Quick Walk Through on How to Customize the Default WordPress TwentyEleven Theme

This post is for those of you who’d like to customize the default WordPress TwentyEleven theme a bit, and aren’t looking to install any new themes or get a custom design. The following will not go into complete details on how to run a WP site, nor will it dive into editing theme templates or CSS or anything like that.

Just a quick rundown of the basic options available with WP’s TwentyEleven theme.

Just Another WordPress Website

You’ll notice this, the now nearly infamous default tagline that comes with every WordPress installation. Changing it is pretty simple.

  1. Go to Settings > General
  2. Find the Tagline field (it’s the second one).
  3. Change it to whatever you’d like.
  4. Click Save

Not so rough, eh? Let’s proceed.

The Navigation Menu

Slightly more involved to set this up, but still no big deal.

  1. Go to Appearance > Menus
  2. In the Menu Name field enter any name you want, probably something like “Primary Navigation” or “Main Menu”
  3. Click Save Menu
  4. In the Theme Locations box, choose your new menu from the dropdown there
  5. Click Save

You’re all set to create your menu. If you’d like more info on how to configure menus, check out this post on configuring WordPress menus.

The Header Image

You can easily add a custom header image. Just visit Appearance > Header and follow the instructions there. You can also change the background of the site via the Appearance > Background menu.

Layout

You have some control over the layout as well, via the Appearance > Theme Options panel. You can move the sidebar from left to right, or hide it entirely.

Want more options?

If you’re ready to get serious about your brand and have a site created from scratch, custom designed and coded to fit your needs, do feel free to contact me and we can discuss your options.

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