A WordPress theme is the design of your blog. It includes colors, fonts, graphics and layout for the entire site. WordPress themes are an important tool in maintaining your branding across all social media platforms as well as any other marketing materials you might use to promote your business. Blogs using WordPress can also be customized by adding plugins that allow you to change the look and feel of a WordPress theme without having to redesign it from scratch. This article will discuss what WordPress themes are, how they work, and provide tips on how to customize them based on your needs!
1. What Is a WordPress Theme and Why Should I Use One?
A WordPress Theme consists of both static content (text) and dynamic content (pictures). WordPress is designed so that the theme is independent of the content. This means that you can change your WordPress Theme without having to worry about formatting or design issues. We covered it briefly here.
WordPress themes are an important tool in maintaining branding across all social media platforms as well as any other marketing materials you might use to promote your business. Blogs using WordPress can also be customized by adding plugins that allow you to change the look and feel of a WordPress theme without having to redesign it from scratch!
How WordPress Themes Work
When designing a blog, one will create posts and pages with text and images which together form what we know today as “content.” The author decides on a topic such as cooking or politics, writes relevant articles on this subject, maybe takes some pictures, and uploads them to WordPress.
But it’s the WordPress Theme that determines how that content and the rest of the site actually looks. How? WordPress themes use Cascading Style Sheets, or CSS. Each WordPress theme has a “style.css” file that tells your web browser how to display all the content of your site, including fonts, colors and layouts.
Other files for the theme determine how the pages of your site are laid out, what graphic elements are included, and where, and other determinations.
When you click around through a website such as this one, you’ll notice that the logo is usually positioned in the same place on every page, every page uses the same fonts, has a sidebar with similar elements, and has links and icons in the footer.
All of that is controlled by the WordPress Theme so that you are able to make broad decisions about how your site looks (like where the logo is placed on pages) without having to edit each and every page.
2. How To Choose The Best WordPress Theme
Choosing a WordPress Theme is an important decision that will have lasting effects on your website. It may seem daunting, but there are many resources to help you find the perfect WordPress theme for your needs!
WordPress provides excellent documentation and tutorials about how themes work and what they can do. You can go through their vast library of free themes by doing an online search or browsing through them in WordPress’ Themes directory. There’s also plenty of websites with reviews – just type “best wordpress blog theme” into any search engine and see what comes up!
The easiest way to choose a WordPress Theme is to start by identifying which blogs already use it (that is, sites run with WordPress) so you get some design ideas. A WordPress theme might not have all of the features that you need so before purchasing or downloading one, always make sure to review what each has to offer and find out if they meet your needs!
Themes with less features may lack some social media integration but this could save time on coding – which might actually save money too depending on how much customization work goes into your site. WordPress themes are diversely priced from free ones such as Divi Builder Studio (which offers drag-and-drop content blocks) up to $700.
It’s also worth noting that changing your mind and buying a different Theme is far less costly than sticking with a Theme that you don’t like or doesn’t suit your needs and struggling with it. Don’t be afraid to change your mind and pivot your Theme customization efforts.
3. How to Customize Your WordPress Theme Based On Your Needs
WordPress themes are highly customizable. WordPress has a simple to use dashboard that allows you to customize the look and feel of your blog without having any website development experience what-so-ever!
It is important, however, not only to think about how your WordPress Theme will appear on desktop computers but also mobile devices such as iPhones and iPads, and WordPress has you covered on that too!
You can use the WordPress Theme Customizer to preview mobile devices such as iPhones, iPads, or Android phones. It’s a quick way for you to see how your blog will look before publishing it!
All WordPress Themes have their own settings which allow you to change colors (backgrounds and text), layouts of different pages on your site, graphics in headers and footers, fonts used throughout the theme – both statically in posts/pages and dynamically via menus – adding “slider” images at the top-center of each page (to show rotating content without having to navigate away from this page). You can also add widgets to show off your most recent posts, for instance.
Now, if we want to make changes beyond what is offered by default – for example, changing the site’s font choices to match your brand’s style guide – then some basic HTML knowledge will be required. Fortunately WordPress themes come with instructions and tutorials on how to customize them based on your needs. And all it takes are a few simple CSS rules which every newbie designer should be able to master.
4. How To Use Plugins to Change the Look of Your Blog
As WordPress Theme designers release new updates to their themes, you might find yourself in a position where the design of your blog doesn’t match your needs. But don’t worry! You can change aspects of any WordPress theme with plugins without having to do anything more than upload them and activate them on this site’s dashboard.
Here are some examples:
– A plugin that changes colors throughout different pages on your website (such as text or backgrounds)
– A WordPress Plugin which adds an image gallery slider to show rotating content on the top center of each page without navigating away from this article’s webpage
– Moving social media icons into a bar at the bottom of every page – so they’re not cluttering up the page – with a WordPress Plugin
– Adding social features such as “Share” buttons to every post, or adding your blog’s Twitter feed below each individual post on your site.
These are all examples of WordPress plugins that can be installed and activated without having any experience in website design!
5. Create an Original Design for Your Blog’s Header Image
If you want to make your WordPress Theme match the rest of your branding materials (like a logo), then one approach is to design an original header image in Photoshop and add it as your custom WordPress Header Image.
