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Template Monster
This website is very well-known. It offers a good collection of
professional looking website templates at good prices. Some of them
are too "rich" in colors and layout, but some are very good. The only
problem is that they have a huge network of resellers and virtually
every company offering website templates through Google and other
search engines (except the ones listed below in this section) is using
their library. So your best option is to make a 'unique' purchase of a
template, in which case the price jumps from $70-ish to $2000-ish.
However, if your budget permits, we recommend doing so, if you would
like to have a
good looking site to be up and running quickly. Alternatively, you can
buy a template and then customize it to make it different (we
recommend not using too much Flash unless you are in the Entertainment or
similar type of industry). At the very least, you can use their color
schemes to provide examples and guidance to your graphic designers.
The Template
Store
This site offers simple customizable templates starting from $20
Canadian. Some of their Flash templates are very nice, ideally suited
for small businesses and independent consultants. The site also sells
good corporate
identity items, such as logos, business card templates, and letterheads.
The templates are very easy to modify and enhance. You need to know
only the very basics of such web publishing programs as Dreamweaver or
FrontPage (for simple modifications, they are very similar to Word or PowerPoint).
Template
Central
Apart from website templates, they offer
logos, PowerPoint presentation templates, images, Word templates, etc.
We find that their logos are overpriced for the type of models
presented and their buttons are very old-fashioned. But overall, they
nonetheless offer a great collection of templates, which you can
download and customize either yourself or with the help of a graphic designer.
You can also order a customized template from them for under $500
Canadian, but be prepared to be very patient and pay a top price for every stroke they make on a keyboard.
Stock Layouts
This website offers a decent collection of Newsletter, Brochure and
Flyer templates made for print for under $200 Canadian. The desktop
versions are all under $20. Once again, change a couple of colors by
using a color palette, replace one or two images, copy and paste your
own content - and you have a professional newsletter, brochure or flyer
ready.
Smarter Templates
This website offers a wide range of templates, from business cards to
newsletters to logos to websites, and more - all for a one time fee
under $70 Canadian. We found their website template collection to be
decent, although somewhat too rich in color and design layout, for our
taste. A few of their Outlook templates look very professional. We also
liked their brochures. We were not impressed with their logos and
corporate identity templates. Overall, access to all their categories
for a small one-time fee is undoubtedly a great value.
Stock Photos and Images
This website offers a rich collection of stock photography. Some of
the images are ready to be used, while others may require a bit of
customization work. If you know Fireworks, Photoshop or even Paint at a
novice level, you can already enhance and customize all of your web and
marketing materials quite easily. Alternatively, supplying the required
images to your graphic designer and giving them specific instructions on
how you'd like the images to be modified (adding shading, color
transition, oval borders or other enhancements) should also help you cut
costs.
High Quality Photos
and Images
One of the largest providers of imagery,
photography, and other graphic components and related services.
Flickr
One of the largest social networking sites on the net specializing in
photos and images. Free to upload, free to share, free to download.
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Anna
Tulchinsky 
