How much would you pay for a Wordpress/CMS theme?

Hello.

I am working on 5 Wordpress themes at the moment, and i was actually thinking of reselling them instead of them stealing space on my computer. However, i really want to do some kind of a research before even attempting to sell anything, anywhere.

What would you pay for a Wordpress theme you liked? The themes are simple but they look elegant without to much fancy settings or options available. The theme codes are W3C validated, two of the themes are using diferent frameworks and 3 themes are built from scratch. I have 1 review, 3 blogger and 1 magazine theme.

I know it is kinda difficult to answer how much you would pay for a theme without looking at it, but lets play with the idea and you already think the theme/design looks good. How much would you pay for a simple but good looking theme with not to much advanced settings in it? What do you think is a MUST in a Wordpress theme and what can you not live without and what are You looking for in a theme you want to purchase?

When it comes to reselling themes i am new at this but i know how to create and design themes and i am pretty confident on my coding and designing skills. All guides, tips & tricks on how to make a theme sell successfully (somwhat) is more then welcome.

Thanks

 

I keep my budget to a maximum of $50 for a theme. And when I say that, it has to be a well built and good looking theme. Anything over that, I just make it myself.

 

Thank you for reply

Okay, you have found a theme that looks good. Now, what other things are you looking for in a theme? Lets say you are interested in a default Wordpress theme for bloggers. What are you looking for and what kind of settings, customization options do you need? Are stuff like widgetized areas, localization, responsive design, Page templates ready to use (like blog, contact, full widt pages etc), sliders etc important for you?

 

I think you should take advise expert.

 

Check prices and layouts on themeforest and think about it.

 

Don't get me wrong, I have checked themes all over the place close to hundereds of websites like freelancer.com market, themeforest, and companies like elegantthemes, themejunkie etc. I think it is the same Impossible factor as if i should ask in a forum. The price on the diferent websites are from 1-200$ and many cheap themes that cost lik 3$ are similair and better looking then themes that cost 30-40$ or even 100$.

So yeah, i find it easier to ask on forums and get some written and personal answers then looking at thousands of themes I do look at themes from other companies to tho, but that is for theme comparison and not much when it comes to pricing.

I just want to get whatever help, wherever i can I know it is hard. Who knows, maybe i get some valuable tips here and there by asking in forums as well

I will finnish some of the themes and post them here. I just wanted to get some invisible theme opinions before live review (yeah, i know i am wierd )

Thnx

 

SEO and traffic is not really my main goal at the moment and in the future that will not be any issues because i have several partners that will help me with things like that, however, this is my first time selling anything on the internet, specially webdesign and i am just doing some quick research on what people are looking for in a webdesign/theme. I have created websites for a few small companies and a bunch of private people in the past, but they already knew what they wanted and i think premade themes might be a bid harder to sell if you don't have like 500 diferent themes to offer. I will release a few themes and see how it goes and if i get lucky with some of my designs i will take it a step further and include alot of marketing.

 

If you actually code something custom that is on the level of Themeforest(meaning tricked out admin panels etc.) then you should be commanding over 500 dollars at a minimum. You just can't get that here unfortunately.

Nigel

 

That was one of my first thougts, however it requires alot of work (i am only one guy), support and what not, and they will be harder to sell as well i belive. Tho i might create really high standard and complex themes i will be sticking with flexible, simple but yet good looking Wordpress themes, and theme support/updates will not be that timeconsuming as well I am going to start slow and steady to see how things works out for me.

 

I'd probably say in the $30 to $40 range.

I looked up some themes recently that I was going to pay for (I ended up not buying, as I have too many projects already on the back burner) but the themes that I did look at that I liked were in the price range listed above.

 

You should likely think themeforest then. It gives you time to do something vaguely new, etc and submit it to themeforest. I buy some stuff from folks that have made well over 100,000 on just a few things. That is much easier in terms of hammering stuff out and you can slowly build your portfolio. It seems to me its a tad faster to go that route.

Its also a lot easier to function when you are in less fiscal duress lol.....

That being said, you can always offer someone a piece of the action and get some of the logic bits done(admin panel, widgetized area stuff) if need be, to churn out a few things a bit faster.

