Review of Woo Themes

It’s official, J.R. is now a Woo Themes subscriber. Yep, I gave in and bought the developer subscription on Woo Themes.  I did this about 2 months ago, but sadly I am just finding time to review them and give my thoughts about Woo Themes custom Worpdress Themes.

Before finding Woo Themes and eventually purchasing their subscription I began to follow Adii, one of the founders of WooThemes.  I subscribed to his blog and followed him on Twitter.  When I started to see post’s about their new project I was pretty anxious to see what they would come up with.

Who is Woo Themes?

WooThemes is a project started by three respected designers – Adii, Magnus Jepson and Mark Forrester – whom all share one thing: their passion for WordPress. All of the themes available on WooThemes are 100% unique and we can assure you that you won’t find similar CMS solutions elsewhere for any other platform.

We pride ourselves not only in the quality of our themes releases, but also that of our support & customer service. Our ultimate aim is to build a community of passionate WooThemes users, where future themes will be influenced by our userbase.

We truly love WordPress and after using any of our themes, you’ll not only love WordPress, but you’ll love WooThemes as well!

I won’t lie, there are plenty of “so-called” Custom Wordpress Themes, so I couldn’t imagine it being much different.  I already had purchased one of Brian Gardner’s themes and he is one of the pioneers of custom Wordpress Themes.

The Bottom Line… Worth It or Not?

100% Yes.  I am not new to Wordpress, I have had my fair share of free and premium Wordpress themes and these themes are worth every damn penny.

They include a one of kind “theme option tab” in the admin section which includes all kinds of goodies:

• Easily change your logo
• Add Feed Burner URL
• Add Google Analytics
• Add Flickr photos
• Add Twitter updates
• And More!

The best part is, all of those things I just mentioned take about 5 seconds flat to add to your site.  There’s no digging through the code, not worrying if you placed it in the right section, it’s all laid out for you ready to go.

Lastly, WooThemes has collaborated with well respected designers (Elliot Jay Stocks), making their designs not only genuine but truly nothing you have ever seen before.  They also guarantee that you’ll see at least 1 new theme every month.  So far they have delivered.

UPDATE

Today is December 28th, 2009. It’s been well over a year since actually wrote this post and bought the Woo Themes club package. I’m happy to say, I’m still a customer. I pay my $15 every month and I have yet to be disappointed with Woo Themes. From fresh design to a speedy customer service team, they’ve got a handle on it. With that being said, just go and purchase a theme and I promise you won’t be disappointed.

You don’t need to take my advice though, go to their site and demo any of the themes, read what the community is saying on their blog and you’ll know what I am talking about.

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P.S. – You can Follow Me on TWITTER.

Are you using Google Analytics on your WordPress Blog? If you’re not currently using any type of Web analytics on your site you should seriously consider it. Why you ask?

1. It’s $FREE.⁹⁹
2. Its’ easy to install
3. It’s helps measure your blogging efforts
4. I love Google Analytics more then a friend and you should too

But just a few reasons why Google Analytics is vital to any WordPress Blog — now onto the meat of how to easily stick this sucker in your site.

If you DON’T have a Google Analytics account yet start here:

Step 1 – Setup a Google Analytics account.

• Head on over to Google Analytics and sign up for a free account. Complete the steps by filling out your website and general information.

If you DO have a Google Analytics account start here:

Step 2 – Choose the correct Google Analytics tracking code.

• When you reach the point of copying and pasting the tracking code you are given 2 options:
  • The New Tracking Code (ga.js)
  • The Legacy Tracking Code (urchin.js)
• See the example below –
  • 
• Basically just choose the “New Tracking Code.” Only people with the Legacy code already on their site, should even consider placing that script on their site. The new tracking code allows you to receive updates and is also compatible with all the features of Google Analytics.

Step 3 – Installing the Google Analytics tracking code.

• One of the biggest benefits of using WordPress is how easy it is to edit and customize on the fly. Simply login to your WordPress Blog Admin section and take the following steps.
• Make sure you copied the “New Tracking Code” from your Google Analytics account. Now head back to your WordPress Admin Section and click on the “Design” Tab. Below that you will see a link labeled “Theme Editor” click that link
  • 
• On the right hand side you will find all of your themes files. Choose the file labled “footer”
  • 
• Just before the “</body>” tag paste the Google Analytics code.
  • 
• By installing this snippet of code in the footer, this will be the only place you need to install the code. The code will follow on every page since the footer obviously needs to be on every page of your blog.

And that’s it! Wham bam, thank you Ma’am.

If you got tripped up at all leave me a comment and I’ll walk you through any sticky parts.

More to come…

Wordpress Fun Theme

This Wordpress Fun Theme was featured on Smashing Magazine just recently.  I actually used this theme myself for quite sometime.  Takes a little bit to get up and running but the illustration and design work is unlike any other Wordpress Theme I have ever seen.

Preview: Click Here to see a Live Demo of the Wordpress Fun Theme.

Download: Click Here to Download the Wordpress Fun Theme.

Additional Downloads: Click here to Download the PSD and EPS files.

WP Polaroid by adii (Wordpress Rockstar)

The WP Polaroid theme is one of a kind.  The polaroid images at the top are easily customizable along with the rest of the Wordpress Theme features.

Now I don’t know adii personally but I do follow him via RSS and Twitter and this guy is brilliant when it comes to Wordpress.  Like I said I follow him regularly and just last month, adii and a few other designers launched Woo Themes.  If you haven’t checked it out already, head over to WooThemes. Over at Woo Themes you will see some of adii and the other 3 founder’s awesome work.  There are 4 creators of Woo Themes and all of them do fantastic work.

