Magazine themes for wordpress. A lot of such themes are available both for free and for sale. To check out a long list of magazine themes, check out this post and this post. I’ve also written two posts (one, two) comparing some magazine themes. Most of these themes look great and attractive.

Many bloggers who are starting up tend to get tempted by these designs and start using them. But, as the name suggests, these are aimed for magazine-style websites and not for general blogs. Of course, no rule tells you not to use a magazine theme for a blog, but still your writing need to satisfy certain basic qualities to get the best effect.

1) Many Categories

Do you tend write posts under a variety of categories ? Then, magazine themes are apt for you. Because, these themes help you manage them efficiently.

2) Images for Each Post

Most of these magazine themes have a thumb rule to display a small image next to each post on the front page. As I said, only little things like these make such themes look good. So, you must pay attention and add unique image for each post.

3) Video Blogging

Also, many magazine themes provide a separate area on the homepage for displaying video. Of course, you can add videos from Youtube and other video sharing websites. But, video blogging makes this space look much more personalized.

4) Update your Blog Often

These magazine themes give a very professional look to your site and thus users will expect professional content from you. They’ll like you to update your blog very frequently. “New Articles” on the homepage is displayed for a reason, and not to display the same articles for weeks together.

5) Less Interactivity

This is not a proven concept. But, my opinion is that, these themes give less priority to commenting. And the comments and the comment box are less visible to the user. Thus, it might affect the level of interactivity of your blog.

These are just my opinion. What do you think ? Have you used magazine themes on any of your blogs ? What is the effect ?