5 Pieces of Advice

[Douglas Atkin]

What are the top five pieces of advice you'd give to a new Network Creator...the five pieces you wish you'd had when you started out?
I'm a new creator, and I don't know what I should know...a common feeling I'm sure.

[joey brunner]

What a great post. I have had my social network up for a little over a year and it's going pretty good. It's funny, though, how many of these "rules" I break on my network! I think I'm starting to get it. Very helpful stuff-thank you.

Quick question-no one posted anything about newsletters or broadcasting messages. Is this a big "no, no?" Just curious if I missed the post or to see what others thought. I try to stay away from doing it too much as I think many of our members already get several message a day from our network from other members. What is the rule of thumb here?

[Angela Gunter]

Thank you for the great information! I had no idea about choosing either blogs, forums, or groups. Currently I have all 3 enabled but users are using the blogs to post pictures of their items for sale. That's not really what I had in mind for those. I haven't written any guidelines or rules yet.

My Ning network is intended to be a place for online sellers of all marketplaces to join together and share, discuss, and provide them with resources. My groups are the various marketplaces where my members sell. I also had some Forum topics set up with the same agenda. I didn't realize, at first, that the groups could have their own forums. I have temporarily disabled the forums until I figure out how I want to go about it.

Lots to think about!

[Tuxedo Ramen]

Go to Manage - Update Information. Completely fill in Network Name, Tagline, and Description. Keywords are no big deal, don't use more than 10.

The Network Name and Tagline will be cocatenated to form the html title tag for your site, and this is the most significant line for Google ranking.

For this site, it might be: "Ning Creators Network - Forums, Guidelines, Tips and News for Ning Network Creators and Editors".

Instead, the title tag for THIS SITE is: < title > Creators </ title >

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=ning+forum&a...

[Sharon Dial]

Since committing to setting up a Ning network, I have been trundling through Ning Creators discussions for information useful to someone very new and inexperienced. This has been extremely useful! My network is an educational network with a very specific potential membership so I am not interested in how best to bring in new members or how to increase visibility on search engines. However, the advice on set up, forums vs blogs vs groups, and simplicity of design are all very important. One bit of advice that struck me as essential was to understand the audience and then focus on what they need. Very thoughtful contributions!

[Sixfour]

Our site has been online for 4 months and is approaching the 250 member mark. We have followed these few rules...

1. Dont over moderate ! We let the members sort out the trolls(we have 6 I think)but we leave them there to 'spark' it up a bit. If members get out of hand(it has happened) we leave it up to the community to sort itself out.

2. Absolutely no porn ! We have set up a Code of Conduct and this is one of the main rules. We have had to deal with a few spammers a while ago who insisted in 'testing' the Moderation. They were readily shown the delete feature !

3. Keep it simple yet interesting. Like others have said, we have kept our site simple yet easy to read in 'visitor' mode whilst being attractive to the naked eye.

I hope I have shed some light on this subject. It takes up so much time just doing the basics of running the site as well as having full time employment so be prepared for some late and long nights !

[MultimediaMarcus]

I run multiple Ning sites...here is some of what I have learned...

1. Use those text boxes! It's a great way to add custom html code, pictures and links. FYI - before making changes to these, backup your code in case you screw something up. (there is no Undo)
2. Approve images and videos, especially if you plan on having a large site. The larger your site becomes, the more likely you are to encounter spam, people uploading porn, and becoming an annoyance.
3. Use those badges that Ning provides for you. It's a great way to increase membership when you add to Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and other social networking sites. Integrate all of the sites for your particular organization or company to link to each other.
4. Ning provides a tab for you to enter your Google Analytics link. That way you can monitor traffic that's coming to your site. Setup a Google analytics account - it's free, and see how many people are visiting your site!
5. Make your site - especially your home page look really good and clean. Don't put too many widgets on it, or it will slow the page down, but make it look really inviting and professional. Your website should have a "target" page...(the page you want everyone to go to)...make sure you have an inviting hyperlink to that page from every page on your site.

