What's next? Read criteria. Understand criteria. Compare your site against criteria.

This is critical step that many people miss. You see, most people who submit their sites for awards want to do it fast and furious. They burrow through a site - straight for awards submission page, enter data and let fly. Within a few seconds they move on to next award.

That's wrong way to do it. No, read criteria and look at your site with a critical eye. Let's say criteria says, "good HTML code" and your site was created with Frontpage or GeoCities site editor. Your chances of winning are highly reduced, because neither of these produces particularly good code.

Sometimes it will be pretty obvious that you should not submit your site. The criteria says site has to be made by a woman, and you are a man, for instance. Or awardmaster wants science fiction sites and your's is about how to make money from internet. Don't waste everyone's time - please read criteria.

Sometimes it's a bit more difficult. Let say criteria says, "text must be easy to read." Well, step back and take a look at your site. Is text light pink on a dark pink background? It's not easy to read. Or perhaps criteria says, "usable navigation on every page." Does your site have usable navigation? Maybe criteria says, "You must provide an obvious way to turn off any music." Well, do you?

Other criteria might include: no bandwidth stealing - check your images to be sure they are locally stored. No copyright violations - make sure you haven't "borrowed anything" from anyone. Fast loading - check your site on a 28.8 modem to see for yourself.

Correct anything that you feel like fixing, making a best guess as to awardmasters intention. Once you feel your site is up-to-snuff, then go ahead and submit it.

You see what happens if you approach award programs from proper direction? Your site gets better. You are taking "advice" of dozens or even hundreds of webmasters and determining if you agree or disagree. If you agree (you want to submit your site to award), then you make change. If not, you move on.

An in reality, that's what awards programs are all about. They are a way to improve websites and make internet a better place for us all.

Once I received a comment from an awardmaster who told me, in a very long email, that my site was great but since I do not accept psychiatric sites into my own awards program he could not award me an award. Keep in mind his own criteria did not mention such a restriction. I was so furious. How dare this pinhead make that kind of comment?

I remember another woman who had a beautiful site with some non-traditional navigation (it was some floating squares and was absolutely gorgeous). She didn't get an award and received a response from awardmaster which said her navigation was terrible. She was upset and posted a note to a newsgroup asking for a site review. Before long, she got back a dozen responses, some negative some positive. She was so confused, discouraged and unhappy. Nothing good came from comments.

I've known many beginning webmasters who are just starting out. Of course their GeoCities and Tripod sites are lacking ... but heck, these people are beginners. What do you expect? Telling them they didn't get award because, well, their site failed all 26 criteria points just will not make any friends and, believe me, will not help anyone.

Okay, what about honorable mention awards? Lord, I hate these ... this is a wonderful way of saying, "your site was only a little bit sucky". Come on, either give out award or don't, but please don't hand out honorable mentions.

My opinion: honorable mention awards are product of amateur awardmasters. Don't include them in your program.

So what should you do about those who do not win? It's simple ... don't do anything. No matter how much time you spent judging site, just put it aside and resist any temptation to "help" or "give some advice". Move on to next web site without looking back.

If webmaster sends a note asking (and this has only happened to me once), well, then you can either (a) ignore request or (b) just send a quick note saying it didn't meet criteria. You can suggest he read criteria again and in, say, a few months he can resubmit his site. Don't get into any details, even if he asks and says that he wants to know. Believe me, he really doesn't.

The bottom line? Keep you negative comments to yourself.