Dr. Ralph F. Wilson, Founding Editor, Web Marketing Today, Rocklin, CA

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The bad news is that an October 2007 Netcraft.com web server survey found nearly 143 million websites, adding up to untold billions of webpages. The good news is that only a tiny percentage of these site owners actively promote their sites. The clutter, however, is ginormous.

If you want people to find your website for the first time amidst all that clutter, you must employ strategies to promote your site and draw traffic. There’s no use reinventing the wheel. These are the primary tried and true approaches to site promotion. They vary in cost and effectiveness.

Search engine optimization (SEO). Your site rises in search engine rankings due to careful use of keywords in webpage titles, meta tags, headings, body text, in your webpages, as well as many incoming links to the site from directories, social bookmarks, complementary sites, etc. (See my Guide to Search Engine Optimization, 2007). Can be quite effective if you achieve page 1 or 2 rankings.	Time consuming, but relatively low cost, even when outsourced.
Pay-Per-Click Advertising (PPC) or paid search on Google, Yahoo, or MSN. Your text ads show up to the right of search results when searchers search on keywords. You pay only when someone clicks on your ad. Can be quite effective with careful keyword choice and tested landing pages.	Moderate to high cost, depending on the keywords.
Banner advertising. Your banner ads show up on ad networks. However, the click-through rate is probably less than 0.3%. Low effectiveness except where highly targeted.	Moderate cost.
Affiliate programs. You pay affiliates for showing your ads only when a customer clicks-through and makes a purchase from you. Can be effective, but good affiliates are difficult to find and motivate to create adequate volume.	Lower cost.
Advertising in e-mail newsletters. Your ad is displayed in an existing e-zine sent to people in your target group. Can be moderately effective.	Low to medium cost.
Solo e-mails using an existing list. Your e-mail promotion is sent to opt-in subscribers of a targeted e-zine list or rented list. Can be quite effective with well-written copy, a tested landing page, and the right list.	Relatively expensive, depending upon the list.
Networking in online communities. You become an active part of several online communities, forums, blogs, etc., participate in discussions, and promote your site passively through your “signature.” Can be somewhat effective.	Low cost and targeted, but time intensive.
Viral marketing campaigns. You promote your site by creating a “creative” (video, text message, photo, animation, etc.) so compelling, interesting, bizarre, funny, or helpful, that people pass it on to their friends — with your URL or marketing message. Wildly successful for the fortunate few who stumble upon a compelling creative.	Low cost.
Joint venture (JV) arrangements. Essentially this involves getting others sites and e-zines to carry your marketing message in exchange for either a sales commission or for a reciprocation on your part. Can be effective with the right partners.	Low cost.

Which of these is “best”? Wrong question. There is no “magic bullet” (no matter what anybody claims). Most successful online businesses employ several of these strategies simultaneously to create a successful marketing “mix.” The higher cost of one approach is balanced out by the lower cost of another. Together they bring in a large enough volume of traffic at a low enough cost to allow an online business to make a profit.

How do you find the best mix for your organization? (1) Research each approach using the articles in our Web Marketing Today Research Room (www.wilsonweb.com/research/). (2) Try various approaches while carefully tracking the results. Then (3) do more of what is working. In the face of 143 million websites vying for attention, spending no time or budget on promotion is a sure recipe for a failed online effort. What will you try next to help your site rise through the clutter to see the light of day?

Dr. Ralph F. Wilson, Editor, Web Marketing Today

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In the earlier days of the Internet everyone seemed to be talking about e-zines or e-mail newsletters. These days blogs are the hot item. Just how do e-mail newsletters compare to blogs?

Let’s start with definitions. A blog (short for “web log”) is a website in which entries are typically displayed in reverse chronological order. The most common blogging platforms are easy to use content management systems which notify subscribers of a new blog post by means of RSS feeds. E-mail newsletters, on the other hand, are usually published using third-party Email Marketing Service (EMS) providers such as iContact or ConstantContact.

Of course, I’m a veteran e-mail newsletter publisher — that’s my bias. But blogging has certainly established itself as a powerful marketing medium. Here are some of the differences between the media:

Ease of Publishing

Blogs are certainly easier to publish than e-mail newsletters — and much faster. The blogging platform allows you to write and instantly publish your thoughts with a built-in content management system, so the most recent blog automatically becomes part of your website content. E-mail newsletters, on the other hand, aren’t so automatic. They must be written, laid out in an attractive HTML format, copied into a web interface at the EMS provider site, and scheduled to be sent out. If you want to add the content to your website (which I strongly recommend), that is a separate step altogether.