[Matt LaClear]

If I were just starting out I would focus very hard on getting your new and existing members to invite their friends to your network. An easy way to do that is to create a private group on your site and then upload a handful of giveaway products relate to the theme of your site. The products can be podcasts you recorded yourself, 2) eBooks, 3) Special reports, etc and etc.

Then when you have a new member join your site you can post a welcome message letting them know you appreciate them joining your site and then offer them access to the private group (and goodies!) if they invite at least ten of their friends to join your site.

Then once a day you log in to the "manage" section of your site and click the tab "invited" to check to see who actually sent out invites the day before. Then just right click on the person who sent the invitations so you can feature their account and then give them the link to the private group.

You'd be surprised how much traffic this generates.

To make this system work effectively you'll also really need to use all 5 of the RSS feeds Ning allows you to place on your site. Then fill it with great content and set them to display detailed accounts of 4 posts a piece.

When the new member hits the page and likes the content and the feel of the page and are certain you aren't a spammer they'll send the invites out.

[KEVIN Jackson]

well don't know about 5..however let me see...1.unless you are like i am,which means you have the ablity to monitor your site closely 24/7 don't be to restrictive...i was a member of this site and the funny thing the guy got his idea to start his site from visiting and becoming a member of mine. well on his network you could do nothing without his approval...which means to post a pic,you had to wait for his approval. and the same for anything on the site,that is annoying to have to wait hours or days in this case to have your content posted. i ask him to let up on the restrictions,he told me to go find another site,,,i replied i will and i have 2 ning networks of own. so folks let up that control thing....

[alice]

1. Be passionate
2. Get involved in the conversation
3. Give reasons for people to come back (new content)
4. Appreciate your members (esp your core ones)
5. Know your goals

[chase]

[seymor54]

5 Good points & 5 BAD points

APPROVE all membership, ensure you ask specific topic questions perhaps even use a PHONE call approval scheme - this KILLS SPAMMERS DEAD.

GROUPS - are the ONLY way to ensure members feel engaged with the site, as every comment all members in the group gain a response so they feel that they are engaged!

PHOTOS - this gives members something to try out, and its so immediate that they they learn quickly how to use other features.

FRONTPAGE GRAPHICS - make sure you create a brand identity, don't just use a Ning template try to add things to it, to make it your own and the only one like it.

ADD AS MUCH SELF GENERATING CONTENT to the frontpage, users come to the front page and theres nothing there, then they quickly go away, ensure you put up PHOTOS, FORUM and GROUP activities, as it focuses users on what has been going on the site.

5 BAD TH-NINGS

POOR tracking of membership activities

Lack of facilties to track more than the previous last 20 activities on a forum/group etc

FORUM - is clunky, very limited in its scope for development just a basic set of features, that means you have to spend a lot of time managing it.

NOTES and PAGES - dreadful unless you know HTML inside out with a good measure of java or something else to make it work. TEXT EDITORS - these leave a lot to be desired, especially as there isn't one for pages or notes.

SITE MANAGEMENT - there is NO site management possibilities - how many times have LOST a set of PAGES or NOTES, even whole GROUPS have been lost, all you need to do is rename a page, then all LINKS associated with that page also needs updating, but this isn't done automatically - YOU HAVE TO DO IT! so consequentually you end up with a lot of lost threads and dead end hyperlinks going to page cannot be found!

Hopefully this is 5 good n bad things that most content creators will respond to....

[seymor54]

Due to the structure of the FORUM - this posting has already been buried.

Clearly illustrates the main PROBLEM with the forum.

 

If its not a heated topic, then it disappears from view before anyone has even noticed - how many other GOOD ideas have been lost to the 14,440 PAGES of the forum!

Would appreciate CREATORS thoughts - so that NING can see it relevance and importance to creating enhancement to members engagement to our Ning sites.