ORGANIZATION | PROGRAM | URLs |
---|---|---|
Houston First Corporation | Houston First Corporation is the official destination marketing organization for the country’s fourth-largest city. We work to create value and enhance economic prosperity by promoting the Houston region. | https://www.houstonfirst.com/do-business/ |
Houston Office of Business Opportunity | The Office of Business Opportunity promotes the success of small businesses and developing Houston’s workforce, with a special emphasis on historically underutilized businesses and disenfranchised individuals. | https://www.houstontx.gov/obo/ |
Fort Bend ISD | Small Business Enterprise Program FBISD seeks to give 25% of its SBEP-eligible contracts to small businesses. | https://www.fortbendisd.com/Page/920 |
Houston – METRO | Small Business Enterprise Program | https://www.ridemetro.org/about/business-to-business/procurement-opportunities/small-business-dbe-programs |
Texas Economic Development | The Governor’s Office of Small Business Assistance and the Business Permit Office assist small and medium Texas businesses. | https://gov.texas.gov/business/page/small-business |
Houston Community College | HCC aims to spend 35% of our dollars with certified SBE’s. These SBE’s have to be certified by one of the agencies we recognize. However, you do not have to be certified to do business with HCC. | Vendor registration can be found at https://www.hccs.edu/about-hcc/procurement/ and the SBDP can be found at https://www.hccs.edu/about-hcc/procurement/small-business-procurement/ |
Port of Houston | Procurement opportunities with the Port of Houston. | https://porthouston.com/business/vendor-opportunities/procurement-overview/ |
NASA | Office of Small Business Programs | https://www.nasa.gov/osbp |
SBA – Houston Loans (2022) | Local SBA lenders often make funds more available to small businesses (vs larger national banks). Here is a list updated in 2023 that you can sort by industry to see what SBA loans some Houston businesses were awarded. | https://www.sbalenders.com/top-sba-lenders-texas/ |
Client Toolbox
Houston Small Business Owner Training and Networking Events
ORGANIZATION | PROGRAM | URLs |
---|---|---|
Goldman Sachs | 10K Small Business | https://www.hccs.edu/hcc-in-the-community/10ksb/houston-program/ |
Port of Houston | Opportunity U & Training Events | https://porthouston.com/business/vendor-diversity/opportunity-u-training-events/ |
NASA | Office of Small Business Programs | https://www.nasa.gov/osbp |
Small Business Hiring Opportunities in Houston
Find Your Next Houston Employee Before Your Competitors Do
Career Hub is the Largest Job Board
in the State of Texas
Sign up for free and access a portfolio of free services
(e.g., give a talk in a classroom, career services, etc.)
Have you Considered Hiring from Houston Community College?
“Our students need to know you as community partners” – HCC
- 80K students across 26 campuses…with 6 divisions
- 14 Centers of Excellence with many subject areas. For example:
- Engineering (NW division)
- Real Estate (NW division)
- Marketing (NW division)
- Welding (SW division)
Career Fairs — There are 15 every semester
What are other companies doing? Just posting jobs no longer works. 2023 hiring environment now is different than 2020. Also, companies are paying more now (e.g., In-and-Out Burger pays $17 per hour now)
- Student organizations — over 120+ here. Why not sponsor one? (e.g., Geico looking for bilingual customer service reps)
- Invite students to get to know you (e.g., Tesla did a Linked-in class — it is a storyboard )
- Invited 6-week training class in sales and marketing at Mattress Mack
- 16-week training class from Turner…all ended up getting jobs
- High School — (e.g., Chevron – tapping into talent at the high school level)
College students are looking for:
- Support
- Growth
- Learning organization
HCC partners with local Texas Colleges
- University of Texas Tyler (Alief Campus)
- University of Houston (Katy Campus)
- Texas A&M (NW Campus)
HCC also offers 2 bachelor degrees (health care administration; artificial intelligence; July 2023).
What are you waiting for? Why not explore HCC’s students today?
LIFT Lever: Never Rely on a Single Channel
2023.06.18 - Published Sunday 7:30AM. Title: Websites Say Traffic Plummeted After Facebook Algorithm Change. Publication: Gizmodo.com
Original Article : https://gizmodo.com/facebook-traffic-down-algorithm-change-1850549012
Summary: Publishers relying on Facebook traffic are at the mercy of Meta’s algorithm, and they say it’s punishing them.
A recent change to Facebook’s algorithm in May resulted in a significant decrease in traffic to news and media websites, leaving publishers concerned about the lack of transparency from Meta, Facebook’s parent company.
The decline in clicks from Facebook had been ongoing, but it accelerated rapidly in May 2023. Publishers are struggling with the reliance on Facebook as a major traffic source and express frustration at the lack of control over algorithmic changes.
