While you're considering what to put on your site, you should browse the web and see what other bands have done. You will then find out what most people notice about most indie band websites: They suck. Most of them are really bad. They are a few paltry pages with poor backgrounds that make it impossible to read. They make it hard to find the most simple information about the band, such as the music, or the next show.

If there's a trend of the worst band sites, the mistake that bands most often make is that they highlight the people in the band, rather than the music and the brand of the band itself. In a lot of ways, the band members are the least important part of a band when it comes to marketing the band, unless one or more of the band members are famous (or have large breasts). The people all over the world that are visiting your band website don't care about the people who are making the music until they've decided that they like the music first.

Because of this, the most important thing that you can put on your website is music. Put as many free songs on your site as you are comfortable releasing. The more you share, the better.

Profiles

There is more than one type of audience for your website, and you will want to meet their needs with as little trouble to them as possible. This part of the website design is the same no matter if you have a band, or a company that makes widgets. No matter what you have for a website, you should consider the types of customers that you have, and create profiles for those different customers. Then tailor their website for each of these customer types, making sure that each type is no more than a click or two away from the information that they want to find.

Businesses that really want to get into the mind of their customer will create fake personas of each, with names, pets, income, where they live, what they're like, etc. It helps to envision a particular person because then you can imagine them browsing your site.

We can't do this exercise for you, however we can give you some general profiles. Remember, the idea for your website design is that these profiles should be no more than one or two clicks away from finding out what they want. Here are some profiles and questions that they might ask:

• Fan who went to a show: When is your next show? Where can I buy an album? What's new with the band? Where's some music I can listen to? How can I join your mailing list? Where are pictures of the band?
• Web surfer who wound up on your site: What kind of website is this? (If they figure out it's music: Where can I listen to the music?) What kind of music do you play, what bands do you sound like? Entertain me!
• Music Reviewer: How do I contact you? Where's the band bio? What are the press releases and notables that this band has had? Where has this band been played? When are the next shows?
• Booker: How do I contact you? What's the stage plot? How many band members? What instrumentation? Where's a picture or logo to use for the ad that I want to run for your show?

These are not a complete list of questions, or profiles, but you want to make sure that the answers that each question a profile is asking for is easy to locate. It also depends on your goals for the band. If you don't care about a particular profile, then you don't have to answer those questions, of course.

Website Goals

If you have a good idea of the profiles that you want to serve for your site, and have collected the information and are ready to create your site, you should clarify the goals for each profile that goes to the site.

For example, for a fan, you probably would like them to buy your albums. You should make sure that it's very easy for people to do so no matter where on the site they are, and mention your albums often throughout your site. We keep our albums listed on the right side of our site for that very reason. If at any time they're entertained, and make a snap decision to buy an album, we've made it simple for them to do this. On our website, you are always two clicks away from an album order form.

Your site doesn't always have to do with commerce, however. If you make free music, for example, and just want to share it with the world, then your goal is to make it as simple as possible for them to hear, and get your music. In this case, the borders of your site should always have a link that says something like "Get Free Music!" that goes to a page where they can do this.

We suggest a standard, static menu that will fulfill the most common needs of your different audiences, so that they can find what they're looking for no matter where they are on the site. We did this by adding a menu at the top that never changes. Those include: "Buy, Listen, Shows, Join, Booking / Press, and Sitemap." From watching people browse our site, we've found that most all of them can find what they want from that list, with more detail underneath those pages. If they came to the site to look for the latest show so they know where to go, it's simple to find it out.

If you match these goals with the profiles that we mention earlier in this section, you can more powerfully lead each type of person through the site to get to the information or perform the action that you want them to. You should REPEAT the things that you want them to do as often through your site as you feel comfortable. This is to give them many opportunities to do what you'd like them to, and reinforce the message. The most powerful marketing technique is repetition, and you'll find it a common technique on well-designed commerce sites.

Here's some sample goals that you might have for different types of people that visit:

• Fan: Buy our albums, join our mailing list, listen to our free music, go to our next shows.
• Booker: Contact us!
• Press: Contact us! Print our press release! Publish our pictures!

One thing to keep in mind as you consider how to put together your site is to remember that aside from the reviewers, bookers, and other serious browsers of your website, music is entertainment in the end. Fans are going to your site to be entertained, whether that be to listen to music, find out when your next show is, or read about your band. If you can keep them entertained along the way, your fans will want to come back. Just because you have goals for them doesn't mean that you can't have fun.

