Why Skins Matter

Whether your site is as big as ebay or a simple blog the goal is the same "connect with your visitors." Regardless of who they are or what you do, you want each interaction between your site and your visitors to instill feelings of trust, comfort and that warm fuzzy sensation called happiness.

There are many factors that influence the way visitors perceive your site. Most site owners are adept at refining their navigation and ensuring that their content is friendly and professional. What is often overlooked when developing sites is the importance of continuity of appearance. Visitors feel comfortable when there are smooth visual transitions between each of the pages of a site. Like wise nothing can make your visitors distrust the professionalism and security of your site like an abrupt visual change.

Templates have done a lot for helping sites maintain  visual consistency as well as a unique look and feel by applying the same header, footer and background to all of the pages of a site. However most sites based on cms technology utilize one or more add-on extensions. This is where, with few exceptions templates are no longer able to control visual consistency of the site and you are left once again with an overall great site that just has that one big eye sore.

Until recently the way to solve this as to hire a designer/developer and pay steep fees for a custom design for your extensions. This has become less necessary with the creation of extension skins that match cms templates and can be easily installed by any site administrator. The increased development and exposure of skins means that more sites will be able to provide the quality of a professionally custom designed site for a much lower entry price point.