Website templates are pre-designed HTML or Flash page including source files, which can be used by web designers to fill in their own content, image files, logo, color theme and links.
As website development is becoming more and more important for today’s business including small firms, the use of website templates is becoming more popular as they can offer different varieties of color schemes and designs, at much lower cost than hiring a web designer to do a custom web design.
Using a website template has the following benefits:
– Save time in website building and design, you can launch a website much faster – Cost saving, no need to hire a web designer and you can select the most suitable design from ready made templates
– If you have some HTML or Flash knowledge, you can customize the website template by yourself to make your site design looks unique.
– Consistent of color theme, design style as most website templates comes with both the main page and sub page designs
However, there are also drawbacks of using website templates which you should take into consideration:
– If you hire a professional web designer you can specify exactly what you want, including color, images, fonts, etc. You can select a website template among the many you can find online, however you would have to accept all the design elements as it is.
– Not all website templates are created using clean coding and style, and usually no any template editor software is included. Therefore you might find it very time consuming to edit the template you have bought
– You can hire a professional designer to do the template customization, however this way you might not save much. Most web design contractors would charge you a higher price if you ask them to customize a third party template.
– The same website template might have been used by many other buyers, it is possible that your visitor have seen a website with a similar design elsewhere.
For web templates purchased without an editor included, usually you will receive a zip/rar archive with the full template source code file. You need to extract the source code files, and then open using Adobe Flash or Dreamwaver.
There are software packages which comes with a collection of website templates plus the template editing software, which enable you to edit a selected flash template easily, without having to know any coding.
These software packages requires no HTML or Flash skill at all, all you need to have is software which allows you to select a web template, and change text, images, logo, and arranging links.
Simply search for keywords such as ‘flash template software’ or ‘website template windows software’ (if you are using Windows), and you should see a list of these software.
Godfrey Ko, website designer and software author. Develop software including a flash website builder which comes with a website template gallery, flash photo gallery, and website video gallery software.
