Business Blog Advice

Your guide to the world of free blog templates as a design strategy for your blog. An overview of blog themes and templates, how they work, where to find them and more.

Free blog templates can save you a lot of time and energy when designing your blog. In this tutorial we will take a closer look at blog template designs and how you might use them. But first, let’s start with a basic definition:

Web Templates Defined

The template concept actually started long before blogs came onto the scene. I’ve been involved with website development for nearly a decade now, and as long as I can remember there have been website templates available to simplify the design process.

Basically, a website template is a pre-built website that you can make your own. You can do this by customizing the template, adding your own logo, your own content, your own images, etc.

The primary advantage of using a website template is that they save the designer a tremendous amount of time. Instead of coding a website from the “ground up,” the designer starts with a pre-built “shell” and customizes it to his or her liking (or to the client’s liking).

Blog Templates Explained

In much the same way, a blog template is basically a design “shell” that you can apply to your blog (and the customize the design template as you see fit). But there’s one key difference between templates for websites and those for blogs — the blog templates are unique to a certain type of blogging program.

Each type of blogging program (such as Blogger and WordPress) functions in a unique way, as far as the structure and function of the blog. So a WordPress template will not work with Blogger, nor will a Blogger template work with WordPress.

If you’re running a WordPress blog, you will need to use WordPress templates exclusively (with WordPress, these templates are known as WordPress “themes”). If you’re using Blogger, you will need to stick with templates designed specifically for Blogger. If you’re using TypePad … well, you get the idea.

Where to Find Free Blog Templates

I’ll only cover the two most popular blogging programs here (WordPress and Blogger), because otherwise this article could go on endlessly. Let’s start with WordPress templates (which are also referred to as “WordPress themes”).

You can download free WordPress templates from many places. The most popular place is the official WordPress themes page, located at the following address:

http://themes.wordpress.net

There are hundreds of free templates for WordPress within the site listed above. You can use the “Test Run” link to see how each blog template / theme would actually look and function. You can also download each template for free.

Here’s the thing about the WordPress themes found on this site. Most of them have a line in the footer area that credits the theme / template designer. It’s usually a link to the creator’s website as well. That’s understandable, and you should leave this credit in place. But some of the people who create blog templates will insert several additional links as well, usually to the websites of their clients or other sites they own.

For example, the bottom of your WordPress theme might say something like this:

“This theme created by Blog Design Guy, and is sponsored by cheap Viagra and premium wood blinds.”

In the example above, the Design Guy link would likely be the actual template designer. The other two links would be to his client website, or other websites he owns. So essentially, this person is offering “free” WordPress themes that are really designed to increase the link popularity (and search engine ranking) of multiple websites.

Personally, I find this lame. I fully understand (and respect) the need to cite the designer and link to his or her site. After all, they created the WordPress template for people to use free of charge. But I think spamming up the templates with multiple links is silly. I recommend you avoid using WordPress templates / themes that employ this tactic. Stick with the ones that only link to the designer’s site.

Other places to find WordPress blog templates / themes:

• www.wpthemespot.com
• www.topwpthemes.com
• www.justskins.com
• www.templatemonster.com

Moving on to Blogger Templates

Blogger (www.Blogger.com) is another popular blogging program, and here too you have many options for choosing free blog templates for your own use.

When you set up your Blogger account, you will have to choose a blog template to use initially. Keep in mind that this template can be easily changed later on, so don’t think you’re “married” to it by any means.

Here’s the weird thing about Blogger (at least the last time I used it): When you first sign up for a blog account with them, you will only see a handful of blog templates … but after creating your free blog account you will have access to additional templates for Blogger.

As with WordPress templates, there are also plenty of other places to find free blog templates to use with Blogger. In many cases, the templates you find at third-party websites (outside of Blogger’s domain) are of better quality than the free blog templates offered by Blogger.

With that said, here’s where you can find plenty of template options you can freely download for your Blogger blog:

• www.blogger-templates.blogspot.com
• www.blogspottemplates.blogspot.com
• www.mashable.com/2007/09/13/blogger-templates/

Conclusion + Questions

I hope you’ve enjoyed this tutorial on free blog templates as a design approach for your blog. If you any questions about using a blog design template or anything else related to this article, leave me a comment below and I’ll respond here for the benefit of all readers.

Good luck with your blog design and template customization!