Design Tips
Pam keeps up with what's current on the net. She moves with the times and her approach to web design and marketing is flexible.

Simplicity is the way forward.

Designing for the web
The time a site takes to download is all important. How many sites have you given up on because they had fancy animation?

Did you know that the most popular command on the internet is the 'back' button, followed closely by 'skip intro'? That means that all the design of Flash intros amounts to a waste of time?

Photos make a web page come alive. They also take time to download. One good photo is better than dozens. If your site is picture based then a photo gallery with thumbnails that can be enlarged is the solution. See how Pam has designed this at www.pollyevans.com

Structure makes a site easy to navigate. Many D.I.Y. sites are easy to spot because of poor links. CSS styles and tables make a site stable across different browsers.

Its worth knowing that the same font, at the same point size on a Macintosh "looks smaller" than on most Windows machines. In a nutshell, this is because the "logical resolution" of a Macintosh is 72dpi, while the Windows default is 96dpi. Firstly, it guarantees that it is essentially impossible to have text look identical on Macintoshes and Windows based systems. Plus different browsers will show your website differently.

Edit your site yourself
You can update your site yourself with ease using a programme called Adobe Contribute CS3 (PC). It's the easiest way to update, create and publish web content. Many clients use this software and it's proved invaluable. All you need to know is the basics of word processing. If you can use Microsoft Word you can use this. Also available for the Mac, click this link Adobe Contribute CS3 (Mac) Currently it's priced at approx £110 with free shipping.

Marketing
This is the most important aspect of your website to put energy into. Firstly  to get good ratings your site needs good content. The web is about giving and sharing information. Google will list it only if the content is good. Be aware that a one page site will not get high ratings.

Expand your site gradually and it will attract more traffic. A great web site with masses of information on website marketing is www.bytestart.co.uk

Sound
Pam can add sound to your site. Supply original wav or mp3 files and she can add buttons so viewers can easily click and hear it. Pam personally doesn't like sound that plays automatically. It's good practise to let people have a choice to hear sound. It's an excellent idea to offer a short soundbite of a CD you're selling.

Newsletter
Get people to show their interest in your work by putting a 'subscribe' button on your site and sending out a newsletter.

This is one of the key marketing tools you need to use. Make sure your newsletter is personal and has useful and entertaining content.

"Treat every email address you send to as though it was that person's treasured family heirloom, and you should rarely if ever have trouble with complaints of Spam. Mail unto others as you would have them mail unto your personal irreplaceable golden email box" is good advice from a professional newsletter web site.

For an example see Pam's astrology site www.healingstars.com and subscribe to her newsletter. She has been sending out a newsletter now for over 18 months. She constantly receives positive feed back. For a free trial from the company Pam uses click this linK >

Web Tips
To block pop-ups while surfing on the web install Google's useful toolbar for free at http://toolbar.google.com

Plagued by Messenger pop-ups?
The solution is to turn off the automatic start and login of Messenger, when Windows starts and when Outlook starts. This is what  to do:
Start Messenger, Start > Programs > Windows Messenger.
Under the Tools menu, choose options.
Under Options, on the Preferences tab, uncheck 'Run this program when Windows starts' and uncheck 'Allow this program to run in the background'.
In Outlook, under Tools > Options > Other tab, down at the bottom: uncheck the 'Enable Instant Messaging in Microsoft Outlook'. No more Messenger pop-ups.

Switch Browser
I've switched to Firefox as my main browser, it's easy to open multiple pages at once, is safer and blocks pop ups. Highly recommended. DOWNLOAD for free at www.mozilla.com/firefox/

Free Windows Update
Surfing becomes easier of you are running the latest versions of Microsoft Windows and Windows Explorer. Some things- such as forms - won't work if you are running versions lower than 4. Current versions are Windows XP and Explorer 6.0. For free Microsoft downloads go to www.microsoft.com

To determine which version of Microsoft Windows you are running:
1. On the task bar at the bottom of your screen, click Start, and then click Run.

2. In the Run dialog box, type: winver

3. Click OK. A dialog box displays the version that you are running.

Email Virus attacks are mostly hoaxes
Before you send an email to your entire address book please check out the scare at this site. Most are hoaxes. www.symantec.com

Symantec Security Response uncovers hoaxes on a regular basis. These hoaxes usually arrive in the form of an email. Please disregard the hoax emails - they contain bogus warnings usually intent only on frightening or misleading users. The best course of action is to merely delete these hoax emails. Please refer to this page whenever you receive what appears to be a bogus message regarding a new virus, or promotion that sounds too good to be true.

Email Courtesy
On that note, please when emailing a group of friends do them the courtesy of sending blind copies (bcc) so their address is not broadcast to the entire internet.

Useful Site
Lots of useful information about setting up Outlook and spam on Microsoft's site http://office.microsoft.com