New theme = Less traffic?

[Newjabber]

I Changed the theme on one of my sites about a week ago, and my traffic has gone down drastic.
I have never noticed this before when i change theme, is this normal?

And while im at it, is there a big difference in the different themes SEO wise, or dosent it matter as long as you use SEO plugins?

[sirtiner]

I don't get the seo plugin thing,
Anyways, you should always have 1 h1 tag and a couple of h2 tags. on everypage, you don't have to but it's good.

Is the new template heavy?
Are the menu (left menu if you have one) first in you're code? beside the logo of course. Don't know if it madders anymore but it could help.

[TheDonk]

And while im at it, is there a big difference in the different themes SEO wise, or dosent it matter as long as you use SEO plugins?

Personally I think there is a huge difference. Amount of code, type of code, use of Flash, htag structure, navigational structure, tables, images, all sorts of things come into play with themes. I have a boatload of sites I put up a couple months ago that are aging, on pretty basic themes that I further gutted. The content I have on them is almost nothing at all, but I'm getting these sites indexed in less than 24 hours and ranking for some decent keywords with very little text and only a few pages. All of the standard SEO elements have to be considered whether it's a WP theme or anything else.

I've become a minimalist in a lot of ways lately, spending more time gutting sites and future-use themes than anything else. Every time I get rid of another 10 lines of useless code or a plugin I didn't need I feel like I lost 5 pounds off my gut.

Send me a PM to somewhere that I can see the old theme, and the url to the site with your new theme and I'll see if I can find some reasons this might have happened.

[THPKR]

I know what is it. You forgot to put tracking code to your footer

[Newjabber]

I know what is it. You forgot to put tracking code to your footer

ROLMAO exellent, thank you.

[Bryan]

Different themes render the page code differently, and a poorly designed theme (when it comes to SEO) can definitely hurt your rankings. Whether or not that's what you're dealing with is hard to say without seeing the before and after, and also knowing the other factors going on with your site.

Most of the paid themes (studiopress, thesis, etc.) are very well coded & designed. There's a reason people are charging for them, as a theme that has kickass design, clean code, and proper SEO takes time to develop.

[Newjabber]

well in this casi the only problem was that i had forgotten to place the sitemeter code :-)

[Bryan]

well in this casi the only problem was that i had forgotten to place the sitemeter code :-)

haha - I thought that was a joke

I guess that's a good thing though!

[Newjabber]

I guess that's a good thing though!

Yes that was very nice to find out that there wasent a problem. No change in visits after changing the theme.

[Jordan]

haha - I thought that was a joke

I guess that's a good thing though!

haha! I thought that was a joke too!

Glad you got it sorted NewJabber.

I've never actually changed a wordpress theme on a pretty well established site, so let us know if it does actually have an effect on the traffic if at all now you've got your tracker in there

-Jordan