Cost

The most popular blogging platforms are free — Blogger, WordPress.com, WordPress.org, and others. This is one of the reasons that blogging has grown so rapidly. EMS providers usually charge on the basis of the number of e-mails sent to subscribers each month, though some charge based on the size of the mailing list.

Frequency

Blogging at its best includes frequent posts. Three times a week might be an appropriate minimum for an active blogger. A frequent poster is seen in a positive light. E-mail newsletters should be published a minimum of once a month. Once a week is possible, but the content has to be excellent. E-mail too often, and you’ll be perceived as spamming.

Length

Blog posts can be quite short, just a paragraph or two. E-mail newsletters are usually somewhat longer, but still must be kept short if you want them to be read. Sometimes e-mail newsletters compromise by sending the title, teaser sentences, and a URL for several articles, expecting you to read the full article on a website. But many readers don’t bother to click-through to read — either from e-mail newsletters or from RSS feeds.

Notification and Content Delivery

Blog readers are typically alerted to a new blog by means of an RSS feed, which they access using an RSS reader, such as the one built into Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0+.

Subscribers click on a link in the RSS feed to read the latest post on the blog website. E-mail newsletters, however, arrive in the subscriber’s e-mail box; the reader doesn’t usually have to go to a website to read the newsletter, as is the case in a blog.

Readership Metrics

Blog readership can be measured by unique visitors to the blog site and by the number of subscribers to an RSS feed (tracked, for example, by FeedBurner). E-mail newsletter readers are measured by the number of subscribers, qualified by such fuzzy metrics as open rate and inbox delivery rate. Since spam filters dispose of a significant percentage of even double opt-in newsletters, e-mail delivery isn’t as reliable as it used to be. However, nearly 100% of Internet users actively use e-mail. Active RSS reader users, on the other hand are only a fraction of that — though RSS users tend to be more active Internet citizens and visit more websites.

Subscriber List

The biggest difference between blog and e-mail newsletter approaches to reaching subscribers is the e-mail subscriber list. E-mail newsletter publishers have an actual list of e-mail addresses — and often names and locations — of their subscribers, while bloggers have no tangible list at all. An active, up-to-date list is considered a business asset, since it enables the publisher to push to subscribers newsletters and advertising at will. It can’t force subscribers to open or even read an e-mail, but it can count on delivery of a high percentage of the e-mails sent — despite the challenges posed by spam and spam filters.

Which Should You Choose?

So which is best? Blogs or e-mails? I don’t think one size fits all. I’m an e-mail newsletter publisher and an evangelist for the benefits of this kind of marketing. However, many, many businesses have found blogging a successful way to get the word out. Some blogs are so influential that they figure in both presidential and industry politics.

This article has displayed some of the differences between these proven digital media. It’s up to you now to decide on one or the other (or both) and begin to communicate to your prospects, customers, and industry. Go for it!

John Henson LunaMetrics Pittsburgh, PA

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If you’re paying for any kind of advertising — for example, Google AdWords, banner ads, or e-mail marketing — it’s important to know what’s working and what’s not. Fortunately, analytics programs have built in ad tracking capabilities. I’ll describe how you can track your ads with Google Analytics.

First, let’s define a couple of terms:

• Landing page. This is the page you want people to go to once they click on your ad. The purpose of this page is to get your visitor to take a desired action — subscribe, fill out a form, purchase a product, etc.
• Thank you page. This is the page that appears after your visitor has completed the desired action. Anyone who gets to this page will have completed your desired action.

Setting Up Your Goals

You can’t track your ads if you don’t have “goals” — desired activities — set up. Someone usually completes a goal when they get to the thank you page. So here are the steps to set up a goal in Google Analytics that will track visitors to this thank you page.

1. Login to Google Analytics and select the account you want in the upper-right pull-down menu
2. In the Website Profiles section, select Edit in the Settings column
3. In the Conversion Goals and Funnel section select Edit for one of your Goals (G1, G2, G3 or G4)

4. Select “Head Match” in the pull-down menu labeled “Match Type.”

5. In the first text box labeled Goal URL place the URL of your thank you page.
6. In the next text box labeled Goal name type a name for your new goal then scroll to the bottom of the page and click on the Save Changes button.

Now, whenever a visitor from your ad gets to this thank you page, Google Analytics knows that the ad has achieved its goal. It is also possible to set your shopping cart up to track actual revenue resulting from your ad, but that’s beyond the scope of this article.

