Buddypress screengrab

>> What is BuddyPress? See Alick’s previous post.

Before starting to install BuddyPress you need to use WordPress MU. Once uploaded onto your server you will be guided through the installation. This includes the standard email and database details but you are also asked whether to use sub-domains or sub-directories for each user’s blogs, e.g. blog.example.com or example.com/blog.

On the first install I went for sub-domains, everything installed correctly. We could have multiple users and access each control panel but there was a problem trying to access everyone’s blogs. As I installed WordPress MU onto a shared server blog.example.com gave a ’shared ip’ error. You will only be able to use sub-domains on a dedicated server.

Once re-installing (you can just delete wp-config.php!) I chose sub-directories, wow! Huge breakdown. WordPress MU gave a redirect loop error, I couldn’t even access wp-login! After searching through a few forums I started to find this was a common error.

The solution:
Many forum users say to ‘clear your cookies’ which in a lot of cases seems to work. Other people suggest modifying the SECRET_SALT so WordPress generates a new code – SECRET_SALT is auto-generated by the install for wp-config.php.

But the one I found to work was by bradleyland.net. Basically just delete wp-config.php and do the setup again. From what I can tell this resolves both the solutions above so if you have tried one and it didn’t work, try the other too.

Installing BuddyPress
Once WordPress MU is up and running BuddyPress is fairly simple, I didn’t have any errors getting this to work first time. The read-me.txt file is useful but it doesn’t tell you every step, I would suggest following their online guide.

We get quite a few requests from prospective clients looking to build social networks. It often turns out that the plans are like a house of cards. Give them a prod while asking ‘What’s the business model / your budget / hook to get people to sign up?’ usually brings it all tumbling down. At the heart of a lot of these requests is the desire on the client’s part to either own a community or engage customers on their network. As such, ownership of the customer is key and that can potentially rule out using certain off the shelf social network content management systems (CMS) because there are always issues over who owns the user. So, to combat this, the route proposed is often to build it from scratch. This in itself is often impractical as what budget there is then goes into re-inventing wheels as we go about re-writing blogs/forums/groups/etc from scratch.

End result of all this is that everyone who’s come and asked us about building social networks has ended up re-thinking their ideas as a result of either a) not wanting to invest in building a plan up front or b) realising that the lack of robustness in their business plan means that the self build route will be a quick and effective way of losing a lot of money very quickly.

So, as a result of this, we’ve been quite excited by the idea of BuddyPress, and as such we’ve installed a version of it on our test server of which you’re free to sign up and have a play and see what you think. I don’t know how long we’ll keep this up for, so if this link here isn’t working, you’ll know we’ve taken it down.

So far, the biggest criticism of it is that it’s got no privacy settings and is without a lot of key social network features. But, it’s got a Facebook style wall (the wire) and Groups (which with no privacy, are really just a twist on profiles) and email based messaging. And, because it’s based on WordPress it’s got blog functionality which is something we know we can skin pretty easily.

I actually think the BuddyPress control panel is a bit confusing and we’re yet to dig into this enough to see how much we can change this. That I think will require more than skinning – it strikes me as there are some core IA issues that need to be resolved. But I guess for the WordPress team, this is work in progress and if BuddyPress is anywhere near as successful as WordPress it’ll surely be of great use to clients looking for a potential candidate for building social networks which are feature rich, give full ownership of the user and provide lots of opportunities for design customisation.

We’ve now deleted our test install of BuddyPress. If you want to learn more about what we can do for you with Social Media just get in touch.

Based in Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, contact miggle.co.uk for website development, content management and online media services in the UK and worldwide.

In the fight for credit crunch business, grabbing the attention of your target audience can be extremely difficult. To paraphrase Alick in his previous post – A website is just the beginning – you can’t just hope for online business to find you.

The solution? An integrated business blog and subscribable RSS feed, like our very own miggleblog. An inexpensive, simple tool, it can give you direct access to millions of prospective customers worldwide.

The benefits of a blog:

Reach more people, and make money
The likelihood is that only your existing customers will read a news section on your website. With a blog you can reach out and find new prospects. Google’s Feedburner is an invaluable tool that can help you publicise your RSS feed content and make it easier for people to subscribe. By participating in the FeedBurner Ad Network, you can make money from your pearls of wisdom.

