More premium themes are being sold today than ever before. Since WordPress became popular, a rise in premium themes arose, as users wanted something that was both affordable, more unique than most of the free themes, and support for the themes. The top theme designers are raking in millions annually, and many have wanted to cash in on this growing market. Although the concept of “premium” themes is nothing new, the WordPress craze (since roughly 2007) helped increase the popularity of premium themes both for the platform as well as other growing platforms, like Blogger, Tumblr, and Posterous.
Now, this guide certainly isn’t for the well-established theme designers out there, as they have found what is successful, but it is for the new ones that may be looking to start their own theme club or site. These are just rough guidelines for pricing your themes, and you can certainly adapt them to suit the needs of your business. I am sure that additional tips could be included, so please feel free to share them in the comments area.
What Do You Plan on Offering?
This is the first question you need to ask yourself. Of course, you will be providing premium themes. However, you need to think beyond this. For example, some of the premium theme designers have branched out into “paid/premium” plugins, which offer more features and better support than many of the free plugins. This is only natural, since many of them have these features integrated into their own theme, but they can’t be ported onto other providers’ themes.
Basically, the more you offer, the more you will be able to charge. If you include one of your premium plugins or a theme framework, then you will be able to charge a little more than a provider that offers less features.
Along the lines of support, include support for all of your themes. Sure, customers expect a nice looking theme, but there is a good chance they are new to WordPress, they’ll abandon their site if they can’t solve the problem. If you price themes too low (generally less than ten dollars each), you’ll have a difficult time making a profit if you are spending all your time offering support.
How Feature-Packed Are Your Themes?
Although I briefly mentioned pricing appropriately for features above, this isn’t as big of a problem as when premium themes first became popular. Most themes now come standard with all the latest WordPress features, so be sure not to ever exclude these. For example, with WordPress 3.0, Custom Menus, Custom Backgrounds, post types, and more. Of course, implementing a better solution, building on the existing WordPress frameworks.
Here are some features commonly found in WordPress themes today:
- Parent-Child Theme Frameworks, which provide easier updating and better customization.
- Easier posting, otherwise giving your theme users the ability to post more quickly than using the default WordPress interface (as the result of the growth of microblogging sites like Tumblr and Twitter).
- Custom widgets are always nice to implement.
- Alternative color styles. Don’t make your customers pay twice for a simple CSS or image set change!
- SEO options and other implementations for improved rankings in search engines. You want your work to stand out too, right?
- Multiple page layouts. This feature is a must. With premium themes, people expect to have some of the work cut out for them. They shouldn’t have to search for an ideal plugin (unless they want to) for a contact form or archives page.
Assuming you are able to match what other theme providers offer and whether you are able to retain your customers (resulting in additional sales from recommendations), you should be set on getting your theme site up and running. Remember, there isn’t any clear path to becoming the “leader,” you just need to prove that you are able to consistently deliver a product that is both profitable and well-designed.
Disclaimer: I am providing this information purely for informational purposes. Please adapt the information to match the needs of your business. None of this should be taken as financial advice, so please consult a qualified adviser if you are setting up a business.