Woo Themes consists of “Premium Wordpress Themes” so they are not free.  If you are going to spend money on a theme I would definitly check there first.  Also if you have sec when you’re there, check out the creators personal websites.  They are kick ass, trust me.

[note]Preview: Click Here to see a Live Demo of the WP Polaroid Theme.[/note]

[download]Download: Click Here to Download the WP Polaroid Theme.[/download]

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P.S. – You can Follow Me on TWITTER.

Tutorial on How to Install a Wordpress Theme

PLEASE READ.

If your Wordpress Blog is hosted on Wordpress.com then…

The following tutorial is for “self hosted” wordpress blogs. If you have a blog that is hosted on Wordpress.com (www.yoursite.wordpress.com) check out this brief tutorial on Wordpress.com on how to change your wordpress theme.

If you have Self Hosted Wordpress Blog then…

This is for you!  If using Wordpress to power their self hosted website, here is a quick tutorial on how to Install & Activate your Wordpress Theme.  If you get lost, feel free to comment and I’ll be glad to answer any questions.

Step 1. Downloading your Wordpress Theme

Once you have found the Wordpress Theme(s) you must download the zip file to your desktop or designated folder.  If you’re using a PC you will need to extract the file.

It should look something like this… A single folder with the title of the theme.

If you click into the file you will find all the necessary files that you will need to upload to your site.  Here is an example.

Everyone of your themes that you upload should contain a majority of the files shown above.

Step 2. Uploading your Wordpress Theme

Now that have your Wordpress Theme extracted or unzipped you are ready to upload your theme.  You will upload your Wordpress theme to your site via FTP.  If you don’t have a FTP client here is a completely free one I suggest.

This FTP clients is 100% free!  Mac Users & Windows Users – Filezilla

Go ahead and login to your site via FTP.  (Open FTP client, enter Hostname, Username & Password.)  Find your theme directory.

This is how you get to your Wordpress “themes” directory.

public_html/yoursite/wp-content/themes

Now that you have found your theme directory, go back to your theme folder located on your desktop or designated folder.  Using a Mac or Windows you can easily drag and drop the file directly into the themes folder.

Wait for the file to upload completely and also make sure the file is in the themes folder.

Step 3. Activating your Wordpress Theme

Nice, so you have successfully added your Wordpress Theme via FTP.  Now all you have to do is activate it.

Login to your Wordpress admin area like you would normally.  (http://www.yoursite.com/wp-admin)

Click on the design tab – shown here.

You should now see your already existing themes and of course the new Wordpress theme you just recently upload.

Now that you have located the Wordpress Theme, simply click the theme to activate it.

And that’s it!  Congratulations you’re all set.  You should now see your new theme activated!

Once you get that down you can browse for other themes and upload them the exact same way.

Hope this helps.  Please comment if you need any other instruction, hope this helps!

More to come…

So my featured wordpress theme I have for you today is called the HigherGround Wordpress Theme. It’s simple, easy to customize &  has great site naviagtion.

I have used the theme in the past and it did the job for me. It was fairly easy to take the header image and edit it to custom image.  Just changing that big image made me feel like this free wordpress theme was custom for me.

This theme was designed by StyleShout and was adapted by Seobilgi

Preview: Click here to see a demo of the HigherGround Wordpress Theme.

Download: Click here to download the HigherGround Wordpress Theme.

More to come…

I was on Wordpress.org today asking a question on a forum about the Audio Player plugin.  Of course I got side tracked and started snooping around the site right.  We all do it.  Anyway, I found an interesting post on the development section of Wordpress.org.

It looks like the Theme Directory is going to be revamped here, wordpress.org/extend/themes/

It’s been a long time since themes.wordpress.net stopped accepting new themes. Since then most theme authors have been distributing their themes from their own sites, without a good centralized place for people to browse, search, comment on, and rate themes. With the success of the plugins directory, we’ve wanted to have those same benefits in a theme directory. Today is the day we start making that happen, with the introduction of wordpress.org/extend/themes/.

I thought this was cool enough to let all of you know.  It will be nice to have one structured, legit wordpress theme destination.

I will still be featuring Wordpress Themes on my site to help you all from having to digging through the masses of Wordpress Themes they have on there.

Good luck finding your Themizzle!

If you follow my blog regularly you noticed last night I decided I would start featuring Wordpress themes on my blog.  Particularly ones I felt like were decent, functional and professional looking wordpress themes.

I wrote a post last night featuring the Aesma Pro Wordpress Theme

Today I was going through my Google Analytics account like usual and notice a ton of traffic already from terms like, wordpress, wordpress themes, pro wordpress themes.

I did a quick check in google for a few different variations on the above keyword terms.  So, I come to find out that I am on the 1st page of Google for the keyword, pro wordpress theme and pro wordpress themes

Anyway, not that I haven’t been ranked for any keyword variations in Google before but for such a competitive niche I thought that was pretty crazy to be on the first page of google for.  I am going to dig some more into other keyword variations but pretty cool stuff huh?

NattyWP.com is a great resource for Wordpress themes and I have decided to feature another today.

Aesma Pro Theme

Preview: Click Here to see a Live Demo of the Aesma Pro Theme.

Download: Click Here to Download a free version of the Aesma Pro Theme.

This theme is customizeable and I like how it takes advantage of the sidebar widgets.  Check it out!

More to come…

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P.S. – You can Follow Me on TWITTER.

I decided that with how many lame Wordpress Themes there are out there I would try to make it easier on a few people and start posting about Free Wordpress Themes I come across.

I came across I pretty nice looking one today that seems pretty functional.

It’s called “The Was JTk Free Wordpress Theme.”

Preview: Click here to see a Live Demo of “The Was JTk”

Download: Or Click here to Download the Free Wordpress Theme.

Hope this helps with your blog theme search.  Keep checking back to see what awesome wordpress theme I feature next…