Ning Networks 101: Your Guide to Creating a Thriving Online Social Network

Ning Networks are social networking communities that are user created around a central hobby, interest, lifestyle, etc. They aren’t meant to replace Facebook, rather, they are like Facebook and Linkedin on steroids, a world you create to your specifications and to which you invite like-minded visitors. In fact, it’s best to keep a “Facebook” attitude in mind when creating your network. In this post I’ll show you how to set up and maintain a thriving Ning network.

The Ning Network Setup: Getting Started

• Domain Name: The best domain name for your network is keyword1forum.com or keyword1keyword2forum.com. Remember to also buy keyword1form.com and have it automatically redirected to your domain name since this is a common misspelling. You must choose the option to use your own domain name or you lose all of your SEO efforts.
• Ning Theme: When you start out your Ning site, pick a theme from the options Ning gives you and don’t waste too much time customizing it. Pick something simple, that will not turn away visitors.
• Colors: Feel free to change the colors of the site to match the branding of the site, but you must stick to these principles: Keep the background color white and the text color black in text heavy sections of the site (message board, forum, blog postings). Keep background colors light. For the tabs, make sure you have a good hover color so users know what they are scrolling over.
• Tabs: This is one of the most important areas of setup. Limit the main level tabs to eleven or less. Make efficient use of the sub tabs. Your most important tabs should be located on the far left of the top bar since that’s where readers’ eyes naturally start first. Under the home tab, place the two sub tabs titled ‘Subscribe in a Reader’, and ‘Sign up for Daily Email’. It’s important for members to keep connected with the site.
• Keep the site open to the public. There’s no faster way to stunt growth than to have a closed network.
• Make the sign up process as easy as possible. Do not require a picture and do not require new members to answer 50 questions.
• Nobody likes going to an empty party. Ask at least ten friends to join your network in the beginning. Create a few fake profiles and get the activity going. But, as soon as you reach 60-70 members delete all the fake profile accounts.
• Limit your site to the forum function at first. Do not try to manage forums, blogs, and groups in the beginning of your site. This will confuse visitors and spread user generated content too thinly around your site.
• Find relevant videos on YouTube and place them on your site. Make sure the titles of the video are optimized for search engines. This is a great way to bring in long tail traffic with little effort.

Making Your Ning Network Go Viral

• The best way to spread your network is through efficient use of the Invite Tab within Ning. This tab allows users to invite their contacts through Gmail, Hotmail, and Outlook. This tab should be displayed prominently. You will see the best conversion rates on visitors invited by members of the forum. People hate receiving spam, so when members use the invite tab to invite friends and family, they will most likely only invite those they know would have an interest in the site.
• You must incentivize users to use the ‘Invite’ tab. Throw a contest. Your first contest should be for a prize between $20 and $30. Make sure you get a photo of the person who won the contest to display the next time you run another contest as proof that you actually give out a prize. Once members see that there is cash to be made by inviting friends they will participate.
• Your second contest should include three prizes. This will encourage the fence sitters who think they have nothing to win. Once this contest is over, post how many invites each winner sent so that your community knows what it takes to win.
• Enable both the ‘Share’ and ‘Twitter’ tabs on your Ning site. You must give people an easy way to spread the content around your network.
• Link Building: find sites of similar interests and contact them about your new social network. Ask them to mention your network on their next email campaign and to give you a link from their site. And let them know you will post their link on your site.
• If you have an existing email lists, mention the network on your lists. Better yet, find other email lists that will mention your site. Email lists are one of the best ways to grow your site. The key here is to find a list that is relevant to your topic.
• Google AdWords is another strategy to implement. You can have ads show up whenever someone Googles keywords related to your Ning site.

The Care and Feeding of Ning Community Members

• Initially you want to welcome each member with a comment on their profile. You can easily make a template to use over and over again. Make sure to add a personal note to the comment. You should include links to change their profile, invite new friends, new member guide, and other useful pages on your site.
• If members post in the wrong place in the forum send them a private message showing them the correct place to post things.
• Feature members who have a profile photo.

