Five Ways to Tweak a Wordpress Theme
Ah, free Wordpress themes. I’m convinced they’re one of the biggest reasons Wordpress is the most popular blogging platform today. From one-column minimalism to grid-based magazine layouts, photoblogging styles to made-for-Adsense themes, there are free Wordpress themes for every taste- just download, install and activate!
But to set your blog apart, you’ll want to tweak that theme- and when I say tweak, I mean make small changes here and there. To make these tweaks to your theme of choice, a tool like the Firebug extension for Firefox can be very handy- but, really, any text editor will do.
- Tweak your header
Usually the first place new visitors will look, and a good place to start. Some themes include “theme options” pages that show up when you’ve activated the theme, and others include banner photos or graphics that can easily be replaced with your own. If you’re using the default Wordpress theme Kubrick, the aptly named Kubrickr will automatically find photos on Flickr for you to customize your header with. To get more in-depth, I recommend reading through Wordpress’ official codex page on Designing Headers. - Play with your widgets
Most Wordpress theme designers “widgetize” their themes, and for good reason: widgets are probably the quickest way to personalize a Wordpress theme. Built-in widgets, available in every fresh installation of Wordpress, include widgets for displaying your Archives, Calendar, Recent Comments and so forth- and And if the theme you love isn’t widgetized, you can do it yourself. - Experiment with color
Even slight changes to the colors on your site can have a big impact. Online tools such as the Color Scheme Designer can keep you busy for hours, or you can check out pre-made color schemes at sites like colr.org and GenoPal. - Change your fonts
We used to have just two choices when it came to web fonts: serif or sans-serif. Today, we have methods like sIFR and FLIR, which replace your fonts using Flash, the newish Cufon, which doesn’t require Flash, and CSS3’s @font-face, which works by downloading the specified fonts. - Personalize your About page
This one, which requires no CSS tweaking at all, just might be the most important way of all. Tweaking your About page, the only page that comes pre-built with Wordpress, is where you can truly let your personality shine through. A photo of yourself is always good, but you should feel free to add anything here that shows the world- or your readers, at least- who you are. You can read more about tweaking your About page in a previous post of mine.
Of course, we’ve only barely scratched the surface of the ways you can tweak your Wordpress theme. For more ways, the Wordpress Codex is an excellent place to start, or look through our previous posts on Wordpress here.
Performancing Releases the Herald Theme for WordPress
Considered one of the premier sources of blogging news, commentary and information, The Blog Herald has gone through different iterations since its inception in 2003. Among the most successful designs was Brian Gardner’s grey-themed three-column layout released in 2007. Performancing is releasing this theme as our latest free WordPress theme as the Herald Theme.
Sporting a grey-dominant color scheme, with red and blue highlights, the Herald Theme looks clean and crisp, with a wide main content area, and two sidebars to the right. The middle sidebar us wide enough to contain an ad block of 125×125 pixel buttons or a 250×250 banner, and supports featured posts which will display only posts from a defined category or tag. Each sidebar block and footer column can be customized using widgets for easy drag-and-drop rearranging.
The Herald Theme is optimized for use with WordPress 2.8 and newer. Dropdown menus use jQuery.
Preview the Herald Theme
For a live preview of the theme, click here.
Download the Herald Theme
Avocado Theme for WordPress
Green is the in thing today. We do want to save the Earth and the human population from a radical change in climate. The Avocado Theme reflects this philosophy, both with the green-themed color scheme, and with how the editorial and design team of Performancing strive to be green in the way we live and work.
The Avocado Theme uses a three-column layout with rounded corners. The green-dominated background and sidebars are highlighted with orange headers and icons. The theme is optimized for use with WordPress 2.8 and above, and supports various features like threaded comments, post classes, image captions, galleries, and drop-down menus.
We have included in the theme ZIP file the Photoshop file and font used for the header, should you wish to use the header image for your title or logo.
The Avocado Theme is a classic theme release from Performancing Themes for WordPress, and is another collaboration with designer Sophia Lucero, who has likewise designed other themes, like Too Newsy and Rubidious.
Download Avocado Theme
Why invest in a premium theme for your blog?
There are a whole host of very good free themes for most blogging platforms, which can often be used “as is” or customized just a little to create something a bit different, but is it time you invested some money in a premium theme to really push your site forward?
It’s true that content is very important, but the way that it’s presented is not to be ignored, particularly when you consider that first impressions count a lot, people will initially judge your site on what it looks like, and it takes just a second or two to click on the “back” button.
If you have the time, knowledge and dedication to work out a theme from scratch, or rip out the guts and replace swathes of code on a free theme, then good for you. I know there’s satisfaction in creating your own design that’s completely yours. I also know, now, that I’d rather spend that time creating content than designing from scratch.
How to get a premium theme
There are two routes to getting a premium theme.
The first is to find a designer that sells premium themes. Generally you’ll want to look for designs that are highly and easily customizable, have a degree of support (whether that be direct with the designer or via a forum), offer upgrades/updates to fix bugs or add new features, and offer more than “run of the mill” features you could easily find in a free theme.
The second is to hire a designer to create a unique blog template to your exact specifications. You’ll want to take a look at their portfolio to ensure that they’re creating bespoke sites, and maybe talk to some of their previous clients to see how the process went.
The first option is cheaper and quicker but you still may not own a completely unique theme.
The second option is more expensive and takes longer to implement, but you’ll hopefully get a design that’s truly your own.
Advantages
Look and Feel
Whether you’ve had your blog template designed for you, or you’ve customized a premium theme, the way it looks and operates will be unique and tailored to your blog.
Ease of use
If you’ve picked a good theme or designer, it should be really easy to add new elements without breaking the template or having to get bogged down in the code. This means you have more time for creating content and building community than wrestling with how things work.
