The introduction of content publishing systems like the WordPress CMS platform has effectively simplified web design and web development for web users.
This is a great thing for entrepreneurial-minded people planning to start a web presence that is easy to manage.
Prior to “blogging” and the introduction of powerful CMS solutions, if you wanted to get a web site for your business, you typically would have to wait until both the website development and web design processes were completely done. This process could take weeks, sometimes even many months!
WordPress themes helped change all this. In this post, you will learn what themes are, how themes can help you save money, and how themes make it easy to customize your WP site.
Web Design Revolution
More website owners are benefiting from a tremendous change in web design that has been going for a number of years now. If you own a small business, you will want to learn more about this, because it can save your business a lot of time and money on website development or website design costs.
Let’s take a look at how things used to work in “traditional” website design before CMS software like WordPress were introduced:
The first step would be to discuss your project with a web site developer or website designer. After this, the “web design” itself would be decided upon. This required spending time and money with a professional web designer discussing areas of the site like the layout, colours, formats, visual elements, content, etc.
Every page of your site then had to be hand-coded with all your design elements and codes scripted into your page content. All pages were then assembled into a web site using hyperlinks and navigation menus and uploaded to your server, together with every other file needed to make your site work – script libraries, graphic images, media, etc.
(image source:adobe.com)
Only once everything passed testing and functioned how it was intended to (and looking the way the client had wanted it to look), was the site considered to have been completed and ready for delivery.
Then, web design “templates” came along”. A website template allows ”look and feel” elements of the web site to be created separately from the page content. The development of templates helped to speed up the web site development process and resulted in reduced costs of production. This also allowed web development companies to service smaller businesses and clients with less money to spend on marketing …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As more small businesses started choosing “template-based” web design services, web templates were created that offered clients with various customization options, such as the option to choose different colors, styles, layouts
As websites and web editing tools evolved, web templates also began to evolve into web templating “systems” that allowed website owners to control their website’s design elements.
Then, WordPress came along and helped to start a new business 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 pushes the idea of a web template system further.
A WP theme controls and integrates every aspect of your site’s design. It allows you to add a “skin” to your site similarly to what a template system does but it gives you complete control over the management, presentation and customization of all template settings.
As stated 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 the above states, a unique feature of WordPress is that how your site displays to site visitors in no way affects the way your site works in the backend to handle areas like content management and functionality.
In plain English terms, what this means is that you can change the design of your website as much and as often as you like without modifying your website’s content and all the work you’ve put into it. For example, if you have configured WP website for e-commerce, changing the entire look of the site with a different theme won’t affect the content or the functionality of the website. All e-commerce features, site 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 wait until your site’s web design is done. You can get your website built quickly and get started with any theme you like, and customize the entire look, feel and design of your website in seconds, whenever you want … and as often as you like!
Even better, you can easily replace any theme on your WordPress site without requiring web code editing knowledge. Just pick a WP theme you want, upload it to your site and activate it. WordPress allows you to change your website design and modify elements like header images, page layout, style settings and more with just a couple of mouse clicks …
Because WordPress is made available as open source software, website design companies from all over the world can design themes specifically for the WP CMS platform using the WP template system.
This means that loads of high quality WP themes are made available to WP users. WordPress are generally distributed freely under the terms of the GNU License Definition, or sold as Premium (i.e. paid) themes.
The WordPress team keeps a FREE WordPress Theme Directory which gives WordPress users access thousands of excellent web templates at no cost …
(WordPress.org – Themes Directory)
As WordPress becomes more popular, more designers are now starting to develop themes for a wider range of users.
WordPress themes range from corporate-looking, to designs that are beautiful and would normally cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars to design. Surprisingly, themes can be purchased very inexpensively, especially when compared to what it would have cost you if a web designer had to develop it from scratch.
You can see several theme galleries containing various examples of great premium WP themes in this post:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
WordPress Themes – Benefits
Here are just a few of the benefits and advantages of choosing WordPress themes over using applications that require traditional web template design:
Installation Is Easy
Themes are really easy to install on your site. Simply upload a zip folder that contains the plugin to your Plugin folder via your dashboard and activate. Even easier still, you can install any of the themes listed in the theme repository at WordPress.org) directly from within your WP admin’s “Theme” section.
Additionally …
- WordPress has a large online community of professional web designers and design companies who make thousands of fantastic WP Themes available to users. And many of these themes are completely free to use!
- Themes give sites a consistent design across all of your blog’s elements, i.e. pages, headers, footers, layout, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your site’s content. This means you can replace themes as often as you like without changing the website’s underlying content.
- Many themes come with additional features and settings that enable you to customize the theme’s style, layout and design elements to create a unique look to suit your preferences.
- Many themes are built using a framework that enables users to update the theme to newer versions without losing its unique customizations (e.g. CSS styles)
- WordPress allows you to search, import and install WordPress Themes automatically within the admin panel.
- WordPress themes lets you save hundreds of dollars on website development costs. Free themes cost nothing and most “Premium”themes are normally quite affordable.
About Responsive Theme Design
Many theme developers are now developing WP themes that incorporate “responsive” design protocols.
A responsive theme enables websites to automatically resize to display smoothly across different monitor sizes and screen resolutions, as well as different devices (e.g. computers, tablets, cell phones, etc.) …
A responsive theme is also optimized for each device type. Users can navigate, read and load your site on various device browsers without having to resize anything, or requiring website owners to have installed additional display elements.
Note: When downloading WordPress themes, we strongly recommend choosing a responsive WordPress theme. Not only will a responsive theme ensure that your website will display correctly on all of your visitors’ devices, but it also means that the theme is newer than non-responsive themes and therefore should comply with the latest standards, practices and techniques of website design and web coding.
We hope that the above overview has given you a clearer understanding about themes, what WP themes are, how themes help you and your business save money, and how WP themes allow you to easily customize your site.
To learn where to find the best themes for your blog, visit this page: Where To Find The Best Paid And Free WordPress Web Themes For Your Business.
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