Powerful website publishing platforms like the WordPress Content Management System (CMS) have truly simplified web design and web development for anyone wanting a website.
This is terrific news for businesses thinking of getting a web presence that they can easily manage themselves.
Prior to blogging and the introduction of powerful and simple content management systems, if you wanted to build a website for your business, you normally had to wait until both the web development and website design processes were completely done. This process could take weeks, even many months!
The development of WordPress themes changed all this. In this blog post, you will learn what WP themes are, how themes save your business money on website design costs, and how themes let you easily customize your site.
Website Design Revolution
More website owners today have been benefiting from a revolution in web design that began shortly after websites were first introduced. If you own a business, you will want to know more about this, because it can save your business thousands of dollars on web development and website design costs.
In a nutshell, this is what typically happened before WordPress were developed:
First, you would discuss your project with a web site developer or designer. Then, the actual “web design” itself would be decided upon. This involved spending time with a professional web designer discussing elements of your site like the layout, colors, styles, visual elements, content, etc.
Every page of your web site then had to be individually created with the elements and codes scripted into the content. The pages were then assembled together into a website using links and custom coded navigation menus and uploaded to your server, together with all other files required to make your website work – script libraries, graphic images, media elements, etc.
(image source:adobe.com)
Only once everything passed testing and performed how it was supposed to (and looking the way a client had wanted it to look), was the web site deemed as being finished and ready to go live.
The next phase in the evolution of business web design was the introduction of “web templating elements”. A web template allows the presentation of the web site to be worked on separately from the page content. The development of ready-made templates helped speed up the website creation process and resulted in lowered costs of production. This also enabled web development agencies to expand their services to include businesses and clients with less money to spend on marketing …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As the number of small businesses using “template-based” websites increased, web templates started being created that offered a range of custom settings, such as color palettes, the ability to pick different formats and header, footer and navigation elements, etc …
As web sites and website building applications evolved, website templates also started to evolve into website template “systems” that permit website owners to manage the visual elements of a site.
Then, a “blogging” tool called WordPress was developed 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:
About WordPress Themes
A WordPress theme drives website template systems much further.
A WP theme controls and integrates every aspect of your web design. It lets you add a “skin” to your site much like a template system does but it also also gives you complete control over the management, presentation and customization of all template features.
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 displays to site visitors in no way affects the management of your content.
Basically, what this means is that a WordPress theme lets you change the look and feel of your site as much and as often as you want without modifying your site’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 the site with another theme won’t affect the content or the functionality of the web site. All e-commerce features, site settings and product information will remain unaffected, but the site will look completely different.
This is important. Why?
Because when you use WordPress, you no longer have to spend weeks or months waiting for your website design to be completed. You can get your business website built simply and get started with any WordPress theme you want, and then completely modify the look, feel and design of your WordPress site in mere seconds, whenever you choose … and as many times as you like!
Even better, you can easily replace any theme on your site with no web design skills required. Just pick any theme you want, upload it to your site and activate it. WordPress allows you to change your entire site’s web design and modify elements like header images, page layout, typography and more with just a couple of mouse clicks …
As WordPress is made available as open source software, commercial web designers can create themes specifically for the WordPress platform using the WP template system.
This means that loads of great WordPress themes are made available to WordPress users. Themes are normally distributed for Free under the terms of the GNU General Public License, or sold as Premium (paid) WP themes.
The WordPress development team keeps a FREE WordPress Theme Directory which gives WordPress users access thousands of great website templates completely free of charge …
(WordPress.org – WordPress Theme Directory)
As the popularity of WordPress increases, more designers are now starting to develop themes for a wider audience of WordPress users.
WP themes vary from professional-looking, to designs that are quite breathtaking and would normally cost hundreds to many thousands of dollars to create. Surprisingly, most premium themes are very inexpensive to buy.
You can view several WordPress theme galleries that include many examples of great themes in this article:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
Benefits And Advantages Of Using Themes
Here are just some of the benefits and advantages of choosing WordPress themes over using applications that require traditional web template design:
WP Theme Installation Is Easy
WP themes are very easy to install on your site. Just upload the plugin file 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 your WP admin’s “Theme” section.
Additionally,
- WordPress has a growing online community of commercial website designers who, collectively, contribute thousands of fantastic WordPress Themes available to WordPress users. And many of these themes are 100% free to use!
- Themes give sites a unified and consistent “look and feel” across all the site’s elements, like pages, headers, footers, menus, layout, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your digital content. This makes it possible to change WordPress themes as often as you need without affecting your site data.
- Many WP themes come with additional built-in functionality and options that enable you to customize your site’s layout and design properties to create a unique look to suit your business.
- Many themes are built using a framework that lets you upgrade the theme to a newer theme version without losing its unique customizations (e.g. styles)
- WordPress allows you to search, import, install and update WordPress Themes automatically right within your admin panel.
- WP themes lets you save hundreds of dollars on web design costs. Free themes cost nothing and most “Premium”themes are normally very affordable.
Responsive WordPress Themes
Many theme developers are now creating WP themes that incorporate “responsive” design.
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) …
A responsive theme is also optimized for each device type. Users can scroll, read and load your site on all device platforms without having to readjust their browser settings, or requiring the website owner to install additional display elements.
Note: When downloading WordPress themes, we recommend choosing a responsive WordPress theme. Not only will the theme ensure that your web site will display correctly on all of your visitors’ devices, 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 this basic overview has helped you gain a clearer understanding about WordPress themes, what WordPress themes are, how themes can help your business save money on website development costs, and how WordPress themes let you easily customize a website.
In our next blog post in our article WP newbies on helping you understand features and functionality of WordPress, we show you where to find great themes for your website or blog.
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"I am beyond impressed with what you have put together. I can tell that you put a ton of hard work into building what you have. You have the absolute best content on WordPress I have ever seen!" - Robert T. Jillie
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