Why do virtually all wp themes fail so badly?
 

It's as if virtually every designer out there believes that sites are only made to show off stock phtography and spiffy ajax features, don't need any ad-specific space, and have no use whatsoever for designs that actually lead visitors to other content on the site.

Seriously, what the fuck? :disgust

Because knowing photoshop well and being able to draw dont make someone a designer

But you'd think there would at least some capable designers out there selling themes.

As it stands, maybe 0.1% of paid themes out there are usable for commercial purposes - and that's being generous.

Its because any fucker can throw up a site and call themselves a designer without knowing anything about useability, conversions and even god forbid how to build a site that SE's like.

That's why.

Guaranteed that 98% of the designers out there have never sold anything in their lives, and have no clue how to develop a concept or brand larger than their Photoshop window. The entire purpose of their skillset is to SELL the product and / or develop something useful. Not to make something purty.

Amen. :thumbsup

It has been my experience that you never give a designer free reign and expect to be 100% satisfied. It has to be a collaboration between designer and owner. I have ideas for my sites and no one knows my business as well as me. An outsider cannot just come in and put out materials that will blow the competition away. Consequently this collaboration always costs more as you may go through several meetings and drafts until you get what you want. You cannot expect award winning work when you are only paying a few dollars for their time.

Most of the designers I have worked with over the years are fully capable of extrordinary work, but you need to communicate your needs and wants and give them the time and money to develop something big. Originality does not get pulled from one's butt.

More than 1/2 my clients provide less than satisfactory information for a site design and expect me the designer to know everything about what they are attempting.

The more info I have and the client is willing to tell me the better a production becomes.

But a vast majority of my clients come to me and expect I know everything. I only claim to know it all on GFY but professionaly I am only as good as I am instructed to be...

I love you.

I'm talking about wp themes here, though. I regularly need them for quick deployment of sites, but there are *very* few good ones out there. Hiring a designer is also an option, of course, but it usually adds at least a week to development.

Come to think of it... I should team up with a designer, and produce high-quality commercially oriented premium themes. They'd sell like hotcakes.

Any designer up for a project? :)

See sig :)

Just from the thread, I'd pick Voodoo or Mike Semen as both seem to understand that something "purrty" does not mean it's functional.

The designs in your portfolio are really good, yet the design of your own site is god-awful. And by god-awful I mean truly, utterly, completely horrible. One of the worst I have ever seen on any design company's website.

Since you're obviously a talented designer, judging by the designs in your portfolio, I can't help but wonder why you'd present yourself like that...

well ok then:)

"The shoemaker's son always goes barefoot." Theres my excuse. :1orglaugh

But seriously, I guess it comes down to taste, and in the case of my website probably I pushed it a bit to the extreme, but personally I like it (I wouldnt have done it that way if I didnt).

Anyways, thanks for the compliments! :thumbsup

Its the background thats killin it, other that everything is nice on your site:)
Fuck the way the site looks the work is awesome.
Yer a guy I would definatly say is a good designer and would refer work to and probably will when the season picks up.

quite excellent blog designs, I think I will be hitting you up in the next few weeks regarding a blog design for me :)

Sorry, but it's not just a matter of taste.

There's also the matter of usability. In the case of your site's design, usability is extremely low. Apart from the background quite literally hurting my eyes when I open it, you have a flash "contact" button which is a mailto link in an age where many people use webbased mail, a flash button saying "our blog" which doesn't appear to do anything, and the center of the page dedicated to what at first glance appear to be dead images. Quite frankly, it looks rather unprofessional.

The main website in your portfolio is always your own. From a marketing perspective (note that I am not talking about an artistic perspective here), this one is simply bad.

When I have an issue like you are describing I fix it by learning how to
do something for myself.

:2 cents:

Then you must have a lot of spare time :2 cents:

So we are talking 'off the shelf' themes yeah?

I ask that because I have NEVER used a paid custom theme, until recently...

