Since I designed and build my first paid website in 2002, I have witnessed how web development has evolved, from basic static pages with tables and almost no CSS, to search engine friendly sites replacing tables with div tags and richer CSS, to the interactive and more robust CMS based sites.
In my search for the “holy grail” of web development, I discovered Drupal and WordPress, undoubtedly two of the most popular and most complete CMS systems. I quickly started to train myself on how to create websites with them, and I have been able to develop web pages with both platforms.
Drupal is very robust and secure but the learning curve (more like a mountain) is very steep, WordPress has some security issues (which can be easily addressed) but is very intuitive and easy to use. Being easier to use, I usually choose WordPress to create my niche websites. My only (and most strong) complaint against WordPress was the frustrating lack of design control without the use of complex PHP coding, my creativity was feeling repressed by the two or three column basic layout, so I started to search again for the “magic wand” that will allow me more design control in my WordPress sites without the heavy PHP coding.
I was able to find at least 7 good contestants, but that wasn’t a good thing, now I had to review and research all of them to make an informed decision in selecting the best theme framework that will truly satisfy my desire for design control and creativity freedom.
Finally, my research took me to an excellent article titled “Battle of the Titans: Premium Theme Framework Smackdown” written by the well known and respected WordPress theme connoisseur Aaron Brazell, his article was very helpful and gave me a sense of direction in my research.
After reading the whole article, the Genesis Framework was looking good but I was getting more inclined towards the Builder framework because it offered more control of the layout design as I wanted. Then, one of the user’s comments caught my attention…
David wrote: “The Frugal framework is missing from this list…”
Aaron replied: “I don’t consider it to be one of the top frameworks, no offense to the developers over there.”
Then, Seth Atwood, (a Frugal development team member) commented: “No offense taken, but I must say we’re a bit puzzled here at Frugal HQ. We know our theme is rock-solid, more feature-rich, more powerful, and easier to use than the majority of other ‘framework’ themes.”
Aaron answered: “Seth, I’m sure Frugal is a great framework. It’s just not in widespread circulation so I can’t consider it one of the top frameworks…”
At that point, I said to myself, “It doesn’t really matter much to me if the theme framework is not in widespread circulation, as long as it allows me the desired design control without all the custom coding.” So I went on and look for the Frugal website and found that Frugal had been replaced by a new and improved framework named Catalyst.
Wow! I was very impressed with all the control that Catalyst offered, but still I was undecided between Builder and Catalyst so I continued looking for other user experiences and input, and found a very useful post at websitetemplatereviews.com titled “Builder Theme vs. Catalyst Theme: Which WordPress Theme Should You Buy?” at the end of the article the author commented:
“I own and use both (Builder and Catalyst) to some degree (although I use Genesis the most because I prefer using pre-designed themes – I’m not big on designing websites).
Frankly, I don’t have a preference because both Builder and Catalyst largely offer the same features. Both are designed for people who want a custom designed WordPress theme that’s achievable easily and quickly. You won’t be disappointed with either Builder or Catalyst.”
I agree with the writer of the article mentioned above in the sense that you can’t go wrong with either Builder or Catalyst. So, why then I decided to choose Catalyst over Builder?
Why Did I Choose Catalyst over Builder
In my case 4 major reasons were involved in my decision of choosing Catalyst over Builder, they are:
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- Price. – When I started comparing the two themes, both Personal Editions were priced at $97, Builder offered over 20 child themes and Catalyst offered the Dynamik child theme and 22 Dynamik skins. Unfortunately, Builder changed their price structure recently, and although their personal edition price was dropped to $80, you now get only 5 child themes. I was able to purchase Catalyst for only $72.75 with a 25% discount coupon saving more than $8 over the new Builder price and still get all the 22 skins, that’s like getting 17 more themes for a better price.
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- Updates Policy. – This was a major decision maker issue for me. When you buy Builder you get only 1 year of updates and access to the forum, after that you currently have to pay $80 for each additional year. With Catalyst, you get free updates for life and unlimited access to the members-only support forum that means your premium WordPress framework will always stay current without any extra expense.
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- Easy Advanced Features. – With Catalyst you can easily export your custom designs as Stand-alone Skins for use in other projects, that feature alone saves me a lot of time when designing my niche websites. The Custom Layouts option allows me to layout the monetizing widget areas once and reuses them on any new sites. I can also effortlessly design landing or squeeze pages with the EZ Static Homepage option. The Front-end CSS Builder feature is without a doubt my favorite because allows me to add Custom CSS Styles to my website right from the front-end of my site and watch the changes take place as I type in the code.
- Great Tutorials and Support. – Catalyst, as most premium theme frameworks include several training and tutorial videos, but what set it apart (and really appealed to me) was that currently, you can get free access to the “Catalyst Cheat Sheet” with your purchase of Catalyst. The Catalyst Cheat Sheet is an excellent written easy to read and follow 200+ page report written by the veteran internet marketer David Pritchard. His report is very inclusive and will really show you how to maximize your results with Catalyst and how to build better sites, get better rankings and obtain more traffic and more revenue. You can read more about David’s Catalyst report at www.catalystthemecheatsheet.com
Found My Magic Wand
And there you have it, Catalyst is the excellent-robust-easy-to-use-no-coding-layout-magic-wand that I was looking for, and in my humble opinion Catalyst is a very strong contestant to be included in Aaron Brazell’s “Battle of the Titans” article.
Although Catalyst was the perfect solution in my case, yours may be different. I usually like to custom build my sites from the ground up, but you may prefer working with pre-designed themes and just tweak them a little bit to meet your needs, in that case, I’ll recommend the Genesis framework or The HeatMap Theme Pro, which has 23 Adsense ready widget positions and comes with 25 skins.
