Selecting the right WordPress theme can be downright puzzling, with literally thousands of options to evaluate. But have no fear! By the end of this comprehensive yet friendly guide, you‘ll be equipped with insider tips to confidently navigate the WordPress theme landscape.
First, quick question: Do you currently manage a WordPress based website? Or are you building a new one from scratch? Either way, themes influence the entire user experience so choosing wisely matters.
What exactly are WordPress themes?
At a basic level, themes control the appearance, layouts, and features available for your site. They allow you to take a raw WordPress install and transform it into a beautiful, functional site tailored to your brand.
But WordPress themes encompass more than just skin-deep aesthetics. Here are 5 core elements themes shape:
1. Site structure: Themes provide default layouts, menu locations, widget regions, and content blocks. For example, ecommerce themes include product galleries, shopping carts, and checkout functionality.
2. Visual design: This includes color schemes, typography, and graphic stylistic elements that set site-wide visual design language.
3. Features: Based on site type, themes bundle relevant features like slideshows, subscription forms, social media integration etc.
4. Customization: Better themes offer customization capabilities to tweak site to match your brand identity without coding.
5. Performance: Optimized lean code, efficient queries, image handling etc. impact site speed and scalability.
In summary, themes allow us to build professional WordPress sites and blogs to achieve our goals without extensive development skills.
With over 10,000+ free and premium themes available, selecting the perfect one can definitely feel head spinning!
By following the dos and don‘ts ahead along with evaluating themes across above 5 facets, you‘ll nail down an ideal theme in no time.
Why go with WordPress and what role do themes play?
With over 43% market share of all websites, WordPress absolutely dominates the content management system landscape. Reasons abound:
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User friendly interface: Intuitive dashboard allows easy content creation and site management.
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Open source and free: Base WordPress platform has no licensing cost. Thousands of free themes and plugins expand functionality.
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Ease of use: No coding expertise needed to launch fairly sophisticated sites thanks to abundance of themes.
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Scalability: Handles enterprise-grade traffic yet ideal for personal blogs allowing endless growth.
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Flexibility: Easily create blogs, ecommerce stores, portfolios, magazines etc. Technology agnostic to adopt any tech stack.
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Search engine friendly: Optimized for SEO success right out the box – themes further help.
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Huge ecosystem: From hosts to developers, extensive community support speeds solutions.
With WitPress revealing over 455 million WordPress sites now active globally, its position continues strengthening.
And within the WordPress environment, themes are the foundation.
Well coded, fast and secure themes set sites up for success. Testing themes to optimize UX and conversions before launch is a must.
Let‘s drill into the exact dos and don‘ts to account for when choosing your ideal WordPress theme.
11 Theme Selection Dos
When assessing themes, keep these best practices in mind:
According to HubSpot, confusing navigation is a top reason 61% of visitors leave a disappointing site. Prioritize intuitive menus and layouts in your theme. Testing before buying is crucial.
2. Match features needed
E-commerce sites need product pages, carts etc while multipage blogs should highlight post formats. Ensure your theme delivers core functionality for your goals.
3. Allow for customization
Customization promotes uniqueness. Seek themes with flexible layouts, design options etc. WordPress Customizer speeds up changes without coding.
4. Security as top priority
Themes drive security. Vet them to confirm regular updates, no vulnerabilities. Outdated deserted themes risk 59% more threats.
5. Mobile responsiveness
With over 63% of traffic now mobile, responsive mobile-friendly themes are essential. Test resizing and layouts across devices.
6. SEO optimized code
The right metadata, URL structure and accessibility improvements offered by themes allows up to 2x higher search engine rankings.
7. Check plugin compatibility
If key functionality requires certain plugins, test integration with your shortlisted themes. Conflicts cause 32% of post launch issues.
8. Accessibility focused
ADA compliant accessible themes expand your audience reach by nearly 57% by ensuring content reaches more users.
9. Multilingual abilities
Themes with built-in translation features or compatibility with plugins allow tapping into global non-English markets valued at $1.5 trillion.
10. Well documented
Look for extensive theme documentation. Good docs means you save approx. $265 per theme in support costs.
11. Stellar support
Even with great documentation, access to responsive customer support still matters when launching any vital site.
Let‘s explore what to avoid when assessing themes…
9 Don‘ts for WordPress Theme Selection
These pitfalls often plague theme options so be sure to avoid:
1. Bloated code
Too many unnecessary features bog down performance. Light and lean promotes 196% faster load times.
2. Overly stylized fonts
Fancy cursive or intricately stylized fonts hurt readability and accessiblity. Keep body text simple.
3. Limited customization
Lack of options to tweak pages and components to suit your brand limits uniqueness by 47%.
4. Cookie cutter error pages
Generic 404s and errors feel uncaring and lack useful navigation. Match error pages to other branding.
5. Outdated designs
While trendy themes excite initially, clean future-proof options have wider appeal and lifespan. Classic works.
6. Unpopular niche themes
Hidden gems happen but generally popular themes have more community support, updates etc. Trust the 4.5+ star ratings.
7. Excessive built-in ads
Too many ads seem spammy, divert focus from content and destroy UX. Keep just 2-3 maximum.
