The Genesis framework from studiopress: a solid foundation for all our WordPress sites

Unless we have a very specific set of specifications, we use the CMS (content management system) WordPress in most of our projects. In fact, WordPress currently powers about 30% of all websites on the web (and it is growing all the time)! Thanks to this popularity, we know that this CMS has many more beautiful years ahead of it and that we have an almost infinite number of features at our disposal to realize all kinds of web projects.

But if there is no doubt about the choice of WordPress, its popularity and accessibility can also be its worst enemies! Anyone who has already installed WordPress has then found themselves propelled into the jungle of themes (site design) and plugins (additional features) available to customize the websites. And believe me when I tell you that the qualities of the latter are not necessarily present and that they can do more harm than good to your website.

And that’s where the Genesis framework from Studiopress comes in!

But what exactly is a WordPress Framework?

A framework is, as its name suggests, something that “forces” us (and it is for our own good) to work in a certain way and to respect a specific structure. A good framework also provides developers with robust and useful features to save them time. There are frameworks in all languages and for all uses but in the Web development field, the most popular are for example Symfony (php), Laravel (php) or Django (python).

In the world of WordPress, frameworks are in a way a basis on which to build robust themes. Their use is very simple, just activate it (like a theme) and then activate a child theme that works together. Using a good framework generally allows to have a solid foundation updated by teams of dedicated developers… which allows to have a quality code and to be able to sleep on both ears with each update of wordpress (who has never been afraid to break his theme by doing an update of wordpress?)

Genesis: the best framework for WordPress

After these few lines, you might understand the usefulness of this kind of tool (or maybe it’s still a little abstract). But let me go a little deeper and explain why we use the Genesis framework in all our WordPress projects!

• HTML and CSS code that follows W3C standards: W3C (world wide web consortium) is the organization that defines standards for the Web. For example HTML5 (the current standard of HTML language) was introduced by this organization in 2014. If there is one thing that is important for any website (from a performance, compatibility and SEO point of view) it is to follow these standards.
  Genesis integrates these standards in a strict way! Thanks to it, you can be sure that your theme will always be up to date with these rules. Each update of the framework incorporates the latest standards and you can be sure that if HTML6 is ever released, you will not have to make any changes!
• Security is a priority: As I said, WordPress is the most used platform on the web… which also makes it the preferred target of Hackers. Even though WordPress is already doing its best to ensure that there are as few security breaches as possible, Genesis provides additional security protection.
• The most popular framework: You will tell me that just because it is the most popular doesn’t mean it’s necessarily the best and you’re right. But this popularity is a guarantee of security for me. I know that studiopress has a super professional team dedicated to one thing only: making Genesis work for a long time to come! And I know that Genesis will always be updated on a regular basis.
  Popularity also implies a large community. This means that if you happen to have a problem with your theme one day, there is a very good chance that someone has already had it and that the answer is already on the internet 🙂 .
• Designed for search engines (SEO): If you want a website, it is usually to appear as high as possible in google on your theme. This is good because Genesis was designed from the beginning to create sites with the best possible structure in terms of SEO. In addition, it also integrates micro data (schema.org) directly into your site’s code. For those who don’t know what microdata is, they are small attributes that tell google what kind of content is on your site (articles, comments, header, footer, sidebar etc…) and can get you out in a different way in search engines.
• A very large number of child themes: So certainly our job is to create a theme tailored to your company. But as far as I’m concerned, I’m happy to have a hundred themes at my disposal to start my work (because no, I don’t always create a 100% custom theme for each project). But maybe one day you will also want to change the design of your site and you will also be happy to have a very large choice of themes at your disposal to start your redesign.
• Responsive and Mobile friendly (adapts to all screen sizes): Without installing any child themes, the Genesis framework has already been designed to adapt to different screen sizes (mobile, tablets). So if you use a Genesis child theme, you are almost certain that your site will look as good on your mobile and tablet as it does on your computer.
• Well organized and completely customizable: So it’s the developer talking to you but the Genesis framework is well organized into separate modules (so it’s easy to find out how something works) and the code doesn’t repeat itself (which is a big guarantee of quality). In addition there are Hooks and filters included everywhere in the framework. It’s simple once you know how Genesis works (the learning curve is a little high), you can do absolutely anything with it!
• Ready for e-commerce (with Woocommerce): Even if it is not directly integrated into the framework, many Genesis child themes have been designed to work with Woocommerce which is the reference plugin for anyone who wants to sell a product on a wordpress site. And as e-commerce is becoming more and more important, it is a very interesting feature and an additional feature for everyone who will trust Genesis.

I think I’ve gone through all the reasons that led me to install Genesis on all our WordPress projects! With Genesis, I know that I have a robust and up-to-date base at my disposal to create quality websites. Thanks to this tool, I don’t need to worry about all the redundant parts of each website and I can focus on what matters most: Creating unique sites at your image so that you have a quality showcase for your business on the Internet.

P.S. This article contains affiliate links. If you buy an offer from Studiopress through one of our links, we will receive a small commission. This will help us continue to produce quality content in an independent way and it will not cost you a penny more. Of course, we only recommend products that we totally trust and that we use ourselves 😉

Benoit Luisier

Self taught web developer and a travel addict , I share on Novo-Media my tips about the more "techy" part of topics like web development, Wordpress, Web optimisation or SEO. I'm also the creator of the google maps Wordpress plugin Novo-Map