Faced with the multitude of themes offered by WordPress, it is difficult to choose the one that perfectly matches your website. There are thousands of free and paid options and each WordPress store theme is more beautiful than the other. Here are 7 tips that will help you choose the best WordPress theme for your website.
Do not rush
WordPress is used to create all kinds of websites. That’s why each WordPress store theme is for a different market. Your WordPress theme should complement the content of your website. For example, if you are launching a blog on political or social issues, you will opt for a theme that improves readability. Before choosing your WordPress theme, know that many ones come with tons of customization options.
If they are not coded correctly, these options may prevent you from changing themes or using some WordPress plugins. You will be locked into this theme or will have to pay a developer to help you change. Some WordPress themes that look really good can actually make your website incredibly slow, which nobody likes, especially Google, which prefers faster websites. Your theme is the face of your WordPress website and plays an important role in the way users and search engines perceive it.
Opt for a simple and effective WordPress store theme
A WordPress store them should avoid offering colorful schemes, complex layouts and flashy animations. Instead, take simplicity as your motto. Look for a theme whose layout matches your goal. It must be aesthetic and easy to use.
The objective is to help users find the information they need easily. If a theme is beautiful but does not help you get new customers or subscribers, or it makes your users in trouble navigating your website, then this is not a good theme.
Choose a suitable WordPress theme for all screens
There are responsive themes that adjust their layout according to the size of the screen and the device. Today, much of the web traffic is generated from mobile devices or tablets. Depending on the topics on your website, this number could even exceed 50% of your traffic. Google prefers to rank mobile-friendly websites at the top of its rankings. It is therefore essential that your website is readable on all screens. Most WordPress themes are already responsive by default, but there are still developers selling fixed-width layouts that are not geared to mobility at all.
How do I know if a WordPress theme is mobile-friendly? The easiest way to test whether a theme is responsive or not is to resize your browser screen, after which you will notice whether or not the theme layout fits the width of the screen. For a more in-depth test, you can copy the URL of the theme demo page and paste it into Google’s Mobile Friendly test page.
Choose a suitable WordPress theme for all web browsers
Your users will be having different browsers. Your theme may look perfect on the browser you are using, but some bugs may appear with other browsers. This is where compatibility comes in. Most WordPress theme developers rigorously test their themes using sophisticated browser compatibility testing tools.
They can clearly mention it on their website, but if that’s not the case, you can still do some basic tests to check the theme on different browsers like Google Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari, etc. Do not forget to test on different mobile browsers too!
Select a WordPress theme that supports essential plug-ins
The real power of WordPress comes from its plugins. They allow you to do anything with your WordPress website. If there are specific plugins, some are essential for all websites.
For example: Gravity Forms, SEO Yoast, W3 Total Cache … Make sure your WordPress theme supports these popular plugins. If you are not sure, ask the developer of the theme!
Adopt a WordPress theme that allows for better SEO
Your WordPress theme plays a crucial role in the SEO of your website. A beautiful theme can still generate poorly coded HTML, which can affect the performance of your website. It can be difficult for beginners to analyze the source code of a WordPress store theme. That’s why many developers of premium WordPress themes will let you know that their pages are optimized for SEO.
You can also take a look to see if the page generates the correct HTML5 by checking it with the W3C Markup Validation service. However, please note that the W3C tool will generate many warnings that are not to be feared.
Look for a WordPress theme with support options
One of the disadvantages regarding free WordPress themes is that there is no guaranteed support. Although some developers provide excellent support for their free themes, many ones do not have a support option.
If you have problems installing your WordPress theme, you will have to solve them yourself or hire the talents of a developer. Make sure you select a WordPress theme with good documentation and a support option. Most premium WordPress themes offer detailed documentation with 1 year of email support.
We hope this article will help you choose the perfect WordPress store theme for your WordPress website. If you still face difficulties, do not hesitate to contact us!