8. Bare bones themes
Too sparse templates still require heavy lifting to realize your vision – not ideal for lean teams without robust design skills.
9. No demo site
Being unable to test drive a theme prior to purchase is always a red flag.
Taking the time upfront to thoroughly evaluate themes across above factors will pay off tremendously with a high performance website optimized to fuel your growth and accomplish your online business goals.
Now that you know what to look for and what to avoid, let‘s tackle a few other key considerations…
With thousands of free WordPress themes at your fingertips, is paying for premium themes worth it? Consider pros and cons:
Free Theme Pros
- No financial investment to test and use themes
- Some free themes nearly as robust as paid
- Okay for basic sites or testing concepts
Free Theme Cons
- Limited quality support
- More security vulnerabilities
- Less customization options
- More coding skills required
- Less consistent updates
Premium Theme Pros
- Higher quality code and compliance
- Better support and documentation
- Frequent security and feature updates
- More customization options
- Some include page builders
Premium Theme Cons
- Added cost of between $29-$299 typically
- Subscription models can get expensive
- Hard to deeply evaluate before purchase
The Best Route:
Start with quality free theme options like Astra, OceanWP, GeneratePress etc. Upgrade to premium later if gaps emerge for more advanced functionality.
Popular paid theme developers to evaluate include Elementor, Thrive Themes, Elegant Themes and StudioPress.
Optimizing theme speed
With site speed a ranking factor, optimize the visual appeal vs performance equation.
- Leaner themes with clean code run faster – eliminate unnecessary scripts.
- Pay attention to image optimization, compression and lazy loading.
- Utilize browser, server and content delivery network caching.
- Enable GZIP compression and leverage browser caching.
- Monitor site speed and user behavior flow to isolate problem areas.
Fast performing themes increase organic traffic by nearly 53% according to Search Engine Journal. Keep speed top priority!
Digging into customization
Many assume custom coding is required to tailored themes. With WordPress Customizer, this is no longer true.
The built-in WordPress Customizer offers a user friendly drag and drop interface to:
- Preview site changes in real time
- Modify layouts, fonts, colors and design elements
- Alter menu placements
- Switch enabled features
- Configure widgets and sidebars
- Tweak theme settings
For more advanced customization needs, modifying the underlying theme files directly allows precise control.
Pro tip: Utilize child themes before editing any parent purchased theme code! This protects against losing settings during parent theme updates.
Now let‘s tackle testing and launch success…
Thoroughly vetting themes before launching
Too often folks pick a theme based on screenshots or demos without extensive evaluation. This leads to preventable post-launch headaches.
Follow these 7 steps to fully test drive shortlisted themes:
1. Review demos
Do designs align to brand style and site goals? How is usability?
2. Check core web vitals
Page speed tests. SEO audits. Mobile friendliness checks.
3. Compare key features
Upload product images for e-commerce site. Toggle slideshows for blogs. Form functionality etc.
4. Customize design elements
Fonts, colors, layouts. What customization exists sans coding?
5. Utilize available support
Submit tickets with presale questions to test response times/effectiveness.
6. Thoroughly comb documentation
Is it well organized? Searchable? Sufficient to guide setup?
7. Read latest user reviews
Any recurring complaints about spam, lack of updates, conflicts etc?
This upfront testing process pays massive dividends helping select the optimal theme while identifying any gaps for plugins and custom efforts.
Migrating from an old theme
Once you’ve selected a promising new theme, how do you safely switch?
Follow this process:
Back up existing site files and database so you can revert just in case. Cloud backups like BlogVault automatically handle this.
Install and customize new theme on staging copy of site first. Get all settings dialed in before promoting live.
Use migration plugin like WP Theme Switcher to automatically port menus, widgets etc saving hours of rebuilding. Be cautious of potential theme conflicts during migration.
301 redirect old URLs to new theme URL structure to prevent broken links and preserve SEO juice.
Test rigorously across devices before launching officially. Have other team members provide second set of eyes to find issues.
Take it slow. With systematic vetting and migrations, your new theme will support your growth vs hinder it!
Post launch: Monitoring user behavior
Set up site analytics using Google Analytics.
Closely monitor:
Bounce rates: High bounce rates may indicate theme usability issues. Compare rates across top pages.
Pages per visit: More pages visited implies visitors engaged by themes. Low numbers signal navigation confusion.
Conversion funnel: How many landing page visitors become subscribers, make a purchase etc? Where do they fall out?
Mobile experience: Slower speeds? High exit rates on phones/tablets? That’s bad news for mobile first world.
Site speed: How do real world load times stack up? Test site with PageSpeed Insights.
Create custom reports highlighting exactly how your new theme is performing against your KPIs like revenue, conversions etc.
Ongoing tuning will help maximize new theme success!
Nice work! You now have a solid handle on intelligently navigating the WordPress themes universe.
Remember to:
- Align to your brand and site goals from UX to security
- Test potential themes exhaustively before launch
- Adhere to speed and customization best practices
- Continuously monitor analytics around themes
Here‘s to launching your best WordPress site yet! Please drop any other questions in comments below.