Just food for thought. On paper its easier to sell a few things as yourself if you will. Generate a few customers and or followers and then fund a more personalized business model.

hope that helps a bit,(Don't work for themeforest, just sayin...)
Nigel

 

The cheaper the better, Base the price on the customization others can do to it, 19.99 Is always a decent looking price. But if I was to see the best theme ever probably 40-50$

 

First of all, I think you are loosing value by creating a theme and then figuring out if you can sell it. You will get more success if you research whats in demand before you make a theme.

Check out WSOs, there is a lot of themes for sale there, you can research your market and get a really good idea on how to price these. Just make sure you actually look at themes for sale there and compare their functions etc to yours.

You can also launch them together with another products, and over price the theme that way.

Btw you can PM me, I might be able to help you.

 

I've been out of theme development for a while, but I think your question of price is dependent on how you want to sell it. If you're selling it unique, meaning that only one person will get it, then you need to charge more. If you're selling it as a general purchase theme, then you need to charge less. I lean more toward selling multiple copies, since you end up making more money that way. After all, $75 x 1 = $75, but $15 x 10 = $150. It takes longer to get the money by selling multiples, but the ROI is higher.

As for what makes a theme desirable for me, I like to have the ability to quickly change things like header, background, and image colors. What I don't see a lot of is themes that offer more than a couple of color options. You may see a theme that offers 2 or 3 different color options, with different colored nav bars and icons for each, but very seldom do you see one that offers more than three options, and the majority of themes leave you stuck with one color unless you are proficient in CSS (which I am, but I'd rather not dig through someone else's code in order to change colors). You may want to consider a theme that offers a variety of color options as a start.

Also, I'd stay away from the "basic" themes. There is plenty of competition there. Do some keyword research and see what the hot blogging topics are, then make some themes for those niches. Admittedly, targeting a niche can be risky, but in the long run it can pay off very well. Don't be afraid to give a theme away to an established blogger in order to make sales. Giving away freebies is one the best guerrilla marketing tactics out there, and it works. If your theme ends up on a highly visited site, it will go a long way toward establishing your reputation as a quality designer.

MrBelu's suggestion of a package is a good one. For example, you could make "turnkey" themes, complete with starter content, by teaming up with a talented copywriter. I've seen a few on JVZoo and ClickBank, and they seem to bring in a decent amount of money. I can tell you from experience that PLR content is a good seller, and having a PLR website ready to go for a certain popular niche would be a dream for most new marketers.

 

Thanks for the reply and for alot of good tips guys, copy & pasted to a .txt file

It looks like custom themes are the most populair way to go, however what do you guys think of themes created with software (theme builder) like woothemes framework, ithemes and so on (i am not talking about builder software that creates a 100% complete theme including design and all like artisteer)? They future alot of theme customization and already have SEO settings etc already implemented in to their theme. Do you think of this as "cheating" and do you see these themes as a "low value" themes? Even tho you don't build everything from scrach, you still have to do the design work and layout. The only thing that differs is that you don't invent the wheel with the basic theme coding.

I am trying to be flexible when it comes to themes. I really want to have custom themes (created from scratch) and themes containing frameworks (like ithemes and woothemes etc). Personally i have tried more or less everything on the marked and i have found a few theme builders that are really good and will make it easy for a "newbies" to use and customize the theme.

What do you guys think of this?

 

Personally, if the theme works to my satisfaction, gives me the functionality I need, and is well designed, I don't honestly care how it was created. I've played around with Artisteer myself, and while it won't pass the theme-check that most of the marketplaces use, it can make beautiful themes, after you do a little bit of work on the more obscure code. Here's an example that I personally did with Artisteer.

Again, functionality, design, and customization are the key things I look for, not how it was created. That being said, if you are using a generator you can expect to get less per purchase. However, they'll still sell if well done.

 

It depends on my requirement , if i just want to start a blog , i just go with any theme from theme junkie , or i i want to start a corporate website , i have around 50$budget for it.

 

i think its depend of your design but..in worpress my budget for my design is worth $50+/

 

I always though $30 was a good price, but then i found a really nice website that sells them for $20. The themes are a lot better to.

How much would i pay well no more then $40. Ideal i would pay $15-$20. Remember though the cheaper you sell the more people will buy more people that buy your themes the more of you is out there.

so $30= 1 theme (1 link to your profile)

or

$15 - 2 themes (2 links)