Until the advent of social networking sites, it was never easy to build your own network of friends. Through these sites, friends, relatives or even strangers can exchange ideas because its net based. Creating a Social Networking Site of your own is much simpler than you think regardless of its expense. Even if it’s a small enterprise it is pretty easy to establish ones own identity and create brand awareness. It also provides different features like profiles, photo and video sharing, podcasts, groups, discussion forums and many more options are available. But it is sad to know that it takes time to learn what’s available. So the solution you are looking for is a DIY (Do It Yourself) solution. Social networking sites have two important components:
Social networking Software: This software includes templates and scripts.
Features: This will let you communicate with a person by means of chatting, seeing and hearing.
Following are some tips for creating your own social networking site:
Research – Initially you should be aware of what is that you can do. Either you can host on another company’s server or you can self host, but you might have limitations if you host on another company’s server. Also you should have some technical knowledge while hosting on your own servers. By performing search, examine what’s possible. Just type “create your own social network” into your browser.
Analyze free solutions cost – Depending on how much you pay, you get assistance for creating a social networking site. You might have to make some compromises while creating a social networking site on a small resource. For example:
There might be company ads on your site
You might not have a domain name and this might effect your organic search engine traffic
You might have limited branding options
There might be limitations on what you can put on your site
However you should not forget if you go in for “Free”, you might have lot of limitations and won’t have all the features, so it might be less attractive.
Estimate you technical skill level – Technical skill is an important aspect so you should not discard it, even though you don’t need them in the beginning. As your site expands you will require them and you might realize that you have no time to spend on technical tinkering. You can hire technical experts to relieve you from this headache. You can also use any of the social networking software available on the net, either for free or paid.
Have Clear cut idea about the business model you want to pursue – Different business models need different means – and different equipments. You should spend time on assessing your strategic goals, options and your skills before  deciding upon  a social networking script. Also, give a glance on what others have done, while researching your software options. Do communicate with them and find out how their experience was. Try including the latest updates and the best features for your site and so this will attract the users. Likewise you can increase the rate of visitors in your site.