Social Media Integration and Ning

• Include Facebook and Twitter buttons on the sidebars so that members can interact with your network on those sites.
• Creation of a Facebook fan page is a must for your network. This will help spread the word about your network faster than any other social media tool. This enables you to exponentially increase the exposure of your Ning network to potential visitors who otherwise might never find you on Ning, or even know about Ning networks. It’s free and easy advertising.

Broadcast Message Basics for Ning

• The broadcast message serves two functions: Update members about your site, and bring them back to your site.
• Send no more than 2 broadcast messages a month.
• The top section of your broadcast message should highlight the most popular discussion in your forum.
• Feature an interesting blog post.
• Make the message short and to the point.
• Include pictures if possible (show a photo of the latest contest winner)
• At the end of each message always remind members to add a profile photo and to invite other members so the site.

Home Page Layout on Ning

• Home page layout can make or break your Ning site.
• Create a home page layout that is very simple and easy to understand.
• Have a sidebar on the left, main content in the middle and a sidebar on the right.
• Left Sidebar Setup
• Show 3 rows of members in the top left most sidebars. This is one of the first places people will look when they come to your Ning site. Make sure the profiles featured here have good pictures.
• Below members, have the latest activity showing the last 12 items. Select the following items under display preferences: new items, new comments on items, status updates, Ning apps activity. Select profile photos under “Profile Photo Latest Activity Displays”
• Place a medium sized badge underneath the latest activity feed. This will allow those with blogs to showcase their membership.
• Main Content Setup
• Have a short text box welcome message with a link to your new member’s guide.
• Underneath this box place the forum. The forum should be visible “above the fold”. On the main page edit the forum to display “Discussions”, “Titles Only”, “Newest Discussions”, “10 Items”. Under the Manage tab be sure to select “Latest Discussions by Category” under the “Main Forum Page Style” This setup is key to encouraging members to participate in the forum.
• Place blog posts underneath the forum. On the main page select “Detailed View” “Featured” “4 posts”. Your blog posts will be filtered more than your forum, this is why you want the detailed view. Give your visitors a paragraph or two of what the blog posts is about. That way they’re more likely to click on it.
• Right Sidebar Setup
• Place a text box titled “Subscribe” and put links to the invite friends feature, Facebook fan page, RSS subscription, and email subscription
• Place 3 featured videos below this box. This gives the site some nice graphics on the side and encourages visitors to stay and watch some videos.
• Place an RSS feed with news items from your industry or hobby.

How to Set Up the Ning Forum

• A good forum layout is key to engaging your visitors and members.
• In the beginning of your site, you should have no more than four categories
• Under discussion style select “Flat: replies are shown in Chronological order”
• The most popular categories should be placed at the top of the forum page.

Blogging Setup

• Blogging should be reserved for premium content.
• Under feature controls, select “Approve blog posts before they appear”
• Only use the blog to display content that is well written and approved by you. The forum is the playground of the novice. The blog is for the expert.

Tabs Best Practices for Ning

• Tab setup is key for a successful Ning site.
• Limit the amount of tabs to 11 or less, and limit the amount of sub tabs on a single main tab to 6 or less.
• The most important tabs are on the far left, these are the tabs that visitors will see first.
• Under the home tab, add the following sub tabs: ‘Subscribe in a Reader,’ ‘Sign up for Daily Email’
• My Page: Inbox, Edit Profile Settings, Change Profile Picture
• Forum: List all forum categories then popular contributors, add a discussion
• Videos: Top Rates, Most Popular, Add a Video (this should link to the add a video from Youtube page)
• Members: Members near me, search for members, member map
• About Us: New Member Guide, Privacy Policy, Facebook Fan Page
• Blog: Names of Featured Bloggers, Submit a Blog Post

Insider Tips

• Sending the broadcast message at least twice a month (and no more) is imperative to encourage participation in the community.
• Keep the entire site open. This will increase visits from search engines.

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