What is Ning.com?

Before I get started with the how to tips and tricks; let me begin by explaining what ning.com is all about. As I previously mentioned, Ning is an online service designed to help you create, customize, and share a social network. Essentially, by using ning you can create a social media site similar to a site like Myspace.com. What’s great about Ning is that your space is completely customizable and free to create. Anyone online, web savvy or not, can easily create their own social site on Ning. It’s worth pointing out that even though they are easy to create, setting up a network isn’t really for everyone. If you don’t have the time to maintain your own community, it might be best for you simply join the networks of other on ning. Above and beyond creating networks, Ning is also a great place to find and join communities of interest to you.
As I mentioned in my eBook, Turn Your Niche into a Network, as a ning network creator you have the ability to build a space on which:

• Users can create and customize their own page (featuring a blog, photos, videos, widgets, and more)

• Users can start their own groups

• Users can start discussions in a forum created and customized by you.

• Users can add music to their pages

• You can create custom pages like an events page

• You can define what questions if any that all users are required to answer on their member profile page

• You can send out broadcast messages to all the members of your network

• You can import your Flickr photos

• Users can easily add your network widgets to social sites like Facebook and MySpace

• Users can easily share and comment on each others photos or videos. Easily adding video from popular websites link youtube.com.

• Your network can be public to the entire member community, or you can create an exclusive group on which you approve all members.

• Your communities overall look and feel is a reflection of your personality, which is what makes Ning such a diverse and wonderful resource for Network Creators.

• You can add RSS Feeds to your site

• You can control the Ads on your site, which is one of several Premium Ning Services available for only $19.95/month. I personally consider this to be a small price to pay when you consider the fact that most free social media networks neither give you a portion of the revenue acquired from hosting ads on your personal page. Nor do they allow you to generate revenue from the popular pages you create on their networks.

• Other premium services include adding your own domain name or adding more storage and bandwidth to your network.

• These are some of the core features on Ning, but there are several others, with new features being added regularly.

This post is a part of my blog series / eBook ‘Create Your Own Ningalicious Network‘. You can read most of the Chapters of this eGuide on the SistaSense blog. To get the complete guide, with tips not featured on the blog, download your own copy here.