When we launch Web site for clients, we provide tools that allow them to make changes to their Web sites. These content management systems are popular with other Web site developers and end users alike. These tools are powerful: they let site administrators make many changes to Web sites without hiring a Web site developer.

But as the expression goes, “with great power comes great responsibility.”

A typical mistake we see is that site administrators upload very large images to these content management tools and then use the tools to “resize” the image. However, content management systems often leave the image the original size and compress the image to fit the space you have “resized” it to, in the same way one might use a shoehorn to make a shoe fit that doesn’t. When this occurs, the image can appear distorted and can take a long time to load.

Luckily, there is an easy way to fix this: resize the images before you upload them. On Windows XP, download and install the XP Image Resizer Powertoy (by Microsoft). On Windows Vista or Windows 7, download the Image Resizer (a clone of the XP version that other developers made). These tools will let you resize the image by right mouse clicking on it. You can even select multiple images and right mouse click to change many at once.

Either tool will help you resize your image. Remember to always downsize your images before uploading them to your Web site.