WORDPRESS CLIENTS

Wordpress is by far the most common CMS system I encounter. The platform’s flexibility, ubiquity, and large number of plugins makes it an appealing choice for many small to large businesses. Though these strong benefits are countered by significant downsides — including an unwieldy code base, security holes, and the need to frequently update both the Wordpress software and its themes — many businesses choose to go with Wordpress regardless.

Because of this popularity I’ve worked on many Wordpress-centered projects, from marketing sites to ecommerce. In these projects my role is often both developer and designer, in addition to whatever business or strategy consulting role may be packaged with the project. While some developers choose to build Wordpress themes from scratch, I find that’s usually overkill, as a conscientious application of theme-modification methodology will often yield stellar results (not to mention save time and money). Though my approach to theme modification differs project-to-project, I usually use a well-built “starter” theme or theme-framework paired with content-editing plugins, such as the Beans Theme Framework and Advanced Custom Fields. Using a combination of these two tools or others like them helps me build highly customized themes that make maintenance and content modification relatively straightforward.

Regardless of the tools and methodology applied, I’m careful to supply my clients with detailed documentation and commented code bases. All too often developers and designers “build it and leave it,” not documenting their processes or choices adequately. This observation applies all the more strongly to designers and developers who work as contractors or in small agencies. This lack of attention to documentation can create an absolute horror show of reverse-engineering for future developers/designers; a situation I hope to help avoid.