After facebook was released in 2004, it rapidly grew to become a large success and it now has millions of members. Only google is ranked higher than facebook on the alexa list of top 500 websites. As a result of facebook’s good results and because so much of today’s online traffic is centered around social networks, many online marketers, corporations and private person’s would like to figure out how to setup a social networking site.
There are typically 3 different approaches you can use to start your own social networking site. The first and simplest option is signing up with a social network service which allows you to startup your social network by just editing your social network options. If you don’t possess a lot of technical knowledge, this might be your best option as no technological knowledge is needed to get your site online. You could find completely free solutions to use, but I recommend using your own domain name, so the starting price tag is about 20$ a month and upwards, depending on the functions you need.
The second option you can use is purchasing or finding an open source script you can download and install on your own hosting server. The most used open source social networking script is elgg, that you can download absolutely free. A paid social network application costs you approximately 100-400$ depending on which functionality you want and what kind of software license that you need. Installing your social internet site with a script requires some technological knowledge. The advantages are that you are in complete control of your own data and the software is in most cases not encrypted and it is can be extended.
I can’t discuss in details how to install a social network site using a script within this short article, but listed here are the general guidelines:
1. Purchase and download the script to your PC
2. Extract the contents of the .zip file
3. Sign up for hosting which has the specifications your script requires
4. Create a new database
5. Upload your script to your hosting account with a FTP (file transfer protocol) program
6. Open the script’s set up wizard with your web browser and follow the guidelines
7. Change the options of the script to your liking
8. Change the design of your social network or find a template you like
The final option you can choose is buying a tailor made developed system. This will obviously be much more expensive than buying or implementing an open source out of the box solution. The benefit with choosing a tailor made script is that your site will be different from any other social network and you will get precisely what you would like. Most social networking scripts are unencrypted and extensible, so extending a script that has been created and tested adequately before hand, will save you lots of time and money building the essential functions that virtually all social networks have.
All of the three choices mentioned that can be used to develop an online community has some disadvantages and benefits. A few points to consider when planning how to put together a social network is price, your technical abilities and knowledge, whether you are in control of your data as well as what functionality you want. I would not ever suggest using a service that don’t enable you to use your own domain or where you are not in complete control of your data, as you may be at risk of losing your website if your supplier goes bankrupt.
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