How To Build A Music Website
Today we’ re going to look at how to build a music website that will attract and keep fans. Not only will you make a super attractive website, but it’ ll also be fully functional and everything you could want from your band website.
This guide is suitable for musicians, bands, music managers, people who want to give music business advice like myself, and anyone else who’ s involved in the music industry in any way that wants to make a music website. In fact, even if you’ ve not involved in the music industry, you can still follow this guide and make a cool website suitable for your industry. So feel free to share it round with anyone you know that wants to make a professional website.
If you haven’ t already got your own website, you’ re missing out on one of the best tools you can use to gain new fans and keep them. Websites aren’ t difficult to make when you know how, and I’ m about to show you how right now.
To create our website, we will be using a free content management system called WordPress. Don’ t download WordPress yet though, as I’ ll be showing you a much easier way to get it up and running on your site.
Why You Need To Create Your Own Music Website
Before we look at how to make your music website, I want to quickly explain why you’ d want to do this.
I’ m sure you’ ve already got a Facebook and / or a Twitter account, so that may be enough of a web presence for your music right? Erm, no. Having your own. com website not only looks a lot more professional then just having a Facebook and Twitter account, but you can also do a lot more with your own site. You won’ t have the same restrictions that these external sites will have, so can do whatever you please. a form for people to sign up to your mailing list? You can do all of this and more with your own website!
Another benefit is that you site will belong to you. You won’ t have to worry about the site you’ re using becoming unpopular and having to build up your fan base from scratch again( Like what happened to many people with Myspace), your fans will always know where to find you.
There are many reasons why you should own your own site, these are two of them. But enough about that, let’ s get into actually building your band’ s site.
Getting Your Domain Name And Hosting Account
Although WordPress is free to use, you will still need to buy your domain name( E. G. www. YourBandName. com) as well as web space. Web space, also known as web hosting, is the space you own online. You can use this space to store all your music, videos, pictures, and information. Without buying web space, there is no way to get your website online.
Both of these things are easy to get hold of, and can be purchased at the same time from JustHost( Note: I get a commission if you sign up to JustHost after using my link). This is the hosting company I use for Music Industry How To and most of my other websites. I have found them to be reliable, and the cheapest around for the level of service you get.
Once you go on JustHost, you will need to sign up for a new account by choosing the option Need Website. On the next screen you will be able to pick your domain name, so make it a good one. Maybe your band’ s name?
On the same screen where is says coupon code, you will see there’ s a coupon already added. This will ensure you don’ t pay for your domain name, and that you get a reduced hosting price.
Want to put a banner on your site to increase song sales? Want to change colors to suit your brand? Want to add Good times. 30 Independent Artist Magazine www. indieartmag. com
Click to continue, then on the next screen enter your details and what pricing plan you want. I suggest you don’ t add any of the extras they try and offer you, other then the Domain Privacy. If you don’ t add this, people will be able to look up who the website is registered to and see your real name and address. Not ideal for most, so ensure you get Domain Privacy.
And that’ s it, you not have your own website name and web space. Pretty easy to set up right? Next we need to put a website on your web space.
Using WordPress To Create Your Music Site
So now we’ ve got our website name and hosting sorted, the next thing we need to do is add a a website builder to our site. By far the best free website builder on the market is WordPress, so we’ ll be using that.
WordPress is quick and easy to set up. It’ ll allow us to get a good looking website in seconds, that’ s highly functional and will be able to do all of what we need.
In order to install WordPress, you need to be logged into your JustHost account. In the JustHost dashboard, look for the tab called Popular Choices. Under that section you’ ll see a button called WordPress, so go ahead and click that. Click New Installation on the next screen, and follow the instructions on the two screens after that. And that’ s it, within a minute or so you’ ll have your new website up and running.
Make sure you save the details you add as the username and password for your WordPress install. Once done, you will be able to log into your website by adding / wp-admin to the end of you site. So for example, you’ d type www. Yoursite. com / wp-admin. This will bring you to your WordPress dashboard, and allow you to edit your site.
You can now visit your website in a