It can be quite overwhelming when comes the time to choose a theme for your brand new blog. There are so many options through the web that it becomes quite difficult to make a decision.
You have to focus on a few thing if you want to succeed on this task.
- Your theme must match your niche, of course, but this can be a bit more difficult than it seems. A celebrity blog, for an instance, will make use of more vibrating colors than a technology one.
- You must know who your target audience is before anything else. What do they seek when they come to your blog? Text, images, videos?
- Colors can be a tricky thing. When in doubt, follow a golden rule: less is more.
- Avoid dark backgrounds, specially if you publish a lot of text. White text on a dark background will make your reader’s eyes burn after a couple of minutes.
- If you intend to publish a lot of images and videos, you will need a large content area.
- Fluid width themes work well if you start with them from day one and plan what you publish in advance. You have to consider a lot of things, from ad spaces to images width. If you skip this step, you will end up with a weird looking blog, where images go over text and/or sidebars. And vice-versa.
- Fixed themes are easier to use, but avoid anything aiming more or less than 1024×768 resolutions.
- 800×600 resolution is dead. According to my statistics, nobody who reads this blog uses it anymore. Most readers use 1024+ monitor resolution or higher. If your theme is built with 800×600 in mind, your blog will look like a thin strip on the middle of most screens.
- If you think about monetizing your blog in any given time, make sure you have the proper spaces, even if you will not use them yet.
- Avoid obscure sponsored themes. Many of them carry malicious code that will turn your blog into a spam heaven, mixing hidden links to your content behind your back.
Do you have an interesting tip that’s not here? Feel free to submit it via comment form.
