The popularity of social network websites among Internet users all around the globe is tremendous. With the increasing globalization globally, social network websites provide the easiest and effective means of communicating and getting connected. Moreover, the scope of networking is also increasing day by day, and it is expected that it will be the most demanded skill in the future. Therefore, more and more people are now interested in getting their hands on social network websites to prepare for the future. According to studies, the majority of the world’s population uses at least five social networking websites. The most popular among them being Facebook, with 2.375 billion users around the globe.
Before heading towards building a social network website, it is essential to know about the types of social networking sites to have a clear idea of what you actually need to do. The main types of such sites are mentioned below.
Informational sites:
Every internet user must have come across informational sites at least once. These are the websites that provide information to users by answering questions that they usually search on the web. These sites usually appear to be in a review site or forum such as Quora or Reddit.
Media sharing websites:
One of the most popular types of social network websites is media sharing websites. As the name refers to, these sites focus on exchanging and displaying multimedia content. Users use these websites to share media such as videos, audio, photos, etc. The most popular examples of such websites are YouTube, Flickr and Instagram.
Social networks:
These sites allow users to establish and grow personal connections with people worldwide by communicating with them directly. They allow individual communication as well as group formation to enhance user experience. These are the most common among Internet users, and the examples include Twitter and Facebook, among others.
Educational websites:
These are the websites or online platforms designed with the purpose of helping students communicate with each other for matters regarding education. They can ask questions, answer other’s questions, seek help in research, get connected with teachers and experts and much more. These websites are different from sites such as assignment writing service, as they enable two-way communication.
Professional sites:
Business or professional websites are those that are established to facilitate business communication, the establishment of connections and the creation of brand name and image. Here, people can communicate with business persons and professionals to exchange information, seek guidance, and even find jobs. The most popular professional sites include Glassdoor and LinkedIn.
Besides these, there are academic websites, hobby networks, and other platforms. Before actually building a website, you must decide on the type of website you want to build, and for that, you must go through proper research for the best decision.
Steps to build a social network website:
Here is a step-by-step guide to building a social network website from scratch.
Generate an idea:
Like everything in the world, building a website also begins with having a unique idea that is later converted into a concept and finally into a website. To have a well-thought practical idea, you may test it by answering the following questions.
- What is the feature that would differentiate your network from your competitors and compel customers to choose you?
- What is the main concept behind your website? What type of website are you going to build, and what purpose will it serve?
- What would be the name of your website? The name of your website must be catchy and easily memorable, representing the concept of the website.
All these questions are essential to consider as you need to create a website that would have a strong impact on users.
Target Audience:
After generating an idea and researching thoroughly about it, the next step is to plan your targeted audience. You must know and determine who you are targeting specifically interested in your social network website. The basic information you must have about your audience includes age, financial status, location, hobbies, etc. Along with that, your planning should include the numeric figure of your targeted audience. This is crucial to ensure that you would get a good return on your investment. After collecting the necessary information, you need to test your idea on a sample of people. You may select people through online means or contact them in real life. This will help you improve your idea and choose the best marketing strategy.
Prepare strategy:
At this stage, you would have enough information available to you to design your website’s strategy. You must decide on what you would be offering to your audience and how. You must know what features your users will be expecting from your website. At first, you can start with a sample model and then it would be easy to expand it later by adding features. If you have enough resources, you may start off with a more sophisticated website offering multiple features. Starting off smaller would be less risky and, therefore, more beneficial for beginners. However, the final decision is always yours, and you can go according to your desire.
Hiring web development services:
In case you are yourself a developer, you do not need to follow this step. However, what usually happens is that you need to hire professional web development services to build your website. This is a crucial decision as the choice of the right vendor has an impact on the development and performance of your website. Choose a vendor who is adequately able to provide your desired features and is reliable and trustworthy.
Development, marketing and promotion:
After choosing the right vendor comes the final step that is website development. This may take a few months to be done properly, or it is also possible to get done in a shorter period. You must test your website after development and resolve any issues that arise during testing. Finally, carry out your marketing plan practically because, without marketing and promotion, you would have to struggle a lot to get users as people would have no idea of your offering.
The process does not end here as you continuously need to perform maintenance activities to keep improving the functionality of your website and enhancing the user experience.