Ok, So I have been reading about affiliate marketing on and off for a couple of years but have put off actually giving it a go until now. However I just recently purchased a domain and hosting package and am about to start my first blog in the fitness niche. I am looking to learn the ropes by blogging about my own experiences as I lose weight, I started about 3 weeks ago and have lost about 3kg so far. Looking for suggestions on a FREE wordpress theme to use for primarily blogging, but with plenty of options to include advertising such as adsense or CPA/CPM style adds. Losing weight need not cost me money, I would prefer to come out ahead financially from my weight loss endeavours. At this point as I am starting out from scratch I do not have funds available to purchase a premium theme, I would also prefer a theme from a reputable source. Searching this site just brought up a bunch of WTS ads for free themes (not sure how you SELL a FREE theme). I also googled for what themes affiliate marketers prefer and have found that they are all use premium themes that cost money. Once I am up and running and making money I will have no problem making a small investment in a theme, however until that time I will not be buying a theme so please do not post me offers to sell me a theme. I have looked at wordpress.org and they have a lot of themes to choose from obviously, however being totally new all I see is appearance, I do not have the knowledge required to assess them for suitability for generating revenue. Thanks in advance for any feedback/suggestions
Check the official wordpress themes repository at wordpress.org where you would find loads of quality GPL licensed free themes.
In order to chose a theme (regardless of it being free or not) you need to assess your needs. Long story short... what do you need where? All images, font colors and font styles can easily be changed, but the layout is what is hard coded (HTML & PHP) and is more difficult to modify. Therefore do a mock-up schematic on a piece of paper using squares / rectangles to show different content types. - Top banner - Top menu (or side menu) - Advert space (how many adverts do you want?) - Bottom menu? - Homepage written content (how much? A sentence, a paragraph, a book?) - Newsletter sign up? After you have all these content types, you can asses how much space you need for them. Do you need a template with one column? two columns? three columns? Is it enough that there is ONLY an area for written content and images in the second column? Or do you need that divided up into additional sections? Are doing this site in only Left to Right languages? Only one language? When you return to the wordpress.org themes, you now know what you are looking for. Each theme states it's layout: one column, two columns, three columns, etc. It also will state if it supports Right to Left languages or any other special features, like ability to change background images, colors, etc. Good luck.
Look for the official wordpress themes directory and visit freewpthemes.net if you want some stylish themes for free.