NopCommerce Theme Development

We are a nopCommerce theme development company based in the UK, with over 10 years experience in customising nopCommerce themes.

There are many options available to you when designing your nopCommerce store, and getting this right is critical. Options range from simple changes to the default nopCommerce theme, to 3rd party nopcommerce theme customization, to building your own bespoke nopCommerce custom theme from scratch. Each route comes with its own pros and cons, and our experience will help guide you down the right path based on your business needs and budget.

To understand more about these options read our brief guide to customising nopCommerce themes, or alternatively you can see some of the transformations we’ve been involved in recently here.

If you’re looking for a nopCommerce theme development or nopCommerce theme customization then contact us today for a friendly no obligation chat about which of these options will best suit your needs.

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If you’re looking for help with your NopCommerce theme development call us on 01273 068146 for a friendly chat about your needs.
Alternatively you can email us here, or use our FREE request a quote service below.

 

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    A brief guide to NopCommerce theme development

    NopCommerce like most platforms uses themes and plugins to generate the frontend design of the site, making NopCommerce theme development a much easier process. Themes are off the shelf designs used to house the content, and plugins are self contained bundles of code to facilitate certain functionality.

    NopCommerce comes with a default theme and plugins, and site owners and builders have a choice about how they proceed from here. Where they go depends on factors like what they are looking to achieve in terms of design, how critical this is to the project, how much they have to spend, and when it needs to be done by.

    There are 3 main options for NopCommerce theme development:

    1. Use the prepackaged NopCommerce theme)

    i.e. http://demo.nopcommerce.com/
    Its pretty basic but does very well on google page speed tests, which is very important for SEO and usability. Nevertheless it lacks some of the more interesting plugins that most sites use (filters, menus etc. and its also not the most cutting edge of designs.
    Suitable for:
    – Very low budget or tight timescale projects where design isn’t critical. A quick change of a logo and some colours can often do here
    – Higher budget projects looking for a much tighter control over branding and functionality, with a focus on front end optimisation. This provides a lightweight framework to use as a starting point to add custom plugins and a bespoke design to.

    2. Build your own bespoke theme and plugins from scratch

    A far more time consuming route, however it does give you full control over the frontend code, with some caveats. The main issue is that the frontend code needs to be built in a particular way for the backend to work. This means the designer and person building the front end have to have intimate knowledge of this for the build process, and this gets quite complicated.
    Generally if we go down this route we tend to end up using then default NopCommerce theme customization as the starting point and then building out from this shell framework. We would then build out a range of custom plugins to implement the more fancy frontend things that don’t come prepacked, for example filters, image zoom, searching etc. There may be some 3rd party options we used here depending on how optimized they are.
    Suitable for:
    – High budget no compromise projects.

    3. Use 3rd party theme and plugins

    These are themes and plugins developed by 3rd party companies. They can be free but are usually not, however don’t cost a lot (e.g. £150 for a theme and its plugins).

    Most of our builds use 3rd party themes as the starting point these days, the reason being it saves months of work building and testing bespoke layouts and plugins. These themes and plugins are built using standard ecommerce patterns and have had countless hours of QA testing getting them to work across all the different devices. This means there are many screens we simply don’t need to touch, saving a lot of development time and cost.

    Once a suitable theme has been chosen by the customer (with our help), we then decide together the scope of the customisation required. This varies by project, some clients simply need a logo and colour change, others require a completely different layout and design for key screens. Once this is agreed, we’ll then take the customer through a wireframing stage, leading on to the aesthetic side and pixel perfect photoshop layouts. Once signed off we then translate this onto the screen by adapting the theme.

    To give you an idea of what this looks like in practice here are a few examples of transformations we have made. As you’ll see the transformations can be pretty dramatic, yet using this approach can help save lots of time and cost on NopCommerce custom theme development projects.

    FAQ

    NopCommerce theme development is a process of creating a custom look and feels for an e-commerce store based on the nopCommerce platform. It involves modifying the HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and other components of the software to produce a unique design tailored to the specific needs of each business or organization.

    This helps create an attractive, user-friendly experience for customers when browsing and buying products from their store. Additionally, custom themes can help improve page loading times and give businesses more control over how their website looks and functions.

    Customizing an existing nopCommerce template is relatively straightforward. You can adjust the colors, fonts, and layout of your store’s design to make it look more personalized. The easiest way to customize a nopCommerce theme is by using the built-in “Theme Editor” feature, which allows users to make changes directly on their website without having to modify any code or files.

    Additionally, you can use custom CSS and JavaScript coding to further tweak your theme if needed.

    When creating a custom theme for an e-commerce store based on the nopCommerce platform, there are several best practices that should be followed in order to ensure optimal performance and user experience:

    • Limit the number of plugins used – using too many can slow down page loading times.
    • Test the theme on different devices and browsers to make sure it’s compatible across platforms.
    • Use a responsive design to ensure consistency across all devices.
    • Optimize images and other graphics for faster loading times.
    • Include a favicon and logo to give your store an identity.

    Developing your own custom theme provides numerous advantages, including:

    • Unique, personalized look and feel that reflects your branding and style preferences;
    • Improved page loading speed due to optimized code;
    • Increased control and flexibility when customizing the design of your store;
    • Enhanced user experience for customers browsing and buying products from your store.

    Optimizing a nopCommerce custom theme can help ensure smooth performance and enhance the user experience on your e-commerce website. Some techniques you can use to optimize your nopCommerce theme include:

    • Minimize HTTP requests by combining CSS, JavaScript, and image files where possible;
    • Compress code to reduce file sizes;
    • Cache assets in order to speed up page loading times;
    • Use asynchronous loading for external scripts;
    • Defer the loading of non-critical elements;
    • Leverage Gzip compression and other technologies.

    By following these optimization techniques, you can make sure your nopCommerce theme runs efficiently and provides customers with an enjoyable experience when shopping on your store.

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    Get in touch today

    If you’re looking for experienced NopCommerce theme developers, then contact us today to find out how we can help transform your nopCommerce store.

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