Sometimes, people say that all Thesis-themed sites look the same out of the box. That’s true, if you don’t know how to work up the design. In my case, I used a designer to give my site my own look and feel while using the Thesis theme. Pretty shortly, I’m going to redesign my site while still using Thesis, plus I’m about to launch a few new projects using Thesis. I promise that you’ll see four completely different-looking sites, but all still clean and SEO pretty. That’s why I like it. I can use the same framework for different designs.

Anyhow, if you’re thinking of ways to up the ante on making your site look more professional and improve your search results at the same time, I’m a huge fan of Thesis for doing that. I hope you give it some consideration.

The new design options are spectacular. They answer a few people’s concerns that thesis can look pretty similar when just turned on and applied to your blog. There’s a video showing you some of the design options here:

Click here if you can’t see it.

This will give you a bit more design control. The thing is, MOST people use Thesis as a starting point and then use a designer to make it pretty. I can strongly recommend WeFixWP and Coffeehouse Ideas as two groups who can up your design.

Anyhow, if you want to pick up my vote for the best wordpress theme out there, and if you want to earn me three beers worth of loot for doing so, check out Thesis and get the best SEO boost your site’s had in a while mixed with flexible design and features that I feel improve the performance and the presentation of your site.

There are many other great WordPress themes out there. I’m supporting Thesis because I like the team, I like what it does for my blog, and I believe a quality theme goes a long way towards earning me more success.

I promote Thesis because I really love the work of Chris Pearson. In 2006, I used to bug Brian Clark at Copyblogger for his designer. He said I couldn’t afford Pearson. (I really couldn’t back then, but always said I could).

Years later, Chris makes the best WordPress theme out there, and I love it. It’s what I use. It’s what I tell others to use. It’s exactly everything I want in a theme: great SEO, simple editing tools, and a palate that a real designer can turn into something amazing. (Mine was designed by Chris himself, but when I buy my next design on the same theme, it will be easy for them to work with it, too).

So that’s why. I firmly stand behind the product. I believe it’s the best in the game. I use it myself. I tell others to use it all the time. To me, any question about a WordPress theme ends in Thesis. (Okay, not ANY, but you get the point).

And THAT is how I wish advertising worked, by the way. I promote things I love. I promote things that matter to me, and if you want to buy it and enjoy it to, I get paid a few bucks by Chris for the referral. Chris pays me, not you. Chris pays me because I help him find new people that want his theme.

That’s the best of all worlds to me.

Agree? Disagree?

Want to buy Thesis? There’s a few links for that, I’m told. : )

The first, How to Build Small Business Websites Using the Thesis WordPress Theme [pdf file], comes from Expand2Web.com, by Don Campbell. His site was packed with similar information, so if you like this doc, swing by and check out his other information.

The other document was called Thesis Tutorial – SEO for Everyone [pdf file] , and I found that at DoubleMule, which had lots of posts about Thesis themes and designs.

Most folks appreciate the theme and get it installed just fine, but I do get the occasional email from someone who isn’t as comfortable with the installation process, or they might have it configured in bare bones mode, but want to do more. I think having an affordable premium WordPress theme is a great way to make your blog look even more attractive and professional, but you have to remember that I’m biased.

Need suggestions for good designers? I recommend both Nico Pin and WeFixWP.com. If you want to go a bit more premium than even that, my friends Justin and Eric at Coffee House Ideas kick serious butt, too.

Good luck with tuning up your blog with Thesis. I think it’s a really useful theme and I love promoting it.

If you’re more of a visual thinker, you might try checking out Great Thesis Resources, where I found you some videos to browse.

Let me know how the docs work out for you, okay?

I got curious as to what resources were out there for people who agreed with me that they should buy Thesis, but who might be wondering what to do next. I found some great videos and tutorials. These are just a few:

This came from Chris Pearson himself. I liked his work, and found another video of his that explained design elements:

I also found a nice little general review here:

Lisa has a longer review, and it’s very conversational, but it definitely gave me some information I didn’t have before.

My personal favorite Thesis tutorial person is Sugar Rae. She has lots and lots and lots of tutorials. If you read nothing more, swing by her site and check it out.

I’m really thrilled that I have Thesis as the theme for this blog. It’s so flexible and powerful. If you’re interested in learning more, check it out. If you decide to buy it (It’s cheap – $87 US), and you click one of my links, I get a few dollars (beer money, not enough for a free pony), but you can also visit the folks who created the videos above and buy from their sites, as they did all the heavy lifting. Either way, it’s a really cool product and you can see everyone’s pretty enthusiastic about what Thesis does for your WordPress blog.

