I actually enjoy doing promo images because it gives me a chance to play around with the character I've created from a customer perspective.

In the last few weeks I have gone from dialup to broadband and I think I've been reborn LOL but I know only too well about reams of images that take forever to load when the merchant has used html. I've never used it mainly because I didn't feel the need and I know I couldn't be bothered waiting for it all to load so I assume there are plenty of others on dialup who feel the same way and I try to make viewing my packages a pleasant experience. 

I've also always taken the WYSIWYG approach when doing promo images. Absolutely no postwork and very basic lighting so that the customer knows when they look at my promo images that what they see is exactly what they get. It's not difficult to "pretty" up a promo image with nice fonts, background colors/images and general presentation. Save all the fancy filters and stuff for gallery images unless you have hours to spend with customers explaining how they can get your character to look like it does in your promo images. Admittedly I come from an advertising background so easy for me to say I guess lol.

Closeups of skin or fabric detail are essential and not just the face. If I were purchasing a character pack, I'd want to see some nice closeups of the body skin along with elbows, knees, hands and feet. These are areas that really take a lot of work particularly without the use of the plethora of merchant resources that are out there.

The devil is in the detail and if a prospective customer can't see the detail you can't expect them to fork out money with fingers crossed in the hope that they will be satisfied with their purchase.

Just my more than two cent's worth :) 

Kym

STORE:
http://market.renderosity.com/mod/bcs/index.php?vendor=KymJ
GALLERY:
www.renderosity.com/gallery.ez?ByArtist=Yes&Artist=KymJ