You don’t have to be a professional designer or web developer to design professional sites. With the help of ready-made templates, anyone with some idea of ux web design can build his own website.
If you are still wondering how to get started, read on to know everything about designing a site using ready to use templates available online. There are numerous options which makes choosing a template an overwhelming process, especially for those who don’t have much knowledge or experience about designing websites.
Whether you are a pro developer or a newbie, the following tips will help you pick the best template for your site in no time.
1. Understanding the theme and purpose of your site
The first thing that you need to consider while building your site is the niche and theme of your site. Even if you are designing a site for someone else, make sure to ask them about the genre and main purpose of the site. Instead of getting overwhelmed with flashy templates, try to opt for one which goes well with the theme of your site.
Every site needs to have a purpose and objective. For example, you cannot opt for a minimalistic blog design for an e-commerce site and vice versa. By understanding the theme and purpose of your site, you can choose a template which makes your brand and product stand out from other sites dealing with similar goods or services.
2. You need to customize and modify a lot in free templates
Today, there are different types of templates available for designers and developers. You can either choose a free or paid template. Similarly, you can choose between a custom or premium version. When it comes to the overall cost of your template, you need to consider the time and energy that you are spending to create a website.
If you don’t like to invest too much time in developing your site, then it is better to avoid using free templates. Unlike the paid versions, you need to customize and modify a lot in free templates which can be quite time consuming, especially for those who are not familiar with different designing tools and services. Paid versions are designed and coded by experienced developers and offer excellent service and support to its users.
Nevertheless, free templates are a great option for artists, writers, designers or anyone who offers professional services and want to create a static site to list their services, skills and contact details online but don’t have enough budget for using a paid template.
3. Make sure to modify the template and customize it
It is equally important to make some changes and modifications in your template to make your site look unique and personal. It is possible that a competitor brand may be using the same template that you have used for creating your site.
Therefore, make sure to modify the template and customize it according to the services or products that you offer to your clients or customers. Some templates come with more options for customization whereas some are hard to customize. You can pick one according the theme and purpose of your site.
If you are new at this, you can find it hard to customize your template. However it is better to customize a template with less content than making frequent changes into a template which already contains different types of images, written text, videos, etc.
4. Make sure your site is responsive and mobile friendly
Responsive templates are those which can be used across several types of smart devices and laptops. In today’s digital age, where everyone owns smart devices, it makes sense to use a template which can be used to access a site anytime and anywhere. Whether you have an eCommerce site or an entertainment blog, if your site isn’t responsive or mobile friendly, then you can lose a large number of potential customers and users. Therefore, make sure that the template you pick won’t distort on the screens of different devices and gadgets.
5. Make sure to buy template from a trustworthy supplier
A lot of new developers tend to offer paid and free templates online. However, not every template works or looks the same. A weak template which is poorly designed can cause technical problems while building the site. Therefore, make sure to buy template from a trustworthy supplier. Search for online reviews and rating of previous buyers before buying the template.
Final words
Every developer wants his site to have a good rank which is not possible without following effective SEO practices. It is relatively easy to create a website with a stunning layout and content. However, it is equally important to use various SEO tools to get more traffic and better ranks online.