Just a little over a year ago, I bought my first premium WordPress theme – Thesis. And, while I really like it – and I have been using it a lot since (still do) – I felt that I needed more time and technical know-how to make Thesis to look less like Thesis and customise my blog’s appearance a lot more.
I mean, JMMO has had the standard installation of the Thesis for over a year. I didn’t tweak the design much partly because I found it a bit of a challenge to make it look really different without a lot of coding/designing knowledge. So, I kept it “as is”. Having said that, I did tweak my Thesis installation on my personal blog a little bit. But, it took a lot of time. And, it still looks Thesis-like to me.
Anyway, I guess that’s why I thought it’s time to start experimenting with other WordPress themes.
That’s why when I encountered the Headway theme a few days ago, I decided to give it a whirl. Partly because I was impressed with some of the reviews I found. And partly because I was blown away with some of the sites and blogs that were shown in their showcase section. Each one of them looked really different – and nothing like the basic template that comes with Headway.
After purchasing Headway, I immediately tested it on one of my sites. I couldn’t quite get the hang of it. Plus, the header upload feature just wouldn’t work. So, I stopped and restored my old theme. I was initially really disappointed. Especially since I already paid the Developer’s License fee.
Then, I kept reading about Headway and posting some questions on their support forum. I found that while Headway’s community isn’t quite so big yet, they do have a handful of really helpful folks over at the forums. So, I decided to give it a go again.
Since it’s JMMO’s 5th birthday this month, I decided to give it the makeover treatment. It took me over a couple of hours to get the hang of it.
When I started getting to know how some parts of Headway’s visual editor works, I began to work quicker. And, I started liking it more. That’s why after over a year of being on my old plain blah Thesis theme, I managed to jazz up JMMO’s site a bit more. Nothing major (I’m still a Headway newbie after all), but at least my initial disappointment with Headway has been abated. The header uploader feature still doesn’t work (I’m using version 1.6 at the moment)… and the Visual Editor still freezes on me every now and then… plus, the whole “drag and drop” thing isn’t really as easy as they make it sound… some aspects of the layout still isn’t all that flexible.
But, having said all that, I like the fact that it IS possible to customise a blog site on WordPress using the Headway theme and make it look totally different from its original template. In fact, it’s even possible to come up with different themes and layouts for different pages of your site. Without tweaking any code – just using the visual editor. So, yeah, there’s potential here.
My plan is to play around with it a bit more to see if I can make it work the way I really want it to work. I’ll keep you posted.
What about you? What theme are you using on your WordPress site? Have you bought a Premium theme yet? If yes, which one and how do you like it? Have you tried Headway?
If you’re interested to give it a go too, check out Headway Themes.
And yes, they do have an affiliate programme, so you can sell the theme as well. The affiliate programme has its own tracking and reporting system so you can easily see your referrals, etc. Affiliates get paid 33% of final fee. And, there’s a $75 payment threshold (which sucks, as I’m really not a fan payment thresholds 
).