Theme Tip 6 – 3 things to think about when making WordPress Themes

Before you build your WordPress theme – STOP!

You have to complete a little challenge first.

Whenever I sit down to start work on a new WordPress theme project, I ask myself the following questions:

Should I buy a theme or build my own?

I’ve a really short answer to this rather big question. If you can afford your own custom WordPress theme – pay for one. If you can’t don’t!! Yes I’m over simplifying somewhat but the beauty of WordPress is the fantastic open source community that has developed some of the best WordPress themes you can find anywhere – either free or premium. Free WordPress themes will let you get your site up and running – you can always spend more in the future to sharpen the overall design of your website when you can afford it.

How will I organise my homepage?

Homepage design is critical with or without WordPress.But it’s especially important when considering your theme requirements as you will need to know:

• What content will be on my homepage?
• What calls to action should there be?
• What features do I need to appear on my homepage?
• How will all these be managed in WordPress – or do they even need to be?

I’ll let you in on a little secret – widgets will be your life saver when thinking about the answers to the questions above. More on widgets tomorrow.

How do I make my website unique?

This is less of a WordPress question and more one of an overall strategic nature. Some people get caught up in theme design, WordPress development, site installation etc. and then forget to plan what will actually make their website unique! Is it your wonderful content that you’ll be creating on a consistent basis? Is it some new unique plugin that you’re building? Give this one serious thought – it’s not as easy as you might think.