Next: Website Laundry List

Back to The Indie Band Survival Guide Ebook Home

While you're considering what to put on your site, you should browse the web and see what other bands have done. You will then find out what most people notice about most indie band websites: They suck. Most of them are really bad. They are a few paltry pages with poor backgrounds that make it impossible to read. They make it hard to find the most simple information about the band, such as the music, or the next show.

If there's a trend of the worst band sites, the mistake that bands most often make is that they highlight the people in the band, rather than the music and the brand of the band itself. In a lot of ways, the band members are the least important part of a band when it comes to marketing the band, unless one or more of the band members are famous (or have large breasts). The people all over the world that are visiting your band website don't care about the people who are making the music until they've decided that they like the music first.

Because of this, the most important thing that you can put on your website is music. Put as many free songs on your site as you are comfortable releasing. The more you share, the better.

Profiles

There is more than one type of audience for your website, and you will want to meet their needs with as little trouble to them as possible. This part of the website design is the same no matter if you have a band, or a company that makes widgets. No matter what you have for a website, you should consider the types of customers that you have, and create profiles for those different customers. Then tailor their website for each of these customer types, making sure that each type is no more than a click or two away from the information that they want to find.

Businesses that really want to get into the mind of their customer will create fake personas of each, with names, pets, income, where they live, what they're like, etc. It helps to envision a particular person because then you can imagine them browsing your site.

We can't do this exercise for you, however we can give you some general profiles. Remember, the idea for your website design is that these profiles should be no more than one or two clicks away from finding out what they want. Here are some profiles and questions that they might ask:

• Fan who went to a show: When is your next show? Where can I buy an album? What's new with the band? Where's some music I can listen to? How can I join your mailing list? Where are pictures of the band?
• Web surfer who wound up on your site: What kind of website is this? (If they figure out it's music: Where can I listen to the music?) What kind of music do you play, what bands do you sound like? Entertain me!
• Music Reviewer: How do I contact you? Where's the band bio? What are the press releases and notables that this band has had? Where has this band been played? When are the next shows?
• Booker: How do I contact you? What's the stage plot? How many band members? What instrumentation? Where's a picture or logo to use for the ad that I want to run for your show?

These are not a complete list of questions, or profiles, but you want to make sure that the answers that each question a profile is asking for is easy to locate. It also depends on your goals for the band. If you don't care about a particular profile, then you don't have to answer those questions, of course.

Website Goals

If you have a good idea of the profiles that you want to serve for your site, and have collected the information and are ready to create your site, you should clarify the goals for each profile that goes to the site.

For example, for a fan, you probably would like them to buy your albums. You should make sure that it's very easy for people to do so no matter where on the site they are, and mention your albums often throughout your site. We keep our albums listed on the right side of our site for that very reason. If at any time they're entertained, and make a snap decision to buy an album, we've made it simple for them to do this. On our website, you are always two clicks away from an album order form.

Your site doesn't always have to do with commerce, however. If you make free music, for example, and just want to share it with the world, then your goal is to make it as simple as possible for them to hear, and get your music. In this case, the borders of your site should always have a link that says something like "Get Free Music!" that goes to a page where they can do this.

We suggest a standard, static menu that will fulfill the most common needs of your different audiences, so that they can find what they're looking for no matter where they are on the site. We did this by adding a menu at the top that never changes. Those include: "Buy, Listen, Shows, Join, Booking / Press, and Sitemap." From watching people browse our site, we've found that most all of them can find what they want from that list, with more detail underneath those pages. If they came to the site to look for the latest show so they know where to go, it's simple to find it out.

If you match these goals with the profiles that we mention earlier in this section, you can more powerfully lead each type of person through the site to get to the information or perform the action that you want them to. You should REPEAT the things that you want them to do as often through your site as you feel comfortable. This is to give them many opportunities to do what you'd like them to, and reinforce the message. The most powerful marketing technique is repetition, and you'll find it a common technique on well-designed commerce sites.

Here's some sample goals that you might have for different types of people that visit:

• Fan: Buy our albums, join our mailing list, listen to our free music, go to our next shows.
• Booker: Contact us!
• Press: Contact us! Print our press release! Publish our pictures!

One thing to keep in mind as you consider how to put together your site is to remember that aside from the reviewers, bookers, and other serious browsers of your website, music is entertainment in the end. Fans are going to your site to be entertained, whether that be to listen to music, find out when your next show is, or read about your band. If you can keep them entertained along the way, your fans will want to come back. Just because you have goals for them doesn't mean that you can't have fun.

