Mosques or Masajid should have their own websites. It is the best way to build an online presence and inform the local community about upcoming religious events, classes, workshops or any kind of announcements. Developers have worked hard to make the process of building websites as easy as possible. This post focuses on how to build a website for mosque or masjid for people who have no experience in making a website.
The process of making a mosque website is the same as any other website. After setting up the basic foundations you will have to alter the content to make it match your needs and transfer the website into the looks of a mosque website. The initial focus should be on setting the foundations of a website. So we will break the website making process into two parts.
In the initial part, I will guide you to buy the domain and then hosting. The second part would be about choosing a free or paid theme to set up the design foundation of the website. Lastly, I will recommend some important plugins that will help add necessary functionalities for a mosque website.
Building Foundations of Mosque Website
Let’s get straight into the first part. Although it can be done later stage as well but if you are a total beginner then you should take this as the first step, to begin with. Like a building as to have the right foundations a mosque name and the place where its website has to be deployed should be carefully chosen as well.
Mosque Domain Name:
You need to buy the name which people will use to write on their browser and view your website. This name will be the domain name of your mosque. The place where this name is bought is called as the domain registrar.
There are many places where you can register your domain name. Registering a domain name simply means that you are claiming a name as your property and pay an annual fee to keep it your own property. Failure to pay the fee by the end of the year can make the domain go public, anybody else who pays for it can become the new owner.
I would recommend SiteGround as your domain registrar. They have a good grace period, so in case you missed one payment, there will be still enough time to reclaim the domain. Also, SiteGround support will remind you in time so you do not miss the payment on time.
Mosque Hosting Place:
Like the actual place where the mosque is located in the same way, there has to be an actual place where the files of your mosque websites should be located. This place is called the mosque’s website hosting.
Hosting will give the mosque a storage area where they can place the files which compile up to show the website into one form. This storage area has to be economical, safe and at the same time have a good reputation in the market.
SiteGround can be an ideal place where you buy the hosting. So you will have the hosting and domain registered at one place. It will help make the website go live in quickly. If you have the domain and hosting at different places then you will have to keep track of different platforms. Having everything at one reliable place can help better organization and management.
StartUp plan as WordPress managed hosting plan is ideal for the mosque. It offers enough storage space that will last for years for a mosque website. Additionally, the security features offered by SiteGround will help add another layer of security.
The additional advantages of having SiteGround hosting is fast loading speed, CDN support, daily backups, good support, free SG optimizer fee. All these perks come along with their basic WordPress managed package. On other platforms, such as Kinsta, you will have to pay a much higher fee to get these perks.
Functionality Foundations of Mosque Website
After getting the domain and have space where you can store your website files aka hosting, you need to install WordPress.
In simple words, WordPress is free software or a content management system that helps you to make a website without knowledge of coding or design skills. After getting the SiteGround WordPress managed package you will have a preinstalled WordPress.
In case, you do not have it installed, you can create a ticket or install it yourself with just a few clicks in the SiteGround’ member area.
Theme For Mosque Website?
Themes are pre-built website structures that you can simply unfold on your WordPress installations. With a theme and some experience, anyone can build a fully functional website in a matter of a few hours.
You can use the pre-installed theme but if you want to take a design leap than you can use head over to ThemeForest and get a premium mosque theme with in-built functionalities. There are also free themes available that can be altered with mosque content to make them more professional.
Mosque Website Necessary Functionalities
If you need a typical informational static website then you do not need to add any extra plugins. If you need to add functionalities like prayer time table, event calendar, contact form, donation or educational area then you will need to install the precoded scripts or plugins.
Plugins are one of the reasons why WordPress is the most successful content management system or CMS. You can think of any functionality you can add any function to your website. If plugin repository was not available then you would have to hire a developer and pay a hefty price to get the functionality coded
This post is focused on helping the masjid committee to build and maintain their own mosque website with minimal annual charges. The goal is to make the administrator self-sufficient and bear only the expense of domain and hosting renewal.
These are the must-have plugins for a mosque website:
Azan Plugin: This plugin will help to display the prayer timings for all 5 and Friday prayers time on the sidebar of your future mosque website.
TablePress: In order to properly display all the functions, events, workshops or classes at the mosque you need to display the time table to the website viewer. This plugin will help you show exactly that on your website. Every day you can create different tables and show them with the help of easy shortcodes.
Modern Event Calendar lite: For future events there you can set up a calendar on the sidebar of the website. Visitors can scrawl and view upcoming events and plans.
Contact form 7: There must a form for people to do all kinds of inquiries or get in touch with the administration of the masjid. This plugin will help you create that form that you can easily integrate onto your website pages. All the emails will be sent directly to your selected email address. Typically mosque management email account is linked to the contact form.
Donations Plugin: All mosques need donation and the robust plugin can help integrate this functionality. You can add the donation box on any part of the website thanks to this plugin “GiveWp – Donation Plugin and Fundraising Platform”.
Wordfence: To further strengthen the website security and make it safe from hacking attempts.
Time To Build Mosque Website Yourself
If you follow all the above instructions I have shared then it should not take your more than few days given no prior experience. If you have little experience with WordPress beforehand then you can make the website within one day time.
Final Thoughts:
The mosque website is a lot easier to build today. You can avail services from companies to build your mosque website but given the non-profit nature of the mosques, I would highly suggest that you take the step and build it by yourself.
The above-shared tutorial is highly practical. Anyone with an aim to build a website can use it to make not just mosque but any website. Still, if you feel that you need assistance then you can drop me an email.