Creating a Tagged URL for your Ad

The next step is to tag or code the click-through URL to the designated landing page on your site. Normally, this link might look like

http://www.yourdomain.com/specialoffer.html

But to track your campaigns you’ll need to add some extra information on the end of that link.

Tracking Three Pieces of Ad Data

With Google Analytics you can keep track of your advertising results by using three parameters:

1. Campaign Source: This is typically the website or e-mail list where the visitor sees your ad. For example, Yahoo or MSN. If you’re advertising in an e-zine, the name of the e-zine goes in this field.
2. Campaign Medium: What type of ad is it? Banner ad, PPC ad, or a link from an e-mail?
3. Campaign Name: What promotion is this ad part of? For example it might be part of your “Free shipping this month” promotion or your “End of year inventory reduction” promotion. Or a promotion to introduce a new product.

Each ad you place will have a unique set of values. Here’s a table with some example values:

	Campaign Source	Campaign Medium	Campaign Name
Ad #1	Amazon.com	Banner	Fall Clearance Sale
Ad #2	Newsletter	Email	Fall Clearance Sale
Ad #3	Amazon.com	Banner	Holiday Sale

Google URL Builder

You’ll insert these values into your link using Google’s helper tool, the URL Builder.
http://www.google.com/support/analytics/bin/answer.py?answer=55578&topic=10998

Here are the steps to building a link:

1. In the first text box or field put the URL of your landing page for this ad, that is, where the visitor goes after they click your ad — for example http://www.yourdomain.com/specialoffer.html
2. There are five text boxes you can fill out, three of which are required (designated by an asterisk *). Here is where you indicate your Campaign Source, Campaign Medium, and Campaign Name with the values you selected.
3. Click the Generate URL button and the new link appears in the text box below. This is the tagged link you will use for your ad.

Here’s an example. Using the values for Ad #3 in the table above we transform the simple landing page link:

http://www.yourdomain.com/specialoffer.html

into

http://www.yourdomain.com/specialoffer.html?utm_source=Amazon.com&utm_medium=Banner&utm_campaign=Holiday%2BSale

I’ve added colors so you can easily spot the three elements of this tagged URL. Note: The question mark ? separates the simple URL from the special parameters. The “%2B” characters signify a blank space.

View Ad Tracking Results

When visitors come to your site through a specially tagged URL from your ad, Google Analytics will now be able to track their actions. Here are the steps to viewing the results of your ad campaign.

1. Login to Google Analytics
2. In the left side-bar, select Traffic Sources.
3. Then click on Campaigns.
4. Select the Campaign Name you want to track. This is the Campaign Name you designated when tagging the ad URL above.
5. Finally click the Goal Conversion tab to see how well this campaign converted for each of your goals.

This is an overview of the process. The first time you set this up it’ll take some time, but soon you’ll be able track your advertising with ease. Now you’ll be functioning as a smart advertiser who doesn’t waste money. You’ll know just how each of your ads has performed so that you can spend money on the campaigns that give good results and cancel campaigns that don’t work adequately.

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John Henson is Senior Web Analyst at LunaMetrics, a Google Analytics Authorized Consultant based in Pittsburgh, PA.

Search engines have become an increasingly important part of the online experience of American internet users. The most recent findings from Pew Internet & American Life tracking surveys and consumer behavior trends from the comScore Media Metrix consumer panel show that about 60 million American adults are using search engines on a typical day. These results from September 2005 represent a sharp increase from mid-2004. Pew Internet Project data from June 2004 show that use of search engines on a typical day has risen from 30% of the internet population to 41%. This means that the number of those using search engines on an average day jumped from roughly 38 million in June 2004 to about 59 million in September 2005 – an increase of about 55%.

comScore data show that from September 2004 to September 2005 the average daily use of search engines jumped from 49.3 million users to 60.7 million users – an increase of 23%.

This means that the use of search engines is edging up on email as a primary internet activity on any given day. The Pew Internet Project data show that on a typical day, email use is still the top internet activity. On any given day, about 52% of American internet users are sending and receiving email.

These findings have considerable consequences for the way people gather and use information online and the way e-commerce is conducted.

“Most people think of the internet as a vast library and they increasingly depend on search engines to help them find everything from information about the people who interest them, to transactions they want to conduct, organizations they need to deal with, and interesting factoids that help them settle bar bets and backyard arguments,” said Lee Rainie, Director of the Pew Internet Project.

