Are you a thriving musician or artist and ready to establish an official online presence? Would you like to start your own music website affordably? In the past, web design was an expensive undertaking that required special skills and HTML coding knowledge. Today, designing your own website is a quick and fairly painless process that almost anyone can do. With the many tools and platforms available, musicians can create affordable, modern and professional-looking websites with the click of a few buttons. If you’re looking to create a website yourself, there are options. In this article, we’ll cover how musicians can create a great looking website (like these) for less than $4 per month.
Why pay for a website when you can have an online presence for free?
As a musician, you are first and foremost a business person. You’re constantly making decisions about how much money to spend and how things will affect your bottom line. So yes, you could go for free options and there are many of them to choose from. However, there are some drawbacks to consider when using free tools for your professional website. While having a free website saves you money, it won’t necessarily help you achieve business goals. For starters, not having your own dedicated domain could make you look unprofessional and the folks you’re looking to impress might not take you seriously. Plus, you may be missing out on a lot of cool features such as pop-up software, customization ability, and storage space that you would otherwise get if you upgraded to a paid version. Ultimately, choosing a free website or a paid one is a business decision you’ll have to make for yourself. However, we strongly recommend making the investment and utilizing paid options because it would give you more autonomy and set you up to better achieve professional and business goals.
But that doesn’t mean you should have to pay an exorbitant amount of fees. How can you get a website for less than $4 a month? It’s pretty simple, actually. The only thing you’ll need is a domain name (usually costs $20 or less/per year), but if you follow my link below, you can get the first year free and monthly hosting. Click here and get domain hosting for only $3.95 per month. It’s as easy as a one-click install. The first step is to choose a website name and register it. You can do that directly with Bluehost, one of the most trusted domain and website hosting sources on the market. The best thing about registering with Bluehost is that you can get your first year of domain registration for free. Bluehost offers an easy plug and play connection with WordPress, another authority in the website and blogging sphere. With WordPress, you can build your website without needing any coding or HTML knowledge. They have free themes available that you can use as a template. Once you select a theme, all you have to do is upload your pictures, plug in your text, and you’re done. It’s that simple. What’s more, there are lots of free WordPress themes for musicians to choose from that can help you build a beautiful site in minutes. Check out this post where we picked out 10 of our favorite free WordPress themes for musicians.
One of the things we love about WordPress is that it is an open-source platform. This means that you can take advantage of free and/or premium resources such as extra plug-ins and customization tools developed by really smart people from all over the planet to further enhance your own website. A variety of tools such as newsletter opt-ins, pop-up banners, fully customizable landing pages, dynamic calendar widgets, sound players, photo galleries, video players and more can be utilized with just a click of a button. This type of community-style offerings and support is not available with other popular website building platforms.
How to Set-Up Your Website
Choose a Domain
The first thing you’ll need to do is choose a name for your domain. We recommend picking something simple, easy to pronounce, and easy to remember like yourname.com. The shorter the better. Remember, you’ll be announcing this web address while on stage if you’re a live performing artist. You’ll be adding it to your email signature and putting it on your business card. Therefore, brevity is ideal. We also recommend using a “.com” instead of a “.org” or “.music” because most people are used to “.com” addresses and they will type that into a browser out of habit. Stay away from numbers and hyphens. The simpler you can make your name, the easier it will be for people to find you on the web.
Once you have your name selected, see if it’s available. Use the tool below to find out if your chosen domain name hasn’t already been taken.
Set-up Your Hosting Service
Next, you’ll be taken to a screen to create your account. You’ll be asked for basic information such as name and address. At this stage, you’ll also be able to pick which package you’d like to go with. One thing to remember is that while the price is $3.95 a month, depending on the package you choose, Bluehost charges by the year and you can purchase up to 3 years worth of hosting in advance. So, be prepared to pay $100 more or less to set up your website. But the good news is, you won’t see another bill until a year later. It’s up to you which upgrades you’d like to try but none of them are mandatory. They are nice-to-haves but not necessary to run your site. After including your payment details, you’ll see a confirmation screen next and Bluehost will send you an email with your login credentials for your website dashboard.
BONUS: Would you like to earn cashback with your Bluehost set-up? Right now Rakuten (formally eBates) is offering a $10 cashback on Bluehost purchases. That means you’ll get a $10 rebate for your purchase. Plus, if you’re signing up for the first time, you’ll get another $10 for joining. That’s $20 in free cash just for starting your website! Sign up with Rakuten here.
Connect to WordPress
Now it’s time to connect to WordPress. Bluehost provides a program that makes it very easy to install WordPress to your hosting account. If you want your website to have a WordPress blog, you can use the Marketplace to install WordPress to the root of your site or to a subdirectory. Once you get to your dashboard, navigate to the website section and select “Install WordPress.” Follow the prompts and finish installing WordPress. For more detailed information on the set-up process, click here.
After this, you’ll receive an email with all of your WordPress login info. Don’t forget to save all of your login information and password. You’ll need them when it’s time to log in again.
Set-up Your Content
In order to add content to your website, you’ll need to login to your new WordPress account. You created this when you installed WordPress on your Bluehost account. A standard theme should already be active, but you can select a different theme to use altogether. Don’t forget to check out our list of 10 Beautiful WordPress Themes for Musicians for inspiration. These themes were made with the artist in mind and will come with widgets you most likely will need to showcase your work. Once your theme is selected it’s time to add your content. Check out this guide on working with themes from WordPress. It’s a great resource to help you get up and running.
If you’re an artist, there’s no excuse not to have a professional online presence. Whether you choose a free option or a paid one, it’s imperative to have a home base on the internet. A website is how people learn more about you. Having a website will help you build your fanbase, win gigs, showcase your art on your own terms, and build your brand. It doesn’t have to be expensive! Whether you decide to hire someone to do your website, opt for a cost-effective do it yourself version, or set-up a free site, knowing and understanding what your options are available will help you make more informed decisions.
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