Welcome back
Now that you have the foundation and framework for your new business firmly in place, it is time to think about adding your own style and content to match your brand or the self image of your business.
WordPress uses Themes to add style sheets and predefined settings to your pages and posts.
So let’s take a look at Themes to see what they are and what they can do for us, to make building and running our business website easier and less time consuming.
WordPress Themes
In WordPress, a theme is a collection of templates and stylesheets used to define the appearance and display of a WordPress powered website.
They can be changed, managed, and added from the WordPress admin area under Appearance » Themes. There is a multitude of free and paid WordPress Themes available.
Let me tell you a little of my backstory regarding Themes.
I spent the first two extremely frustrating years, working on my website and never achieving the appearance and quality that represented the vision of my ideal brand.
I wasted a ton of time, trying to learn how to work with complicated and generalized templates/themes.
I couldn’t get the support I needed and spent countless hours trying to learn what I needed from YouTube or poorly written documentation that comes with most free WordPress Themes.
It nearly drove me out of my mind.
As a female business owner and Jewelry Designer, the themes I worked with were too streamlined or masculine in appearance. They did not project the image I had for myself, let alone my business.
Part of the frustration was my own fault. I did not have my business planned out and I had not done the work to clearly define my brand and my target audiences.
Once I remedied those issues, I was ready to find Themes that portrayed my ideal image, were easy to use and modify and that provided the support needed for success.
Free versus Paid Themes
There are pros and cons to choosing a free or paid theme and the most obvious one is cost.
But there are many other factors to consider when you are ready to choose a theme.
Check out the info below for a realistic comparison.
Key Factors
- Cost
- Ease of Use
- Documentation and Tutorials
- Time Consumption
- Functionality
- Current Compatibility
Free themes are great if you are experienced with WordPress and have time to find good documentation or tutorials on how to use them.
In my experience this is not easy to do. Sure, many of them have great initial set up videos or walkthroughs, but once the basics are covered, you are on your own to figure out all the rest.
The documentation is often written very technically and is hard for a layperson to understand. It is very time consuming and frustrating, especially if you can not find well written or in-depth video tutorials to guide you.
When you start browsing for free themes, you will find, that many may have not been updated or tested with the current version of WordPress.
I have found that the free version of most themes provide limited functionality, and you are constantly prompted to upgrade to the pro version.
Some free themes do not provide, one on one support, unless you upgrade to the pro version.
Using a professional theme is the easiest way to get the style and appearance you desire for your website.
Most provide updates to keep them compatible with WordPress and plugins.
The developers usually provide at least 1 year of one on one support.
Many include branding materials, such as stock photos used in the creation of the theme.
A professional theme includes lots of extra functions right out of the gate, no extra purchases or upgrades.
These themes are much less time consuming and easier to use because you are provided with better documentation and support.
Widgets and Added Features
Ad Ready Themes
Newsletter and Email Widgets
Social Media Widgets
Design and Menu Widgets
SEO Friendly
A WordPress Widget is a small block that performs a specific function. You can add these widgets in sidebars also known as widget-ready areas on your web page.
WordPress provides several widgets originally created to provide a simple and easy-to-use way of giving design and structure control of the WordPress theme to the user.
Many themes, whether free or paid also add additional widgets to WordPress. So look for themes that provide helpful and easily managed widgets.
Also look for themes that are optimized for search engine compatibility and that are either ad ready or offer widgets for placing ads.
Great Feminine Themes
Now that you understand what Themes are and what features and elements to look for, let’s take a look at a few great options that I have found.
I am so pleased with them, that I am now an affiliate for these companies and can highly recommend them with confidence.
Head over to my Sugar and Code resource page and check out the gorgeous Theme Kits they offer.
I currently use Blogging Babe on my website and it changed my life this year.
Sugar and Code specialize in feminine themes designed to empower women in the Business world.
All of Jess’s Web Design Kits are packed with all the site features and extras you need to build a gorgeous feminine website.
Plus she has awesome, step by step tutorials to walk you through setting up and using your theme. And she is quick to respond when you need support.
She makes it easy to build your business and your brand.
- Beautiful Responsive Designs
- Mobile Friendly
- Lifetime Updates
- Great Price
- Bonus Content
- Genesis Framework and Child Theme Included
- Awesome Support
Bluchic is another company devoted to creating beautiful Web Design Kits for Business Women.
Check out my Bluchic page to see the gorgeous kits and details.
Andrew and Kathie are a husband and wife team, whose designs make it easy for you to build your website and your brand.
- Beautiful Responsive Designs
- Mobile Friendly
- Lifetime Updates
- Great Price
- Bonus Content
- Social Media Features
- Time Limited Support
Blossom Themes is another provider of feminine SEO friendly, features-rich and easy to use WordPress themes.
They offer several themes with free and pro versions.
Each Pro theme is available to install yourself for $49.00 or Theme installation and set-up for $99.00.
Blossom is one of those providers I mentioned earlier.
The have some very nice free themes, but to get all the great features and functions, you are going to have to upgrade.
Blossom also has two Theme Club options that give you access to all Blossom Themes.
- 1 year access to all WordPress themes
- 1 year access to new theme releases
- 1 year access to support and updates
- Install on unlimited domains (unlimited site licenses)
- Lifetime access to all WordPress themes
- Lifetime access to new theme releases
- Lifetime access to support & updates
- Install on unlimited domains (unlimited site licenses)
Installing and Activating Themes
There are several ways to install themes into WordPress.
Notice in the image that Appearance is highlighted in the Navigation panel on my WordPress dashboard and that I have selected the Themes section.
From this Work Area, I can choose the highlighted blue box to add a new theme directly from the the WordPress repository. This method is used to find and install tons of free themes for your site.
You can use the Upload Button and the top of the work area.
This option is used to upload Paid or Pro themes. Once you purchase a theme, you will download the theme in a zip file.
You simply upload the zip file and WordPress will automatically unzip and install the theme files for you.
WordPress comes pre-loaded with a few themes, as you can see from the image above. In my test-site. the Twenty Seventeen theme is currently activated and ready to be customized.
I can click the Preview Button for any other installed themes to see what they look like live on my site.
If I want to change my theme, I can simply click the Activate Button.
We have covered a lot of information today. We learned that Themes are used to style and help design our website to reflect our brand.
The include powerful features that help add cohesive pages, posts and other content to our website, with ease and speed.
And we discussed key factors to look for in a theme.
Finally, we compared free and paid (pro) themes. And looked at a few of my favorite theme developers.
We are almost there...
In the next post, we will discuss tools we use to add many tools and functions to our website and that deeply enrich the design process.
Plugins
Page Builders – Elementor
And in the last post of the Starting your own Jewelry Business series, I will walk you through adding a theme and essential plugins to your new website.