The challenge in web design on WordPress lies in turning an empty page into a searchable and functional website.
You can hire a professional web designer to build a site from scratch or design a website yourself.
But first, let’s help you determine precisely what website is best for you. So you can decide what particular web design on WordPress you should opt for to make your site a reflection of your brand. What you want to achieve or gain from “going public” essentially defines the kind of website it’s going to be.
Below are some of the common types of websites:
Personal Website
An individual or a personal website is more minimalist in design. It features, as the term suggests, the content of personal nature. Anything that showcases your credentials or talents and highlights your best work or accomplishments for the world to see. It may be an online diary, journal, resume, portfolio, personal brand, or blog.
Corporate Website
A business entity owns a corporate or company website. It serves as a portal that delivers information about the company or a platform for communicating with site visitors.
It should at least have a brief introduction of who you are and what you offer, a navigation bar, contact information, visuals, etc. Most post company profiles, product descriptions, reviews, testimonials, or company announcements.
E-Commerce Website
An e-commerce website or an online store allows people to buy or sell digital or physical products and services over the internet.
It requires a different web design on WordPress. It should have an SEO-friendly layout, blog, product display section, promo, discount tools, easy-checkout, CTA button, and other features that enable you to interact with customers or accept payments.
How To Design a Website With WordPress?
- Start with a domain name. This will be your website’s name and address. It’s how people will identify and get to your site. So, choose one that’s short, brand-related, and easy to remember. The simpler, the better.
- Select a design package and hosting plan. Once a domain name is established, you’ll have to create an account for the kind of package and hosting plan that you’d like to avail yourself of.
- Pick out a theme. WordPress offers a lot of free built-in themes that you can choose from and install. So it’s a practical option to start with. But if you’re not entirely satisfied with what’s installed, you can change the theme later and upgrade to premium.
- Do a familiarization tour. Take your time in exploring and reviewing the features of the website that you’d likely be using the most. Your WordPress dashboard or the back-end is the area where you get to display and control what you want your site visitors to see on your pages.
- Time to customize. Now you have a new website waiting for you to redesign and work on. You can start playing around with your choice of colors, fonts, and other elements that’ll help you express yourself or define your brand better.
Why Choose WordPress Over Its Competitors?
Here are the stats and advantages of designing a website on WordPress.
- WordPress powers 43% of the world’s total number of websites on the internet, from personal blogs to substantial corporate portals.
- WordPress powers 14.7% of the websites belonging to giant corporations. Over 500 sites are built on WordPress each day, which accounts for 60.8% share in the CMS market.
- WordPress has a wide array of resources. It has a lot of specifically designed plugins that work well with its sites. Website owners and designers can select from those and equip their sites with the necessary features. These include tools for optimizing site performance, a video or photo gallery, an event calendar, social media widgets, etc.
- Websites that WordPress powers are efficient and scalable. They can support a massive amount of content without compromising your site’s performance.
- WordPress sites are designed so that search engines can crawl and index their posts and images. This helps developers optimize your site and ensure consistent rankings in SERPs.
Is WordPress Free?
The WordPress software in itself is free. Anyone can download and access it to build the website they need without restrictions. But you have to pay for a domain name, employ the services of a web hosting provider, and purchase plugins to have it working efficiently on the web.
WordPress.Com And WordPress.Org: What’s The Difference?
WordPress.com is a for-profit blogging service. It was founded by Matt Mullenweg but is run by Automattic.
It helps users build a website using WordPress software.
WordPress.com has restrictions. It uses the WordPress platform to power its hosts, but with limitations. For example, custom themes and plugins can’t be uploaded unless you upgrade to a premium plan.
Startups and other users take full advantage of the free version to familiarize themselves with it. Then, they, later on, switch to premium to gain more control over their sites and have access to more functions and features.
WordPress.org is a software project owned by no individual or company. It’s self-hosting (which means you can run it and set up a network and server) and an open-source website that most web developers and designers use.
It provides all the information about using the software and its upcoming updates. In addition, the WordPress app can be downloaded from WordPress.org to create a website.
What Web Design Software Works Best With WordPress?
There’s various web design software with advanced CSS (cascading style sheets) options and professional visuals that offer free and premium templates you can use to design a website on WordPress.
Adobe Dreamweaver is a web design software created in 1997 by Macromedia. It helps web developers to build websites by allowing them to code, design, and manage mobile content.
Dreamweaver is a reliable web design tool for WordPress. It makes the creation and publishing of content easier for both web designers and site owners. It helps them understand what coding does for a website and instantly checks it by highlighting every detected mistake.
SeedProd is a layout and website design software for WordPress. It offers a user-friendly page builder plugin for both small and large websites. It allows you to create and customize landing pages and site designs in WordPress without coding or the help of a professional web developer.
Over a million design professionals use SeedProd to build websites and expedite the web design on WordPress. It has dynamic personalization and subscriber management tools, SEO integration, and complete access control.
Pinegrow is a Linux, Windows, and Mac web editor capable of opening and saving standard CSS and HTML files. It comes in three licenses suitable to different types of users—students, individuals, and companies.
The standard version is best for building one-page sites. However, the Pro allows users to create multi-page sites with added features like CMS. In addition, the one with the WordPress version can be used to develop production-ready themes.
And last but not least, GoDaddy. It’s one of the most extensive web hosting service providers globally. Originally founded as a domain registrar, GoDaddy today provides various services from web hosting to website building.
It uses Artificial Design Intelligence (ADI) which facilitates the creation of simple and customized websites and makes publishing of content easier for beginners.