I’ve only ordered one theme from WooThemes in the three years I’ve been aware of them, but they’re always the first site I check when I’m looking for a theme with a specific functionality. Back in 2009 I ordered the Gazette Edition theme which has a CNN newsy kind of look that I still really like. Although I no longer use the theme, I do still have a site using the Bueno theme they offer for free.
One of the things that I really enjoy about the WooThemes themes is the number of theme options that an inexperienced user can easily configure. Need to upload a header image or custom favicon? How about adding some tracking or analytics code? Just click to expand the General Settings, input, and save. Want to populate your site with standard sized advertisements? You’re covered there too, and that kind of thing is just what I’m viewing from a free theme. There’s a lot more of those kinds of options in their premium themes.
What I found extremely interesting about this company is how well they’ve done selling premium themes. In an interview from 2010, one of the co-founders admits that they are raking in over 2 million dollars a year in revenue. I can only imagine with the growth they’ve experienced what they are pulling in two years later. I checked their Alexa rank for the hell of it only to find they’re #1268 at the time of this writing with a Google Page Rank of 7/10 for the home page. Whatever these guys are doing, they’re doing it right.
If you spend some time on the WooThemes site, you start to realize how much time and energy they’ve spent developing this home base for their products, as well as the breadth of information they have available, from theme information, documentation, and demos, to the knowledgebase, the blog, and the detail that has gone into every single page. I’m both envious and inspired, and if I ever have an actual product to sell, I think the WooThemes site will be extremely influential in how I design my website.
It’s funny how success begets greater success. The more popular and accepted you become, the more popular and accepted you become. Just spending the few minutes at WooThemes to gather data for this quick post, I’ve already started spinning my wheels on how I can use another one of their themes for a new idea, and in the process I’ve also decided to become a WooThemes affiliate.