It’s been another big few months for our Radio Website builder! We are committed to continuous improvements to this platform – this includes new features, enhancements, and bug fixes. Your monthly subscription means you always have access to the latest features and support.
If you don’t already use Radio Websites for your station, take a look at all the features you can get access to for a simple monthly price. We’ve currently got over 50 stations on the platform, and this is growing steadily.
This article outlines the changes to the platform since our last update in July. All updates are now available to all sites, subject to plan requirements.
If you have questions, please get in touch with our support team. We’re here to help!
Full Screen Player Pages
Our Global Player has always been very popular with stations and listeners – it allows anyone to keep listening as they browse around the site. However, it doesn’t fit all the information on it (particularly on mobile), and it doesn’t allow you to hand out links directly to your player. That’s why we have rolled out the first version of our Full Screen Player. Go try it out now on our demo site!
Listeners can access the Full Screen Player by clicking on the middle section of the Global Player. You can also send out links directly to it.
Right now it displays this key information:
- Current Program & Announcer
- Current Song Title & Artist
- Previous Song Title & Artist
- Next Program
- Last Four Tracks
You can customize it in the WordPress Customizer to include your own background image. You can also select a Banner Advertising zone to include on your player page. It will also use your site’s default Banner Overlay settings.
We’ll be listening to users over the coming months to find out what else they’d like to do with their Player Page.
Station Banner Block
The first block on the Player Page is also available as a standalone block (it’s called ‘Station Banner’). You may want to use this on your homepage, ‘ways to listen’ page, or other locations where you want to prompt people to tune in.
The block is customizable with your station, background image, overlay settings, and fallback text (in case you don’t have any program scheduled).
Custom Directories / Custom Content Types
Users on our Premium Plan now have access to Custom Content Types. This is an expanded and configurable version of our existing directories (e.g. Events, Businesses & Artists).
You can use these to create your own directories, such as a segment directory or team member directory. We suggest using these sparingly. Please contact our support team for advice on the best ways to use this new feature.
Each Custom Content type can have custom fields, which will be displayed on the content page.
You can also create a Gravity Form to allow visitors to submit content directly to your custom content type (as a draft post, of course).
Fortnightly & Monthly Guides
MetaRadio now supports multi-week program guides. The quantity of weeks in your guide rotation is configured in WordPress Admin > MetaRadio > Settings. Your guide rotation can now be 1-4 weeks in length.
Once you have enabled multi-week guides and configured your new guide, your website will show the guide for the upcoming 7 days.
Table Block – Sortable Columns
If you have large data tables, you may want to allow visitors to sort these table by a specific column. You can now do so by enabling the ‘Allow Sorting by Column’ option in the Table block. Just make sure you have a ‘Header Section’ setup too.
You can see this new feature in action here:
| First Name | Last Name | Age |
|---|---|---|
| Angelique | Branch | 6 |
| Mckayla | Kim | 90 |
| Eva | Baxter | 11 |
| Shannon | Spencer | 42 |
| Samara | Gray | 18 |
| Clayton | Campos | 38 |
| Finn | Preston | 40 |
| Tristen | Hester | 55 |
| Willie | Downs | 29 |
Social Icons
We’ve expanded the range of social icons available. You can use these to link to a wide range of social network platforms. We have also added chat options include SMS, Phone Call, Whatsapp, and Facebook Messenger.
The full list of networks is now:
- X / Twitter
- YouTube
- TikTok
- Facebook Messenger
- SMS
- Phone
Donation Form Refinements
We have rolled out some minor layout and formatting improvements to the Donation Page. These changes should make the form easier to complete.
Coming Soon: Apple Pay & Google Wallet
You will soon be able to accept payments from Apple Pay and Google Wallet on your website via Stripe. We’re currently finalising testing and writing up setup instructions. If you’re interested in early access, please email us!
What’s coming up?
We have a lot of product improvements in the pipeline. New features will include automatic translations, AI content assistant tools, additional CRM & accounting system integrations, and more design options. We’ll be sending out surveys to active Radio Website users in the coming months, so please keep an eye out for that. Australian Community Radio Stations will receive their survey from CBAA, and all other users will receive their survey directly from Media Realm. This survey will help us prioritise new features and other improvements.