Envato Notes |
| Posted: 01 Jan 2014 01:00 AM PST Two2twelve is a small theme team with a passion for building websites and WordPress themes. We asked the company founder, Eric Alli, all about the challenges of running a successful theme company and his journey on the Envato Marketplaces. Eric first started designing for the web in South Florida, “back when the Internet came to your house as a CD in the mail,” and currently lives in Silicon Valley, California. He first taught himself HTML and PHP, and has continued to pick up programming languages ever since. At the tender age of 15 (whilst searching for ways to make some extra cash and pass the time between client projects), he started his first web development company. It was around this time that he stumbled upon WordPress and ThemeForest, and started building themes. In 2009, he and his sister Elizabeth created another web design agency, and they began building themes together. This company is now known as two2twelve, and has had considerable success on ThemeForest. The two2twelve team consists of Eric and his sister Elizabeth (better known as ‘The Whizard’), Michael, Alex and Ryan. They all provide theme support and monitor the support desk around the clock, but their other tasks are very specialised. Eric describes the team as; “Elizabeth is T2T Themes lead designer. She creates the theme concepts and design mock-ups, devises the UX/UI, handles branding, copy, marketing material, and her least favorite task… accounting. She’s also in charge of interviewing and hiring our support reps.” "Michael and Alexx are Florida-based devs, and work with the team on HTML templates, various other marketplace products, and theme shop related tasks. Ryan is the newest addition to the two2twelve team, a Michigan-based programmer, avid CrossFitter, and my former startup colleague from Silicon Valley.” Having remote team members does create some challenges for the two2twelve team. “We use Hipchat, Skype and Screenhero to stay connected, and sometimes keep totally strange hours because of the time differences between us. We fly or drive across states and borders to meet up with each other as much as possible (though not nearly enough!). We are all work junkies, and tend to have one too many side projects going on. But building themes has been a kind of thread that keeps us all together.” Eric and his team have recently released a new theme, ‘Chroma‘, aimed at professional photographers. It is a project they are especially proud of because of the amount of research they put in before launching it on ThemeForest. “Chroma is one of our favorite themes, and the most feature-rich and customizable one we’ve ever created. We did a lot of market research beforehand, talking to real photographers about what they want and need in a website, and pulling from our own past experience working with photographer clients. “I think we’re most proud of the unique interactive photo elements that resulted in this focused development such as the before and after revealer, photo loupe, photo strips and EXIF info.” For any theme shop, the creative process from an initial idea through to the final product launch can be complicated and drawn out. We asked Eric to walk us through a typical 'inception to launch' with the two2twelve team. “When we decide that we’re ready to create a new theme, we usually get together on Skype and do a bit of research and brainstorming on what kind of theme we want to build. Once we decide on a concept, Elizabeth starts us off by creating the branding and design mock-ups in Photoshop. If we’re not in the same room, we usually plan out a lot of the features and functionality together via Screenhero. “After the design process, I start on the front-end code such as the HTML, CSS and Javascript. We manage our code base with GitHub (and have learned the hard way that nothing good ever comes from commits made after 3am). Once we’ve got a stable enough version, we test it, then we test it again, fix some bugs, and test some more. “Finally, we setup the live demo, create the documentation, and submit the theme. We then spend the next few hours refreshing our browsers every five minutes to see how far the approval queue has moved. So what inspires the two2twelve team? Eric says that, above all else, it's “personal need". "When we decided to create Limon for instance, it was because we noticed a lack of quality restaurant sites on the web, and a limited offering of WordPress themes for restaurants on ThemeForest. The same was true for our nonprofit theme Advocate, as well as Chroma.” To date, two2twelve has made over 12,000 sales on ThemeForest. That’s a long way from the one-man team who signed up in 2008. "When I submitted my very first theme, I was heavily consumed by client work and all of the frustrations and limitations associated with working with clients directly." Eric says; “ThemeForest was a welcome reprieve that offered a chance to create something on my terms, and revitalize my inspiration. The creative liberation I felt, coupled with increasing sales numbers and the positive feedback I received from my buyers, is what encouraged me to continue.” The biggest changes for Eric and two2twelve have been gradual over the last four years. The shift from being a single developer to a team has been an interesting challenge, and they have had to explore ways to make their daily theme tasks more efficient. Eric explains that, “as a result, today our theme shop operates more like a startup company; having team meetings, pushing code to GitHub, and pulling the occasional all-nighter to get our latest theme released.” He points out that part of the reason he decided to focus on being a theme author on ThemeForest was because it allowed him more freedom. “We have found that the very nature of being a ThemeForest author lends itself particularly well to the concept of personal freedom. The creative freedom to make our own hours and express our unique creativity, the financial freedom to make continual and substantial income, and the physical freedom to work from anywhere. “In a sense, ThemeForest can (and has for us) become a job that integrates nicely into our entrepreneurial sensibility; allowing us to contribute to a platform that we love working with, and customers we love building for.” When it comes to dealing with buyers, Eric has some suggestions to help those who are on the lookout for a new theme. He believes that, by focusing on a few areas when they are looking into items they like, buyers will be able to get more out of their purchases. “I think one of the most important things for buyers to keep in mind when looking for a template is their own skill level. WordPress theme development varies greatly from author to author. Some prefer to create very robust custom admin panels which provide granular control over every pixel of your site, while others stick more closely to the WordPress core to keep things universally familiar. The former can be very important to a developer who is customizing a theme for a client, but may prove too substantial a learning curve for the more novice user." His core advice for buyers is simple; "Ask questions, read reviews, and get to know the theme (and the author) before buying.” Two2twelve has gone from strength to strength in the last few years, and one can’t help but feel that they are on to a winning formula. We asked Eric to share three things from his experience to help authors who are just starting out, or interested in selling themes on ThemeForest. His top tips to becoming a successful author are:
There you have it, an exclusive interview with Eric Alli from two2twelve. We hope you enjoyed reading about their journey. Eric's story shows us what is really happening behind-the-scenes at successful theme shops on ThemeForest. A big thank you to Eric for talking with us.         |
Sometimes it’s not as linear as that, and tasks tend to overlap and weave into each other, but we all have our specialties—which compliment one another—and make for a pretty streamlined and fun development process."
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