We asked our staff what their best website tips and favorite Bandzoogle features are. These tips are coming from the developers that helped to create the features, our support team who know our system better than anyone, and even our CEO gets in on the action.
We hope that you learn something new that will help improve your website, and feel free to add your own tips and favorite Bandzoogle features in the comments below!
David Dufresne, CEO
Tip: You can use our video feature to make a much more interesting page for your videos than what fans see on Youtube or Vimeo (or Facebook). You can add text features to explain the concept behind the video, when it was shot, by whom, etc. You can post photos, a music feature so folks can buy or download the featured track, etc.
Favourite feature: Our new(ish) digital file sales feature. Opens up many ways for artists to make more money. They can sell live video, instructional videos, ebooks, sheet music, loops, samples, etc. (see a list of David’s 66 favorite Bandzoogle features here)
Stacey Bedford, Head of Support
Tip: You can send out download codes for a single track, or a full album to mailing list members, or print them to give out at your next show. You can also track how many of your codes have been redeemed.This is a really great promotional tool.
Favourite feature: This is an obvious one, but commission free sales. It’s great to work for a company that is gunning for its members.
Joseph Longo, Support
Tip: Make use of the new Photo Gallery slideshow option! Add a killer image slideshow to any page of your site. Use it for promoting upcoming gigs/merch or rotate some of your best live shots for your fans to see.
Favorite feature: Having a free domain name registration included with any plan.
Melanie Kealey, Support
Tip: Don't be afraid to get creative and try things out! Changing things up like adding a new design, trying different images on each page, moving features around to see how it looks with a different layout is super easy (and fun!)
Favourite feature: My favourite thing is how easy it is to update your website content. Adding an event, a video, getting fancy with CSS or just adding plain text - it only takes a few clicks to keep content constantly updated and fresh.
Daniel Collins, Developer
Tip: Take good pictures of your products on a clear, uncluttered background so you can easily remove the background in photoshop and have the images display on your page regardless of background color, OR use a solid color backdrop to have your items stand out in a sharp grid, regardless of how “busy” your page background photographs are.
You can also have multiple store views on your site, so play with putting diverse options on the front page and the detailed views on other pages -- for instance, put a t-shirt, an LP, a box set, and a fan package on the front page, and have a dedicated sub-page in your merch section to show off all of your t-shirt designs in one place.
Favorite feature: Store Grid View. For a professional, sharp look to your merch or album store, use the store grid view to showcase your items. It looks great and you can fit more items on a page.
Allison Sharpe, Support
Tip: Focus on your fans and don’t get hung up on the little things. Visitor stats, website layout, colors, and fonts are all important factors to your website but they don’t make you money. Don’t get sidetracked dissecting your stats, or stuck trying to get a image to fit pixel perfect on your site. Instead dedicate that time to blogging, vlogging, interacting on social media, putting out contests, live gigs, live streaming events, and anything that allows your fans to better get to know you and your music.
Favorite Feature: Our built in mailing list feature makes it easy to stay connected with your fans. Dedicated e-mail marketing companies are expensive! With the Bandzoogle Pro plan you can add up to 10,000 mailing list members and send 4,000 mails per day. To do the same anywhere else would cost ya at least $50 per month. Having this included with your membership here is a major bonus!
Jorge Manrubia, Developer
Tip: Adding new features and content is so easy in Bandzoogle that it’s good to keep in mind that less is more. Pay attention to every element you add to your page and to every word you write. Lack of clutter will empower your site and message.
Favorite Feature: Knowing that you can completely change how your site looks at any time with one click, and being certain that everything will work perfectly, mobile devices included.
David English, Support
Favorite Feature: The built in responsiveness for the preset themes ensures a great display on any device. I am especially fond of the new Dusted theme with its full page background. It has such a versatility and it is great seeing how members use that capability, giving each site a beautiful and fresh look.
Tip: Keep practising.
Alternative tip: Always look for feedback. Whether it comes in the form of a site review from one of our friendly support team or some constructive criticism from a colleague and friend, there are always refinements and additions that you make to your website.
Dave Cool, Director of Artist Relations
Tip: Always (always!) use professionally shot photos for your main website images (background, header, and promo photos). Great photos can create a positive first impression for potential new fans, as well as for industry and media. But if the images on your website look unprofessional, chances are, people won’t take you or your music seriously.
Favorite Feature: Our music players. They have so much flexibility and functionality. You can sell your music and we take 0% of the sales. You can set the price, ask fans to pay what they want, give the music away for free, or simply stream full songs (or even create custom preview clips). Each album and song is shareable on social media. You can add lyrics for songs. You can import tracks directly from SoundCloud. The players support MP3, WAV, and FLAC files. Plus, they’re responsive and work great on mobile devices.
Dave Spurr, Developer
Tip: Never eat yellow snow.
Alternative tip: You might know you can add custom CSS sitewide from the design section but did you know you can also target individual pages with your CSS as they have unique class name applied. Each page receives a class name in the format of website-page-[your-page-slug], so for example website-page-home or website-page-contact-us which you can then use in your custom CSS to add styling to just that page for things like having page specific background colours.
Favorite Feature: The new, coming soon, design system. It will make our themes system so much more flexible allowing us to create even more advanced and different themes while allowing users more customization than ever before across the board.
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