My Webspace

Free Stuff

Counters

Probably the most common request we get for something free is a counter. Karoo has decided to advise customers to use The Counter, which allows you to access statistics about your visitors.

One other piece of advice - unless you've had about 10000 hits a counter can reflect badly on your site - so either start it up with a large number, or keep it invisible until you have really had a lot of visitors.

Images

If you don't want to go to the trouble of designing your own images, get some off the web for free. You can use images from some one else's site by clicking the right mouse-button on it (hold down the mouse button if you are a Mac user) and select "Save this image as". Be careful you don't break copyright though, so either use images that don't have copyright, or ask for permission first.

The MSDN Online Downloads Area has been set up by Microsoft and contains rules, clip art, buttons, bullets, photographs, and more, as well as sounds.

Feedback

Many people like to get feedback from their visitors. You could go to the extent of having a mailform that e-mails you the feedback, but it is much easier to get a free guestbook.

We would recommend Guest World.
Another alternative is The Guestbook.

If you really want a mailform, you can get one from Response-O-Matic or Formmail to you.

Message Boards

One step up from a guestbook is a message board. These allow you and your visitors to discuss whatever you like. Most free message board services allow you to customise the appearance of the board to fit in with the colour scheme of your site, however you will have to put up with adverts which pay for the service.

A good example of a free service is ProBoards.

Chat

If your message board proves popular, you may wish to offer online chat. Remember though, that an empty chat room doesn't get many repeat visitors - we tried this ourselves after people asked for it, and it was found to be best to schedule chat times.

You can get free chat services from sites such as QuickChat.

Mailing Lists

If your site is regularly updated you may wish to set up a mailing list to tell people about your latest changes and site news.

Try Yahoo! Groups, which also allows you to share files with your members and schedule events, for instance the online chats you've set up above.

Online Polls

Why not poll your visitors and find out their opinions on matters relevant to your site?

One excellent site for a free poll is Perseus which allows you to turn off the advertising. Another quick site is Ezpolls.

Content

Another possibility is free content, saving you the effort of having to update your site constantly.

For instance, why bother with the effort of supplying a page of news headlines updated all the time, when you could simply sign up with someone like The Press Association who provide lots of useful little nick-nacks, like their Vidiprinter, Flip Bar, TV schedules, the weather etc.

Searches

There are two types of search - Internet searches and site searches.

Most search engines allow you to incorporate an Internet search into your site by providing you with a few lines of HTML.
Examples include UK Plus and The Open Directory.

Site searches require a little more effort, but enable people to find information easily on your site. These generally work by indexing your website, and then storing the results on it's server. Thus, if you change your site, you have to remember to reindex it.
You can get these services from sites such as FreeFind, Atomz, and SiteMiner.