Flexible web publishing tools like the WordPress Content Management System (CMS) have effectively improved web design and web development for anyone wanting a website.
This greatly benefits business owners thinking of running a web presence that they can fully manage.
Before “blogging” and the development of easy-to-use CMS technologies, if you wanted to get a professional site for your business, you would have to wait until both the web development and website design processes were completely done. This process could take weeks, sometimes even many months!
The introduction of WordPress themes changed all this. In this article, we will explore what themes are, how WP themes save your business money on website design costs, and how WP themes help you easily customize your WordPress site.
Website Design Revolution
Businesses, especially small businesses, will benefit from a tremendous change in website design that has been going for many years now. If you are a business owner, you will want to know more about this, because it can save your business a lot of time and money on website development and website design costs.
In a nutshell, this is how things typically worked in “traditional” website design before solutions like WordPress came along:
The first step would be to discuss your requirements with a web site development agency or designer. Then, the actual design itself had to be decided upon. This meant spending time with someone with website design skills discussing areas of your website like the layout, colors, formats, page elements, content, etc.
Each page of your website then had to be individually created with all your elements and scripts coded into your page content. All pages were then assembled into a website using links and custom coded navigation menus and uploaded to your server, together with all other files required to make your site work – script libraries, images, media elements, etc.
(image source:adobe.com)
Only after everything passed testing and worked how it was supposed to (and looking how the client had wanted it to look), was the site considered as being completed and ready for sign off.
The next step in the evolution of business website design was the introduction of “web templates”. A website template allows the presentation of the website to be worked on separately from the page content. Having template elements helped to make building web sites faster and resulted in reduced costs of production. This also enabled web designers to service small businesses and clients with less money to spend …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As the number of small businesses choosing “template-based” web design services increased, web templates were created that offered various customization settings, such as colour palettes, the ability to specify different page layouts or styles, and so on.
As web sites and website editing tools developed, website templates also started evolving into web template “systems” that enable users to manage the design aspects of a site.
And then, a “blogging” application called WordPress was developed and helped to start a new web 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 much further.
The WordPress theme system controls the design aspects of a web site. It allows you to add a “skin” over your entire site in a similar way that a web template system does but it also also provides users with more control over the management, presentation and customization of your template features.
As the official WordPress site states …
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 stated in the quote above, one of the unique features of WordPress is that how your site displays to site visitors is kept independent of how your content is managed.
Basically, what this means is that a WP theme lets you change the design of your site as much and as often as you like without modifying your site’s content and all the work you’ve put into it. For example, if you have set up WordPress website for e-commerce, replacing the theme won’t affect the content or the functionality of the website. All e-commerce features, site and plugin settings and product information will remain intact, but the site will look completely different.
This is important. Why?
Because when you use WordPress, you no longer have to wait until your site’s web design is completed. You can get your business website built simply and start with any theme you want, and change the entire look, feel and design of your site in mere minutes, 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 code editing knowledge. Just pick a WordPress theme you want, upload it to your website and activate it. WordPress allows you to change your site’s design and modify elements like header images, page layout, styling options and more in minutes …
Since WordPress is open source software, web design companies can design themes specifically for the WordPress platform using the WordPress templating system.
This means that loads of high quality WP themes can be downloaded by WP users. Themes are usually distributed for Free under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or sold as Premium (paid) themes.
The WordPress development team keeps a FREE directory of WordPress themes which gives WordPress users access thousands of great WP themes completely free of charge …
(WordPress.org – WP Theme Directory)
As the popularity of WordPress soars, more designers are now starting to create themes for a wider audience of web users.
Themes range from corporate-looking, to designs that are visually breathtaking and would typically cost thousands of dollars to design. Surprisingly, most themes are quite inexpensive to buy.
You can see a number of WP theme galleries that include stunning examples of great themes here:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
Benefits Of Using Themes
Here are just a few of the benefits and advantages of choosing WordPress themes over choosing tools that require traditional web template design:
Ready To Go To Work In Very Little Time
WP themes are very easy to install on your site. Simply upload a zip file that contains the plugin to your Plugin folder via your administrator login and activate. Even easier still, you can install any of the themes listed in the theme directory at WordPress.org) directly inside your WordPress site’s admin area.
Additionally,
- WordPress has a thriving online community of professional theme developers and development companies who contribute thousands of quality WordPress Themes available to users. Many of these themes are completely free to use!
- Themes give sites a unified and consistent “look and feel” across all of the blog’s elements, like pages, headers, footers, menus, layout, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your site’s content. This allows you swap themes as often as you want without deleting the website’s content.
- Many themes come with built-in functionality and options that enable you to easily customize the site’s layout and design elements to create a unique look to suit your needs.
- Many WP themes are built using a framework that lets you update the theme to newer versions without losing any unique customizations (e.g. styles)
- WordPress allows you to search, import and install WordPress Themes automatically directly from your dashboard.
- WP themes helps you save hundreds, even thousands of dollars on web development costs. Free themes cost nothing and most “Premium”WP themes are typically very affordable.
About Responsive WordPress Theme Design
Many WP theme designers are now developing “responsive” WP themes.
A responsive theme enables a website to automatically resize to display smoothly across different monitor sizes and screen resolutions, as well as across different platforms) …
Responsive themes are also optimized for different types of devices. Users can scroll, read and display a site on various devices without having to resize anything, or requiring the website owner to have installed additional browser tools.
Note: When downloading WordPress themes, it’s a good idea to choose a responsive WordPress theme. Not only will the theme ensure that the content and layout of your site will work correctly on all of your visitors’ devices, but it also means that the theme is newer than non-responsive themes and therefore probably complies with the latest standards and practices of website design and web coding.
We hope that this overview has helped you gain a clearer understanding about themes, what WP themes are, how themes can help you and your business save money on website design costs, and how WordPress themes make customizing sites easy.
To learn where to search for the best themes for your website, visit this page: Where To Find Great Free And Premium WordPress Themes For Your Business Web Site Or Blog.
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