Not Just Another Pretty Face(book)

Mike has been blogging of late about Seth Godin’s new book and the associated social network, Triiibes.com. A little bit of browsing and you’ll notice that Seth’s “tribe” is used Ning to create this social network. That got me thinking…is this the next step in the evolution of social networking?

By “this”, I mean people and companies creating their own fully developed social networks. There are more ways than just Ning to do this. You can create a network using tools like vibEngine and PeopleAggregator. Or you can do it totally on your own using an OpenSource tool called AROUNDMe. After looking at each of these tools, it seems to me that Ning is both the most popular and the easiest - so I decided to experiment.

To create your social network on Ning you start with a network name and a web address. Then you’ll need to get set up with an ID (username and password). Once that’s done you can launch with just that. However, you’ll probably want to customize it further.

There are lots of options for customization. You start with a tag line, description, and keywords. Then you move on the social features. You can drag and drop social networking features right onto your page. These features include: photos, videos, forums, event calendars, text areas, music, activity lists, and member lists. You can also change the appearance of your site by selecting themes, changing colors, or uploading your own design using CSS.

Ning is free if you want to use the ning.com domain, don’t mind ads, and only need the limited storage and bandwidth. If you want to run your own ads, get rid of ads altogether, use your own domain name, or increase storage and bandwidth, you’ll need to invest some monthly coin for each. For everything they offer, it would only be $35/month.

That’s a quick and dirty description of how to start an online social network. It’s up to you to come up with a why. Could your business benefit from it’s own Facebook? Maybe you want a network for your employees. Maybe you can come up with something great for (potential or current) customers. Seth Godin seems to have created something unique with this tool, and I think you can too.

Dan
Don’t we all need another social network?