Flexible content management systems like the WordPress CMS have truly simplified web design and web development for non-technical users.
This is great for business owners wanting a website that they can manage.
Before “blogging” and the development of powerful content management systems, if you needed to get a website built for your business, you had to wait until both the web development and web design processes were fully completed. This process could mean weeks, even sometimes many months of waiting for the work to be done!
The introduction of WordPress themes changed all this. In this article, we take a look at what themes are, how themes can help you and your business save money, and how WP themes allow you to easily customize your site.
Web Design Evolution
More businesses today are benefiting from an evolution in web design that began shortly after websites were first introduced. If you own a small business, you will want to learn about this, because it could save you thousands of dollars on website development or web design costs.
Let’s briefly take a look at what used to happen before WordPress were introduced:
First, you would meet with a website developer or web site designer for a brief. After that, the “web design” itself would be discussed and agreed upon. This meant spending time and money with someone with web design skills discussing design elements of your web site like the layout, colors, styles, graphic elements, content, etc.
Every page of your site then had to be hand-coded with all of your design elements and scripts coded around the page content. The pages were then assembled into a website using links and 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 once everything had been tested and worked how it should (and looking the way the client had imagined it to look), was the website deemed to be finished and ready to go live.
Then, web design “templates” were developed”. A website template allows ”look and feel” elements of the web site to be created separately from the page content. Having templates helped make the process of site development faster and resulted in lowered costs of production. This also allowed web development firms to service smaller business clients and clients with smaller marketing budgets …
(image source: www.dreamweaver-templates.org)
As the number of small businesses choosing “template-based” websites increased, templates were designed that could provide expanding custom features and options, such as color palettes, the ability to specify different formats or elements, and so on.
As websites and website editor software evolved, website templates also started to transform into web template “systems” that let users control the visual elements of their website.
Then, a “blogging” application called WordPress was introduced and helped to kick off 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
A WordPress theme takes web template systems further.
A WordPress theme controls the design elements of your web site. It lets you add a “skin” over your site similarly to what a website template system does but it provides you with complete control over the management, presentation and customization aspects of your site’s template settings.
As stated in 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 stated in the quote above, one of the unique and revolutionary features of WordPress is that how your site appears to visitors is a completely separate system from the management of your content.
In simple terms, what this means is that a theme lets you modify the design of your site as much and as often as you want without modifying your site’s content and all the work you’ve put into it. For example, if WordPress website has been set up for e-commerce, replacing the theme won’t affect the content or the functionality of the website. All e-commerce features, settings and product information will remain unaffected, but your site will look completely different.
This is important. Why?
Because with WordPress, you no longer have to wait until your website’s design is done. You can get your business website built quickly and get started with any theme you want, and then change the entire look, feel and design of your website in mere minutes, whenever you choose … and as many times as you like!
Even better, you can easily replace any theme on your WP site with no website design knowledge required. Just choose a WordPress theme you want, install it on your website and activate it. WordPress lets you change your web design and customize elements like header images, page layout, styling options and more in a few seconds …
Since WordPress is distributed as open source software, hundreds of web design companies can design themes specifically for the WP CMS platform using the WP templating system.
This means that loads of high quality WP themes are made available to WordPress users. WordPress are normally distributed freely under the terms of the GNU General Public License Definition, or they can be purchased as Premium (i.e. paid) WordPress themes.
The WordPress development team maintains a FREE theme directory which gives WordPress users access thousands of great web templates completely free of charge …
(WordPress.org – Free WP Theme Directory)
As more businesses turn to WordPress for publishing and managing their digital presence, more designers are now focused on developing themes for a wider range of users.
WP themes range from functional-looking, to elegant designs that are simply breathtaking and would normally cost many hundreds of dollars to design. Surprisingly, most themes are really inexpensive to buy.
You can see a number of WP theme galleries containing many examples of great themes in this post:
(Browse Thousands Of FREE WordPress Themes!)
Benefits Of Themes
Here are just a few of the benefits of using WordPress themes over using traditional website design:
Be Up And Running In No Time
WordPress themes are quite easy to install on your site. Just upload it to your Plugins folder via your WordPress admin account and activate. Even easier still, you can install any of the themes listed in the themes directory at WordPress.org) directly from your WP admin’s “Theme” section.
Additionally,
- WordPress has a thriving online community of commercial web developers and development companies who make thousands of excellent WordPress Themes available to users. And many of these themes are 100% free to use!
- Themes give sites a unified and consistent “look and feel” across all your site’s elements, i.e. pages, headers, footers, layout, etc …
- A “theme” works independently of your blog’s content. This makes it possible to swap the “look and feel” of your website as often as you want without disturbing the content.
- Many WordPress themes come with additional built-in functionality and options that let you customize your theme’s style and design properties to create a unique look to suit your needs.
- Many WP themes are built using a framework that allows users to upgrade themes to newer theme versions without losing any customizations (e.g. CSS styles)
- WordPress lets you search, import, install and update WordPress Themes automatically from the site’s administration interface.
- WordPress themes allow WP users to save hundreds of dollars on website design costs. Free WordPress themes cost nothing and most “Premium”themes are typically very affordable.
Responsive Themes
Many theme developers are now developing “responsive” themes for WordPress.
A responsive theme enables a website to automatically readjust the web layout to display smoothly across different monitor sizes and screen resolutions, as well as across different devices (e.g. PCs, iPads, cell phones, etc.) …
A responsive theme is also optimized for each device type. Users can scroll, read and load a site on various device browsers without having to resize anything, or requiring the website owner to have installed additional display elements.
Note: When purchasing WordPress themes, it’s a good idea to choose a responsive WordPress theme. Not only will the theme ensure that your website displays well across all devices, but it also means that the theme is newer than non-responsive themes and therefore probably complies with the latest standards and practices of website design.
Hopefully, the above article has given you a better overview of themes, what WP themes are, how WordPress themes can help you and your business save money on web development costs, and how themes make it easy to customize a WP site.
To learn where to search for the best WordPress themes for your website or blog, go here:
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"Learning WordPress has been a huge stumbling block for me. I've been looking for something that covers absolutely everything but doesn't cost an arm and a leg. Thank you so much ... you have just provided me with what I have been looking for! Truly appreciated!" - Tanya
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