steven2019-12-21T06:37:32+00:0021 December 2019|Technology|

What Not To Say on Social Media

What you say on social media can lead to ruining your privacy, reputation and brand. It’s always best to engage brain before hitting “Post” on your device, in other words, “planning”.

Most organizations will have a strategy in planning their social media in advance to coincide with their projects, goals and timelines. Most likely they will go into review by other members of staff including those on the senior leadership team and marketing. It’s helpful to keep this in mind for your own individual posts. If you aren’t careful what you say you could either lose followers or the worst case scenario be your own risk to reputation.

We’ll just dive into what I think people should not post.

You dislike your job
You dislike your boss or work colleagues
You dislike your customers or complain about their looks/ethnicity etc
You dislike your life partner or shame him/her over social media
You dislike your family or shame them over social media, even in conversations they are not a party to
Constantly shame other people over social media (being a troll)
Don’t be an emotional vampire
Don’t provide details of when and where you are going on vacation (tells the world that your property will be empty)
Don’t provide details of your daily schedule (again tells the world that your property will be empty)
Don’t say that you are having an affair
Don’t reveal your financial status, whether you are poor or rich, need or have loans, in serious debt
Don’t reveal or give any clues as to what your usernames and passwords are
Scams about how many followers people can make if they listen to you
Photos of you being too familiar with other people than your partner
If you are going through some legal investigation don’t say anything that might jeopardise that for yourself (friends could let slip about something you have mentioned on Facebook)
Your toilet habits
Medical records or photos of your condition
Extreme views about politics or people ie racism, homophobia.
Photos with documents that users can zoom in to in order to find confidential information about yourself or loved ones
Photos of strangers in embarrassing situations, obtain people’s permission before posting
Post too much on yourself, show you are considerate of others too
Death and other threats
Lies
Steel someones work/data and say it’s your own (always cite your source)
Repeat the same message day after day or constantly retweeting yourself. Always come up with new and exciting stories to keep your visitors engaged.

Steven2019-10-01T00:52:09+00:001 October 2019|Social Media, Technology|

iMac Trauma

iMac 2017 I thought I would bite the bullet and soup up my iMac which I bought in mid-2017.

RAM

I’ve been running on 2x4Gb RAM since I bought the computer and noticed recently it had been slowing up especially with Adobe products and Firefox. So I went ahead and bought 2X16Gb RAM to upgrade it to a total of 40Gb. I ordered Crucial RAM from Amazon. If I had bought the RAM from the Apple Store it would have most likely cost me 2 or 3 times that cost, quite unaffordable. The RAM was so easy to install, instructions on how to do that are on the Apple website, and everything worked perfectly, what a relief.

Mojave

Next, was to upgrade the operating system from Sierra (yes I was still using that) to Mojave. This is where the horror story began. Generally, I read that the upgrade should take between 45 minutes to 1 hour, well 4 hours later it finally finished. Then when I went to log in to my user it wouldn’t work. I looked online and saw literally hundreds of people have faced the same issue, I wasn’t happy. So, these are all the things I went through to get my system to work, with assistance via Apple on the phone:

Went into Recovery Mode to change my user password to something else, twice. Still couldn’t log into my computer.
Found that I could log onto my computer in Safe Mode.
Created a TEST user with administration rights and could logon with no problems.
Back in Safe Mode, I deleted Comodo, a virus checker I had installed on my system.
In Safe Mode, I deleted my scanner software from login items as I thought it might not be compatible with Mojave.
In Recovery Mode I ran First Aid
Checked the Activity Monitor to see if something was tying up my computer.

Well, none of this worked so I was booked into the go-to Genius Bar to see if they could resolve the issue. It was a strain on my back to get the computer all the way there, I was not a happy person.

Apple performed their diagnostics and couldn’t find any issues with my computer
They went through some of the steps I had already gone through just to double check
Then they went through the startup files to see if there was anything in there, this is where they found the issues.

So, the resolution was to delete DivX player and Comodo Virus scanner from the startup files, the computer returned to normal. I was extremely happy.

What I’ve Learned From This

Many people have had the same issue and ended up re-formatting their hard drives, I didn’t want to go through this and tried to see it through so I didn’t have to do this.
Trying to resolve this issue with Apple on the phone was a mistake. I was actually on the phone for 6 hours without making any progress. While I appreciate their time it wasn’t very productive for either of us and just made me more upset and frustrated.
When I visited the Genius Bar at the Apple Store the engineer didn’t take long to diagnose and resolve the issue. While lugging the computer all the way to the store, and iMac’s are very heavy, it was worth it to get a quick fix.

