Flexible content publishing technologies like the WordPress CMS have effectively improved web design and web development for users.
This is a great thing for entrepreneurial-minded people that want to own a website that is easy to manage.
Prior to blogging and the development of advanced content management systems, if you wanted a business web site, you had to wait until both the website development and website design processes were completely done. This could take many weeks, sometimes even many months!
WordPress themes have changed all this. In this post, you will learn what themes are, how WP themes help your business save money, and how WordPress themes allow you to easily customize your site.
Web Site Design Revolution
Businesses, especially small businesses, have benefited from a revolution in web design that began shortly after websites were first introduced. If you are a small business owner, you will want to learn about this, because it can save you thousands of dollars on website development and website design costs.
Let’s go over how things worked in “traditional” web design before application like WordPress came along:
First, you would discuss your requirements with a web site development company or web site designer. After this, the “web design” would be discussed and agreed upon. This meant spending time and money with a professional web site designer discussing areas of your site like the, colours, formats, graphic elements, content, etc.
Every page of your web site then had to be individually created with the elements and codes inserted into the page content. All the pages were then assembled into a web site using hyperlinks and custom coded navigation menus and uploaded to your server, along with every other file needed to make your site work – script libraries, images, media elements, etc.
(image source:adobe.com)
Only after everything passed testing and performed the way it was intended to (and looking how a client had imagined it to look), was the site considered as being finished and ready to go live.
Then, web design “templates” came along”. Website templates allow the design of the web site to be worked on separately from content on the page. The introduction of ready-made templates helped to make the process of building websites faster and resulted in reduced production costs. This also allowed website development firms to service business clients with smaller budgets …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As more website development agencies began adopting “template-based” websites, templates started being created that could offer different custom options, such as colour palettes, the ability to pick different formats or elements, etc …
As websites and web building software evolved, web templates also began to transform into web templating “systems” that let website owners and web developers manage the visual aspects of a web site.
And then, a “blogging” tool called WordPress was introduced and helped to start a new digital publishing 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 improve the concept of a website template system further.
A WP theme controls and unifies every aspect of your web design. It allows you to add a “skin” to your entire site similarly to what a web template system does but also provides users with more control over the management, presentation and ability to customize your site’s template settings.
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 in the quote above, one of the unique and revolutionary features of WordPress is that how your website appears to visitors externally is kept independent of your site’s functionality and content management.
In simple terms, what this means is that you can modify the design of your website as much and as often as you like without affecting your site’s content and all the functionality you’ve built into it. For example, if WP site 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, plugin settings and product information will remain intact, but the site will look completely different.
This is important. Why?
Because when your site is built with WordPress, you no longer need to wait until your website’s design is completed. You can get your business website built quickly and start with any WP theme you like, and change the entire look, feel and design of your website in mere minutes, whenever you want … and as many times as you like!
Even better, you can easily install a theme on your WP site without requiring any website design knowledge. Simply choose any WP theme you like, install it on your site and activate it. WordPress allows you to change your web design and modify elements like headers, layout, styling options and more with just a few mouse clicks …
Because WordPress is made available as open source software, commercial web design companies can design themes specifically for the WordPress CMS platform using the WP template system.
This means that thousands of high quality WP themes are made available to WP users. WordPress are usually distributed for Free under the terms of the GNU License Definition, or sold as Premium (i.e. paid) WordPress themes.
The WordPress team maintains a FREE theme directory which allows WordPress users to access thousands of great WordPress themes for free …
(WordPress.org – WP Theme Directory)
As WordPress becomes more popular, more designers are now starting to develop themes for a wider audience of web users.
WordPress themes range from professional-looking, to fancy designs that are visually breathtaking and could typically cost thousands of dollars to commission. Surprisingly, most premium WordPress themes can be purchased quite cheaply, especially when you compare the cost to what you would have been charged if a website designer had to build it from scratch.
You can see several WordPress theme galleries containing various examples of great premium WP themes here:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
WP Themes – Benefits & Advantages
Here are just a few of the benefits and advantages of choosing WordPress themes over using traditional website design:
Be Up And Running In Minutes
Themes are quite easy to install on your site. Just upload a zip folder containing the plugin to your Plugins folder via your WP admin account and activate. Even easier still, you can install any of the themes listed in the themes directory at WordPress.org) directly from within your WordPress dashboard.
Additionally …
- WordPress has a growing online community of commercial website developers and development companies who make thousands of great WordPress Themes available to users. Thousands of these themes are completely free to use!
- Themes give sites a consistent design across all your blog’s elements, like pages, headers, footers, layouts, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your website’s content. This makes it possible to replace the “look and feel” of your templates as often as you like without deleting the blog’s underlying settings.
- Many WordPress themes come with additional built-in functionality and options that enable you to customize your site’s layout and design properties and create a unique look to suit your business.
- Many WordPress themes are built using a framework that enables users to update the theme to a newer theme version without losing any customizations (e.g. CSS styles)
- WordPress allows you to search, upload, install and update WordPress Themes automatically within your site’s administration interface.
- WordPress themes helps you save hundreds, even thousands of dollars on website development costs. Free themes cost nothing and most “Premium”WordPress themes are typically very affordable.
About Responsive Themes
Many theme developers are now creating themes that incorporate “responsive” design protocols.
A responsive theme enables websites to automatically reconfigure the layout to display smoothly over different screen sizes and resolutions, as well as across different devices (e.g. laptops, iPads, cell phones, etc.) …
A responsive theme is also optimized for each platform. Users can scroll, read and load your site on a range of devices without having to resize anything, or requiring the website owner to install additional display elements.
Note: When selecting, WordPress themes, we strongly recommend choosing a responsive WordPress theme. Not only will the theme ensure that your website 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 website design.
Hopefully, the above overview has given you a clearer understanding of themes, what WP themes are, how themes help your business save money, and how themes make it easy to customize your WP site.
To learn where to find great themes for your website, go here:
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