WordPress is a perfect tool to create a website for your band. It is easy to use, looks great, and offers a range of features that can be especially useful if you are into music.
These are my tips on what features to look out for when choosing a WordPress theme for your new band website.
Integrated E-mail Newsletter
Alongside social media, e-mail is an essential way to keep in touch with your fans. Make sure you get a WordPress theme that includes an integrated way of capturing e-mail addresses.
Gig Management or Calendar
As you are a band, you will probably be doing some gigs and shows. Well, hopefully, you are. Some band theme include a built-in event template making it easy to clearly show your upcoming gigs. From these calendar pages, you should also check if it is easy to include “book tickets” buttons if required.
Built-in Music Player
Myspace is dying a painfully, slow death. Therefore, ideally, you will want to be able to upload your own songs to your website and include them in the sidebar, blog posts, and pages.
How easy is the theme to work on?
Some WordPress themes make it easy to customize them and make them your own. When buying a theme you will want to check what features are included to make your life easy when working on your website.
Social Media Features
Social media like Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr are a great way of promoting your band and keeping in touch with your fans. You will want to check what social media features the theme has as an integrated Twitter feed or an easy way to embed YouTube videos.
Photo Gallery
You are probably going to want to post all of those cool photos you have of the band playing and looking good. If that is the case then make sure you choose a theme with a built-in photo gallery template to show them off in the best possible way.
WordPress is relatively easy to work with out of the box, however; theme designers can make it even easier by providing easy to use option panels for theme-specific functions. Other things to check for are widgets, support for the WordPress menu system, and integrated SEO options.
Don’t panic too much if your chosen favorite theme doesn’t tick all the boxes as some of the above features can be added by using plugins.