Next: Website Laundry List

Back to The Indie Band Survival Guide Ebook Home

While you're considering what to put on your site, you should browse the web and see what other bands have done. You will then find out what most people notice about most indie band websites: They suck. Most of them are really bad. They are a few paltry pages with poor backgrounds that make it impossible to read. They make it hard to find the most simple information about the band, such as the music, or the next show.

If there's a trend of the worst band sites, the mistake that bands most often make is that they highlight the people in the band, rather than the music and the brand of the band itself. In a lot of ways, the band members are the least important part of a band when it comes to marketing the band, unless one or more of the band members are famous (or have large breasts). The people all over the world that are visiting your band website don't care about the people who are making the music until they've decided that they like the music first.

Because of this, the most important thing that you can put on your website is music. Put as many free songs on your site as you are comfortable releasing. The more you share, the better.

Profiles

There is more than one type of audience for your website, and you will want to meet their needs with as little trouble to them as possible. This part of the website design is the same no matter if you have a band, or a company that makes widgets. No matter what you have for a website, you should consider the types of customers that you have, and create profiles for those different customers. Then tailor their website for each of these customer types, making sure that each type is no more than a click or two away from the information that they want to find.

Businesses that really want to get into the mind of their customer will create fake personas of each, with names, pets, income, where they live, what they're like, etc. It helps to envision a particular person because then you can imagine them browsing your site.

We can't do this exercise for you, however we can give you some general profiles. Remember, the idea for your website design is that these profiles should be no more than one or two clicks away from finding out what they want. Here are some profiles and questions that they might ask:

• Fan who went to a show: When is your next show? Where can I buy an album? What's new with the band? Where's some music I can listen to? How can I join your mailing list? Where are pictures of the band?
• Web surfer who wound up on your site: What kind of website is this? (If they figure out it's music: Where can I listen to the music?) What kind of music do you play, what bands do you sound like? Entertain me!
• Music Reviewer: How do I contact you? Where's the band bio? What are the press releases and notables that this band has had? Where has this band been played? When are the next shows?
• Booker: How do I contact you? What's the stage plot? How many band members? What instrumentation? Where's a picture or logo to use for the ad that I want to run for your show?

These are not a complete list of questions, or profiles, but you want to make sure that the answers that each question a profile is asking for is easy to locate. It also depends on your goals for the band. If you don't care about a particular profile, then you don't have to answer those questions, of course.

Website Goals

If you have a good idea of the profiles that you want to serve for your site, and have collected the information and are ready to create your site, you should clarify the goals for each profile that goes to the site.

For example, for a fan, you probably would like them to buy your albums. You should make sure that it's very easy for people to do so no matter where on the site they are, and mention your albums often throughout your site. We keep our albums listed on the right side of our site for that very reason. If at any time they're entertained, and make a snap decision to buy an album, we've made it simple for them to do this. On our website, you are always two clicks away from an album order form.

Your site doesn't always have to do with commerce, however. If you make free music, for example, and just want to share it with the world, then your goal is to make it as simple as possible for them to hear, and get your music. In this case, the borders of your site should always have a link that says something like "Get Free Music!" that goes to a page where they can do this.

We suggest a standard, static menu that will fulfill the most common needs of your different audiences, so that they can find what they're looking for no matter where they are on the site. We did this by adding a menu at the top that never changes. Those include: "Buy, Listen, Shows, Join, Booking / Press, and Sitemap." From watching people browse our site, we've found that most all of them can find what they want from that list, with more detail underneath those pages. If they came to the site to look for the latest show so they know where to go, it's simple to find it out.

If you match these goals with the profiles that we mention earlier in this section, you can more powerfully lead each type of person through the site to get to the information or perform the action that you want them to. You should REPEAT the things that you want them to do as often through your site as you feel comfortable. This is to give them many opportunities to do what you'd like them to, and reinforce the message. The most powerful marketing technique is repetition, and you'll find it a common technique on well-designed commerce sites.

Here's some sample goals that you might have for different types of people that visit:

• Fan: Buy our albums, join our mailing list, listen to our free music, go to our next shows.
• Booker: Contact us!
• Press: Contact us! Print our press release! Publish our pictures!

One thing to keep in mind as you consider how to put together your site is to remember that aside from the reviewers, bookers, and other serious browsers of your website, music is entertainment in the end. Fans are going to your site to be entertained, whether that be to listen to music, find out when your next show is, or read about your band. If you can keep them entertained along the way, your fans will want to come back. Just because you have goals for them doesn't mean that you can't have fun.

