The introduction of web publishing tools like the WordPress Content Management System (CMS) has truly simplified web design and web development for anyone wanting to start a website.
This is a great thing for entrepreneurial-minded people planning to build an online presence that they can fully manage.
Before “blogging” and the introduction of advanced CMS technologies, if you needed a professional business website, you had to wait until both the website development and web design processes were completely done. This process could mean waiting for weeks, even many months!
WordPress themes have changed all this. In this blog post, we explore what themes are, how themes can help you and your business save money, and how WordPress themes help you easily customize your site.
Website Design Revolution
Businesses, especially small businesses, have been benefiting from a revolution in web design that has been going for a number of years now. If you are a business owner, you will want to know about this, because it can save you thousands of dollars on web development and web design costs.
Let’s take a look at how things worked in “traditional” website design before solutions like WordPress were introduced:
First, you would discuss your project with a web development agency or web site designer. Then, the “web design” would be discussed and agreed upon. This meant spending time and money with someone with web design skills discussing elements of your site like the, colors, styles, page elements, content, etc.
Each page of your web site then had to be individually created with the elements and codes scripted into the page content. All pages were then assembled into a web site using links and navigation menus and uploaded to your server, together with all other files needed to make your website work – script libraries, images, media elements, etc.
(image source:adobe.com)
Only after everything passed testing and performed the way it was supposed to (and looking how a client had wanted it to look), was the website deemed to have been finished and ready to go live.
Then, web design “templates” were developed”. Web templates allow design elements of the web site to be created separately from the page content. Having template elements helped to speed up the process of developing web sites and resulted in lowered costs of production. This also allowed web developers to work with business clients with smaller marketing budgets …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As the number of businesses adopting “template-based” web design services increased, templates were developed that provided a number of custom options, like the ability to switch colors, styles, layouts
As web sites and website editing tools evolved, web templates also started to transform into web templating ”systems”, which enabled website owners and website developers to manage their website’s visual components.
Then, WordPress was introduced 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:
The WordPress Theme
WordPress themes push the concept of a website template system further.
The WordPress theme system controls every aspect of your site’s design. It allows you to add a “skin” over your entire site similarly to what a web template system does but also provides you with more control over the management, appearance and customization of template settings.
As WordPress has explained in its official web 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 in the quote above, a unique and revolutionary feature of WordPress is that how your site appears to visitors does not affect your site’s functional aspects (e.g. content management and functionality).
In plain English terms, what this means is that themes let you modify the look and feel of your website 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 WP website has been configured for e-commerce, changing the entire look of your site with another theme won’t affect the content or the functionality of the website. All e-commerce features, site settings and product information will remain unaffected, but your site will look completely different.
Why is this great news for business owners?
Because when you use WordPress, you no longer need to wait until your site’s web design is completed. You can get your business website built simply and get started with any theme you like, and completely change the look, feel and design of your website in mere minutes, whenever you decide … and as many times as you like!
Even better, you can easily replace any theme on your site without requiring any web code programming skills. Just pick any theme you like, install it on your site and activate it. WordPress allows you to change your website design and modify elements like headers, page layout, styling options and more in less than a few minutes …
Because WordPress is made available as open source software, hundreds of web design companies all around the world can design themes specifically for the WP CMS platform using the WP template system.
This means that loads of high quality WordPress themes can be downloaded by WordPress users. Themes are generally distributed for Free under the terms of the GNU License Definition, or they can be purchased as Premium (i.e. paid) WP themes.
The WordPress team keeps a FREE theme directory which gives WordPress users access thousands of great themes completely free of charge …
(WordPress.org – WP Theme Directory)
As the popularity of WordPress increases, more designers are now focusing on developing themes for a wider range of uses.
WordPress themes range from corporate-looking, to quirky designs that are quite beautiful and would easily cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars to commission. Surprisingly, most premium WordPress themes can be purchased quite cheaply, especially when you compare the price to what it would have cost you if a web designer had to develop it from scratch.
You can see several WordPress theme galleries containing stunning examples of WordPress themes in this article:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
Benefits & Advantages Of Using WordPress Themes
Here are just some of the many benefits of using WordPress themes over choosing traditional website design:
Fast Installation
Themes are quite easy to install on your site. Just upload the plugin file to your Plugins folder via your admin user login and activate. Even easier still, you can install any of the themes listed in the themes repository at WordPress.org) directly from your WordPress admin’s “Theme” section.
Additionally …
- WordPress has a thriving online community of professional web developers and development companies who, collectively, make thousands of quality WP Themes available to WP users. Many of these themes are completely free to use!
- Themes give sites a consistent “look and feel” across all of the blog’s elements, like pages, headers, footers, layouts, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your web site’s content. This means you can replace WordPress themes as often as you need without changing the website’s underlying settings.
- Many WP themes provide built-in functionality and options that allow you to customize the site’s layout, style and design properties to create a unique look to suit your business.
- Many WordPress themes are built using a framework that enables you to upgrade the theme to a newer theme version without losing any unique customizations (e.g. CSS styles)
- WordPress lets you search, upload and install WordPress Themes automatically from the site’s administration interface.
- WP themes helps you save hundreds, even thousands of dollars on website design costs. Free themes cost nothing and most “Premium”themes are typically very affordable.
Responsive Theme Design
Many theme designers are now developing themes that incorporate “responsive” functionality.
A responsive theme allows websites to automatically resize to display smoothly across different monitor sizes and screen resolutions, as well as different devices (e.g. computers, tablets, smart phones, etc.) …
A responsive theme is also optimized for different platforms. Users can navigate, read and display a site on all device browsers without having to resize anything, or requiring the website owner to install additional themes.
Note: When selecting, WordPress themes, we recommend choosing a responsive WordPress theme. Not only will a responsive theme ensure that the content and layout of your site displays well on all devices, it also means that the theme is newer than most non-responsive themes and therefore probably complies with the latest standards and practices of web design and coding.
Hopefully, the above overview has helped you gain a better understanding of WordPress themes, what themes are, how they help you and your business save money on web development costs, and how WP themes make customizing websites easy.
To learn where to find great WP themes for your blog, click here:
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"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group
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