The Type of Site We are Creating
- A website suitable for service professional or independent small business that looks good on mobile devices
- architects, engineers, designers,
- coaches, consultants,
- contractors, sub-contractors
- The business purpose for the site is:
- Help prospective clients find you when they are searching for your services online
- Present the services that you offer
- Establish your credibility in the field
- Uniquely styled site
- This site architecture is unique
- It’s entirely different than if you are selling products
- different from a blog
- different from a membership site
- While the site may ultimately have a blog it is not strictly a blog site
- Phase 1 – completely static site
- Phase 2 – add blog functionality
- With a specific set of tools
- WordPress
- Thesis 2
- BYOB Agility Nude skin
- BYOB Thesis boxes & packages
- NextGen Gallery Plugin
- Meteor Slider Plugin
- Google Analytics products
- Why these tools?
Why Use Thesis 2 for a Small Business Website?
- Fast and Efficient
- Very efficient code base – it requires less server resources
- Side by side Pingdom comparison –
- With Thesis 2.2
- Page load time – 2.7 seconds
- Server wait time – 33.54% – 0.9 seconds
- With Thesis 1.8.5
- Page load time – 4.33 seconds
- Server wait time – 44.84% – 1.9 seconds
- With Thesis 2.2
- Excellent SEO tools
- Customize the seo for every single page on your site
- Use HTML 5 semantic markup
- Use schema for structured data
- It provides easy automatic Google publisher and author integration
- It works seamlessly with Yoast SEO
- Massive support
- Me – of course
- ticket based email support
- Thesis forum
- For intermediate and advanced users – Hyper customizable
- A system of interchangeable web parts
- Granular control
- Custom templates ANYWHERE
- Easy responsiveness
- All DIY Themes are responsive
- BYOB skins & boxes
Understanding Thesis 2 and Skins
- WordPress uses themes to display the webpage
- WordPress requires a theme
- Switching themes doesn’t change the content
- Changes the display of the content
- WordPress uses child themes to modify themes
- Child theme requires a parent theme
- Parent theme doesn’t require a child theme
- Thesis is a theme – but not really
- Thesis is a “theming engine”
- It provides all the tools necessary to completely customize the appearance of your site
- It uses a skin, rather than a child theme to display your content
- Any and all customization happens to the skin
- What is the difference between a Thesis 2 skin and a WordPress theme?
- Thesis 2 + Skin = WordPress Theme
- Thesis REQUIRES a skin
- Thesis 2 Customizability starts with a Skin
- Thesis 2 exposes the structure of a template
- Drag one part in, drop another part out
- All happens inside the skin
- Summary – a skin is to Thesis as a theme is to WordPress
- The skin contains all of the information necessary to display the content
Types of Thesis 2 skins
- Built in skins
- Thesis Classic
- DIY Themes Skins
- Pearsonified
- Social Triggers
- Promo
- BYOB Skins
- Agility
- Carta
- Maintenance Mode
- Other Reputable Sources of Skins
- icustomizethesis.com
- themedy.com
- Skin sources to avoid
- thesisawesome
- wpthesisskins
Thesis 2 Skin Roundup – DIY Themes
- Classic Responsive
- Minimalist skin
- 2 Column – page width style
- Suitable for either blog or small business website
- Good starting place for a designer
- Promo
- 2 Column – page width style
- Lots of styled elements
- social media icons
- promo bar
- styled optin forms
- styled alert boxes
- Suitable primarily for blogs
- Tabbed widget area for displaying blog stuff
- Social Triggers
- Minimalist skin
- 2 column – page width style
- Suitable primarily for blogs
- Main feature is the feature box on the blog page
- Pearsonified
- Highly stylized skin
- 2 Columns – page width style
- Suitable primarily for blogs
- styles are blog centric
- heavily stylized sidebar
- Lots of styled elements
- widget headings
- post title icons
- styled optin forms
- styled alert boxes
Thesis 2 Skin Roundup – BYOBWebsite
- Agility
- Intended for small business
- pre-configured front page template
- Can be used without blog functionality
- 2 or 3 column design
- Full width page style
- Highly configurable with design options
- font styles
- backgrounds
- menus
- Flat style design
- Tools for simple responsive layouts
- Intended for small business
- Carta
- Intended for small business
- pre-configured front page template
- Can be used without blog functionality
- 2 or 3 column design
- page width style
- Highly configurable with design options
- font styles
- backgrounds
- menus
- Traditional style design
- Tools for simple responsive layouts
- Intended for small business
Thesis 2 Skin Roundup – other skin designers
- Inspire
- Intended for small business
- pre-configured front page template
- Can be used without blog functionality
- 2 column design
- Full width page style
- colors configurable with design options
- built-in soliloquy slider
- Intended for small business
- ClipCart
- Intended for eCommerce site
- pre-configured front page template
- several custom eCommerce templates
- Can be used without blog functionality
- 2 column design
- Either full width or page width style
- colors configurable with design options
- built-in slider
- fully responsive shopping cart
- Intended for eCommerce site
- Thesis DNA
Installing Thesis 2
- Fresh install of WordPress
- Download Thesis 2
- Add it to your local file system
- Install Thesis
- Use the admin install settings
- Upload from local file system
- Look at the result
- Tour the Thesis 2
- Admin Menu
- Thesis Home Menu
- Skin
- Site
- Boxes
- View Site
- More
- Skin
- Design
- Custom CSS
- Manage Skins
- Editor
- Site
- Analytics
- Authorship
- Publisher
- Site Verification
- Tracking Scripts
- Favicon
- RSS Feed
- Blog Page SEO
- 404 error page
- HTML Head
- Boxes
- Manage boxes
- Other menu items
- View Site
- More
- License Key
- System Status
- User Guide
- Support Forums
- Thesis Blog
- Affiliate Program
- Version
- Thesis 2 Skin Editor
- Canvas
- HTML
- CSS
- Image
- Manager
Setup the Thesis Classic Responsive Skin
- Browse the front side
- Skin Design
- Skin Content
- Header Image
- What happens if the image is too big?
- What happens if the image is too small?
- Recommended image sizes
- Main column width
- medium
- thumb
Install the Thesis Footer Widgets Box
- Download the Footer Widgets box
- Install footer widgets box
- Configure box
- Add widgets
Installing the BYOB Agility Free skin
- Download BYOB Agility
- From the Thesis 2 Skins page
- Add to local file system
- Install BYOB Agility
- Select Skins install
- Look at the result
- Activate BYOB Agility
- Select Skins
- activate vs preview
- Skin Design
- Color scale
- Layouts
- Backgrounds
- widgets
- Skin Content
- The use of images in BYOB Agility
- WordPress Featured Images
- Images should fit the column widths
- Basic column widths
- one-quarter – 258px
- one-third – 320px
- one-half – 516px
- two-thirds – 640px
- three-quarters – 774
- Recommended image sizes – primary content column width – 640px
- Large – 640
- Medium – 320
- Thumbnail – 200
- Built In image sizes
- Agility featured page – 320×200
- Agility tiny thumbnail – 75×75
- Regenerating these widths