Advanced web publishing technologies like WordPress have effectively simplified web design and web development for business users.
This is a great thing for businesses that want an online business presence that they can fully manage themselves.
Before “blogging” and the introduction of easy-to-use CMS solutions, if you needed a professional business website, you would have to wait until both the web development and website design processes were fully completed. This could mean waiting for weeks, even many months!
The introduction of WordPress themes changed all this. In this blog post, we will explore what themes are, how themes can help you save money on website development costs, and how WP themes let you easily customize your WP site.
Evolution In Web Design
More website owners will benefit from a great change in website design that began shortly after websites were first introduced. If you own a business, you may want to learn about this, because it could save your business thousands of dollars on website development or website design costs.
Very briefly, this is how things typically worked in “traditional” web design before system like WordPress was developed:
The first step would be to meet with a website developer or web designer for a brief. Then, the “web design” itself would be decided upon. This involved spending time with a professional web site designer going over areas of the site like the, colours, formats, visual elements, content, etc.
Every page of your website then had to be individually created with all of the elements and codes scripted into your page content. All of the pages were then assembled into a web site using links and custom coded navigation menus and uploaded to your server, together with every other file needed to make your website work – script libraries, graphic images, media, etc.
(image source:adobe.com)
Only once everything passed testing and functioned the way it was intended to (and looking the way a client had wanted it to look), was the website considered to be completed and ready to go live.
The next stage in the evolution of website design was the introduction of “website templating elements”. Web templates allow the presentation of the web site to be worked on separately from content on the page. Having template elements helped to speed up the website development process and resulted in reduced production costs. This also allowed web site designers to work with business clients and clients with smaller budgets …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As the number of small businesses using “template-based” web design services increased, templates were created that could offer a range of customization features, like the ability to switch colours, styles, layouts
As web sites and web editing tools developed, web templates also started transforming into website template “systems” that enable website owners and web developers to manage the visual aspects of a website.
Then, WordPress was introduced and helped to kick off a new online publishing revolution …
(WordPress – A Content Publishing Revolution)
To learn more about content management systems and the benefits of the WordPress CMS, see the tutorial below:
The WordPress Theme
WordPress themes take web template systems even further.
A WP theme controls all of the design aspects of the web site. It allows you to add a “skin” over your site much like a website template system does but also provides users with complete control over the management and customization of template settings.
As per the official WordPress site …
A WordPress Theme is a collection of files that work together to produce a graphical interface with an underlying unifying design for a weblog. These files are called template files. A Theme modifies the way the site is displayed, without modifying the underlying software. Themes may include customized template files, image files (*.jpg, *.gif), style sheets (*.css), custom Pages, as well as any necessary code files (*.php).
(source: WordPress.org)
As the above quote states, one of the unique and revolutionary features of WordPress is that how your website appears to site visitors is controlled independently of the management of your content.
Basically, what this means is that themes let you modify the look and feel of your site as much and as often as you want without touching your website’s content and all the functionality you’ve built into it. For example, if your site has been configured for e-commerce, changing the entire look of your site with another theme won’t affect the content or the functionality of the website. All e-commerce features, plugin settings and product information will remain intact, but your site will look completely different.
This is huge! Why?
Because with WordPress, you no longer have to wait until your website’s design is completed. You can get your business website built simply and get started with any WP theme you want, and then customize the entire look, feel and design of your site in seconds, whenever you decide … and as often as you like!
Even better, you can easily install a theme on your site without the need of web coding knowledge. Simply pick any theme you want, install it on your site and activate it. WordPress allows you to change your site’s design and customize elements like headers, layout, styling options and more in less than a few minutes …
Since WordPress is open source software, hundreds of website designers can design themes specifically for the WP CMS platform using the WP template system.
This means that loads of great WordPress themes can be downloaded by WP users. WP are usually distributed for Free under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or sold as Premium (paid) WP themes.
The WordPress development team maintains a FREE WordPress Theme Directory which allows WordPress users to access thousands of excellent WP themes for free …
(WordPress.org – Themes Directory)
As the popularity of WordPress increases, more designers are now starting to create themes for a wider audience of WordPress users.
Themes vary from professional-looking, to designs that are visually breathtaking and would easily cost many hundreds of dollars to commission. Surprisingly, most WP themes are really inexpensive to buy.
You can see a number of WordPress theme galleries that include many examples of great premium WP themes here:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
WordPress Themes – Benefits
Here are just a few of the benefits of choosing WordPress themes over using website building applications that require traditional website design:
Quick Installation
WP themes are really easy to install on your site. Just upload the plugin file to your Plugins folder via your WP administrator account and activate. Even easier still, you can install any of the themes listed in the free WP theme directory at WordPress.org) directly inside your WordPress site’s admin area.
Additionally …
- WordPress has a large online community of commercial web developers and development companies who make thousands of great-looking, high quality WP Themes available to WP users. And many of these themes are 100% free to use!
- Themes give sites a consistent look across all of your site’s elements, i.e. pages, headers, footers, layouts, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your web site’s content. This makes it possible to swap the “look and feel” of your web site as often as you want without modifying the site information.
- Many themes come with additional functionality and settings that enable you to easily customize the site’s style, layout and design elements to create a unique look to suit your taste.
- Many WP themes are built using a framework that enables you to upgrade the theme to newer theme versions without losing its unique customizations (e.g. CSS styles)
- WordPress allows you to search, upload and install WordPress Themes automatically inside the admin panel.
- Themes helps you save hundreds, even thousands of dollars on website development costs. Free themes cost nothing and most “Premium”themes are normally quite affordable.
Responsive WP Theme Design
Many WordPress theme designers are now creating “responsive” WP themes.
A responsive theme enables websites to automatically resize to display smoothly across different screen sizes and resolutions, as well as different platforms) …
Responsive themes are also optimized for each platform. Users can navigate, read and display a site on various device platforms without having to resize anything, or requiring the website owner to have installed additional display elements.
Note: When selecting, WordPress themes, it’s a good idea to choose a responsive WordPress theme. Not only will a responsive theme ensure that your web site displays well on all devices, it also means that the theme is newer than non-responsive themes and therefore probably complies with the latest standards, practices and techniques of web design and web coding.
Hopefully, this overview has helped you gain a better understanding of themes, what WP themes are, how themes help you and your business save money, and how themes let you easily customize a WordPress site.
In our next blog post in the article series on helping you understand features and functionality of WordPress, we show you where to search for the best themes for your website or blog.
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"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)
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