Next: Website Laundry List

A detailed discussion of how to build an actual site is out of scope of The Survival Guide, as it gets into technologies that seem to change about every 10 minutes. There are thousands of books and guides on web design. What we can share are some techniques that make a good band website no matter what technologies you use to build it.

While you're considering what to put on your site, you should browse the web and see what other bands have done. You will then find out what most people notice about most indie band websites: They suck. Most of them are really bad. They are a few paltry pages with poor backgrounds that make it impossible to read. They make it hard to find the most simple information about the band, such as the music, or the next show.

If there's a trend of the worst band sites, the mistake that bands most often make is that they highlight the people in the band, rather than the music and the brand of the band itself. In a lot of ways, the band members are the least important part of a band when it comes to marketing the band, unless one or more of the band members are famous (or have large breasts). The people all over the world that are visiting your band website don't care about the people who are making the music until they've decided that they like the music first.

Because of this, the most important thing that you can put on your website is music. Put as many free songs on your site as you are comfortable releasing. The more you share, the better.

Profiles

There is more than one type of audience for your website, and you will want to meet their needs with as little trouble to them as possible. This part of the website design is the same no matter if you have a band, or a company that makes widgets. No matter what you have for a website, you should consider the types of customers that you have, and create profiles for those different customers. Then tailor their website for each of these customer types, making sure that each type is no more than a click or two away from the information that they want to find.

Businesses that really want to get into the mind of their customer will create fake personas of each, with names, pets, income, where they live, what they're like, etc. It helps to envision a particular person because then you can imagine them browsing your site.

We can't do this exercise for you, however we can give you some general profiles. Remember, the idea for your website design is that these profiles should be no more than one or two clicks away from finding out what they want. Here are some profiles and questions that they might ask:

·        Fan who went to a show: When is your next show? Where can I buy an album? What's new with the band? Where's some music I can listen to? How can I join your mailing list? Where are pictures of the band?

·        Web surfer who wound up on your site: What kind of website is this? (If they figure out it's music: Where can I listen to the music?) What kind of music do you play, what bands do you sound like? Entertain me!

·        Music Reviewer: How do I contact you? Where's the band bio? What are the press releases and notables that this band has had? Where has this band been played? When are the next shows?

·        Booker: How do I contact you? What's the stage plot? How many band members? What instrumentation? Where's a picture or logo to use for the ad that I want to run for your show?

These are not a complete list of questions, or profiles, but you want to make sure that the answers that each question a profile is asking for is easy to locate. It also depends on your goals for the band. If you don't care about a particular profile, then you don't have to answer those questions, of course.

Website Goals

If you have a good idea of the profiles that you want to serve for your site, and have collected the information and are ready to create your site, you should clarify the goals for each profile that goes to the site.

For example, for a fan, you probably would like them to buy your albums. You should make sure that it's very easy for people to do so no matter where on the site they are, and mention your albums often throughout your site. We keep our albums listed on the right side of our site for that very reason. If at any time they're entertained, and make a snap decision to buy an album, we've made it simple for them to do this. On our website, you are always two clicks away from an album order form.

Your site doesn't always have to do with commerce, however. If you make free music, for example, and just want to share it with the world, then your goal is to make it as simple as possible for them to hear, and get your music. In this case, the borders of your site should always have a link that says something like "Get Free Music!" that goes to a page where they can do this.

We suggest a standard, static menu that will fulfill the most common needs of your different audiences, so that they can find what they're looking for no matter where they are on the site. We did this by adding a menu at the top that never changes. Those include: "Buy, Listen, Shows, Join, Booking / Press, and Sitemap." From watching people browse our site, we've found that most all of them can find what they want from that list, with more detail underneath those pages. If they came to the site to look for the latest show so they know where to go, it's simple to find it out.

If you match these goals with the profiles that we mention earlier in this section, you can more powerfully lead each type of person through the site to get to the information or perform the action that you want them to. You should REPEAT the things that you want them to do as often through your site as you feel comfortable. This is to give them many opportunities to do what you'd like them to, and reinforce the message. The most powerful marketing technique is repetition, and you'll find it a common technique on well-designed commerce sites.

Here's some sample goals that you might have for different types of people that visit:

·        Fan: Buy our albums, join our mailing list, listen to our free music, go to our next shows.

·        Booker: Contact us!

·        Press: Contact us! Print our press release! Publish our pictures!

One thing to keep in mind as you consider how to put together your site is to remember that aside from the reviewers, bookers, and other serious browsers of your website, music is entertainment in the end. Fans are going to your site to be entertained, whether that be to listen to music, find out when your next show is, or read about your band. If you can keep them entertained along the way, your fans will want to come back. Just because you have goals for them doesn't mean that you can't have fun.

