Introducing New Sign-up Options

[Phil McCluskey]

Our Product Roadmap this year is rolling along smoothly. Today, we're happy to be releasing another project that we think will be very useful: a whole bunch of new sign-up and sign-in options. Let's get right to it.

Let Members Join with LinkedIn and Windows Live

We've heard a lot of requests from Network Creators who want additional sign-up/sign-in options. You'll be happy to hear that Social Sign In now includes both LinkedIn and Windows Live, which will be great news for business-focused networks and many international networks (e.g., Windows Live is huge in Brazil). The set-up for these will be very similar to Facebook and Twitter options; as the Network Creator, you'll need to create an app for this purpose by entering your own LinkedIn or WindowsLive credentials.

Ready to create yours? Here are the Help Center articles for LinkedIn and for Windows Live.

Sign-up redirection

Want to send new members somewhere besides the Main Page — where they currently land after signing up? This is another request we've heard over time — to be able to redirect members to their own profile page or to a very specific page that a Network Creator has created to serve as a welcome landing page. Now, Ning Plus and Pro Network Creators have the option to send new members to either the Main Page, their own profile page (MyPage), or a custom URL.

This custom URL can be an external URL if you need to integrate your network with another web property. For example, Pro networks may want to send new members to an external web application that makes use of the Ning API to retrieve that new member's information and register them before sending them back to the network.

We hope this will give you a few added options for customization of your new-member experience. Check out this Help Center article about these new redirection options for all the details.

Mix, match or remove sign-up / sign-in

You will now see that your options for sign up and sign in are split, and that "native" network sign in and sign up are included as options. This will allow you to turn off specific services for new members while allowing existing members to continue to sign in to the network, or to do things like limit all new members to Facebook or LinkedIn if it better matches your network's theme and aims, or if you'd like your members to be a little less anonymous than they otherwise could be.

There's an additional option here, one that won't appeal to most Network Creators but that can be powerful for sites that are, for example, less about socializing and more about publishing. That option is to completely remove all sign-ups. If you make this choice, all invite options will be removed and no new members will be able to sign up. This might be an attractive choice if your network is focused on publishing, for example, and not social networking.

Want the full skinny on this new sign-up/sign-in split? Read all about it in this Help Center article.

[SweetPotato]

Nice, Phil. Cheers

[NingStar]

This is great news well done Ning team.

[Patrick Chappelle]

I set it up as soon as this notice went out. Let me tell you something Phil, that sign-up redirection is freaking awesome!

Thanks Phil/Ning!

[solo]

awseome

[Sylvia Hysen]

Thanks for the upgrades. Nice options!

[Ron]

nice update Phil.

[PeruCool]

could explain this please: 

Checking this box forces members who sign up in the middle of an action (e.g., Liking an item) to visit the selected url instead of being sent back to the content they were acting on.

[Eric Suesz]

Hey, PeruCool. So, normally, when you sign up as a new member to, for example, reply to a discussion you found by accident just browsing the Internet, you are taken back to the discussion so you can immediately reply. We put you back into the "flow" you were in. You can change this so that they aren't taken back to the discussion if you want everyone to always go to x page all the time after they sign up. We don't recommend doing this because a new member might be frustrated that they have lost their place in the process of signing up specifically so they can respond, but some people may want this option so we've included it. Very few NCs will probably choose this option, but we wanted to include it for those who do. 

[classic]

That good
I'm having a problem with Windows Live
This link http://e3f23dad-923b-4878-8298-9dae5d23f866.apps.dev.live.com/

[Eric Suesz]

Sorry, classic. I don't think I can see that page. Is it trouble setting up the app or signing in after you've set it up? Can you give it another go and maybe shoot us a message from your Support link if you continue to have a problem?

[classic]

I do I create the application is true
But when I try to register via Windows Live shows mis-linkage

[Abel I. Arenivar]

Gracias, Muy buena esta mejora, ya lo agregue a mi red.