If you’re new to WordPress, I’m going to make two assumptions right off the bat:

• You might not know about Full Site Editing (FSE) in WordPress—or the possibilities it unlocks.
• You’re probably not familiar with coding or with pricey page builders like Elementor.

Here’s the good news: you don’t need to know any of the things to create a stunning, professional-looking WordPress blog template.

Another bonus? With FSE themes in WordPress, you can do it all without spending a dime.

FSE themes – like Neve, Twenty Twenty Four, and our very own Ollie – are powered entirely by the WordPress core, so they load faster and perform better than older, legacy themes based on WordPress’ older Classic Editor setup.

But whatever FSE theme you end up going with, you still need to know how to design a pitch-perfect blog template that encapsulates your brand and what you stand for.

Here’s a look at common challenges bloggers face when choosing and setting up blog templates — and how to get it right without feeling overwhelmed.

How To Design WordPress Blog Templates The Easy Way

Make Sure You Choose The Right FSE Theme For Your Specific Needs

With thousands of WordPress themes available, many bloggers (and aspiring website owners) face decision paralysis when starting out.

You might spend hours searching, only to find yourself more confused about which option best meets your needs.

The first thing to consider is what you need your site to do. Is it a straightforward blog—like a food or tech blog? Or, do you need something more advanced with dynamic data and custom post types?

Pro Tip: Start by clarifying your blog’s purpose. For a travel blog, look for templates that focus on visuals and ease of navigation. For a finance blog, choose a template that emphasizes readability and organization.

GeneratePress is a solid choice for FSE and dynamic data, but it has a steep learning curve. To unlock its full potential, you’ll either need to invest a lot of time into learning how to wield its myriad features correctly or hire a freelancer that can.

If you’re looking to set up a straightforward website with posts, pages, or landing pages, keep things simple and choose a lightweight, user-friendly FSE theme.

Starting with an easy-to-use foundation means you can scale up later, adding Custom Post Types and more advanced features when you’re ready.

For simplicity and performance, Ollie is one of the best options. Right out of the box, it provides everything you need to quickly create a professional-looking site—whether it’s a blog, an agency site, or a platform for a SaaS business.

Ollie’s free version includes access to fully customizable, professionally designed blog templates. This lets you start with a polished, designer-built layout and then add your own tweaks to make it uniquely yours and perfectly suited to your brand.

And if you want to take your blog’s aesthetics to the next level, that’s where Ollie Pro comes in—it packs in 200+ high-end, fully customizable patterns and templates, giving you endless design options to create a truly unique, visually stunning site.

You NEED To Be Able To Customize It Yourself

One common complaint with legacy WordPress themes is limited customization. Non-FSE themes require coding to make even small tweaks to the design, making it difficult to add personal touches.

This applies to blog and page templates too. With a traditional, non-FSE theme, making changes to a single post template means coding inside the theme’s editor (and that’s not much fun, not if you don’t know what you’re doing).

Coding issues aside, it also makes the design process longer and more complex – two things we could all do without.

Suppose you’re setting up a lifestyle blog and want to match the colors to your brand’s palette. Legacy (non-FSE) WordPress themes only offer basic color and customization options. For more advanced stuff, you’ll know to use code or CSS to make adjustments.

FSE in WordPress does away with all of this giving you complete control over the look and feel of your site – from the color palettes it uses to the fonts.

This allows you to quickly make macro design changes to your site without ever needing to even so much as look at a line of code or CSS.

Templates like those from Ollie WP and the premium-designed patterns and pages / posts in Ollie Pro provide user-friendly customization options that let you design your blog without technical skills.

It NEEDS To Work With All The Plugins You Use

Plugins are the secret sauce that can add powerful features to any WordPress blog, from SEO optimization to social sharing and custom contact forms.

However, not all templates are built to integrate smoothly with every plugin; this is just a fact of life in the WordPress ecosystem.

This lack of compatibility can create a host of issues, such as broken layouts, missing functionality, or worse—noticeable slowdowns in your site’s performance.

Imagine you’ve found the perfect recipe plugin for your food blog, but the layout doesn’t display correctly on your chosen theme, leaving your recipes jumbled and hard to read.

Or maybe you’re relying on an SEO plugin to boost your visibility, only to discover that certain settings aren’t accessible due to theme conflicts.

These compatibility issues can quickly turn a promising blog into a frustrating experience, both for you and your readers.

Choosing a theme that’s tested and optimized for compatibility with popular plugins is key to keeping your blog running smoothly.

Pro Tip: With Full Site Editing, you can replace many plugins directly in WordPress. Ollie Pro offers beautifully designed CTA and info boxes that work as effective alternatives to costly tools like Lasso. These built-in designs save money, reduce load times, and give you complete control over customization.

Mobile Responsiveness Is Essential As Well

A responsive template is critical, as more than half of web traffic now comes from mobile devices.

Your site also needs to load fast too. Readers coming from Google simply will not wait for a page to load. It needs to be instant, otherwise they’ll bounce back to the SERPs.

