How to Sell Music on WordPress

So, you’ve made some singles or a whole album of songs, and need a way to sell them? Well, you’ve landed on the right article. The great thing is that it’s super easy to set up a WordPress website and start selling your music, even today! In this article, you’ll learn all about how to sell music on WordPress.

Best Choices for Selling Music on WordPress

There are 2 really great ways to sell music on WordPress, and those are using plugins like WooCommerce and Easy Digital Downloads. However, there are some things to consider before choosing which one is best for you.

Why Use WooCommerce for Selling Music on WordPress

WooCommerce is one of the most popular ecommerce solutions in the market. As for 2023, over 6.5 million sites actively use WooCommerce. You can sell shippable items or digital items. When it comes to selling music on WordPress, you can sell music downloads, but also merchandise.

If you plan to sell more than just digital items, you will find that WooCommerce is robust enough for most of your eshop needs. Out of the box it’s pretty powerful, but if you need more extensions to help with adding more payment gateways, taxes, shipping options, and more, you can visit WooCommerce.com for their add-ons.

Why Use Easy Digital Downloads for Selling Music on WordPress

Easy Digital Downloads (EDD) is strictly for selling digital files like zip files, pdfs, image files, video files, and even music files. You won’t need to deal with implementing any shipping settings, like in WooCommerce. With EDD, you can accept payments via Stripe, PayPal, and Amazon. However, if you need more solutions, you can find more payment gateway solutions on their main site at EasyDigitalDownloads.com. Please note that those extensions may cost.

Aside from offering a few payment gateways, the free version of Easy Digital Downloads offers the means for you to track orders and refunds. You can even require users to log in, in order to download their files.

6 Steps to Sell Music on WordPress

For this article, we’re going to assume you’re only wanting to sell music on WordPress, so you’ll only need Easy Digital Downloads.

1. Install and Activate Easy Digital Downloads

2. Add business name, address, and preferred currency

3. Connect Payment method

4. Edit Email for Receipts

5. Add any extra tools like registration, SEO, or analytics

6. Add your products

Install and Activate Easy Digital Downloads

You can install Easy Digital Downloads from the Plugins section of your WordPress admin area. Once you’ve installed and activated the plugin, you’ll be sent to a general dashboard where you can click on the big green “Get Started” button, and go through the Easy Digital Downloads setup wizard.

Add Business Name, Address, and Preferred Currency

Once you’ve clicked the Get Started button, you’ll be sent to fill in information for your business. Make sure to add your name and business type.

You will also need to add your business address, which also includes the country. This is important for the people who purchase from you, and for your own tax records.

The last area on this page is designating your preferred currency. By default, it’s set to US Dollars, but if you’re from another country, you might want to select a different currency.

Connect Payment Method

After entering your business’ information and your preferred currency, you will need to configure your preferred payment gateway. You can offer several payment methods, but it’s important to start with one first. By default, Stripe shows up in the EDD setup wizard. You can skip this step and choose a different payment gateway later, if you don’t want to use Stripe.

For example, if you wish to use PayPal, you can find the payment gateway settings under Downloads > Setup > Payments tab. You can select which gateways you want to offer, as well as designate one as a default method. For this article, you can select PayPal and then navigate to the PayPal link to sync the service with Easy Digital Downloads.

As a note, make sure your PayPal account is set up as a business or merchant, as you might not be able to process payments under a personal account.

Edit Email for Receipts

Make sure to customize your customer’s email receipt. This will have information that they will need in order to download their item. You might want to allow them to have an account with your site, so they won’t need to email you for a download link in the future.

Add Any Extra Tools Like Registration, SEO, or Analytics

Easy Digital Downloads has a few tools they suggest to download based on what you might find useful while you sell music on WordPress. Some include optimizing the checkout so it’s simple to use, making sure emails get delivered, tweaking your product’s SEO, and more.

When you checkmark each, and then click the continue button at the bottom of this screen, the EDD plugin will install some of the plugins for you. Don’t worry, as the plugins are free to use. If you choose “Reliable Email Delivery”, you’ll need to configure the SMTP plugin. In most cases, unless WordPress isn’t sending emails, you shouldn’t need to check the box for this option.

Another option is that the plugin looks for a particular SEO plugin. If you have Yoast SEO already installed, then this plugin won’t install any other SEO-related plugins.

Add Your Products

Now that you’ve configured all your business info, payment gateway settings, and more, it’s time to add your products. Easy Digital Downloads makes it super simple in the last step of their setup wizard. All you need to do is add:

• Your product name

• Product image

• Specify if there’s a single price or a variable

• Product price

• Your product’s file that you’re offering for download

You can add more than one file for variable products. This is in case you are offering a single song or different songs from the same album.

In Summary

Hopefully this article has helped you with how to sell music on WordPress. Make sure to choose a WordPress ecommerce solution that will suit your needs. Once you have, simply add your products, configure your payment method, and then you can promote your website. Happy selling!

Frequently Asked Questions

Is WordPress good for musicians?

WordPress is the perfect choice when it comes to building a website for a musician. WordPress allows you to create a professional-looking website without any technical requirements.

What should the musician’s website include?

The content on the website can include your story and bio, media like videos and pictures, a blog about your opinions, your upcoming events and shows, the latest news about you, a community forum, and so on.

Is a website on WordPress safe?

Websites on WordPress are safe, however to avoid hacking keep your website up to date.

Do I need to know how to code in order to use WordPress?

There isn’t a need for advanced coding knowledge to use WordPress. The platform offers plenty of plugins and themes which you can use to customize your website.