Yea, I may be a little biased, but here goes:
Premium theme frameworks are absolutely awesome.
Not only do you get rock-solid theme software, you gain access to a premium support community where you can ask questions, and have them answered by qualified support reps.
For example, when you buy the Thesis Theme Framework, you gain access to our community where have volunteers and qualified, full-time support reps
who answer your theme questions in the forums.
And it gets better.
The Interchangeable Parts of WordPress Theme Frameworks
WordPress themes are great, but theme frameworks are better.
I’ll explain.
When you write tutorials on how to do [insert anything] in WordPress, that tutorial may not apply to every single WordPress theme.
So, if you want to take advantage of the benefit of that tutorial, you must figure out how it works with your theme. If you’re not a coder, that can be a huge problem.
Enter the interchangeable parts of WordPress Theme Frameworks.
You’ve heard about interchangeable parts, and how revolutionary they were, right?
If not, interchangeable parts made creating machinery, like cars, real easy and cheap because if one part broke, you can simply replace it with another… without rebuilding the entire car.
Theme Framework tutorials are like interchangeable parts.
Instead of struggling with code, and making broad WordPress tutorials “fit” into your website, you can follow theme framework tutorials, and chances are, they will work… if you use that theme framework.
For example, when you look at Thesis, we have the official Thesis Theme User’s guide where you can see a TON of different tutorials. Each one of those tutorials are “plug and play” for most Thesis Designs (even extremely custom designs).
Pretty cool, right?
The Theme Framework Ecosystem
This is where things get real interesting.
Yes, “plug and play” tutorials are great, but the economic ecosystem that surrounds large theme framework communities is even better.
When you have a large community, there’s opportunity to serve that community with products and services.
And if you do that well, you can make a killing.
For example, with DIYthemes, there’s several people who design Thesis Skins exclusively. We feature many of them on our official Thesis Theme Designer page.
There’s also TONS of websites that write Thesis Theme Framework tutorials, that again, you can simply “plug and play” into your website.
What does this mean for you?
You can either specialize in a theme framework, and differentiate yourself from the pack. Or, if you’re just merely a theme framework user, all this “community” stuff helps you improve your website.
Win-win.
Premium Theme Framework Support
I mentioned this briefly earlier, but let me reiterate.
When you buy a premium theme framework—like Thesis for example—there’s a premium support community that comes with your software.
As I said, here at DIYthemes, we have 3 full-time support reps who are paid to peruse the forums and answer your questions about Thesis. That’s their job, and you can count on getting an answer.
When you use a free theme, or a premium theme without a support community, you might have to hire people to help you out with your issues.
And who has time for that?
If you have a problem, do you really want to find someone to fix it for you?
I don’t. That’s why premium theme support communities are great. When you have a problem, you can go to the forum and ask your question—you know exactly where to go.
Rock-Solid Theme Software
And, of course, this is the “no duh” benefit of premium theme frameworks.
When you buy a premium theme framework from a reputable company, you can have the peace of mind knowing that you’re getting rock-solid software to power your website.
So, now I pass the keyboard to you. What’s your favorite part about theme frameworks? Leave a comment.
Oh, and, if you haven’t bought Thesis yet, what’s stopping you? 
If you enjoyed this article, join 25,715 others and get free email updates!
{ 36 comments… read them below or add one }
You guys really need a like button. Loved the article, and one of the reasons I run almost all my sites, and client sites on Thesis
David, you mean in addition to the Facebook share button that we already have? Share, as you probably know, is superior in the way that it appears in people’s feeds.
I think they just changed that too, real recently. I’m not sure yet, so I’ll look into it.
Just curious Chris, but why is FB Share better than Like?
In the past, Facebook share was better because it displayed differently in the feed. People could add subtext around the links. However, it seems Facebook added that functionality into Like, and we may have to revisit that as an option.
My understanding is that Facebook is phasing out the “share” button completely. Facebook phasing out share button. Not sure when or how it’ll affect the thousands of buttons that are out there.
Just wanted to stop by and say yes, the like button now also has the share properties inside it and if you add the correct meta liking an article will show an image, excerpt and title with link back to the site. Facebook has also stopped support with the share button I believe.
Anyways, great article and great points.
Yeah. The latest “official” version of the FB Like button has the option to add a share button right next to it. Of course it seems like they change that pretty frequently. And it may not fit well with your current social button layout here.
Will you ever design a Thesis Theme for Google Blogger? If you haven’t thought about it, then I think you should. If not, then just create one for me.
Blogger is too limiting a platform to even consider something like that. That being said, if you actually care about your content, you shouldn’t be on Blogger to begin with.
*******************************************************************
“Not only do you get rock-solid theme software, you gain access to a premium support community where you can ask questions, and have them answered by qualified support reps.”