“The evolution of search engines as everyday consumer Web tools has made them a vital resource for marketers,” said James Lamberti, vice president of comScore Networks. “Search engines are obviously a critical vehicle in reaching consumers during the buy cycle, but they also offer a rich source for consumer profiling, segmentation, and measurement of product demand. To-date, we have only witnessed the preliminary impact of search engines on e-commerce.”

The latest data from comScore show that Google was the most heavily used search engine in October 2005 with 89.8 million unique visitors, followed by Yahoo! Search (68 million unique visitors), MSN Search (49.7 million unique visitors), Ask Jeeves (43.7 million unique visitors), and AOL Search (36.1 million unique visitors).

The Pew Internet Project findings cited in this report come from a nationally representative telephone survey of 2,251 American adults (age 18 and older), including 1,577 internet users, between September 13-October 14, 2005. The margin of error on the internet user portion of the survey is plus or minus 3%.

The comScore data cited in this report come from comScore Media Metrix, an internet audience measurement service that uses a massive cross-section of more than 1.5 million U.S. consumers who have given comScore explicit permission to confidentially capture their browsing and transaction behavior, including online and offline purchasing.

“My wedding photography business is failing!”

That was what I was thinking just over a year ago. I was stuck in a rut, doing the same old marketing techniques that I had been doing for years. The same ones that almost every other wedding photographer in my area was doing.

The problem was that my prospects were becoming numb to the same tricks over and over. On top of that, I was getting older, and engaged couples were moving further away from my age demographic, making it more difficult to relate to them.

It was time for a change in my marketing plan. I had to find a way to get back into touch with my niche.

In order to be successful I would need to concentrate on a few things.

1. Focus - Narrow down prospects into groups of exactly who you want to do business with. Know who your perfect client is. Are they first time couples or people getting married for a second or third time?
2. Design Great Material - Design compelling marketing material that speaks to that group of people. Create something of value that you can give away, something with staying power. Personally, I use a free e-book and advertise it with a leaflet. This helps promote my website, and gets me their name and email address (which is required at download).
3. Gather Leads - You can accomplish this two ways: by telephone, or by email. I suppose you could use snail mail, but this is wedding photography business 2.0, remember? As you read in number two, I use a form on my web page that requires that the user input their name and email in order to receive their free download. I require that they opt-in to avoid spam issues. The other method is to include a recorded telephone message with free information in exchange for their name and phone number.
4. Harvest - Now, it’s as simple as staying in touch with these prospects until they require your services! Send out a monthly newsletter, or provide them with valuable information through email. Any way you slice it, they asked for you to contact them, so DO IT! These are hungry prospects asking for exactly what you’re selling.

By implementing this formula into my business, I’ve seen noticeable gains in purchase rate, all while lowering my time overhead in maintaining relationships with prospects.

To learn more about how I make money with photography, please visit: The Money Cam Blog at http://MoneyCam.blogspot.com today! Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=James_Stickel

Before beginning the hunt for a digital camera, there are a few questions you should be able to answer. Knowing the answers to these questions can significantly increase your odds for getting the best camera for you, as well as making your ultimate buying decision quicker. While, this is not an exhaustive list, it covers the basics, which you can fine tune as your shopping process goes on.

Budget

There are literally thousands of digital cameras on the market, in all shapes in sizes. Having a specific budget in mind can greatly narrow down your list to a manageable size.

Size

Digital cameras seem to be getting smaller and smaller every year. To some that seems great, because it makes them very portable, and easy to take with you. For others, the small size can make handling the camera and taking pictures cumbersome. Small buttons, small grips and big hands don’t necessarily go very well together.

Features

Megapixels used to be the single biggest feature in determining the price of a camera. As memory storage has gotten cheaper, megapixels are still a feature to consider, but not nearly as much as a few years ago.

The zoom capabilities of a camera are another important consideration. Thinking a bit about how you will use the camera can be a big clue as to what zoom you will want. Do you shoot lots of wedding shots from the back of the church where you can barely see the bride and groom? Or do you like to shoot lots of landscape photos on vacation? More zoom will certainly give you more options, but you can also end up spending more on lenses than you you do on the original camera.

Consider image quality when purchasing your camera. While this one is a little harder to quantify, you can get a good idea by talking to sales people, and asking lots of questions.

Are you a point and shooter, or a tweak freak. In other words, would the default settings be good enough for your pictures. If the terms shutter speed, and ISO sound Greek, then just check point and shoot, and move on.

