You have finally decided to build your WordPress blog or website but you still don’t know how it should look like.
First of all choosing WordPress is an excellent choice for 3 reasons:
- It’s fast
- It’s easy
- It’s free but…
But, if you are using your blog for your business or to attract a large amount of readers, using the default theme will make you look like everyone else which is not good for business.
You can still obtain free themes or you can spend from your business budget and obtain a premium WordPress theme.
Before doing anything, you should research so that you know the difference between free and paid WordPress themes:
1. Functionality
You will notice the difference between the two due to one very obvious reason: one type is free and the other, premium, is paid.
If you are asked to pay for a website, there will be obvious aspects of the theme that make it premium, such as different layouts or increased functionality.
The default theme is very minimal in its functionality options which is just one of the reasons that this is a non-paid theme.
2. Support
The support that you receive should be of quality if you opt for a paid WordPress theme. Theme designers test and retest their themes to assure the end user that the end product will be user friendly and free of viruses and any bugs in the system.
There are also add-ons and extensions that you can purchase to extend the use of your theme, and some are even free. It is also noteworthy to mention that the support you receive if you have paid for a theme comes freely given.
3. Design & SEO
The main difference between the two is that the designer of a premium theme will pay much more attention to the design and the outcome of the theme, whereas designers of free themes do not put in as much work to ensure that the theme will work correctly simply because there is truly nothing in it for them except for the notoriety.
Not to mention that premium theme is designed more optimally for Search Engine Optimization – SEO. Don’t forget you want your pages ranking high in major search engines.
4. Update
From a premium theme provider you can expect frequent and regular updates. Free ones tend to be “forgotten” through the years by their creators.
Conclusion
I think that spending less than $100 for your premium design is a good investment. Professional looking blog or website will surely attract more visitors, and more visitors mean more sales.
I personally use and highly recommend StudioPress themes based on the Genesis Framework.
If you’re just starting your site I’m sure you want a mobile responsive design with iPhone, iPad etc.
Is your site running on a free or paid platform? As always I’d like to hear your experiences and thoughts on this.
Don’t forget to leave your comments below…
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My opinion
Free templates
What’s great about free templates? Well, they’re free. They are also very abundant. You really do have quite a lot to choose from. If you don’t like a certain template after using it for a bit, ditching it doesn’t mean any loss in investment aside from time. Free templates also give you some good experience using different developers’ work. There are sometimes idiosyncrasies that you have to work around, and figuring this out without spending money is a good thing.
On the downside of free templates, you have the obvious quality issues. There are most definitely some very decent free templates out there that are even suitable for a small to medium production website; however, the majority of free templates are very basic or sometimes even buggy. Realize that developers often use free templates to draw in customers to their paid site or club subscriptions. This is fine, and it’s a great service if you’re able to use a decent template in exchange for a little marketing on the developer’s part. Just realize that most of their energy is probably spent making the commercial templates the best that they can be, not the free ones.
Some developers will require that you leave a link back to their website included somewhere on your site if you use their free templates. Find this out before you build your site, and make sure you’re OK with including this link.
Commercial templates
Just because a template costs money, doesn’t mean that it works and looks better or is more stable and safe. The main consideration here is definitely the developer, not how much or little the template costs. Do some research on the developer or company that you intend to purchase from.
There is a wide variety in the look and feel of each template developer’s offerings, but another thing to consider is what different functionality they focus on in their templates. For instance, some developers spend a good amount of resources integrating eCommerce platforms like VirtueMart, while others are very good at media integration.
The other thing to consider is the framework each developer uses, if any. RocketTheme has developed Gantry and WebsiteBamboo uses Zen Grid. Warp, Morph and T3 are some of the others to check out. A template framework should make administering the site template easier without requiring a Ph.D. to learn. You can usually get a glimpse at them without having to purchase a template to do so.
Desktop software
If you are already developing your own websites, then some of your current tools may have Website integration that you may or may not be aware of. For instance, beginning with Dreamweaver CS5 (and 5.5) has some direct integration with CMS systems, including Website. So if you’ve been using this program for some time, you may be able to learn this method of creating or modifying Website templates relatively quickly, especially if you’re already familiar with connecting Dreamweaver to local and remote sites.
There are also other web development tools that are gaining popularity. It’s particularly interesting to see Microsoft getting involved in open source products.
Other options
You can always just design your own template too. If you have design skills, but lack the programming skills to complete the job on your own, there are loads of contractors out there these days that can code it for you at a reasonable rate.
If you already have HTML/CSS and some basic PHP skills, you can always learn how to create your own Website templates, especially if you have a good eye for design and know how to use web design tools like Photoshop and Illustrator. Starting with a framework can even accelerate the process for development if you have a good head start with the tech know how.
Hi Dejan,
I’m impressed by your comprehensive comment. Thanks for sharing your opinion with us.
Wow, between the review and Dejan’s comment there is nothing else I can add!
VERY informative post as always.
Hi Melodie,
I told Dejan that his comment is much better than my post :). After all he is an excellent IT expert.
Cheers
I was about to say that people could use free templates for their design, but I see that’s already covered by Dejan Majkic. Everything is already here, what a great post/comment!