The introduction of flexible web site management technologies like the WordPress CMS has effectively simplified web design and web development for business owners.
This is great news for non-technical users that want a website that is simple and easy to manage.
Before blogging and the development of sophisticated content management systems, if you needed a professional web site, you would have to wait until both the website development and website design processes were fully completed. This could take many weeks, sometimes even many months!
The introduction of WordPress themes have changed all this. In this article, you will learn what WordPress themes are, how WP themes save you and your business money on web development costs, and how WordPress themes make it easy to customize your site.
Web Site Design Revolution
More businesses today are benefiting from a change in web design that started several years ago. If you own a business, you will want to learn more about this, because it could save your business a lot of time and money on web development or web design costs.
Let’s briefly review how things worked in “traditional” web development before software like WordPress was developed:
First, you would meet with a website developer or designer for a brief. Then, the design itself would be decided upon. This meant time being spent with a professional website designer going over elements of the website such as the layout, colours, styles, page elements, content, etc.
Every page of your website then had to be individually created with all of the elements and codes written into the page content. The pages were then assembled into a web site using links and navigation menus and uploaded to your server, along with every other file required to make your site work – script libraries, graphic images, media elements, etc.
(image source:adobe.com)
Only after everything had been tested and worked the way it was supposed to (and looking the way the client had wanted it to look), was the web site considered as being completed and ready to go live.
The next phase in the evolution of web design was the introduction of “web templates”. A website template allows the presentation of the web site to be created separately from content on the page. Having ready-made templates helped to make the process of website development faster and resulted in lowered production costs. This also allowed web site developers and designers to expand their services to include businesses with smaller marketing budgets …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As more businesses began adopting “template-based” web design services, templates started being created to provide different custom options, like the ability to choose different colours, styles, layouts
As web sites and website editing software evolved, web templates also began evolving into web templating ”systems”, which enabled website owners and website developers to manage their site’s visual aspects.
Then, WordPress came along and helped to kick off 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
WordPress themes take the concept of a web templating system much further.
A WP theme controls all of the design aspects of your website. It lets you add a “skin” over your site much like a website template system does but it provides you with more control over the management, presentation and customization of your template features.
As the official WordPress site explains …
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, a unique feature of a WP theme is that the way your site displays to visitors does not affect the management of your content.
In plain English terms, what this means is that themes let you modify the appearance of your website as much and as often as you like without touching your site’s content and all the functionality you’ve built into it. For example, if WP website has been configured for e-commerce, replacing the theme won’t affect the content or the functionality of your web site. All e-commerce features, settings and product information will remain unaffected, but your site will look completely different.
This is huge! Why?
Because with WordPress, you no longer need to spend weeks or months waiting for your website to be completed. You can get your website built simply and start with any theme you like, and change the entire look, feel and design of your site in minutes, whenever you want … and as many times as you like!
Even better, you can easily replace any theme on your WP site with no web code editing knowledge required. Simply choose a theme you like, upload it to your website and activate it. WordPress allows you to change your website design and customize elements like header images, layout, styling options and more in minutes …
Since WordPress is made available as open source software, thousands of website designers all around the world can design themes specifically for the WordPress platform using the WordPress templating system.
This means that loads of high quality WordPress themes are made available to WordPress users. WordPress are usually distributed as Free Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License Definition, or they can be purchased as Premium (paid) themes.
The WordPress development team maintains a FREE theme directory which allows WordPress users to access thousands of excellent web templates at no cost …
(WordPress.org – Themes Directory)
As more businesses turn to WordPress for online publishing, more designers are now starting to create themes for a wider audience of WordPress site owners.
WP themes vary from minimal-looking, to designs that are quite spectacular and would easily cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars to design. Surprisingly, most themes are really inexpensive.
You can view several WordPress theme galleries containing many examples of great WP themes here:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
Benefits & Advantages Of Themes
Here are just a few of the benefits of using WordPress themes over choosing traditional website design:
Ready To Use In Very Little Time
WP themes are very easy to install on your site. Simply upload a zip folder that contains the plugin to your Plugin folder via your WP admin user account and activate. Even easier still, you can install any of the themes listed in the themes directory at WordPress.org) directly inside your WordPress admin’s “Theme” section.
Additionally …
- WordPress has a thriving community of professional website designers and design companies who make thousands of great WordPress Themes available to users. And many of these themes are 100% free to use!
- Themes give sites a unified and consistent look across all of your site’s elements, like pages, headers, footers, menus, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your website’s content. This means you can change themes as often as you like without affecting your website’s settings.
- Many WordPress themes provide built-in functionality and settings that enable you to customize your site’s layout, style and design properties to create a unique look to suit your business.
- Many themes are built using a framework that allows you to upgrade themes to newer versions without losing its unique customizations (e.g. styles)
- WordPress lets you search, upload and install WordPress Themes automatically directly from within the site’s administration interface.
- Themes allow users to save thousands of dollars on web design costs. Free WP themes cost nothing and most “Premium”themes are typically quite inexpensive.
Responsive WordPress Theme Design
Many WP theme designers are now developing “responsive” themes for WordPress.
A responsive theme allows a website to automatically readjust screen size to display smoothly across different screen sizes and resolutions, as well as different devices (e.g. computers, iPads, cell phones, etc.) …
A responsive theme is also optimized for each device type. Users can navigate, read and load a site on a range of devices without having to readjust their browser settings, or requiring website owners to have installed additional themes.
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 work correctly across all of your visitors’ devices, it also means that the theme is newer than most non-responsive themes and therefore complies with the latest standards of web design and coding.
Hopefully, this post has given you a better understanding of themes, what WordPress themes are, how themes can help you save money, and how WP themes let you easily customize your web site.
In our next article on helping you understand WordPress features, we show you where to find great themes for your website.
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