As someone who works in a theatre or owns a theatre, you might not know just how important having a theater website is. Just like any business, your theatre website is the most important digital asset. It’s the first place people go to find out information regarding your theatre. In this article, we will highlight the importance of beautiful theatre websites design, its importance, and how to build a theater website of your own.
Why is it important to have a good theatre website?
You might think that in recent years your social media profiles such as your Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or YouTube channel are more crucial places to market your brand. However, your website still serves as the backbone for your online presence. Websites have been the most popular medium since the internet began, and it’s safe to say that they are here to stay. Theatre websites are like digital sales reps that work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. While you need to update your social media handles more frequently, creating a good theatre website from the start is more low maintenance but still effective.
For this reason, theatre websites are critical not only for marketing but for businesses as a whole. When you think about your website, you must ask what its main goal actually is. That is, to convince site visitors to book a ticket to your show or go to your venue. While theatre websites essential make the theatre more known, some more benefits include:
- Opportunity to hire more actors who want to perform in the theatre
- More people attending the shows and events
- Higher number of parents who want to enroll their children in acting or dance classes in the theatre
- More volunteers who want to serve during theatre shows or events
- Possible increase in donors who want to improve the theatre
What goes into theatre websites design?
Your theater website design is crucial to each the objective of your website, which is to boost your theatre’s sales and market it to website visitors. When thinking of the design of your theatre websites, include these elements:
- The calendar of events: What is going on for each day at your theatre? Will the place be available every day of the week or are you closed on weekdays and holidays? Are there any special events taking place or is the theatre open for workshops. All these must go into the calendar of events of your theatre website, to provide an overview on what site visitors can potentially attend.
- Show details: While the calendar of events won’t go into specifics, the show details should enumerate the time each production will be playing, the dress code for the guests, and what the show’s gist will be all about. This gives potential viewers a feel of what it will be like to attend your show, and it also eliminates confusion regarding technical matters.
- Mobile friendly and web responsive: Don’t forget to make your website mobile-friendly, as more and more users book movies or theatre plays using their smartphones.
- Integration of ticket sales: An important part of your website, make sure to allow site visitors to purchase directly online. Offer different payment methods to convince onlookers to avail of the offers asap. The easier you make it for your clients to make a purchase, the better it will be for you.
- Description about the company: How did the company started and when? The best theatre websites not only provide information about the event, but they also include a brief background of the company itself.
Examples of theatre websites:
As you will see below, these theatre websites successfully displayed the elements of a good website design to capture their target audience. The websites are powered by Strikingly, a web builder that allows you to publish beautiful websites in minutes. Strikingly takes pride in the ease of use via drag and drop features, sections to carefully create your web content, customizable fonts and themes that can promote your company’s brand.
- Kai no Hai Theatrical Company
Kai no Hai used Strikingly’s hero section feature where a captivating headline and subheadline accompanies a simple yet direct call to action, which is for users to contact them.
Have you ever wanted to watch a play but you don’t know where there are available ones nearby? If you are itching for great entertainment, having a map of the location available for website viewers can be a lifesaver. Aside from the map, Kai no Hai’s theatre website also features Strikingly’s contact form feature where viewers can drop their contact details (name, email address, phone number) and any questions they might have.
There are times when you want to watch a play because of the actors. If the actors already have a loyal following, then having their names displayed on the theatre website is another way to attract more customers. This was made possible by using Strikingly’s content in columns section. This feature is perfect for those who want to display company staff profiles and a brief description of what they do. In the case of theatre websites, the performers’ profiles, along with their pictures and a summary of what roles they play can go a long way in helping out onlookers connect to the play’s story and make them want to watch it.
- Gothic wa Mahou Maiden
This website uses Strikingly’s title section which contains a big background with a title and tagline. Not only that, but we mentioned that good theatre websites integrate ticket sales into their platform. Like in Gothic wa Mahou Maiden’s website, the ticket information such as ticket price and location of seat can be booked within the website itself. This was done using Strikingly’s pricing table section feature which allows users to purchase tickets directly from the theatre’s website by allowing online booking and payment services.
Sometimes you want your audience to get a sample of what performance they can expect at your theatre. In this website, the web developer chose to maximize the design and embed music from none other than their performers themselves. This was done via Strikingly’s multi-functional editor. Just open your editor, click “Add new section,” then App Store & HTML. Click the edit button and choose SoundCloud. Strikingly’s app store isn’t limited to SoundCloud, however, and you can also choose to embed videos from YouTube if you want to display sample performances for your site visitors. Sometimes they just need a small preview to jump with both feet in and purchase the whole package.
Another theatre website element seen in this website is the performance schedule. For this, you can use Strikingly’s process section to mimic the look. Otherwise, you can also opt to make your own section to have more control over your layout. With this feature, you can arrange and mix and match different website components to suit your liking. Feel free to add text, media, call-to-action, custom code, videos and links to different parts of your website to make it more interesting. With Strikingly’s web builder, the sky's the limit.
Remember that a well-built theatre website contains elements such as the calendar of events, details about the show, background about your theatre company, and the ability for customers to book tickets on the website itself. By using Strikingly and its features, this can be done hassle-free. The service Strikingly provides is one of the best out there, as you can always talk to customer service representatives should you have any questions regarding the web builder. Not only that, but the plethora of options to make your theatre website as attractive and enticing as possible is within reach.
Now that you know how to build a theater website, what are you waiting for? Sign up today and don’t waste any more precious time. The clock is ticking and before you know it, another year and opportunity to make it in the theatre industry has passed.