If your site is slow and more and more people are bouncing back to Google, this sends a negative signal to Google’s algorithm and, overtime, your site will start to lose visibility which means less traffic.

Templates that aren’t optimized for mobile – although these are rare these days – can make your blog harder to read, causing frustration for mobile users and hurting your SEO.

If the theme you’re looking at comes jam-packed with features and all kinds of advanced bells and whistles, proceed with caution.

Why? Because all these features and quirky elements come at a cost: website speed.

Don’t be blinded by fancy features and superfluous design elements, they’ll slow your site down and this is a big NO NO for SEO in 2024 and beyond.

• Example: If your beauty blog’s template doesn’t adapt well to mobile, readers might abandon your site if images and text aren’t correctly sized for smaller screens.
• Solution: Choose a template that is mobile-responsive out of the box. Test templates on various devices to ensure they look and function well everywhere. Ollie WP templates are fully responsive, making sure that your blog offers a consistent experience across all devices.

Why Speed and Performance Is Important

Your site also needs to load fast too. Readers coming from Google simply will not wait for a page to load. It needs to be instant, otherwise they’ll bounce back to the SERPs.

If your site is slow and more and more people are bouncing back to Google, this sends a negative signal to Google’s algorithm and, overtime, your site will start to lose visibility which means less traffic.

If the theme you’re looking at comes jam-packed with features and all kinds of advanced bells and whistles, proceed with caution.

Multiple studies have demonstrated that site speed affects conversion rate (or, the rate at which users complete a desired action). Not only do more users stay on fast-loading sites, they also convert at higher rates compared to slower sites – CloudFlare

Why? Because all these features and quirky elements come at a cost: website speed.

Don’t be blinded by fancy features and superfluous design elements, they’ll slow your site down and this is a big NO NO for SEO in 2024 and beyond.

• Example: Suppose you’re running a travel blog filled with photos, animated carousels, hide-reveal menus, and other bells and whistles . If the theme isn’t optimized, each of these features will slow down your site, hurting its SEO performance.
• Solution: Opt for WordPress themes optimized for speed and efficiency, without unnecessary features that add bulk. This helps reduce load times and improves your site’s Core Web Vitals.

Understanding Template Layouts with Ease

Complex layouts can be challenging, especially for new users. If the structure isn’t intuitive, you might find it difficult to rearrange sections or add new ones, resulting in endless headaches and maybe even abandoning your project.

With a good FSE theme, you can quickly load a pre-designed blog post template and customize it to your exact needs. You can move bits around simply by dragging and dropping them, copying them, tweaking them, and extending what they can do.

Just keep in mind that some FSE themes are more basic than others.

WordPress’s Twenty Twenty-Four theme is excellent for speed and for building a simple site, but its templates and patterns are stock—available to everyone. If you’re after more advanced patterns, page templates, and unique block styles, you’ll need to explore other options.

That’s why we created Ollie. We saw the need for high-quality FSE patterns, page templates, and block styles, so we filled that gap with Ollie. The theme itself is free, but for advanced patterns, page templates, CTAs, and landing page designs, Ollie Pro has you covered—and we kept it affordable.

• Real-World Example: Let’s say you want to add a section for product reviews to your fashion blog but aren’t sure how to integrate it without disrupting the existing layout.
• Solution: Templates with modular layouts that can be quickly tweaked and re-ordered and clear documentation make it easier to design and deploy new sites.

Flexible Options Beyond Free Templates

Free templates are a great way to get started, but they often have limitations. Many free options restrict design flexibility, offering only basic fonts, colors, and layouts.

For bloggers, founders, or agencies looking to create a site that stands out, this lack of control can be a serious drawback.

This is where Ollie Pro comes in.

We created Ollie Pro to bridge the gap between simple, free themes and fully customizable design freedom. With Ollie Pro, you’re not limited to generic templates; instead, you get access to a vast library of over 200 high-quality patterns, page templates, and advanced block styles.

This means you can create anything from stunning blog layouts to professional landing pages, all without code.

For bloggers, Ollie Pro offers professionally designed post templates, CTAs, and customizable sections that elevate content and engage readers. Imagine being able to quickly insert a well-designed callout box or an info section for affiliate links with just a few clicks—no need for extra plugins or complex setup.

For founders and business owners, Ollie Pro makes it easy to build custom pages that look polished and professional.

From landing pages and product showcases to about pages and testimonials, Ollie Pro’s library has pre-designed elements that help present your brand in the best possible light.

And for agencies? Ollie Pro offers a flexible solution that lets teams create high-quality, unique sites for clients in less time. The pre-designed blocks and templates save hours of work, while customization options ensure each site matches the client’s brand.

With advanced layouts, style variations, and ready-to-go CTAs, agencies can deliver beautifully crafted, performance-optimized websites faster and more efficiently.

Ollie Pro combines design freedom with ease of use, offering an affordable solution for users who want a powerful WordPress site without limitations.

Whether you’re building a personal blog, a business website, or a client project, Ollie Pro provides the tools to make it happen—quickly, affordably, and beautifully.