In this tutorial, I will walk through how to create a photo-realistic WordPress Blog Headers in Adobe Photoshop with only a few simple steps!
The first thing we need is our customer’s logo or other graphic elements that they would like on their blog header. The next step is designing our WordPress headers using all these graphics including adding text if needed – for example “What do I get from WidgetCo?”
And finally saving out the file so that when publishing new posts on WordPress, you can upload the file and it will automatically show up in your WordPress header on every post!
Here are some websites with resources for creating a custom WordPress Header Image:
– Tutorials from WordPress.com Bloggers – they have tutorials on how to design headers through their own blog tools (and also provide examples of different designs)
– A WordPress Theme that comes with an “easy” option which allows you to just use your logo as the website’s banner image without having any other graphics or text added into it at all
– WordPress Themes directory has listings of themes designed especially for blogs, where many offer predesigned header images already included within them so there is no need to figure out how to design one or go through the process of uploading a WordPress Header Image
– One other resource is Adobe’s Creative Cloud which has many tutorials on designing headers specifically for WordPress blogs.
6. How To Customize Your Theme With Widgets
A WordPress Theme can be customized with Widgets to add content which is relevant and of interest to your target audience.
You could customize the sidebar on a WordPress blog by adding widgets, including:
– A widget that allows visitors who are not logged in (i.e., readers) to subscribe or sign up for your email list – such as MailChimp, Constant Contact, GetResponse…etc!
– Another WordPress Widget called “Popular Posts” where users see posts from other bloggers they might find interesting based on their past activity while reading your site’s latest posts
– A WordPress Social Media Widget, which allows visitors to share your content on social media from right there in the WordPress site
– WordPress Widgets that show recent comments or most popular posts – for example, a WordPress widget can be installed and activated so readers see “Recent Comments” side by side with other blog posts. This way they’re not only reading what you have to say but also learning about others’ opinions as well.
Ready to add some widgets of your own to your WordPress installation? Here’s how.
– Go to your WordPress Dashboard -> Appearance -> Widgets
– Click on the sidebar you want your WordPress Widget(s) in – Blog Footer, Sidebar or Bottom of Post (most blog themes put their widgets at the bottom of every post). You can also add a widget that will show up below all posts by choosing “Bottom” from both drop down menus and placing it where you would like in the editor panel
– Select WordPress plugins such as social media connections like Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn for readers’ convenience when they’re reading your new content
– Or select WordPress widgets such as Recent Comments so visitors are able to get involved with other people’s discussions about what topics interest them most while also reading your latest posts
– WordPress Widgets can also be added by clicking the “Add” button next to “Widgets” in WordPress.com’s Appearance section, then selecting whichever WordPress Widget you would like from the menu that pops up when you hover over it with your cursor and click on it – such as Recent Comments or Popular Posts widgets
– You’ll just need to follow instructions about how WordPress plugins work for installing them in order to add desired WordPress widgets via WordPress plugin installation process.
Readers will see a new WordPress widget under their blog footer or sidebars if they’re logged into WordPress because these are programmed globally so all readers have access too!
WordPress Theme Customization Tips & Best Practices
What tips or best practices should you think about when customizing your theme? WordPress Theme customization can be made easier by following these WordPress tips:
– Use a WordPress theme that is responsive and mobile friendly because it will automatically resize to fit the size of any device or screen, so readers don’t need to pinch their fingers on touch screens or scroll excessively when reading your blog posts from smaller devices like smartphones. This way you won’t have to customize how different layouts are displayed for various sized screens which would require more time, effort and skill in order to create WordPress themes with this capability – just use one out of the many WordPress Themes designed specifically for Bloggers!
– You could also add helpful information such as links beneath each post header image where visitors see Recent Comments (from other bloggers) or Popular Posts (from other WordPress bloggers) – this way readers can visit the post by simply clicking on it rather than scrolling to find what they’re interested in. This WordPress customization tip helps you save time and effort because visitors are able to click your WordPress Widgets for Recent Comments, Popular Posts, Blog Footer widgets such as “Share” with social media icons under them so visitors can easily share blog posts on their timeline
– You might also want to change your WordPress theme’s color scheme – some WordPress themes have a lot of different colors which is great but if you don’t like that there may be too many options then try editing the default settings first so everyone has one primary colored background instead
– Adding custom WordPress Widgets to your WordPress theme can be a great way to customize it as we mentioned. Custom WordPress widgets will help you attract new readers and keep them coming back for more because they’ll find what they’re looking for on your blog so WordPress Theme customization is all about presenting the information in an organized, visually appealing manner that is easy to navigate
– You might want to add custom WordPress Plugins as well – this will allow visitors who are logged into WordPress with their account info or social media credentials automatically have access without needing any additional steps such as typing another username and password. This also helps streamline the process of adding WordPress Widgets which require plugins (such as recent comments) when installing WordPress plugins via “WordPress.com’s Plugins” section
This is the end of today’s WordPress Theme Customization Blog Post – thank you for reading! I hope this helped with how to customize your WordPress blog theme and keep it up-to-date so visitors come back for more!
When you’re ready to focus on what blog content to write that will perform best, consider the Blogging Bootcamp.
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