So, unless it’s a quick question I always recommend taking your computer to the Apple Store.

At least now I can sit back and enjoy my souped-up computer.

Steven2019-08-08T05:04:56+00:008 August 2019|Technology|

Chat Applications

I use quite a few chat applications mainly because I have friends who use a wide variety of them. So, I thought I would review the ones I do use.

I started using chat type apps many years ago the first ones being:

ICQ – originally created by an Israeli company then bought by AOL it was finally sold to a Russian entity, it was at that stage I decided to stop using it.
Yahoo Messenger – many of my friends were on this application probably because there was no other choice, but it closed in 2018.

My current favourites:

Skype

Skype Logo I wasn’t on Skype until Microsoft bought the company and it was amalgamated into its product line. I start using Skype for Business but didn’t have it for personal reasons. I guess I got used to using the program and now it is my most used chat type app. Of course, it is multi-functional so I have the ability to a) make international phone calls, b) chair online client meetings by video and screen sharing. Companies are reaching out/finding me more over Skype than they are over LinkedIn. Skype is my preferred chat type app to use. The only thing I will add about the Desktop version, it is a little confusing to get around, as there is so much there, compared to the other basic chat apps.

Telegram

I’ve been using Telegram for a few weeks for personal use and like the simplicity of the design. It does seem to be working out very well although it would be better if more of my connections used it. The company suggests they are the best for security but there are reviews for and against this, they are most likely they are the best on the market today, everyone needs to make up their mind.

My not so favourites:

Google Hangout

I have found the interface not as easy to use as the other apps, or at least I am not that familiar with it as I’ve only used it a few times. In my experience startups and agencies use it as they prefer the general Google Suite of applications. I am also quite concerned about privacy on Google so I generally avoid it and don’t promote that I am on it.

WhatsApp

Since WhatsApp is owned by the Facebook family of products I rarely use it due to privacy concerns and well, I don’t trust the company. I only have one friend on the app but when I have used it, always on a Desktop, it performs well. I have tried to encourage my friend to try out Telegram.

Worst chat apps:

WeChat

As soon as I registered I was told that there was something wrong with my account and was locked out. I tried to resolve it with them but they were pretty non-responsive not only via Twitter but also but logging a ticket on their system. Therefore I abandoned trying to use this application. It might have been useful in China but alas it wasn’t to be. I only had one friend who tried to encourage me to use the application so all is ok.

Facebook Messenger

When I started receiving adverts through Facebook Messenger and encouraged by companies to use [FAQ] bots through it (rather than speak to live human beings) that was my last straw. Of course, there is also the privacy issue with Facebook too. There are some humans behind companies on Facebook Messenger, for example:

Shaw Cable – able to answer some basic questions on a certain subject quickly even though the initial response was incorrect
London Transport – took them about 48 hours to respond to a message but not with enough detail in order to resolve the situation

Summary

With so many chat type products on the market and a number of friends scattered around them it’s tough to stop using certain ones but often I have to consider privacy and online safety as my number one priority.

Steven2019-05-30T16:09:17+00:0030 May 2019|Technology|

Google Tag Manager – Getting Started

Google Tag Manager has been around for a little while now but I notice many people or companies are kind of nervous about getting into it. Up until 1-2 years ago, there weren’t many easy-to-understand resources on the web to explain the tool concisely, however, this is not so much the case today.

Rather than me go through an explain what it is I will refer you to these great resources around the internet.

About Google Tag Manager

The first video by Jason Whaling explains what Tag Manager is and why you should be using it.

Getting Started/Setup

The second video is by Loves Data, Benjamin explains how to get started with Google Tag Manager from when you sign up, find the code to place on your website and connect to Google Analytics.

WordPress Installation

During the sign up on Google Tag Manager, you will need to place some code on your website. For those using WordPress there are plugin’s to help you do that but if you are using the Avada Theme, as many people do, you can follow the instructions that are described in the following useful video:

I hope these simple Google Tag Manager tips are helpful in setting it up on your website.

If you aren’t used to the Google Tag Manager interface and want to learn more there are many resources over YouTube and on other websites. Generous experts will often share their ‘recipes” which you can use inside your own Tag Manager account, these are always super useful.

Good luck and enjoy.

Steven2019-02-27T21:45:56+00:0027 February 2019|Technology|

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