Next: Website Laundry List

A detailed discussion of how to build an actual site is out of scope of The Survival Guide, as it gets into technologies that seem to change about every 10 minutes. There are thousands of books and guides on web design. What we can share are some techniques that make a good band website no matter what technologies you use to build it.

While you're considering what to put on your site, you should browse the web and see what other bands have done. You will then find out what most people notice about most indie band websites: They suck. Most of them are really bad. They are a few paltry pages with poor backgrounds that make it impossible to read. They make it hard to find the most simple information about the band, such as the music, or the next show.

If there's a trend of the worst band sites, the mistake that bands most often make is that they highlight the people in the band, rather than the music and the brand of the band itself. In a lot of ways, the band members are the least important part of a band when it comes to marketing the band, unless one or more of the band members are famous (or have large breasts). The people all over the world that are visiting your band website don't care about the people who are making the music until they've decided that they like the music first.

Because of this, the most important thing that you can put on your website is music. Put as many free songs on your site as you are comfortable releasing. The more you share, the better.

Profiles

There is more than one type of audience for your website, and you will want to meet their needs with as little trouble to them as possible.

This part of the website design is the same no matter if you have a band, or a company that makes widgets. No matter what you have for a website, you should consider the types of customers that you have, and create profiles for those different customers. Then tailor their website for each of these customer types, making sure that each type is no more than a click or two away from the information that they want to find.

Businesses that really want to get into the mind of their customer will create fake personas of each, with names, pets, income, where they live, what they're like, etc. It helps to envision a particular person because then you can imagine them browsing your site.

We can't do this exercise for you, however we can give you some general profiles. Remember, the idea for your website design is that these profiles should be no more than one or two clicks away from finding out what they want. Here are some profiles and questions that they might ask:

·        Fan who went to a show: When is your next show? Where can I buy an album? What's new with the band? Where's some music I can listen to? How can I join your mailing list? Where are pictures of the band?

·        Web surfer who wound up on your site: What kind of website is this? (If they figure out it's music: Where can I listen to the music?) What kind of music do you play, what bands do you sound like? Entertain me!

·        Music Reviewer: How do I contact you? Where's the band bio? What are the press releases and notables that this band has had? Where has this band been played? When are the next shows?

·        Booker: How do I contact you? What's the stage plot? How many band members? What instrumentation? Where's a picture or logo to use for the ad that I want to run for your show?

These are not a complete list of questions, or profiles, but you want to make sure that the answers that each question a profile is asking for is easy to locate. It also depends on your goals for the band. If you don't care about a particular profile, then you don't have to answer those questions, of course.

Website Goals

If you have a good idea of the profiles that you want to serve for your site, and have collected the information and are ready to create your site, you should clarify the goals for each profile that goes to the site.

For example, for a fan, you probably would like them to buy your albums. You should make sure that it's very easy for people to do so no matter where on the site they are, and mention your albums often throughout your site. We keep our albums listed on the right side of our site for that very reason. If at any time they're entertained, and make a snap decision to buy an album, we've made it simple for them to do this. On our website, you are always two clicks away from an album order form.

Your site doesn't always have to do with commerce, however. If you make free music, for example, and just want to share it with the world, then your goal is to make it as simple as possible for them to hear, and get your music. In this case, the borders of your site should always have a link that says something like "Get Free Music!" that goes to a page where they can do this.

We suggest a standard, static menu that will fulfill the most common needs of your different audiences, so that they can find what they're looking for no matter where they are on the site. We did this by adding a menu at the top that never changes. Those include: "Buy, Listen, Shows, Join, Booking / Press, and Sitemap." From watching people browse our site, we've found that most all of them can find what they want from that list, with more detail underneath those pages. If they came to the site to look for the latest show so they know where to go, it's simple to find it out.

If you match these goals with the profiles that we mention earlier in this section, you can more powerfully lead each type of person through the site to get to the information or perform the action that you want them to. You should REPEAT the things that you want them to do as often through your site as you feel comfortable. This is to give them many opportunities to do what you'd like them to, and reinforce the message. The most powerful marketing technique is repetition, and you'll find it a common technique on well-designed commerce sites.

Here's some sample goals that you might have for different types of people that visit:

·        Fan: Buy our albums, join our mailing list, listen to our free music, go to our next shows.

·        Booker: Contact us!

·        Press: Contact us! Print our press release! Publish our pictures!