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Social networking has become a critical part of our daily lives. They serve to entertain us, facilitate new friendships, match us with business partners, and so much more. There’s one more benefit for the social network owners: revenue. If you are interested in establishing a private social network for your news website, keep reading and we’ll explain. Social networking allows for life blogging, which is a digital representation of the author’s daily life.
Types of Social Networking
The social media industry holds a lot of promise. The problem is, you must understand what exactly you are going to create. There are a few different types of social networking, such as:
Social network Sites
This is the most common form of networking service. It is meant for communicating and establishing connections with others they may or may not know in real life.
Entertainment Sites
This site unites users based on their hobbies. People enjoy these platforms because it allows them to connect with people who like the same things they do.
Educational Sites
These platforms unite users based on the learning process. This is a service where students and instructors can interact online, find research opportunities, and utilize other features of social networks.
Scientific/Academic Sites
Students and instructors are not the only ones that need to communicate. Scientists and academics also need a special resource where they can share their knowledge and experience.
Corporate Sites
This type of site can be a tool for improving sales of your goods/services. In addition, it is a way to connect with your customers as well as colleagues and create brand loyalty.
Professional Sites
With this type of platform, professionals are conveniently connected with other professionals within their industry. They are also given the opportunity to connect with those who may be interested in that industry. It allows them to discuss issues related to their business, arrange interviews, and even offer or look for a job.
Dating Sites
These are becoming more popular. The primary goal of these is to connect soulmates together.
Informational Sites
These platforms are established to find answers to your questions- and share answers when you have them.
Media Sharing Sites
On this type of platform, users exchange audio, video, images, and more with each other and then have interactions based on those postings.
How to Establish Your Social Network
As you can see, there are lots of options when it comes to social networks. However, the category would most likely fall under the “Informational” category on a news website. So now, let’s take a look at the steps to create a private social network for your website.
Determine your idea/concept
The very first step is to come up with your idea and consider your concept. Here are a few questions to ask yourself:
- How would you attract users?
- What type of social network do you want to create?
- What is the name of your website?
Keep in mind, there’s much more to it than starting a social network. You need to make sure that your website provides a strong impression to your users.
Do Your Research
Once you have come up with your idea, it’s time to do some research. This means that you need to do the following:
- General market research: get a picture of the current market
- Competitive analysis: figure out who your competitors are and what they have to offer. Then, think about how you can do better.
- Picture of the audience: finally, figure out who your target audience is and what it is that he/she would want from a social network on a news website.
Determine Your Target Audience
Once you’ve done your analysis, you can use the data to start the next step in web development, determining your target audience. In the step above, you should have gotten the information you need, it just needs to be sorted out based on the following:
- Age
- Type of work they do
- Preferences/tastes
- Hobbies
- Numerical strength
This will help to determine your functionality as well as choose the best marketing strategy.
Figure Out Your Requirements
At this point, you’ll need to make a list of your requirements. This means that you need to consider the following:
- Site design
- Potential for functionality of components
- Ability to search/store audience data
- Principles of using the service and what happens when users do not comply with rules
Develop Your Network
At this point in the process, you have two choices:
- You can choose a template solution that helps you build your site, but it won’t be unique. Still, it’s easier to implement and works better for those on a budget.
- You can create your social network from scratch, which will allow you to create a resource that fulfills your needs. This would be the best option in the long run, but should only be used if the budget allows.
Start Planning/Designing
You may need some assistance with this part, as there is a lot of detail that needs to be paid attention to. Here is what you need to do in this stage:
- Understand the structure of your site and where the information is going to be placed.
- Get an itemized drawing (digital or paper) of your site to better handle what is going where.
- Draw up the technical details and discuss deadlines. Make sure that you are carefully documenting each step so that you can avoid any disputes with your development team.
- Your approved prototype will now be a full-fledged design concept. It will show you want you can expect when your site is launched.
Develop Your Social Network
For site development, there are 2 substeps:
- Creation of the client area of site
- Development of scripting for the server
Once again, you might need to hire a professional team for this part of the process since they have the experience to write code to ensure your idea is implemented accurately.
Stabilize Your Project
At this point, the project is ready, it just needs to be stabilized. That is, you must ensure that there are no bugs in the code and that it runs properly and smoothly. This is also known as testing. During this process, you will test the project and make notes of any necessary improvements.
Then, if you wish, you can offer beta testing, which is a preliminary version of your network to see if it meets the expectation of your users. Once those results are back, you can finalize the project and set it for release if it’s good to go.
Commission Your Network
Now, your network can be put into operation. At this point, you will do the following:
- Configure hosting platform
- Load/configure project
- Configure analytics tools
- Perform final testing
Conclusion
Social networking sites have become an integral part of our daily lives, whether we want to admit it or not. They are wonderful to have because they offer users the opportunity to connect with others. It has a bonus as well for the owners: it can help increase your overall revenue. This isn’t a simple process, but it’s well worth the effort.
