Are WordPress Themes Killing Web Design?

Every so often, somebody writes a post claiming something is dead. Email is dead. SEO is dead. Facebook is dead. Web Design has not been spared, and we have seen bold claims of the imminent death of web design on Mashable. They claim that ready-made themes are killing the industry:

They feel threatened by the sheer number of themes available. Since it is “easy” to setup a website and a ready-made theme — anybody can do it.

See Also: 5 Tips for Designers New to WordPress

If you are threatened by platforms like WordPress and ready-made themes, I hate to break it to you — but you are doing wrong web design. You are missing a fundamental piece of providing any service. You are not providing enough value to the client.

WordPress Theme Companies and Marketplaces

While there will be no need for custom design and development, it is clear from the 2015 WordPress Business Revenue Statistics by Scott Bolinger, you will see that the theme focused companies are developing.

Companies such as iThemes are making more than million dollars a year. WooThemes used to make more than $10 million per year. Envanto does not release revenue figures, but some statistics are available. Up to 2014 they have paid more than $224 million to author since 2006. They have more than 50 Elite authors those are making more than a $75K per year. 30 of those make more than a million dollars a year.

It is safe to say that the premium themes market is alive and kicking.

Embrace Premium WordPress Themes

Old school web designers pride themselves on the work they do. They strongly feel that a job well done is a job which is started from scratch and developed as necessary for a client.

The ideal situation in an ideal world would be developing a custom theme for the exact needs of a client. This course however, costs loads of time and money and will price you out of most website design spending plans. We live in a quick paced world, and whilst money may not be an issue for a few customers, you’ll see that time is an issue. The majority of my clients need things to be prepared yesterday — so running with a custom solution can be shooting you in the foot.

1. Give Your Client Added Value from the Start

One of the biggest challenges we meet while working on web projects is getting the client to understand or imagine the final product’s visuals.

You might be thinking one thing, but you can never fully understand what your client is imagining from what you are describing.

A ready-made theme can work best for the final result. Discuss some ideas with the client, what he or she wants, then go and search for some possible templates you could use. Then go to the client with a choice of templates which would fit their requirements best. These themes are all working demos, so you can already give the client an excellent sense of what they will be getting.

Let’s take Avada as an example — if you take your client through one of the live demos, you are more likely to win the project.

Both you and your client will know what the end product will look like. You are already setting yourself up for success and excellent client satisfaction.

Gives the client that feel good factor. Of course it is your job as a web designer to nudge them in the right direction.

While it may be more fun and feel like a better achievement when you create a site from scratch, using a premium WordPress theme is more profitable. The foundation and most of the work has already been done using a theme so you are going to spend much less time overall.

This allows you to do two things:

• Reduce your rates
• Makes more profit on each project

Task Premium theme Custom theme Project Management 10 hours 10+ hours Design time 4 hours 16+ hours Development time 16 hours 40+ hours Content / copy 20 hours 20 hours … Total 50 hours 86+ hours

1. Charge a Premium for Fast Service Rates

Using stock photography and a familiar WordPress theme — you should be able to turnaround an excellent site in 1 to 2 days.

That allows you to charge excellent fast service rates which will turn to give yourself a bit of bonus.

Can Anybody Do Your Job?

Using a ready-made premium theme may make it seem easy to create a good looking web design.

If your result is only as good as that of somebody who is not an experienced web designer then you are definitely not doing a good enough of a job with your web design.

It is possible to create a beautiful site with a premium theme. But you as an experienced web designer should not settle for a “good” site. The end result of a web design project from you should leave no stone unturned and the end result should be excellent.

You should also know that there are many behind the scenes things which you need to do.

• You need to match colors and tones.
• You need to find the adequate typography and fonts.
• You should have followed all optimal user experience suggestions.
• You should have optimized the site for search engines out of the box.
• You know how to create a responsive site.

Would somebody who has not worked in web design figure out the concept of a responsive grid?

Really and truly, a good web design project requires an experienced web designer who is able to understand the distinction of web design.

What is the value you should be offering as an experienced web designer?

• Understand responsive web design and setup a site with that in mind.
• Know where and how to find appropriate fonts, typography, imagery, iconography for the appropriate design project.
• Know how to combine everything in a way which creates a perfect visual result
• Setup a web design project with security in mind and prevent the site from getting hacked
• Ensure a site is backed up for just those times when things go belly up
• Setup a site, content and plugins as necessary for search engines and local SEO
• Install Google Analytics and monitoring services, connect the site to Google Search Console, and other webmaster activities
• Ensure you’ve followed appropriate User Experience concepts, and optimized the site such that it loads fast
• Tested the site on various devices and browsers and ensured it works well across the board
• Mess with the code where necessary to tweak as necessary to achieve an optimal result
• Be able to understand and figure out any problems or bugs which arise whilst developing the project
• And so many more…

There are of course many other things which an experienced web designer is able to provide. If you are having any trouble justifying your fees, making your client aware that you are able to offer the above will go a long way in winning you the project.

As an experienced web designer, you should be able to walk the fine line of not developing a theme from scratch to save time. At the same time use your experience to generate much more value for your client than anybody else can.

Giving Your Clients Ongoing and More Value

The end of the web design project should not signal the end of the relationship with your client. In fact, it should be the start. There is plenty of value you can give your client using your experience in the industry, after the completion of their website.

• Hosting updates and general maintenance
• Implement a maintenance and updates retainer
• Manage social streams or blogging content
• Optimize for search engines
• Other online guidance

Increase Your Passive Income Stream

There is one final way which we have not mentioned so far. You have got the experience to develop a theme from scratch — why not develop your next custom theme with the intent of selling it? You can then make it available on your own online shop or sell it on one of the many marketplaces available.

Done right — you have got potential for great passive income. This is a good idea for side projects, or a project on which you can work anytime.

Start slowly and build up with small improvements on your own theme. Once you have got a theme which you would be willing to pay money for, start selling it. You should be able to make a nice supplementary passive income stream.

Now that’s it, I have given my reasons for why I feel web design is not being killed by premium themes, why don’t you let me know your own reasons as to why you agree or disagree in comment section.