Episode 40: Wordpress Website Design Brisbane
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[00:00:00] Saul: Hi everybody, and welcome to the Web Design Brisbane Podcast. This is episode number 40, and today's episode is entitled WordPress Web design. My name is Saul Edmonds, and as usual, I'm joined by the lovely Gillian Smith.
[00:00:13] Gillian: Hello, everybody. Hello. Saul, how are you today?
[00:00:15] Saul: I'm great. Thank you so much for asking. Yes, it is good. We are the co-founders and creative directors of Roundhouse, the creative agency, a local business with a passion for helping our clients grow. Over to you, Gill.
[00:00:27] Gillian: Okay, thanks, Saul. Well, today we're talking about WordPress website design, and in particular, we'll take a look at the benefits that WordPress offers. Our goal is to help small business owners start-ups and entrepreneurs in the city of Brisbane, Australia, take their opportunities to the next level with brilliant website design. If you're from another location, or city, welcome. Thanks for joining us today. And we hope that we can help you grow your business in the online space.
[00:00:54] Saul: What are today's topics, Gil?
[00:00:55] Gillian: Okay, so well today. Our key topic is WordPress website site design and we're going to take a look at some of the key benefits that WordPress offers, especially in regard to small business websites. And from there, we'll take a look at custom WordPress themes and cover some of the advantages that they also offer.
[00:01:14] Saul: Okay, let's get started.
[00:01:15] Gillian: Okay, so you have many years of experience, let's go over some of the main benefits that WordPress offers.
[00:01:24] Saul: Okay, so starting off with Numero Uno. Key benefit here is security.
[00:01:33] Gillian: Is it true that WordPress offers a high level of with websites security?
[00:01:38] Saul: Okay, so once again, like on its own, just if you said WordPress, not really. But it's what is within it that you do that you add to that, that adds that extra layer is a range of different plugins, and things that you can add WordPress that let you monitor any, any threats that might be likely to happen to your side malware or anything else in a managed way that some of the platforms don't have, which is really great so in that sense, yes.
[00:02:22] Gillian: Okay, well, what about website functionality? Is it easy to extend the functionality of your WordPress website with plugins?
[00:02:31] Saul: Yeah, well, really, that's one of the key things is that even without a great deal of knowledge, this massive amount of people possibly in the hundreds of thousands, or at least in the 10s of thousands of people who do third party, plugins for WordPress, to add all sorts of extra functionality. Not all of them are great, but there's heaps that do a really fantastic job, and some of the people that create them, that's all they do and they spend all their time on extending the functionality of WordPress.
[00:03:13] Gillian: So would you say that WordPress is in fact, highly customizable?
[00:03:17] Saul: Yeah, I mean, WordPress from any level from a WordPress template that you use pretty much as is, which there's plenty out there that also allow you to highly customize them to. So they just give you the framework for you to do what you want, in a relatively easy why, then through to being fully customize from the whole experience from the ground up? It lets you do any, any level. So the short answer is yes.
[00:03:56] Gillian: Okay. Well, so from a user’s point of view, is WordPress simple for non techie people to use?
[00:04:04] Saul: Well, non techie people. There's a bit of a range there, isn't there? In some ways, if you went to a person who's used it before, they would say, Oh, yes, it's so easy to use for people who've then use something like Squarespace, and when after WordPress that be like, Oh, my God, no, no, not at all. In my experience, often comes down to people's previous understanding or experience with similar things, not really anything to do with WordPress, per se. It's just their previous experience or willingness because a lot of people who actually, in my experience over the years, who would classify themselves as non techie people, but they actually just really want willing to throw themselves into something will actually find it within a very short amount of time frame but that comes back to having someone to help you out and as opposed to just being thrown in the deep end, and people go, Oh, my God, what am I going to do?
[00:05:18] Gillian: Okay, so well, with WordPress, can you have multiple users with multiple logins? If that's what you need?