Build customer relations
It’s far harder to get business from new customers than it is to get more business from your existing customers, so keeping in touch should be one of your top priorities. An interactive blog is a friendly and fun way to keep your existing customers up-to-date with all your new offers and products, so that your business will be at the forefront of their mind when they need your products or services again.

Better search engine rankings
The migglemedia team always recommend that a business blog be hosted on the main business website, as the more people that read your blog and link to posts on it, the higher your website will appear in the search engine rankings.

Bring in more traffic
Google search loves frequently updated websites, therefore a blog can bring in a surprising amount of new traffic to your website through natural search terms. Blog posts are rapidly indexed by the major search engines and can be extremely profitable.

Start a buzz
Blog about your new products, drop hints about forthcoming events, publicise your research – grab the attention of the press! Blogs are increasingly quoted and cited in the mainstream media, and as such are a great way to score free publicity for your company.

Become ‘the guru’
If your business occupies a niche sector of the market, why not share your knowledge via a blog and build a reputation as a go-to person?

Test your ideas
Thinking about a change of direction for the company or expanding into a new range of products? Blog about it and let your customers tell you exactly what they want from your business.

>> How to profit from social media

>> Drive user engagement with a newsletter

Based in the UK’s silicon city – Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, contact miggle.co.uk for website development, content management and online media services in the UK and worldwide.

An active community of users can be great for increasing engagement on your site and for your business as a whole. However, it’s no longer a case on the Internet of ‘build it and they will come’. The community elements of your site need a hook and they’ll need a certain level of effort to start them off and to keep them running.

Users will ‘pay’ to join your community using personal data as the currency. You need to give them something back of value that they can’t get elsewhere. Unmet needs on the web are hard to find these days!

Another point to consider: though you’re building community elements to benefit your business, the dialogue and the interaction is owned by the members. They may not behave as you hoped and they may take the conversation where you never dreamed they would. This can be as much opportunity as threat if you manage it correctly.

If you are going to build a community, what’s your hook?

The best community sites have hooks. Flickr has pictures, YouTube has video, LastFM has music, Yahoo! Answers has questions. Facebook, Bebo and Twitter are built around people – the various tools they supply being able to allow people to share interests. Blogs are built around certain subject matter, forums help people resolve problems.

Between them, all the sites above have millions of users. Those users have to manage many different profiles, as well as the usernames and passwords they use to manage email, online banking, telephony services, etc. If you build another network you are throwing something else into the mix – something else to remember and you’ll be competing for online time against bigger players. That doesn’t mean that you should not try and build the community tools your site needs – but if you think you’ll struggle to make those stand out in a crowd, think about how maybe you could become active within existing communities. Your existing and future customers are already active there after all – and there are great opportunities to use these sites as a pool from which you can fish users.

Which existing community sites could you focus on? Where are the most appealing audiences?

Think about your own use of social networks and communities. Of the sites you use, how are they making money – and how have they made money out of you? Do these communities offer direct revenue generating opportunities, or are the way they contribute to profits more subtle than that?

How will building a community add to your bottom line?

Let’s imaging for a moment that you could invite all the users of Bebo – a site popular with kids – or Facebook to your house or office. Think of what provisions you’d have to make. It’s the same online. Your community needs to be managed, maintained, listened to and catered for. If they don’t – back to the offline analogy – they will trash your house and leave and it’ll look in a pretty poor state for the next set of visitors.

How will you keep the community alive, engaged, entertained and legal?

If you read your news from bbc.co.uk, chances are you’ll go back everyday if you like the coverage. If you meet your life partner on match.com, you’ll never use the site again. Both sites have delivered, but only one retains its customers. The one that can’t needs to be able to continually drive awareness of itself, while always appearing fresh.

What will be our response when our community members don’t play ball and do the things on our site the marketing team promised they would?

The migglemedia team can help you address all the factors you need to take into account before venturing into the world of online communities and social media websites.

Based in the UK’s silicon city – Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, contact miggle.co.uk for website development, content management and online media services in the UK and worldwide.