Advanced web site publishing platforms like the WordPress CMS platform have effectively improved web design and web development for users.
This greatly benefits businesses planning to start a digital presence that they can manage themselves.
Prior to blogging and the introduction of powerful CMS technologies, if you needed a professional business website, you would have to wait until both the web development and website design processes were completely done. This could mean weeks, even many months of waiting!
The development of WordPress themes have changed all this. In this article, you will learn what themes are, how WP themes can help you and your business save money on website development costs, and how WP themes allow you to easily customize your site.
Web Design Revolution
Businesses have been benefiting from a tremendous change in website design that began shortly after websites were first introduced. If you own a small business, you will want to learn more about this, because it could save you a lot of time and money on web development or website design costs.
In a nutshell, here’s what happened before tools like WordPress came along:
First, you would meet with a website developer or designer for a brief. After that, the actual design itself would be discussed and agreed upon. This involved spending time and money with someone with web design skills discussing elements of the site like the, colors, styles, visual elements, content, etc.
Each page of your web site then had to be hand-coded with all of your design elements and codes scripted into your page content. All of the pages were then assembled into a web site using hyperlinks and navigation menus and uploaded to your server, along with every other file required to make your website work – script libraries, graphic images, media, etc.
(image source:adobe.com)
Only after everything passed testing and worked the way it was intended to (and looking how a client had imagined it to look), was the site considered to have been completed and ready to go live.
Then, web design “templates” came along”. Web site templates allow presentation elements of the website to be worked on separately from content on the page. The introduction of templates helped make the process of website development faster and resulted in lowered costs of production. This also allowed website developers to service businesses with less money to spend on marketing …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As more small businesses began choosing “template-based” web design services, templates started being created that could offer different customizable settings, like colour palettes, the ability to specify different formats or layouts, etc …
As websites and website editor applications evolved, website templates also started to transform into web template “systems” that permitted website owners and website developers to manage their site’s visual elements.
Then, WordPress came along 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
A WordPress theme pushes the idea of a website 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 entire site in a similar way that a web template system does but it gives you more control over the management, presentation and customization of the site’s 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 stated above, a unique feature of WordPress is that the way your website displays to site visitors in no way affects how your content is managed.
In simple terms, what this means is that a WP theme lets you modify the design of your site as much and as often as you want without affecting your website’s content and all the functionality you’ve built into it. For example, if you have configured your site for e-commerce, replacing the theme won’t affect the content or the functionality of your website. All e-commerce features, site settings and product information will remain intact, but the site will look completely different.
Why is this great news for business owners?
Because when your website is powered by WordPress, you no longer have to wait until your site’s web design is done. You can get your website built quickly and start with any WordPress theme you like, and then customize the entire look, feel and design of your website in a few minutes, whenever you decide … and as many times as you like!
Even better, you can easily install a theme on your WordPress site without requiring any web design skills. Simply pick any theme you want, upload it to your site and activate it. WordPress lets you change your entire site’s web design and modify elements like header images, layout, styling options and more in minutes …
Since WordPress is made available as open source software, web designers can create themes specifically for the WordPress platform using the WordPress templating system.
This means that thousands of high quality WordPress themes are made available to WP users. WP are generally distributed for Free under the terms of the GNU General Public License Definition, or sold as Premium (paid) themes.
The WordPress development team maintains a FREE WordPress Theme Directory which allows WordPress users to download and access, thousands of excellent WP themes completely free of charge …
(WordPress.org – Themes Directory)
As more businesses turn to WordPress for publishing and managing their content online, more designers are now starting to create themes for a wider audience of WordPress site owners.
Themes vary from professional-looking, to dynamic designs that are stunning and could easily cost hundreds to thousands of dollars to develop. Surprisingly, most themes are quite inexpensive to purchase.
You can view several theme galleries that include various examples of great themes in this article:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
Themes – Benefits & Advantages
Here are just some of the many benefits of choosing WordPress themes over choosing applications that require traditional web design:
WP Theme Installation Is Easy & Fast
WP themes are quite easy to install on your site. Simply upload a zip folder that contains the plugin to your Plugin folder via your admin user account and activate. Even easier still, you can install any of the themes listed in the free theme directory at WordPress.org) directly inside your WordPress admin’s “Theme” section.
Additionally …
- WordPress has a thriving community of professional web designers and design companies who, collectively, make thousands of high quality WP Themes available to WordPress users. And many of these themes are completely free to use!
- Themes give sites a unified and consistent look across all of your site’s elements, i.e. pages, headers, footers, menus, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your web site’s content. This makes it possible to swap WP themes as often as you need without deleting the blog data.
- Many themes provide additional functionality and settings that enable you to customize your site’s style, layout and design elements and create a unique look to suit your taste.
- Many WP themes are built using a framework that allows users to upgrade the theme to newer theme versions without losing any unique customizations (e.g. CSS styles)
- WordPress lets you search, upload, install and update WordPress Themes automatically right inside the dashboard.
- Themes helps you save thousands of dollars on web design costs. Free themes cost nothing and most “Premium”themes are typically very affordable.
About Responsive WP Theme Design
Many WP theme designers are now developing WP themes that incorporate “responsive” design standards.
A responsive theme enables websites to automatically resize to display smoothly over 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 load your site on most devices without having to readjust their browser settings, or requiring website owners to have installed additional browser elements.
Note: When downloading WordPress themes, we strongly recommend choosing a responsive WordPress theme. Not only will the theme ensure that your web site displays well 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 coding.
Hopefully, this post has given you a better understanding of WordPress themes, what themes are, how WordPress themes help you save money, and how themes make customizing your web design easy.
In the next blog post on helping you understand WordPress features, we show you where to search for the best WordPress themes for your blog.
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