The dependence on Facebook has led to business collapses in the digital media industry. Publishers argue that while Meta is a private company, they at least deserve communication regarding algorithmic changes. The article also highlights Meta’s history of opaque changes and controversies related to news content.
Some quotes from the article:
Sources who spoke to Gizmodo all say the shift started in February and worsened in the months following. “There’s been a significant downward trend, and it’s an important platform for us because our audience is disproportionately on Facebook. It makes up about 25% of our traffic,” said Robert Chappell, Executive Editor at Madison 365, a nonprofit newsroom that covers communities of color in Wisconsin. “You never know what’s going to change. It makes it hard to plan for the future.”
Clicks coming from Facebook have been in decline for about a year, but that drop accelerated rapidly in May 2023, according to Echobox, which collects data from more than 2,000 publishers worldwide. Across Echobox’s clients, the share of traffic coming from Facebook fell about 50% from summer of last year.
“It’s difficult to say with certainty what the causes are, but Facebook has made no secret about its intention to deprioritize news on its platform and give greater precedence to video content, which by nature results in less clickthrough traffic,” said Antoine Amann, CEO of Echobox. “It can be extremely challenging for publishers to be at the mercy of third-party platforms, with performance and revenues severely impacted by algorithmic changes over which they have no control.”
Unexpected turbulence in social media traffic is at partly to blame for a recent flurry of business collapses at news companies, such as a bankruptcy filing at Vice Media and the shuttering of BuzzFeed News. Nicholas Carlson, Editor in Chief of Insider, named a severed connection to Facebook as one of the major headwinds causing declining traffic at his company’s sites, which recently laid off employees and endured a combative strike that ended Thursday.
Facebook is no stranger to opaque changes with major ramifications for the companies that make its most popular content. Most significant is Facebook’s infamous 2015 “pivot to video” when the company touted false metrics about how popular video content was on the platform and encouraged publishers make more videos. That prompted a media-industry-wide shift with heavy investments in producing video content (and corresponding layoffs in other departments) that, in reality, users weren’t watching.
“Our content has provided a lot of value to Facebook, we’ve been a part of the ecosystem since they launched Facebook Pages over a decade ago. But as a small business, it seems like Facebook doesn’t respect us,” the sports and culture site employee said. They asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation by Facebook.
Making matters worse, Chappell, Madison 365’s editor, told Gizmodo that the performance of content is varying noticeably based on the subject matter. He said Meta isn’t just deciding whether or not users see more news, it’s deciding what kind of news shows up in users’ feeds.
The digital media industry’s dependence on Facebook, once well known as a firehose of traffic, is well documented and one-sided. In May, Meta threatened to block news links altogether on Facebook and Instagram in California in response to a bill moving through the state legislature that would force tech platforms (Google as well as Meta) to pay publishers for news content… Whistleblowers claimed Meta blocked not only news but also the pages for hospitals and fire services in Australia in 2021 in response to a similar proposed law. Meta denied that allegation, saying the blocked pages were an unintentional flub.
The media workers Gizmodo spoke to stressed that Meta is a private company that is free to make changes and doesn’t owe anyone traffic or revenue. But the publishers said, at the very least, they deserve communication.
Hacks for Improving Email Delivery
Having your emails fall into spam folders continually can be a business critical issue. Here are a few tips we have found useful for improving our email deliverability.
Before We Begin: Deliverability vs Delivery
Email Deliverability is about whether an email was delivered right into the recipient’s inbox or straight to their spam folder. The hacks below are about email deliverability.
Email Delivery is about whether your recipient’s server accepted your email or not. If a message bounces for any reason (incorrect email address, the domain doesn’t exist, attachments are too heavy, etc.), this counts as a failed delivery. You will usually receive a bounceback email notifying you if this happens. The following hacks do not deal with this.
A. Check Your Domain to See if There is an Issue
MX Toolbox
Authentications play a significant role in email deliverability. MX Toolbox offers various tools aimed at helping improve the domains’ capabilities.
- Send a test email to ping@tools.mxtoolbox.com from the email you are concerned about. You’ll receive an email with a link to your report in a few minutes.
- Go to: https://mxtoolbox.com/ and enter your domain to see if there are any concerns
Google PostMaster Tools
Go to https://postmaster.google.com/u/0/managedomains and see what Google tells you.
If You Want More Tools to see if there is an issue:
- https://mailtrap.io/blog/test-email-deliverability/
- Google, “Email deliverability tools”
B. Some Issues We’ve Found and Links to Fix Them
Useful URL
WHAT IS IT
DMARC not set-up
Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance is an email protocol; that when published for a domain; controls what happens if a message fails authentication tests.
Set up your DMARC record at your domain DNS records. Ask your email provider for directions.
DKIM or SPF not set-up
DKIM is a stronger authentication method than SPF.
Setting this up depends on what email service you are using.
