Free WordPress Themes:
One of the biggest advantages of using a free WordPress Theme is, obviously, the cost. It’s hard to beat ‘FREE’. However, many free WordPress sites are not always laid out or function well for your website’s purpose. You may want to hire a designer to alter the theme you choose to better fit your brand and/or business objectives.
Below are links to three sites with free themes that are better than most.
Premium Themes:
If you’re looking for a more professional and feature-rich theme, then a premium WordPress theme is what you’re looking for! Premium themes, which usually run under $200.00, have, in most cases, a much more robust and graphically superior look than most free themes. Many premium themes we work with have significantly more features and options than free themes. Most premium themes need just your logo and slight color change and you are ready to go.
A challenge we have discovered when using a premium theme is they are usually designed to display a lot of content, especially on the home page. Many themes will have numerous “pods” on the home page to display short snippets of articles, photos, video, social buttons and RSS feeds – just to name a few. If your site is not content heavy, look though the premium themes and find one that is not so rich in front page content.
Below are some examples of premium themes we have used frequently in the past 12 months:
Metro Premium Theme
Magazine Premium Theme
Education Premium Theme
Church Premium Theme
Chrome Premium Theme
Allure Premium Theme
Great theme and information thank you.
Thanks Mike!
Great video/article thank you!
hello. thanks for the great information. I can’t seem to click on the “church theme” link though.
Just to echo you, I have use elegant themes on many of my projects, I think they are the best, their customer support is top notch. Thanks for the article
I am very new to WorkPress and evaluating how to migrate my site from Microsoft Live Small Business; which will become Office 365 (which I don’t think is good). I want a site with sophisticated blogging and strong SEO; and a website I can maintain without having to go to someone. I am not a developer but can work with tools that build a site. I am looking for the best way to get started.
Hey John,
Great question. Unfortunately I don’t believe there is any migration tool to move your site from Microsoft Live to WordPress. The best way to start would be be to setup a self-hosted WordPress site and begin the pain-in-the-butt process of moving post. But this will also give you a chance to really take some time and get your blog setup correctly. Send me your URL and I’ll take a look at the site and see if I can come up with some suggestions! Thanks again for the great question!
Where could I get a theme similar to the Allure Theme?!
Thanks for the clarification about the difference between paid and free wordpress themes. I have used the free wordpress themes and they work great if you know code and how to go in to change things and make them do what you want. I think the premium themes are great too, but some of them are just a little too pricey.
Hey Donna,
I used free themes for a long time. Only in the recent year have I moved to premium themes. More specifically, I’m using the Genius framework from StudioPress.
Here is another 2 cents of mine on the subject of themes. As Automattic, the authors of the WordPress code, continues updating and advancing the functionality of WordPress, many Free and even some premium themes begin to have issues. A large chunk of the free themes available in the market were done by free lance developers as a way to get their names out and show of their work. Which I think is an awesome thing! But if you keep your WordPress core code up-to-date like a good blogger should,
, you will see many themes crash, loose their functionality and even get hacked because of old, outdated code. Most theme designers build a theme once on the current standards, but never keep them updated.
So, to end this long reply, if your a blogger just looking to talk about your interest, free is not a bad way to go to begin with. But if you’re looking to make a business of blogging and try to gain a loyal following, $70-$100 is not a bad investment for having a top shelf blog design!
Thanks Donna!
Hey Christina,
I would look at StudioPress. They have some very similar designs, and they have a rock solid framework! Does that help??
Thanks!
Thanks,good video and funny music :d