KYLIE BROWN, 26, an artist from Hitchin, Hertfordshire, last year set up an online art gallery to display her work and that of friends. Twelve months on and her virtual gallery is thriving, Kylie is managing the other contributors, customers find their way to the site to buy and she is expanding.

The interesting thing about the website is that it cost just £200 to build. Admittedly, it is slow and a little clunky but Nearly Orange (www.nearlyorange.com) does the job and has got Kylie off the ground.

Keeping it up to date is not complex. When the group puts on a new exhibition Kylie takes photographs on her digital camera and the next day loads them on to her computer and from there to the website.

“Paintings are fragile and difficult to move. The website shows them in a medium which is quick, easy and convenient. I am often asked when and where my art can be seen. I just direct them to the website.”

The artists can promote themselves as individuals via the site, and raise awareness of the group. They are also getting into the corporate art business, setting up exhibitions in foyers and decorating office suites for customers with displays that change regularly.

The next step is to have the site redesigned by a web designer and to put a fully functional back end on it that incorporates a more powerful database management system to keep more pictures ready to be displayed by users on demand.

Companies without a web presence that are prepared to spend a little more than Nearly Orange can now leapfrog an entire generation of website technology and go straight for an interactive site, bypassing the e-brochure stage.

Research by IDC, the consultant, says 81 per cent of UK companies now have a website but most are shop windows, with only 17 per cent actually taking orders and only 5 per cent can actually accepting payment.

Gartner, another consultant, says even a minor investment in improving the usability of a company website will yield an annual return of 10 to 20 per cent. It raises brand awareness, leads to higher user adoption rates and possibly more transactions per user. Average order size starts to rise and the site generates more return visits from customers.