Little but important change of layout

Sometimes you need other people to slap you in the face with how unpractical your website is, and while you want to build the best website to advertise yourself, it is not an easy feat. It requires a lot of work to source the right font to fit your style, to find some pertinent and catchy pictures, to put together your best tracks for a playlist. Let's not even talk about writing a bio if, like me, you are a natural-ear genius but, let's face it, with no proper, 10-years, Conservatoire-level musical education.

So it gets even more frustrating when, after the hours spent doing the easiest possible website, people still find the website... sort of confusing.

"What's wrong with my website?", I mumbled in a sad, dark corner of my head.

I couldn't find an answer myself, so I did the next best thing. I asked. I went to an Italian group of game developers and asked.

"Hey fellas, I am a composer and it seems that my website sucks at attracting business. Simply put: what can I do to get your attention?"

The result of the post was the following, I think it might be useful to other people like me, still sinking their teeth in the music business:

• Don't, just don't, write too much. People are just one flick away from sending your page back into internet oblivion.

• Important things first. Are you a banjo player? Picture of you with a banjo and your best tracks showing off. Are you a composer? Choose the music that you're really good at and put it at the top.

• This came as a surprise, I think it is mostly pertinent to the game audio sector: show which tools you're using. For me, putting Wwise front-and-center on the page was a boost more than Nuendo and all the usual music production tools.

Maybe there should be more to add, but really, what's important is not that you're a good website designer. It's more important that you convey the right information as soon as possible.

Hence, the player today went all the way to the top of the page, followed shortly by a few lines about the programs I use, which quickly translates as my skillset.