* NameCheap’s PrivateEmail* Microsoft 365 Email
* Google Workspace Gmail
DomainKey Identified Mail (DKIM) tells IPs you’re the original sender and nobody fraudulently intercepted your email.
Sender Policy Framework (SPF) is a special list, a whitelist, that includes everyone who is authorized to send messages on your behalf.
Follow your email service’s instructions to add these records to your Domain DNS records
Domain blacklisted
Your domain has been reported as spam enough times to be blacklisted.
Consider using a different domain for mass emails.
Server blacklisted
If you are on a shared server, another domain sharing that server could have caused all emails from your server to be penalized.
Consider moving your email to a different server.
Poor email practices
Many things such as link shorteners to suspicious attachments can get your email pushed to the spam folder
Adapt some of the recommended email habits.
There are many additional email security steps provided by various vendors. For example, if you use Microsoft Office or 365, you can consider:
- Upgrading to a Microsoft Business Premium license and selecting a few security settings
- Paying for a Microsoft Defender plan as seen in this infographic
- Implementing best practices (e.g., multifactor authentication) which are a pain but effective
There are also many other resources available from companies that handle emails for a living. We just wanted to share a few tips we’ve found helpful in response to an inquiry from a colleague. Hope this has been helpful!
Google Analytics: Accessing it Without a Gmail Acount
You can access Google Analytics with any email address, provided it is linked to a Google Account. It doesn’t need to be a Gmail account but it does need to be registered with Google.
Executive Summary
- To access Google Analytics, you need a Google Account.
- A Google Account is not the same as a Gmail Account.
- You can also use any other email address.
- If you are not tech-savvy, you can set up a Gmail email to access GA.
What is a Google account, anyway?
With a Google account, you have access to certain Google products, such as Gmail, Google Analytics, or Google Search Console. The list of Google products is every changing but the second one listed, Google Account, is at the center of Google’s core business (making money with ads).
The purpose of a Google Account, for users at least:
- No more cookie acceptance.
- A history of everything you have been watching and searching for.
- As a bonus, an algorithm that gives you suggestions tailored to your preferences.
- There is also a section to control your privacy and security.
The advantage of Google Accounts for Google is slightly different:
- More data about users, including searches and all other activities on Google products, as well as on apps and sites that have GA installed.
Anyways, now that you know what you’re getting into, here are two options to sign into Google Analytics and other Google properties if you do not have a google email.
Option 1: Use your own email address to access GA
To access Google Analytics on desktop without Gmail, you need to use another valid email address that is registered as your Google Account.
If that is not the case yet, follow these steps.
Step 1: Visit the Google Analytics site
You can do this here.
Step 2: Click on Create account
You can find the link between the login credentials.
Step 3: Choose Work / business
Google Analytics is a business product.
From the 3 options that show up, choose the For work or my business, even if you are running a personal site or business.
Step 4: Fill in your information
You need to provide your first name, last name, and email address.
Pay attention at this stage:
- Since you already have an email address, don’t click on the blue link to create a new Gmail instead.
- Double check the email address you enter belongs to you and is the one you plan using for Google Analytics.
Step 5: Choose a password
Enter a new password and confirm it.
- Do NOT enter the password of the email address you entered.
Step 6: Click the blue button with Next on it
Step 7: Open your mailbox
Open your mailbox. Look for an email from Google and copy the verification code.
Step 8: Paste the confirmation code
Paste the verification code in the field and click Next.
Step 9: Enter your phone number
Enter your phone number and click Verify.
This adds an extra layer of security to your Google Account. And thus later to Google Analytics.
If you don’t like this idea don’t worry. On the next screen, you can remove it.
You will receive a text message with a code.
Type it in the proper field and click Verify.
Step 10: Enter your age and gender
Now you need to fill in your birthday.
For Gender, you can choose between:
- Male
- Female
- Rather not say
- Custom
If you want to, you can remove your phone number.
Click Next.
Step 11: Optional: verify your phone number
You can skip this step and verify your phone number again. Or do it right away.
Step 12: Accept the terms and conditions
You can opt out of being tracked for certain services.
All set? Click I agree at the bottom of the page.
You thought you were finished?
Here is a surprise:
Remember that Google Analytics is a business product.
You can skip setting up your business account for now, but you will need to go to the steps to set up Google Analytics anyway.
After all that is done, you can access Google Analytics without a Gmail account.
That may seem like many steps, but if you are using a Gmail account, you have done this at one point too.
But honestly, isn’t there an easier way?
Option 2: Create Another Gmail Address or Use One You Already Own
Yes, you can just set up a Gmail account…but if you’d rather not have another email account, the above method works as well.
The choice is up to you. If you’re one of our clients and are still having trouble signing in, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us and we will set up a Zoom to walk you through this.
We hope this has helped!