There is a constant debate going on whether or not to use a free WordPress theme or a premium version. It all comes down to one thing: how serious are you about your online presence? You should all ask yourself this question, even if you would like to start a simple day-in-the-life journal, or have just begun learning how to create a WordPress website. At the end of the day, who knows, maybe it grows exceptionally popular over time. With a ton of daily traffic, it can be really stressful migrating to a premium version.
To make a long story short, you should first decide if creating a website and updating it with breathtaking content would be a long-term project or you just want to test the waters. Obviously, if this is something you would like to work on for years to come and possibly earn some money off of it, then you most definitely need to pick a premium WordPress theme. No need to think twice about it. Go all in, pick a theme and don’t look back.
Even if you are on a budget, I would highly suggest you to rather wait some time, save the money and invest into buying a premium theme. The average price of a theme is around $49 but you can (easily) get them even cheaper. I mean, that is not much, right? And you get a WordPress theme which is 100% responsive, retina ready and fully customizable. Moreover, you can pick a theme that was built for the niche you are getting yourself into. All this means is that you will save a ton of time on the design and get up and running in no time.
At this point, all the mentioned might sound just some random whatnots to you, however, once you face with it and all the struggle that will come with it, you will remember me and this article.
With that being said, let’s together check out 5 reasons why you should use a premium WordPress theme.
1. Stunning design
“But there are a ton of amazing free WordPress themes out there!” Sure, that might be correct, still, no free theme comes close to the premium version. It is just so little that you can do with a free theme.
Meantime, when it comes to a premium WP theme, you can easily change the skin or pick another color and go with the design you fancy the most.
Not to mention, pretty much every premium theme comes with several predefined demos that you can upload with just one click. This means even more design options to choose from. While you are very limited with changing the layout of a free theme, you can play around with it as much or as little as you would like when building a website using a premium theme.
2. Complete control over customization
One of the most important things and the biggest benefits when creating a website is the option to have total control over the theme. You will not get that with a free theme.
It is completely opposite if you decide to go with a premium theme. You are allowed to fully customize the theme and make the website to look the way you want. You can easily add your personal touch to it and truly build a one of a kind website that will amaze visitors and make them hungry for more aka repetitive visitors. Make the website look exactly the way you want it to look and take all the benefits of a premium theme to your advantage.
3. Awesome features
While we already spoke about one of the crucial features of a premium WordPress theme in the previous point, we want to bring out a few more that free themes are lacking in.
First, the majority of premium themes follow the modern web standards to a T. Meaning, even if the online standards are constantly changing, you don’t have to worry about missing on something. With regular updates, your theme will be constantly up to date.
Second, a fully responsive design. Nowadays, people are accessing the web from a variety of devices. It is of the utmost importance that your website works fluently on all the devices. Otherwise, you might get penalized by Google.
Third, SEO friendly design. Each premium theme is optimized for search engines. Meaning, it will help you rank higher in search engines. Still, have in mind that plugins like Yoast SEO can help you optimize your website for SE even further.
Last but definitely not least, supports a wide variety of widgets and plugins. Plus, it is very likely that a premium theme of your likings will already come with a few premium plugins.
4. Free regular updates
One vital downside of a free theme is that your website might break when the new version of WordPress comes out. While browsing the directory, you will notice that many free themes are out of date or soon will be.
Nothing like that will ever happen with a premium theme. It is one of its core functionalities, to constantly be updated and compatible with all the installed plugins. You don’t have to worry about your site breaking or in need of corrections. Some of the themes even offer an automatic update while the others get updated with a simple click. With each update, you do not have to stress yourself with whether or not your website will still look the same. It simply will.
5. Customer support
Our last reason why you should go with a premium WordPress theme is the amazing customer support that the theme comes with. Some theme owners even offer a free lifetime theme support while the others are limited to a month or similar. Either way, you will have enough time to get in touch with the product owners whenever you come across any issue you may have with the theme.
However, every premium theme comes with a complete documentation which will guide you, step by step, on your theme setup. In case you are first time blogger, this will help you greatly. But feel free to get in touch with the friendly staff and they will be happy to help you out.