Overview of Q3 and Ning Q4 2017 plan.

[Kyryl_Ning_Support]

Better late than never - here is the product plan Q3 overview and Plans for Q4.
As you might have noticed, all the promised features have been released. We did our best to keep the deadlines and fit your expectations.
So here are Q3 updates:

1. Paid Access is finally live. It is even more than just old Paid Access, it is a great e-commerce platform with Stripe and PayPal integration. For now it is only available for beta-group, so if you forgot to ask for beta access, don’t miss your chance till Nov 3d.
2. Audio feature is live. Now you can easily create playlists, audio lessons, add audio tracks, podcasts, and any mp3 files. The feature has got a completely new design, which we think looks awesome.
3. Polls. Completely new feature for Ning, only available for Ning 3.0. Using Polls all Ning NCs can easily get up to date feedback from Network members.
4. The Design Studio got a few new templates, a bunch of new fonts and backgrounds to make it more user-friendly and provide flexibility of options you have in order to make your network modern and unique even without coding skills.
5. SSL certification had been implemented for all ning domain names.

Keeping in mind that we are living in the era of mobile devices all new features have been developed in a way so they would look great on mobile devices.

You could not miss how the Creators network changed, which is completely Kyryl’s merit, as is the new guide for Facebook integration.

And now as for the next steps, we are going to make:

1. Member ranking system
2. E-commerce platform wider development (donations, network membership, groups)
3. MailChimp Integration
4. SSL for custom domains, completely automated process.
5. Push notifications

Besides, there are lots of other improvements on the way, more related to back end, like the rework of the activity feed architecture and migration script (these are just the biggest ones so we simply can't help but highlight them).

As always we are happy to receive feedback from you, so feel free to drop us a line.

Sincerely yours,
Ning Team.

[Brandyn Shepherd]

I would like to suggest a notifications feature. One that let's users know when somebody has made a comment on a post or uploads... next to the private messages notification icon. Can this be done? This would help increase participation and cut down search time for members.

Thanks

[Kyryl_Ning_Support]

Hi there!

Please correct me if I'm wrong (I just want to make sure that we are on the same page before I post any suggestions). So you wish to see some sort of the counter and let's call that button "alerts", and when the user clicks, it's opening the comments which were made under the content posted by this user?

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Best regards,

Ning Team.

P.S. If we are on the same page, your suggestion looks cool :-)

[Ceddy J]

I think it is fair to say you all can pat yourself on the back. 4/5 up to this point are accomplished. At the rate you all are going, #5 just might get done as well.

[Ceddy J]

By the way, I have gotten a lot of great feedback on the portfolio theme. I added my own pizazz as well to it.

[Kyryl_Ning_Support]

Hi there!

Glad to know that new theme has been liked by members of your network :-)

Regarding the release of Push notifications, well I hope our tech team would be able to accomplish this task until the end of this sprint. As we are using Scrum methodology to organize our work process, each sprint has a determined length presented in working days, and technically the end of the year for us is the 3-rd of January.

So I hope that the Christmas euphoria hasn't influenced them much and we will be able to finish everything that was planned :-).

Best wishes,

Ning Team.

[Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa]

Why did you remove text colouring feature? I used to highlight some of my  important points using colour. Now this feature has been removed. Very disappointed!

[Kyryl_Ning_Support]

Hi there!

Actually, the whole text editor itself in visual mode has been replaced with another one, so it's not the removal of the functionality.

The new text editor on 2.0 is optimized for the mobile devices and that's why basically the old one has been replaced by this one. Each day more and more people are using phones and tablets to surf the internet on regular basis, so the replacement of the old text editor seems to be a reasonable move for us. 

The suggestion to add the ability to change the font colors has been already added to the task system and sent to the management for the approval, I do apologize for any inconveniences caused by this changes.

Best wishes,

Ning Team.

P.S. This reply is related to Ning 2.0 networks only

[Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa]

Thanks for the reply

[Ceddy J]

1. Member ranking system
2. E-commerce platform wider development (donations, network membership, groups)
3. MailChimp Integration
4. SSL for custom domains, completely automated process.
5. Push notifications

Have been giving a whirl to the 3 bolded ones and I have a huge feeling ranking will be here in time for Santa. ;)

[Jennifer Peterson]

I still am waiting to have my custom domain receive the ssl certificate...is something I can do myself? I see you have on #4 that custom domains is a completely automated process now...can you please let me know if I can do it myself? That would be awesome!