The introduction of advanced website management technologies like the WordPress CMS platform has truly simplified web design and web development for business users.
This is a great thing for individuals or businesses that want an online business presence that they can fully manage by themselves.
Before blogging and the introduction of powerful CMS applications, if you wanted to get a professional website built for your business, you would have to wait until both the web development and website design processes were completely done. This could take many weeks, sometimes even months!
The introduction of WordPress themes helped change all this. In this post, we explore what themes are, how they save you and your business money on web design costs, and how WP themes allow you to easily customize your WordPress site.
Web Design Revolution
More website owners are benefiting from a revolution in website design that began shortly after websites were first introduced. If you are a business owner, you may want to know more about this, because it could save you a lot of time and money on website development and web design costs.
Let’s briefly go over what happened before CMS applications like WordPress came along:
First, you would discuss your requirements with a website developer or designer. Then, the design would be discussed and agreed upon. This involved spending time with someone with website design skills going over elements of your site like the, colours, styles, page elements, content, etc.
Every page of your web site then had to be individually created with all of the design elements and codes inserted into the content. The pages were then assembled together into a website using hyperlinks and custom coded navigation menus and uploaded to your server, along with all other files needed to make your site work – script libraries, images, media elements, etc.
(image source:adobe.com)
Only once everything passed testing and was functioning how it was intended to (and looking how the client had wanted it to look), was the web site deemed to have been finished and ready to go live.
The next phase in the evolution of website design was the introduction of “web templating elements”. Web templates allow the design of the website to be created separately from the page content. Having template elements helped make website development faster and resulted in lowered costs of production. This also enabled website designers to work with small business clients with less money to spend …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As the number of web site development companies choosing “template-based” websites increased, templates started being introduced to offer a range of customizable settings, such as the ability to switch colours, styles, layouts
As websites and web editing applications evolved, website templates also started to transform into website templating ”systems”, letting users control their site’s visual aspects.
Then, WordPress came along and helped to start a new website revolution …
(WordPress – A Content Publishing Revolution)
To learn more about content management systems and the benefits of the WordPress CMS, see the tutorial below:
WordPress Themes
A WordPress theme drives website template systems even further.
The WordPress theme system controls and unifies the design elements of the website. It allows you to add a “skin” over your entire site in a similar way that a website template system does but also gives you more control over the management, presentation and customization of all template options.
As explained in 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 stated above, one of the unique features of WordPress is that the way your site displays to visitors externally is controlled separately from your site’s content management settings.
Basically, what this means is that you can change the design of your site as much and as often as you want without touching your website’s content and all the work you’ve put into it. For example, if you have configured your website for e-commerce, changing the entire look of your site with another theme won’t affect the content or the functionality of the site. All e-commerce features, site and plugin settings and product information will remain intact, but your site will look completely different.
This is huge! Why?
Because when you use WordPress, you no longer have to spend weeks or months waiting for your site to be done. You can get your website built simply and start with any theme you want, and then completely customize the look, feel and design of your WordPress site in minutes, whenever you choose … and as often as you like!
Even better, you can easily replace any theme on your site without needing any website code editing knowledge. Simply choose any theme you like, install it on your website and activate it. WordPress lets you change your web design and modify elements like header images, layout, typography and more in minutes …
Because WordPress is distributed as open source software, thousands of website design companies can design themes specifically for the WordPress CMS platform using the WP template system.
This means that thousands of high quality WordPress themes can be downloaded by WordPress users. Themes are generally distributed freely under the terms of the GNU License Definition, or they can be purchased as Premium (paid) WordPress themes.
The WordPress team maintains a FREE WordPress Theme Directory which gives WordPress users access thousands of excellent themes at no cost …
(WordPress.org – Themes Directory)
As WordPress becomes more popular, more designers are now starting to develop themes for a wider audience of WordPress site owners.
WP themes vary from minimal-looking, to clever designs that are quite beautiful and would normally cost thousands of dollars to develop. Surprisingly, most WP themes are very inexpensive to purchase.
You can see several WP theme galleries containing various examples of WordPress themes in this page:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
Benefits And Advantages Of Themes
Here are just some of the many benefits of choosing WordPress themes over choosing web development tools that require traditional web template design:
Be Up And Running In Minutes
Themes are quite easy to install on your site. Simply upload the plugin file to your Plugins folder via your admin user area and activate. Even easier still, you can install any of the themes listed in the free WordPress theme directory at WordPress.org) directly from within your WP dashboard.
Additionally,
- WordPress has a large online community of commercial website developers and development companies who make thousands of quality WordPress Themes available to WordPress users. And many of these themes are completely free to use!
- Themes give sites a consistent design across all the site’s elements, like pages, headers, footers, menus, layout, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your site’s content. This makes it possible to replace the “look and feel” of your website as often as you want without deleting your underlying content.
- Many WP themes provide additional built-in functionality and settings that let you easily customize the site’s style and design elements to create a unique look to suit your needs.
- Many WordPress themes are built using a framework that lets users upgrade the theme to newer theme versions without losing any unique customizations (e.g. CSS styles)
- WordPress lets you search, import, install and update WordPress Themes automatically right within your dashboard.
- WordPress themes allow users to save hundreds, even thousands of dollars on web development costs. Free themes cost nothing and most “Premium”themes are typically very inexpensive.
About Responsive WP Theme Design
Many theme designers are now creating WordPress themes that incorporate “responsive” web design.
A responsive theme enables websites to automatically readjust the web layout to display smoothly across different monitor sizes and screen resolutions, as well as across different platforms) …
A responsive theme is also optimized for different types of devices. Users can navigate, read and display a site on all devices without having to readjust their browser settings, or requiring the website owner to install additional browser elements.
Note: When downloading WordPress themes, it’s a good idea to choose a responsive WordPress theme. Not only will the theme ensure that your website will display correctly on all of your visitors’ devices, but it also means that the theme is newer than most non-responsive themes and therefore should comply with the latest standards, practices and techniques of web design and coding.
I hope that the above article has helped you gain a better understanding of themes, what WP themes are, how WordPress themes can help your business save money on web development costs, and how WordPress themes allow you to easily customize a site.
To learn where to search for great WordPress themes for your website or blog, see this post: Where To Look For The Best Free And Paid WordPress Web Templates On The Web.
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