David Kirk is a self-employed public relations consultant with more than 30 years of experience. Kirk helps organizations to identify issues that affect their reputations and assists in addressing problems through effective communication. Specializing in crisis planning and management, Kirk typically works with high-level corporate executives who need professional communications advice in a hurry. Kirk also creates customized executive training programs in the healthcare, financial services, and commercial real estate industries.

Kirk's The PR Guy Web site grew out of a need for "something in writing" that he says prospective clients often request before hiring him.

Kirk has been managing Web sites by using Microsoft FrontPage since version 1.0, but more recently he used Microsoft Office FrontPage 2003 to bring his site up to date.

Web site requirements

Kirk felt that his original site was "too quirky" for the professional image that he wanted to project to prospective corporate clients. The self-taught Web designer decided to rebuild the site by using a template and some Flash animation.

Kirk's main objective was to create a "more serious" look and feel for a site that often provides the critical first impression to corporate clients. To accomplish this, Kirk turned to PixelMill for a template that enabled him to modify text, graphics, and Flash content in FrontPage 2003 until he had achieved the effect that he wanted.

"I clearly achieved the 'look and feel' objective," Kirk says. "This is based entirely on anecdotal evidence, but there has been a lot of it. For example, a professional Web site designer that I use for client Web site work gave it her highest accolade, saying that the site looks 'store-bought.' She was also amazed that I was able to do such a functional and competent design for so little money. Other than my time and hosting fees, the total cost was less than $50, and that was for the template."

FrontPage features used

Kirk speaks frankly about his favorite FrontPage option: "Include pages — they are everywhere." He uses six include pages on the home page alone and likes the fact that he can make global changes to the site in a hurry by using the Included Content Web component.

Kirk also reports that he can get the look that he wants without having to rely on frames: "I can get the effect of framed pages without having to use frames, which can't be tweaked as finely as include pages can."

The PR Guy site also makes use of FrontPage 2003 Behaviors, which allowed Kirk to easily create hyperlinked drop-down menus without hand-coding. Finally, Kirk relied on Microsoft Office Clip Art for graphics throughout the site and was able to download and incorporate them by using FrontPage.

"FrontPage 2003 is a very simple WYSIWYG [what you see is what you get] tool with enough high-end features that an amateur Web designer like me can do a credible job of designing and managing the site," Kirk says.

Additional tools

• Adobe Photoshop 6.0
• Clip Art and Media on Microsoft Office Online