[00:05:24] Saul: Yeah, you can if you got it depends on if, if that means to if the site itself has a user base, and people have to log in to do other things within the site, and or if multiple logins and users to be able to edit the site too, but either one of those things? Yes, it's all that sort of functionality is within WordPress.
[00:05:53] Gillian: Okay, a key question that many people know that asking is, is WordPress mobile friendly?
[00:05:59] Saul: Yes. Another Yes. Yeah, that's right. So mobile friendly, being mobile responsive, or a responsive site, being that the site content will adapt and change to suit whatever screen it's on, including smartphones so it's, unless you're using an antiquated version of WordPress and some themes, some WordPress themes out of the box, aren't as good, mobile responsive wise as other ones, but most of them are, but ultimately, that comes down to working with your web designer to ensure that is the case.
[00:06:43] Gillian: Okay. And so what can you tell us about social media integration and WordPress?
[00:06:49] Saul: Well, all your Facebook and Twitter and Pinterest and all the big social media platforms, they already gave developers great tools, and their own versions of plugins or extensions to add extra functionality to WordPress sites, and then you've got a lot of people who already create third party plugins for WordPress, who make their own integrations with a lot of social media. Sometimes that means just simple sharing from your website, social media or sometimes it also means to show and integrate live feed from Facebook, or Pinterest or otherwise, within your site but either way, there's a huge range of options out there to do that for just about anything you'd want to do.
[00:07:49] Gillian: Okay, well, so let's talk about now custom WordPress themes for a moment. Now, first of all, what is a custom WordPress theme?
[00:07:57] Saul: Okay, so, if there's all the themes that are already out there, there's 10s of thousands of them, if not more, if you just want to take the approach of, I'm just going to design something from scratch, I'm going to sit inside illustrator, or Photoshop, and I'm just going to design one from scratch. So it, it suits exactly what I want, you can design that on screen and have exactly that made into WordPress theme that works in exactly the same way as any other thing would but you have to keep in more than two, they've got to add the right features for people to be able to still edit the content in the site.
[00:08:45] Gillian: Okay, well, what are some of the reasons why people would consider a custom WordPress theme? Well, they should consider a custom WordPress theme?
[00:08:54] Saul: well, wouldn't show the two sides of the same coin. With a lot of existing themes, really, to be honest, you could achieve much of what you might want to do. Well, if not everything you'd want to do inside a custom WordPress theme so if the end result is the same, then you might use a really great WordPress theme that's already out that offers really good support for the same end result but if that doesn't fit the bill, and with the interface, or any range of different things need to be done, and that requires a custom WordPress theme, then you would go down that path, or very simply, someone just wants one, and they say, I definitely want this to be done no problem at all.
[00:09:51] Gillian: Okay, well, if you choose to get a custom WordPress theme, how can this specifically be a benefit to your customers.
[00:09:58] Saul: Okay, well. that gets back to your brand if that's going to serve you better by having the reason for doing anything like that shouldn't in my mind shouldn't be made the decision around that shouldn't be made just by I wanted because that means it's going to be better. It doesn't mean it's going to be better, it'll be better if your design is better. And the way in which you implement that is really the most important thing that it ties in with your brand, and whatever features you need within the site that might have an impact on your design. But whichever way you look at it, it comes back to good design, visual design, but also user interface and user experience strategic planning and strategic plan. Yeah, at the heart of it is good planning. And like we said a few times now, good communication with people to make sure everyone's sort of in agreement and moving forward when you're starting any project, because everyone must have a great result, and that's at the heart of it, I believe. So with that in mind on that very happy note. That's actually it for today, guys. Thanks so much for listening in again to other podcast. Before we go. Please don't forget to write, review and subscribe to this podcast would love to hear your feedback. Also, if you'd like to read the transcript of this episode, please visit our website at roundhouse.cc/web-design. We're on a journey to help local Brisbane businesses grow their opportunities online and exceed their goals. Thanks for listening and we'll see you tomorrow. Bye, guys.