There are literally thousands of Wordpress themes available for download today. Some are free and some are “Premium” themes that will cost you anywhere from about $15 and up. I’ve spent hours perusing these themes and build several websites using them. Prior to that, built static sites, sometimes starting with a template.

Pre-built themes and templates are great from my perspective. Even though I can build a web site from the ground up, I’m also a firm believer in not spending my precious time “reinventing the wheel.” It takes much less time to reverse engineer and redesign a good solid template or theme than to create a brand new one.

But, I have learned some lessons along the way. So here are some tips on how to choose a good Wordpress theme and make it great!

1. Unless you are completely in love with a “Premium” theme, you might be sorry if you pay for a theme. You won’t really know until you install it on your site, how easy it is to edit or even if the author was very good at coding. If you do decide to purchase a theme, check out author’s forum first. Ask others what they think about the themes the author has developed and whether they would buy from them again? If you can’t find a forum, you probably won’t get much, if any, support. But you’re sure to get honest answers from previous purchasers and it might clue you in to whether or not this is a wise purchase.
2. Consider whether you need two or three columns. As a commercial venture, you probably want three. The primary column will display your blog posts and pages, one will display catagory, page, meta tags, etc. and the third you can use for monetization and/or links to social sites. If you only have two columns, when you go to monetize, you may find it more difficult to place advertisements on your site. If you’re only building a social blog and don’t intend to monetize, then it’s not an issue.
3. Color is important. Depending upon your niche, you may already have a color palette in mind. But take this into consideration: Unless you are creating a grunge site, I don’t recommend you use a theme with a dark or black background. You can have a dark border or even dark sub columns, but the column that contains the text people will read most often should have a light (preferably white) background. It is very difficult to read light text on a dark background. The older you get the harder it gets and that’s why I often leave these sights within a few seconds. I suspect, I’m not the only one!
4. If you have spent hours and hours looking at themes and are having a hard time, consider this: It doesn’t need to be perfect! While your theme does need to project the image you’re shooting for, it’s only the cover to the book and not the book itself. In other words, content is still king and even if you have a less than perfect site, if it contains great content, they will come! Just settle on something and get started. You can change it later.