I have an extensive background in how site design affects ecommerce sales and usability, so I have some very specific ideas about what makes the perfect WordPress design. Using WordPress as a Content Management System (CMS) allows a blog to incorporate the best features of any Web site.
These ideas include where something should be on the page and what it should look like. As time allows I will link in additional posts explaining exactly why I (and those I learned usability from) recommend specific placement of certain important features. I will also explain what each of the items mentioned below is for the benefit of those new to Web design. For now I’ll make this more concise:
Best WordPress Design Tips:
- Clean, simple and uncluttered
- Header with rounded edges
- Two columns
- Posts in the left column
- One sidebar to the right side
- Additional navigation at the bottom
- Backgrounds that have clearly defined areas for the header, posts, sidebar, and footer
- Tabbed navigation
- Rounded corners on backgrounds, text areas, images and logos
- No more than three text colors and three fonts
- Great plug-in functionality
- Matching Logo, Avatar, and Favicon
Unpleasant WP Design Features:
- Too little contrast between background and text making it difficult to read
- Backgrounds that don’t fit the area that contains content
- Too blocky with square corners
- Excessively long pages
- Cluttered – too busy
- Ads everywhere
- Too many colors
- Use of more than three fonts or type sizes
- Sections on top of other areas
- Aesthetically unpleasing to the eye
NOTE: These are my idea of optimum based on years of experience. That experience includes tracking the effect changing Web sites had on sales. You may have a specific reason for breaking the above “rules” as rules are only guidelines. It is always best to know the guidelines before you decide to “break” them!
Let’s continue with Perfect WordPress Theme Design Part 2: Headers, Search, SideBars, Footers.
RELATED POSTS:
- What is The Perfect WordPress Theme? (First in this series; this post in the second.)
- Perfect WordPress Theme Design Part 2: Headers, Search, SideBars, Footers (Next post in this series)
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Thanks for the link… and the great post!
Twitter: @app103
A visually impaired friend once explained why right column sidebars are bad, and I am really trying to take his tips & hints to heart in every site I build/redesign from now on.
If you are building your site for people, you can’t forget the visually impaired. And in some countries (ex: UK), it is actually illegal to forget about disabilities when designing your site. And designing for the visually impaired is a bit more than just making sure screen readers can read your content.
My friend has to keep the resolution of his screen quite low and if your sidebar is on the right, he is likely to think it doesn’t exist at all, since it won’t be immediately visible to him and he will have to horizontal scroll to know it is there.
But at this same resolution, your content being on the right and your sidebar on the left, all of it will be at least partially visible to him and he will know that both your content and sidebar are both there.
Twitter: @GrowMap
Hello app – Thank you for this. I will do some further research including accessibility before coming up with the Perfect WordPress Theme design.
The main reason for sidebars to be on the right had to do with SEO; however, a good SEO knows how to handle that.
This is an excellent example of why I feel that in order to excel specialization is necessary. There is just too much to know for any one person to learn – and more importantly – stay on top of it all.
Few Web designers know SEO, usability and accessibility. That is why I am seeking people to help create (and then market) the Perfect WordPress theme.
There is no reason why a WP Theme couldn’t be designed so that the buyer could edit the logo/image in the header, plus the slogan that SHOULD be in every header – but rarely is.
Ideally they should also be able to easily select from different color schemes (since most people are NOT good at selecting complementary colors or go overboard with the NUMBER of colors).
I KNOW I am graphics-challenged but I do recognize pleasing design when I see it. I’d like to invite anyone who might be interested in the Joint Venture to join us in the WordPress room at FriendFeed at http://friendfeed.com/rooms/wordpresseng.
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Twitter: @GrowMap
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Nice Information And Good Blog
Twitter: @SEOWorks
It all makes a lot of sense and personally I think if you have a lot of ads, they will all have different colours and fonts, so, maybe you should aim to have only a couple of different fonts and colours on the design.