Everyday Use

I mentioned it before, but it bears mentioning again. Give some careful consideration to how, and where you will be using the camera. Indoors, outdoors, portraits, action shots, scenery, and sporting events all put different demands on your camera equipment. Be sure to bring this up, when talking to people at the camera stores, this will help them to help you make the right decision for you.

How you plan to develop and display your photos is quite important as well. The image quality and resolution of your pictures will look vastly different when displayed on your cameras LCD vs blowing your pictures up to poster size to hang over your fireplace.

This And That

Consider what kinds of cameras you’ve had before, and how they worked out for you. Don’t just go shopping for a particular brand name, because that’s the only brand name you’ve ever owned. If you really liked it, sure that’s fine. But, if not, maybe it’s time to broaden your horizons a little.

A final note about special features would be prudent here. Plan on doing any underwater shooting? Does the camera have an optional underwater housing available? Got shaking hands? Maybe image stabilization would be a good option for you. Some cameras even do red eye reduction editing right on the camera, before you download your pictures. All these come at a price, so carefully consider whether the features are worth it to you. Knowing specifically what your looking for can only hedge your bet in getting the best digital camera for you. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Chris_Campbell

“A picture is worth a thousand words”, but what if it’s torn, damaged or molded? Is it still worth cherishing? Don’t worry; you don’t have to throw those photographs away. There are many photo restoration and photo touch up services available online, which can help you solve the problem in just few clicks. Yes, that’s right, in just few clicks!

A torn, damaged or even a molded photograph can be brought back to life. There maybe an unwanted element, object or space in the photograph, which needs to be removed –this is where photo manipulation comes in. With modern photo enhancement techniques—only the digital copy is fixed and not the original photograph.

Let’s have a look at how photo restoration works:
Earlier, when there were no restoration services available, the changes were made to the original photograph and even till today it’s the preferred method for preserving old, historical photographs. But nowadays, it’s easier to work on the restoration part, as the changes are made to the copy of the original photo.

What kind of photos can be repaired?
All kinds of photographs can be repaired, including:
1. Family photographs
2. Torn, molded photos
3. Damaged or withered photos, etc.

Why use photo restoration?
1. To bring old photos to life
2. To enhance images
3. To contrast and color — old or new photos
4. To remove unwanted element from the photographs
5. To replace missing or damaged area
6. To adjust the sharpness levels

There are many other aspects related to the restoration process, contact us for all your queries, we’ll be happy to serve you, visit www.photostouchup.com

During The Service and Signing Register
Always be discreet and non disruptive in the church. If you have been given permission try to capture the exchange of rings but be very discreet. Any shots you miss at this point can be posed after the service. . In the majority of cases the Minster will wish to allow a proper signing and then allow you to pose a shot. Congratulate the couple using their new name, this will raise a smile.

You should now leave quickly and go to the bottom of the aisle.

There are two ways of capturing the aisle shot, either pre-focus on a chosen spot and take the shot as the couple reach it or, ask the couple to stop. If you get them to stop, focus quickly then ask them to start walking again, at this point take the shot.

Outside the Church
You should now (weather permitting) go outside, check exposure and stop the Bride and Groom in the doorway, take a minimum two shots, one full length and one three-quarter length.

Posing the Bride and Groom
Turn their bodies inward toward each other and ask them to lean their heads toward each other too. As mentioned in the portraiture session, this is about illustrating and capturing the intimacy of the day; to do this effectively you need to exaggerate some of the poses.

The groom should stand on the right of the bride. Ask them to hold each other’s right hands. This technique will pull their bodies naturally closer. The bride should then hold the bouquet in her left hand using it to cover the clasped right hands. The groom should have his left hand gently on the brides back, ensuring the fingers are not protruding from her side.

Start with the Biggest Groups and Work Downward
You should start with the biggest group and reduce it for subsequent shots, this way people do not have the chance to wander off. This approach also allows the Bride and Groom to relax during a few group shots in preparation for their own photo session nearer the end of the day.

The Bridal Party
With all the large group shots taken you should now concentrate on the Bridal party, anyone who has been missed can be taken later at the reception.

Taking the Bridal party somewhere away from the other guests is advantageous. It allows you to work undisturbed by large numbers of guests all wanting to congratulate and photograph the Bride and Groom. It will also allow the Bridal party to relax into the photo shoot.

At the New Location
On arrival at your chosen location your first sequence of shots should be those, which include the parents of the Bride and Groom. Next you should shoot the Bride and Groom with both sets of parents and then with each of their parents in turn.