********************************************************************
You’re not kidding! I JUST got out of the support forum where I received EXCELLENT help from two of the members.
I was in a flat out panic mode after I messed up some coding and thought I destroyed the entire site I had built for a client. My life would have been miserable for a couple of weeks if not for the help I received to get the site back up and running. And that help was very fast, as in less than five minutes of asking for help.
I’m sitting here right now, literally overwhelmed with relief.
BIG THANK YOU to those who take the time out of their day to help others!
Scott
Glad you got the help you needed
I have hosting setup on a Windows platfrom from an ISP. I want to set up a WordPress website and purchase your Thesis product. Before I get started what operating platform do you recommend to best run WordPress with Thesis (Windows or LINUX)?
It depends a lot of which version of IIS (the Windows server platform) it’s running. IIS6 or lower isn’t functional for WordPress, but 7.5 is. But all things being equal, you’d want a linux box to get full access to all of WP’s functionality.
When I have a Thesis question or issue, I have a whole bunch of resources I can run to for help (or who will run to me) – the forum, Twitter, and mass quantities of tutorials. Can’t beat that with a stick.
This is what sets a premium framework apart from the multitudes of free or cheap themes. It’s practically an insurance policy (and as such, a pretty good value for the money spent) I might goof around with a lesser theme to see what it’s made out of. I build my business on frameworks with a support structure.
I couldn’t have said that better myself. On a side note, I didn’t realize you were blogging now Meg!
Excellent Job Guys!
I work solely with Thesis for the exact same reasons Derek mentioned above. Thesis gives you the ability to have your website grow with you as your site morphs into what it is destined to become.
Think about it – if you’ve been running a site for over a year now and you have been committed to its continual progression towards becoming something great, I’m sure that the design and functionality has changed from the first day the site launched until now. Changes can be made quickly and easily with Thesis. I’m not sure the same can be said about non-premium themes.
My clients are extremely happy that I built their sites with Thesis. I’m sure they will be just as pleased years down the road since it is such a versatile product backed by an awesome community.
+1
+1
Got to say, the Thesis support knocked me out of my socks. It’s like having a webdesign coach on stand by all the time!
Just a quick note to say that after wasting all kinds of time with free templates for my new website, the $99 I plunked down for Thesis was worth every penny…and that was before I started getting the terrific web marketing ideas from your blog. The 30-day money back guarantee made it risk free and I never looked back. Color me One Satisfied Customer!
I’ve always found excellent support on the forums. And I love the framework.
+1 there
Thesis always rocks.Waiting for v2.0
In response to the share and the like button…I saw the latest tutorial on the Google +1 button, but now that a few people must have that up and running, are their any reviews from Thesis users on the functionality of it?
It works great, but will take time to get adoption mainly because it requires a google profile, and not everyone has that set up yet. I’m also not certain how much traffic it will send, however, I suspect google will consider +1s in their ranking.
an seo play for “premium theme frameworks” ?
Hopefully my comment helps out
Not really, it was more about elaborating why premium theme frameworks are great.
I don’t think this was an “SEO play” I think they were geniunely sharing, and adding to the conversation
I just bought the developer version of thesis and found myself dropped into a forest of info and how-tos, but no road map. The user’s guide is not a guide but an encyclopedia. The information is there but they need to be collated into a usable user’s guide on how to set up a blog, what design options are available, and how to activate them.
YES! I absolutely agree! I too bought Thesis and had the same feeling. It took quite a bit of piecing things together before things started to work.
Being a novice user I upgraded my site to the beta version of Wordpress without knowing that it my break my site. Well it has broken my site and I have been trying to get help since April. I have sent emails to Chris, I have posted on the forum, I have emailed Kristella (sorry if that is an incorrect spelling), I have called BlueHost – No help. (Even though I was at least able to get bluehost to attempt to help.) Not a word from any of the other sources. SO PLEASE TELL ME HOW DO I GET HELP. When I post to my blog it breaks – loose the sidebars, tumbnails and other formatting on the home page – other pages not affected. Thesis 1.8 WordPress 3.1.3
HELP! HELP! HELP! – My blog is broken – I can’t add any new posts
HELP
HELP
HELP
HELP HELP HELP HELP
HeelShields, we would love to help you, but this is not the place for support requests. Please post your issue in the Thesis forums, and we’ll get you fixed up today. Thanks!
Hi Chris,
Just drop by for a minute to raise this question. Do you provide a step by step guide on how did all the “social media buttons” float on the top left side on this blog? I’ve been reading around the tutorials and got only one of them (http://diythemes.com/thesis/rtfm/facebook-share-button/) and not as a whole. I’m not sure if I’ve missed anything.
I look forward to reading your new “how-tos” in Thesis Theme User’s Guide.
Thanks in advance.