Templates are of course the main reason why people choose Joomla! as their content management system. The possibility to change your web site with just a click of the mouse to select another template is really great, but it has to be used with caution.
Changing your template every month is not a good idea, you will frustrate the frequent visitors of your web site. They have to find their way through your site again, even if you keep the modules and menus at the same position. So, stick to your template for a longer time if the number of your visitors are rising and you see that there are a lot of returning visitors.
In a search engine optimized template, you should look for the following items that we talked about in this chapter:
- Valid W3C compliant XHTML and CSS coding
- Fast loading template images
- Free of hidden and non-relevant links
- Clean coding
- Source code optimized to improve the probability to easily find the content for Search Engine Robots
- Use of typography
It cannot be stressed enough that the template of your site needs to fit the visitor groups you are targeting. Having a large template is not that much of a problem for design nuts, as they tend to have fast Internet access. But for Search Engine Optimization you should rethink the strategy, as Search Engine Robots are not into design but into speed.