Finding a WordPress Theme
This past week I’ve been searching for a new theme for my website. It seems that there are hundreds of themes out there–some free, and some for-fee. In searching through the different sites, I found so many that were just unsuitable for a business website. If you are creating a personal blog, or a blog on a specific subject, you will most definitely find the perfect theme.
But finding a business theme with the ability to customize the way you want, without a lot of trouble and trial, can be difficult. Depending on the style of the site you want, there are a few things to look for in a business theme.
- Navigation: If you are using WordPress as a “blogsite” instead of just a blog, you will most likely want a navigation bar showing your pages as links. While many themes do include that as an option, I found several themes that would have been perfect if they’d just have had the navigation bar as part of the layout.
- Columns: WordPress themes typically have one, two or three column layouts. The position of those columns can vary between themes. As a business owner, your website serves a dual purpose: not only are you conveying information to your current clients and customers, you are marketing to new prospects. You will want to have a theme that allows for flexibility with the column structure, allowing you to have pages with a single right-hand column for your opt-in box, and a page with no columns at all for a sales page.
- Static Friendly: Many WordPress themes lend themselves to using your blog as your main page. With a blogsite, however, you are more likely to use a static page as the main page with your blog being further down the navigation bar. Choose a theme that is not blog dependent (like a magazine theme) unless you do plan on blogging quite frequently.
So where are some good theme resources? Here are a few links that I found this past week. I found my theme (and many other good ones) by searching these theme lists.
WordPress Themes
Rockin Themes
WordPress Themes Base
Where have you found good WordPress themes? Comment and let me know!
~R
My favorite themes are the ones from http://studiopress.com I also like the themes at http://themeforest.net/category/wordpress
By far the best and my favorite themes to customize are at http://studiopress.com. They have an A-plus support forum too.
Thanks Michelle and Cyndi! I do like Brian Gardner’s themes too. I worked with a couple for a client and they are really sharp. They tend to lend themselves more to a “magazine” style website, don’t they? I find that the sites I create for my business tend to be more “websites based on WordPress” than actual blog-sites. As you can see…. lol
I know this is an older post, buy I just found your site and blog and wanted to offer my thoughts. I got into WordPress back in the late Fall and very quickly found modifying other’s WordPress themes to be very time consuming. I discovered a product called Artisteer (www.artisteer.com) and have been using it for several months. I’ve designed about four themes for clients and they really liked them. Also, regarding columns, I just installed the WP Post Columns plug in which allows you to set up columns in a WordPress page/post which eliminates the need to use tables to have columns.
Julia – Thanks for sharing! I’ve seen some themes with Artisteer and they look really sharp. How simple is it to use? And if you find a theme created in Artisteer online, can you import it into Artisteer and edit it? I’d found a theme online for a client that I loved, but needed to make a couple tweaks to it. The CSS coding was so complex ’cause it was created in Artisteer. I would love to learn of a great solution for editing it!