One of the best features of WordPress is the availability of 1000s of free themes for customization of your blog. New theme are created every day and available for free download. When a theme is more attractive than the one you are using for your theme, you definitely have the tendency to change it. I too have changed my theme quite a few time before making my own theme. There are few important things to do when you change your theme.
- After installing the new theme on your blog make sure that the links are working fine. Links like About me and Contact are crucial for a blog as they are the main source to contact the author or get more information about the blog. Most of the new themes will have default About page. Make sure that you have linked to the correct pages.
- Make sure that the feed links are working fine. All the themes have default feed link. Check that you have correctly linked your feed icon to your feeds.
- After installing, check your blog in different browsers to make sure that there is no alignment issues. You can check IE, Opera, Firefox and Safari. IE has the problem of displaying some CSS weirdly.
- Most of us use scripts for site tracking like Google Analytics or 103bees. Once you install the new theme, check whether you have added these scripts to either header or footer. Last time when I changed my theme, I forgot to add Google code and my site stats were not available for entire week.
- Remove all the unwanted links from the sidebar, as there could be few default links in the sidebar. Also check that you have removed all the unwanted widgets from your sidebar. Also make sure that the plugins are working properly in the new theme (Few theme have in-build plugins). Make necessary changes to the CSS, to make it attractive with the new theme.
So next time you are changing your theme, cross check whether you have done these things properly.
Technorati tags: WordPress, Themes
Last time I redesigned I forgot to put Google Analytics 🙁
I believe there is a plugin for Google Analytics, once you place the code there you don’t need to worry about manually updating the code each and every time you change the theme.
BTW, Nirmal nice to see you sharing your experience.!
Checking that the feed link works on the new theme is usually forgotten I agree. Great post as always buddy 😀
The best place to check browser compatibility for your blog is http://browsershots.org/
At Browsershots, you can run a test for all types of browsers. The best feature of Browsershots is that it will do a screen capture for you too.
@Benedict,
Thanks for that info on Analytics plugin.
@BrownBaron,
Thanks for the comment.
@Kuanhoong,
Browser compatibility can be checked at browsershots. They check on a wider range of browsers.
The google Analytics plugin is quite neat and easy to use.
Maybe we should develop its 103bees counterpart 🙂
Other important things to do is to check single.php, header.php and footer.php and make sure that calls to different plugins or other custom code that was implemented in the previous custom theme is now implemented in the new one.
lol very nice post there Nirmal. For me changing theme is like changing clothes. It takes a little time changing but its a lot of time to look yourself in the mirror if you are looking perfect or not hehe 😛
Nice post Nirmal,
I forgot to include statcounter and google analytics code when i changed my theme recently. 🙄
@DJ,
I too look whether its suiting my blog or not. I spend a lot of time this way. 😀
@Ram,
Stats code is one of things to be forgotten as its effects are not visually available.
Great post, Nirmal. I always forget to add analytics code when I change the theme. 😳
Great post Nirmal… I also experienced this recently.. and gave me the idea for my next blog post.
But as Ben said, the Analytics plugin is really effective. It automatically inserts the code into any theme file as soon as the theme is activated
@Ashwin,
Glad that you liked the post and you got some idea for your next post. 😀 I waiting to see your next post. 🙂
@Vijay,
I’ll try out the analytics plugin.
Too many plugins seems to be problem for many blogs. I don’t know whether it is only me, but sometimes I am getting “page cannot be displayed” for your blog as well.
Very useful tips!
I actually only made the switch once before designing my own theme, but I’ve been using Google Analytics and Feedburner plugins (among others) that add things automatically. This is a good way to avoid some of those link problems if you switch a lot.
Before you do all that, the most important thing is that you chose a theme, which is decent, loads up fast and ensures that it has got the usability when it comes to browsing your blog.
Apart, from that the points you’ve mentioned are really nice nirmal 🙂 Especially the feed one..I’ve seen many people not changing it in the auto discovery and find that they put the feedburner (most of us use this..don’t we?) link but fail to put it in the auto discovery..nice tips..once again from you ..as usual 🙂
@WebStuffScan,
I too had problems with plugins, they are not totally error free. Use only those plugins which are really useful for you.
@Kyle,
Thanks for the comment.
@ReviewSaurus,
You are right, first thing is to select a good theme and here I have assumed that you are changing a theme because you have selected a good one. Important thing with theme is that it should load fast without any errors.
Nice post man , i generally forget Google Analytics and stuff .
Thanks for this Post Nirmal. This will really help me alot.
One more thing Nirmal will you plese give me some info bout WP backup and reinstalltion.
@Technobuzz,
I’ll give more info on that. BTW you can mail me if you need any urgent help in backup.
oh, great! i’m thinking to change my theme. and this post comes in very handy!
these are reasons that i dont want to change my theme.. im to lazy.
@Jenny,
Glad to know that this post was helpful for you.
@Internet TV,
Even I was lazy about it, but when I saw beautiful themes, I was tempted to make one. 🙂
yes, all the steps are important. But normally i will try the new theme with my test blog first and modify it base on what i want than only i change with my real blog.
I hate horn tooting…but a few weeks I put together a plug-in that will take all of your code modifications (Google Analytics, MyBlogLog, etc.) and automatically transfer them to your new theme. There is a place for you enter code modifications in the header, sidebar, and footer…so you have greater control over what you can keep when you change your theme. Give it a look if you have a chance http://www.nmediainteractive.com/toggletracking
I have been using this plug-in on a four of my blogs and it has made theme switching a snap.
Nice list, we need more such checklists for WP newbies.
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