But I recently sprung for a custom job from a good design studio... And so far I am REALLY IMPRESSED...

So, I dont quite get what you mean?

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh Yeah man almost everyone I showed the website to hated the background, I should definitely change it sometime... thanks for the nice comments! :thumbsup

Thanks! Looking forward to it! :thumbsup

I know man, it's a strange site and there's lots of room for improvement... (dont even look at the code :helpme)

But thanks for the constructive criticism, much appreciated! :thumbsup

because they are made for no other reason than backlinks

Maybe we should meet for a drink. Do you ever get to New Jersey?

My eyes hurt...

:2 cents:

I know A LOT of wp themes that are marketing oriented and beautiful at the same time. Even a few free ones. So maybe you didn't find the right ones. Of course, most free themes are free because they lack a lot of stuff, hence you'll need to pay for some goodies. But as I said, there are A LOT of excellent mainstream WP themes.

Of course, good adult WP themes is another song... :2 cents:

If you know a lot of them, you've been looking in different places than I have.


Here's an example of one of the better ones I've found:
http://www.woothemes.com/demo/freshnews/

It might look good, but let's take a quick look at the problems with it, from a marketing point of view:

- wastes banner space on the search form, that needs to be fixed
- not enough effective integrated ad spots, those need to be added
- wastes the footer, one needs to be added
- relies strongly on images to look good, which means extra expenses in stock photography
- does not present enough opportunities for slapping attractive content on the front page above the fold - increased bounce rate

To fix it:
Use smaller logo, put standard-sized ad in place of search thingy, add search thingy to nav bar.
Fix front page to show more featured content above the fold. Major redesign, but completely essential.
Add a productive footer.

So you'd end up having to fix the header, the main content presentation and the footer. Essentially, a complete redesign.

Remember, beauty is unimportant. You want to cut bounce rates, increase pages/visit, increase bookmarks and increase ad clicks. Other things don't really matter.

I'll ad that I think the design of a WP is absolutely meaningless. Most Adult BLogs copy and back link each other they are all nothing but dumb drones of repetition.

Its the content, If it sucks and says everything everyone else does you are basically gonna be standing there holding your dick wondering why you got 100 of them and the guy next to you has 1 that does better than all 100 of yours.

SHooting the retarded designer that you paid to design it over the matter rather silly for two reasons.

A: You paid someone to Design a WP for you when there are literally thousands of free templates.
B: Think design matters on WP.

First, I'm not talking about adult.

Second, you're an idiot if you think design doesn't affect bounce rates and average pages/visit. And hey, guess what? Bounce rates and pages/visit directly affect my bottom line.

now my brain hurts...

I'm not a designer.:winkwink:

Because knowing photoshop well and being able to draw dont make someone a designer, but an artist. (and that sums it up) :2 cents:

How many personal websites or web logs (the true definition of the term) need banner space.

None do. So now re-ask the question, why do they all fail at marketing and generating sales.

Because its not what they are made for.

That is why there are designers that make templates with Ad spaces, and a goal to sell a product.

99% of those design fuckers have no clue how to make money on the interwebs.

So, all we see are good looking templates that aren't made to make money.

:thumbsup:thumbsup

Exactly my thoughts for 99 pct. of them,

Where are the banner spots?

What's with all that SEO unfriendly bullshit?

Why is the navigation / categories so overcomplicated - to distract attention from what should be the main point of the site?

I've picked up a theme for my mainstream stuff already, it's pretty light and simple, but I'll anyway need to modify it myself so it fits my needs.

you arent looking hard enough, or you arent modding it right.

I do love my first blogs which were designed by Rochard's great team, but since that I followed the advice to start fine-tuning the default skin with a unique header and some useful plugins and I am satisfied with the results.

Hmm. Would you have any recommendations for places with good themes? :)

What kind of look are you going for?

Magazine/glossy type, not too dark, space for several headlines above the fold, not too image-dependent, ads incorporated in the design, lots of space reserved for presentation of content.