If you did not visit the Bride’s house earlier then you should take a shot of both sets of parents on their own. It is probably a long time since the parents had a photograph of themselves together and looking so smart, this shot is usually a good seller.

Part 3 of this article is also on Ezinearticles

Regards
Bobby

Wedding Photography resource to help you pursue a photography career or hobby. Bobby Jonnes has been a photographer for over 25 years. He has an in depth knowledge of the subject, specialising in wedding photography. You can access his site for more information to help improve your photography at http://www.photobiz4u.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Bobby_Jonnes

One of the best parts about internet marketing is that it’s easy to get started. You don’t need a lot of money to start an internet business—when compared to brick-and mortar businesses a generation ago.

The best internet business model to start if you’re wet behind the ears is affiliate. One of the best parts about internet marketing is that it’s easy to get started. You don’t need a lot of money to start an internet business—when compared to brick-and mortar businesses a generation ago.

The best internet business model to start if you’re wet behind the ears is affiliate marketing. Since you’re selling other people’s products, you don’t have to deal with the hassles of customer service and shipping out products. This article will reveal the secrets of high performance affiliates you can use to make a lot of money online.

One closely guarded secret of high performance affiliates is the ability to choose the right market. In your quest to become one of the elite high performance affiliates, take a look at the marketplace to see what people are buying. Go into bookstores and see what magazines are on the rack and which books people are buying. You can guarantee that high performance affiliates are camping out at the bookstores doing research on which market is in demand.

Of course, there are a group of high performance affiliates that go right for the gusto and enter the most competitive markets possible. These include weight-loss, dating, golf, self-improvement—among others. The demand in these niches has been constant for decades and will continue to be. Therefore it behooves high performance affiliates to do their best to stake their claim of the affiliate pie in these niches.

High performance affiliates also conquer smaller niches that most people don’t think about right away. Small niches such as croqueting, knitting, and scrap booking are rife with high performance affiliates who are making a killing promoting off-the-beaten-path products. To seek out these niches, you’ll have to do more research, as the average high performance
affiliate misses these niches altogether. Check out directory sites such as Yahoo.com or take a look at eBay to see what people are buying. High performance affiliates know that if people are buying products on eBay and online stores, they have money to spend and are willing to pay anything to satisfy their desire.

So, how do high-performance affiliates conquer their niches and out marketing their competition. Simple: they turn themselves into master marketers. High performance affiliates spend gobs of money on continuing education—such as books, seminars, audio books, and newsletters. High performance affiliates know the importance of a superb education, and know that while their competition is wasting time watching “American Idol,” they’re hitting the books so they can kick their tail.

To learn how to become a high performance affiliate, go get this free video and discover affiliate marketing secrets of one of internet marketing most lucrative wunderkinds.

When you create a Web design, one of the more overlooked aspects of the design is the layout. Now, many people think about how to do a layout (CSS, tables, frames, etc.), but the basics of Web layout are often completely ignored.

Space and Whitespace

Use the whole space, but don’t be specific in your use. In other words, use relatively sized layout sections on your Web pages, so that they expand and contract to fit the browser window.

Keep screen resolution in mind. While the majority of computer users have moved away from 640×480 resolution, keep that in mind when you’re designing. Having customers leave because all they can see is a logo on their monitor is not good customer service.

Use color to define spaces. If you want to have a page that’s a specific width, why not center it on the browser screen and make the background color of the page a different color? This will help the page appear to resize for different browsers; larger browsers will just have more background color showing, while smaller browsers will have less or none showing.

Images and Graphics

Align your images. One of the most common newbie layout mistakes is to slap images into a page willy-nilly without thought to layout. If you just use an img tag and then write text to follow it, you’ll have the image and then one line of text to the right of it. Using the align attribute will help make your images part of the layout.

Balance the graphics and text on a page. It’s easy to get carried away with lots of images and animations, but they can make a page very hard to read. When you’re considering your layout, remember that images are a major part of the design, not just afterthoughts.

Text Width

Think about text width. This is often called the “scan length”, and refers to how many words are displayed on one line. Most people can comfortably read about 7 to 11 words on a line. Longer than that, and the text is hard to read, shorter than that and it’s disjointed and distracting. When designing your layouts make sure that the major text area displays the text in a readable width.

Centering text is inadvisable. One of the first layout techniques that a new designer learns is the center tag, and they center everything on their pages. However, centering is very difficult to do well and it’s often hard to read.