I’m still really happy with Thesis as my premium WordPress theme. I am an advocate for the product for several reasons. Firstly, I’ve wanted to have a site designed by Chris Pearson ever since he did Copyblogger.com way back in the day. Second, because I wanted something a hair above the standard themes I was finding freely available. Finally, because it has some really great SEO features that I don’t know how to do on my own.

Thesis does a lot to make my WordPress software really hum. There are all kinds of design elements you can tweak without knowing any code. Here’s a quick screen cap of some of it:

I also really like the design options:

Because of these types of features, I find that I can keep Thesis looking really fresh, keep the search engine optimization details nice and tight, and I can customize it without knowing a whole lot of code. It lets me focus on my writing and my work instead of worrying about the look of my site.

I’m an advocate for the Thesis WordPress Theme because I believe in Chris Pearson’s good work, and because it makes my site look good while improving its effectiveness. If you’re interested in upgrading your WordPress theme to something a bit more professional-looking that doesn’t cost as much as a professional designer, consider Thesis.

(And yes, if you buy Thesis, I get a couple of beers from Pearson.)

1.) Buying Thesis through Missy’s affiliate link means you’re donating to the National Breast Cancer Foundation. Of the three, this is pretty cool to do.
2.) Buying Thesis through my affiliate link and showing me the confirmation email means I’ll put you into a drawing to win a free Gold Pass to the Affiliate Summit East event (where I’m keynoting this fall).
3.) Becoming a Thesis affiliate person yourself means you can earn your own ticket to the Summit if you sell 3 instances of thesis through your own code.

So, either this is a post promoting affiliate marketing, or it’s a post promoting Missy Ward, who runs the Affiliate Summit, or it’s a post promoting Thesis and its affiliate program, or its…

Circular.

The new dashboard design is so publisher friendly. I love the look and feel of it, especially the drag-and-reorder feature that lets me put things where I want them to be. I love the automatic plugin upgrades (one push install-and-upgrades of most plugins) that have been around for a while, but seem to work better in 2.7 (is that just me?).

I like how everything tucks nicely into the dashboard, so that if I’m looking to work within the plugins, those features unfurl, and when I’m looking to tweak my design, that box opens. It’s very simple, and makes it even more user friendly for bloggers.

It feels at once like everything in WordPress 2.7 is optional, and yet, I don’t feel like I have a huge menu of choices to go through. Simplicity at the top and complexity underneath, if that makes sense.

Thesis and WordPress 2.7

I’m a proud advocate for Thesis, the custom WordPress system and theme designed by Chris Pearson. (I wrote about my love for Thesis already.) I’m even more thrilled to have it for the WordPress 2.7 upgrade because I feel it ties the platform together even more solidly.

Thesis costs $87 USD, and I find it completely worth it. When I was researching what theme to put on my site next, I new that I’d spring for a premium theme (And the reason why is that it gives the site a little bit more distinction when coming to it), so I evaluated a lot of them. Another that I liked was Revolution, and I think it’s a nice looking theme.

What sold me on Thesis as the premium WordPress theme for me was that it’s got a lot more integration parts. Here are a few pictures to explain that better:

You can see how the design elements are tucked in nicely, and that they’re easy to work with, and in plain English. That’s probably one of the reasons why I push the theme so much. It’s just so powerful, so customizable, and so simple, all wrapped into one.

The Power of Publish Later

Other Resources

If you’re already a Thesis user, be sure to check out SugarRae.com. Her Thesis tutorials are just awesome. I learn something new every time.

ProBlogDesign has 10 Things to Do After Installing WordPress

Want to see another site dressed in Thesis? Here’s Catskill Cottage Seed.

One little trick: people ask me how I seem to post all the time and many times a day. I don’t always write all my posts when they come out. I use the publish later button quite often. Never noticed it? It’s here:

Your Ideas

What do you think? Are you on 2.7 already? What have you found about it? If you’re not using WordPress, what do you want to know about it, or what do you like about your platform that you don’t think exists here?

See, that’s the thing with Pearson. He doesn’t just make gorgeous themes. They do something. They have typography, SEO, administration, and other tweaks built all through them.

If you’re looking to start a new professional blog or give your existing WordPress blog a much more poewrful theme than the free one you found on that site one day, you might give Thesis a look-see.

Oh, and in case you didn’t know, it’s Chris’s fault that CopyBlogger looks so good.

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