In the present scenario, WordPress websites have become quite popular. Not just because of the ease of development that they provide, but also because of a gamut of other advantages that it offers to its users. While you may think that creating a WordPress website is a plain-sailing, such is not the case every time. However, the journey can be made easier if you know how, to begin with, the WordPress theme.
While talking of themes, making the final decision can be tough, considering the number and customization options available for this platform. Every theme varies, depending on the features and layout it provides. And, most of the time, the next one would look better than the last one.
This can lead to nothing but a vicious cycle of confusion. So, relieving you from the tension and efforts here is the guideline on how you should choose the perfect WordPress theme. Have a read!
Design of the Theme
Most of the times, because of being overwhelmed by a gamut of responses, people end up choosing an altogether different theme than their business. One of the crucial steps in finalizing a theme is looking at its design. Until or unless it is not professional, don’t expect people to take you or your business on a serious note.
Although there are several WordPress themes that come with bright colors and flashy animations. However, unless you are running a cartoon business and meant to attract children, you wouldn’t need these elements in a theme.
On the other hand, try going for a simple theme that includes clear lines, clean and bold design, a lot of white space, readable typography, and absence of blatant elements. Moreover, while selecting the design, keep in mind that people are going to view your website on different devices and not only on a laptop. So, the design should load as easily on a mobile as it would load on a laptop.
Support from the Developer
Who doesn’t get lured by free things? Be it a product at a grocery store or a theme for WordPress, there is no denying the fact that something that comes with a free badge allures number of people. However, as much as you would neglect it, a free theme has its own downsides and disadvantages.
With some free themes, there is no certain support from the developer’s end. If you mess up with your theme, you might have to take the responsibility of fixing it on your own. Or, if you don’t know anything about it, then you might even end up paying someone else.
Therefore, it is important to make sure that the theme you are selecting comes with proper and reliable support from the developer. Mostly, some themes offer email support for the first entire year. So, however, is the case, be sure of the fact that you wouldn’t have to put your foot into problems occurred because of bad support from the developer. Instead, you can hire professionals from a top WordPress Development Company in India.
Features in the Theme
The list of functionality and features that a theme can or should provide is always dubious. But, at the end of the day, it depends on your requirements and needs. Unless you are running a news website, you wouldn’t require a news ticker displaying on the homepage. Same goes for other relevant functions and features.
Having said that, there are certain features that you must always look at. Begin with the surety that the WordPress theme is responsive as well as mobile-friendly. In the present scenario, undoubtedly, a mobile phone holds more importance than a desktop. And, more than half of your viewers are going to see your website on the phone. So, if the theme is not responsive enough, your website would have to suffer the loss.
Apart from this, pay attention to the cost, which is obviously an important factor. And then, have a look at the quality of the theme and more. Moving further, once you have zeroed down upon the features, make sure that nothing is missing in the final theme.
The Community of Users
Another solid indicator to gauge the quality of the theme is by paying attention to the reviews and ratings left by users. It is extremely important to know what the existing users think about the theme before you move ahead and purchase it for your own use. If you are purchasing a theme from a third-party platform, then it would not be difficult for you to check reviews and ratings.
Try to pick such a theme that has high ratings and positive reviews from users. Since you know there is nothing fake in the words written over there, you would get a personalized suggestion on how people’s experience was while using the theme that you have selected.
If you have selected a free theme, you would find the section of rating just below the download button. So, make sure that the line of 5 stars has more numbers in comparison with the other stars.
Code Quality
It would be difficult for you to assess the quality of a well-coded theme. But, even if you are not aware of how an amazing code looks like, there are some online tools that can come to your rescue.
Once you have narrowed down your preferred themes, it is recommended to run a performance test to see how they turn out to be. You can utilize online tools that will only demand the theme’s name and URL of the demo page to provide you the results.
Responsive Features
Although there would be several features that the theme would boast about, however, how can you be so sure that all of them, mentioned in the list, are responsive toward your website? It’s simple. Almost every other premium theme offers demo testing. It would be great to go through the demo version provided by your selected theme.
It will help you try out every individual feature so that you can have a thorough understanding of how it works. This is especially necessary for such features that you want to work out for your website.
While taking the demo, if you find any glitch, it would be easier for you to make a decision of abandoning it and selecting the other one.
Page Builder Support
If you are not aware of page builder, then you should definitely up your game when it comes to choosing a theme. In simple words, a page builder is nothing but a plugin, which helps you creating layouts of the page by using the drag & drop interface. There are several premium themes of WordPress that come with pre-installed page builders.
If you are a novice and have no idea about coding, or you want to save yourself from the tedious process of coding the landing page or other essential pages of your website, then you must make sure that the theme that you have selected supports page builder plugin without any hassle.
Moreover, you must make sure that the page builder of your selected theme is used by a majority of people. If you want, you can even buy a page builder plugin separately, until you are sure that your theme is supportive to that.
SEO Features
One of the most important features to look out for in a WordPress theme is its SEO friendliness. Even if you have ensured a good-looking theme, it can still have a negative impact on the search engine performance if the HTML is poorly coded. Since it will be a bit tough for a beginner to examine the source code of the theme, therefore, many developers mention the SEO optimization in the description itself.
Although WordPress provides a Yoast SEO plugin, however, if your theme would be SEO-friendly, it will help your business and your website to rank higher in the search engine result.
You would even be able to apply some SEO tricks within the theme. If you don’t know how to check it out, keep these below-mentioned points in mind:
- Loading speed of the page
- Responsive design
- Clear coding
- Microdata markup
- Site Architecture
Plugin Support
Believe it or not, WordPress has its real power in its plugins. With the help of right plugins, you can do almost everything and can accomplish every task on your list. Although almost every theme has plugins, however, it is always recommended to keep an eye on the stretched functionality of these plugins.
While you will be assessing the theme stringently, you must see whether or not the developer has taken an extra step to create customized extensions for that theme. And, the fundamental way of doing that is checking out of a variety of plugins that it can support.
There is an abundance of plugins that will turn out to be helpful for you. Be it something to administrate your site or the one to keep an eye on analytics, the needs may vary, depending on the niche of your website. So, whatever it is, make sure that the theme supports such plugins that you require the most.
