Blogging Tips 3 – choice of theme
WordPress Blog themes – there are so many to choose from, so why did I choose WP-MediaMag from Solostream for this blog? (Note: originally, I used WP-Vybe, another excellent theme, also from Solostream, for this blog).
Whatever I do in life, I aim to do well – without being perfectionistic – and one of the fundamental keys to creating a good result is getting the foundations right.
For my blog I wanted a design that worked well, both from my perspective and that of the reader. A WordPress theme with common sense web usability. The definition:”Working well”, also included how the blog theme performs in search engines. My blog needed to look good and professional.
A while ago, I spent a lot of time looking into WordPress blog themes and only two developers made my final shortlist. The other one, Thesis from DIYthemes, was used on a now defunct blog I ran. Other key considerations included testing support, future proofing and scalability. The blog themes I chose are both “leading edge”. Details of two other leading edge blog themes which didn’t quite make my final shortlist appear at the end of this article.
The bottom line then was a key focus on the type of results that I would achieve. It is so easy to try and take shortcuts at the foundation stage of any enterprise, however in the long-run diligence at this stage pays off big time. It is important however not to overdo due diligence – nothing will ever be perfect and imperfect action is much more preferable to perfect inaction, which achieves little.
Because you’re reading this, you have a head start on choosing a blog theme – I suggest you follow the links to the theme developers’ pages and see for yourself. Save yourself the hours I’ve spent looking into a very wide range of themes. The time I spent was very much worth it in the sense of finding good WordPress themes, however I also picked up a lot of other valuable information along the way, some of which I will be sharing with readers of my blog in due course.
In summary then, when assessing a blog theme for suitability we need to consider a wide range of factors – similar to the legs on a large table – if one is missing a weak or damaged, then the table will not perform its job correctly.
When assessing the level of support, which is a very important aspect indeed bearing in mind the complexity of blog technology and its importance to your business or other activities, I suggest that you look at the support forums in detail. You will need to look at the kinds of problems that people are having, how common positive comments are about the theme, the nature of comments, and the response time from support, or other forum members, to questions.
One example of poor support that comes to mind was when I came across an interesting theme and I discovered that the support appeared to be limited to the developer, who was based in India ( there are some very clever people there for whom I have a great deal of admiration), and who took several days off for a religious holiday, commenting that no support would be available for the duration. Of course, people do need to have time off, but from a web developer’s/webmaster’s/customer’s perspective such a level of support that just not acceptable. Period.
It is important not to overlook things like the poor support level illustrated in the example above, no matter how good the blog theme might be; because when you need support last thing you want to hear is excuses, or just plain nothing.
You can find out more about the theme I used for this blog here: WP-MediaMag from Solostream
Click here for more details on Thesis theme from DIYthemes.
During my evaluations of differing blog themes I was quite impressed with One Theme. Click here to view more details
During my research phase, I also came across the site of a 13-year old Kidblogger (now he’s a bit older) and was amazed as to how he managed to grab the top spot at Google for keywords which some people have been trying to rank for such a long time.
Well, he’s number 1, sometimes number 2 or number 3 for the keyword phrase “make money online” (US Google).
Not only that, he manages to earn a handsome four figure monthly income because of his top Google blog.
How does he do it? Well, he is saying that a well-optimized WordPress blog theme helped him. In fact, due to persistent requests of many of his readers, he is sharing his blog theme here.
Aside from the blog theme, he is sharing some of his secrets in on-page SEO and ad placements optimization. Check it out here. I can personally vouch for the developer – Kidblogger – that he is very genuine and businesslike. He bends over backwards with support.
Overall, I prefer Solostream themes for blogs. The themes look great, work well, are easy to use and come with excellent support. I found Thesis a bit too fiddly and time consuming to use, and not as attractive. Thesis is a very good second choice and I would use it if Solostream did not exist.
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Alex Webley
Shaman Hawk
Kenn Day
Martin Day
Ronny