Pride
I found that after I’d invested some money in a premium theme, I took more pride in my blog. Though I didn’t spend much on the theme, it was enough to change my mindset and take my site more seriously. Not only did the theme present content much more attractively but it looked more professional and encouraged me to work harder at building it.
This might not work for everyone, but I find that if I’ve invested money (beyond basic hosting and domain name costs that everyone incurs) I’m more likely to stick with a project.
Long term view
Linked to the pride factor, I’ve taken a much longer term view of my blog design, and am more likely to let it evolve over time rather than completely redesign it.
When I was running free themes, I found myself tweaking or even replacing the design more often. After I invested in a premium theme, I left the foundations alone and added things that created more worth.
That’s not to say that I’ll never revamp the design in the future, but I’m far less likely to do so on a whim.
Conclusions
It’s possible to run a successful blog off the back of a free theme, but moving to a premium theme definitely has its advantages.
If you’ve not considered it before, why not take a look at some of the options available. You don’t have to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to get something a bit different that could set your blog apart from the crowd.
What do you think? Do you use premium themes and how has it changed your view of your blog? Or do you think free themes are fine?
Performancing Themes go GPL
Over the years Performancing has delivered many differences services to its readers: PMetrics, Plugins, Perfcast, the Performancing podcast, and Performancing Themes.
Performancing has released 20 different themes, designed by some of the best WordPress themers known, in little more than 2 years. Today we can proudly announce you that all our free themes have been released under the GPL License. [Read more]
Treasure Theme
Ever wanted to explore for hidden treasure as a kid? Well, most of us have longed for, and still do long for, this kind of adventure. Most would keep other sorts of treasures in all sorts of places, in their proverbial treasure chests. Love letters are kept in drawers. Photos in photo albums. Toys in toy closets. Blog posts, of course, precious that they are, are kept online.
But what if you can keep your blog posts in “treasure chests” of their own? This is what Performancing’s Treasure Theme for WordPress is all about. Each blog post is kept enclosed in its own box–or what you can call its treasure box. This is very appropriate for bloggers who want to consider each and every published post as precious ad gold and gems.
Another classic from Performancing Themes for WordPress, the Treasure Theme is a collaboration with designer Randa Clay, who has done various other Splashpress Media designs.
Treasure Theme is optimized for use with WordPress 2.7 and above. It supports threaded comments, post classes, image captions and gallery classes introduced in this version of WordPress.
Download the Treasure Theme for WordPress here.
See a live preview here.
Too Newsy Theme
We are pleased to announce the January, 2009 Performancing Theme release: Too Newsy. The Too Newsy Performancing Theme for WordPress is a three-column WordPress theme that uses minimal images and earthy colors, contributing to a touch of elegance.
The theme features widget-ready sidebars, which can accommodate several different image dimensions (suitable for button and banner ads). The theme is the first Performancing Theme to support new WordPress 2.7 features out of the box:
- Threaded and paginated comments
- Post classes
- Image captions and gallery classes
Another highlight of Too Newsy is the use of the sidebar for snippets of the latest posts in a pre-defined category (which is by default the “features” category). This can be useful for bloggers who wish to highlight certain posts, such that they are not pushed down too soon by newer ones. The theme also supports gravatars out of the box.
Too Newsy is another collaboration with Splashpress Media designer Sophia Lucero, who previosuly brought us the Rubidious Theme, and various other Splashpress Media blog designs.
TDAge Theme
We are pleased to announce the November Performancing WordPress Theme: TDAge
A free, public release version of design guru Thord Daniel Hedengren’s Swedish-language blog, TDAge is a light-blue themed design with big, bold feed and “about” images, and large-font headers. TDAge also has easy access links to a blog’s pages and categories from the headers, and has a clean-cut pre-defined template for use as an archive summary page.
TDAge is a pun for TDH, which stands for–you guessed it!–Thord Daniel Hedengren, who has developed various designs for Splashpress Media, including the Blog Herald, Jack of All Blogs, Blog Network Watch, Blogger Jobs, Bloggy Award, Audival, Wisdump, Devlounge, and many more. Thord has also collaborated with us on other Performancing WordPress Theme releases: One in a Million and Estranged.
Nitrous Theme
The word “Nitrous” has a motorsport connotation to it, given the use of Nitrous Oxide (or N20) in increasing the power output of engines, and hence giving that all-important boost in acceleration and speed in times of need. This is the concept behind the Nitrous Theme for WordPress. Nitrous is a fast-loading theme that gives you straight-cut, no-nonsense presentation. The design loads fast, with use of lightweight images. The grey and blue color scheme also contribute to that European touring car feel. I can almost feel the wind in my hair!
One interesting feature of Nitrous is that nested pages are automatically added to the top navigation bar as nested dropdown menus. This way you have easy access to your static pages–including the nested ones or the “subpages”–without cluttering up the navigation area with text.
Nitrous is yet another collaboration between Performancing and Brian Gardner, released as a free monthly theme by Performancing Themes.
Update: Nitrous has been updated for compatibility with WordPress 2.7 and up. Download the latest version here.
Click here to preview the theme.
Click here to download the theme.
Rubidious Theme
Rubidious is a three-column theme sporting deep hues of red and blue. The theme name is based on the chemical element Rubidium, which comes from the Latin term for “deepest red”.
Two light-on-dark sidebars sit on opposite sides of the main content. The left sidebar is called “menu” in the Widgets configuration page (WordPress 2.5), and is ideally made for navigational elements like links various subpages. The theme supports WordPress 2.5’s avatar features, though it should work with WordPress 2.3 just fine.
Update: Rubidious has been updated for compatibility with WordPress 2.7 and up. Download the latest version here.
Click here to preview the theme.
Click here to download the theme.
