Learn to create a social networking site using WordPress without programming experience

When talking about social media sites, famous companies in the field of social media, such as Facebook, Twitter, and others, will immediately come to mind. However, it is not necessary to build a social media platform of this size. You may need to create a social networking site that you use in order to provide a social networking platform among your company employees, for example, or even at the level of friends and family, so that it is separate, independent, and not linked to Facebook or other communication platforms.

In this article, you will learn how to create a social networking site, publish updates among members, interact and internal chat, and many of the options that you can provide within the social networking platform, which, as we mentioned, will be independent of itself from the rest of the other social networking platforms, which gives it complete privacy and gives you the freedom to dispose of it and manage it in the way you want. Benefits of creating an independent social networking site When you want to create a social networking site that is completely independent of any social media platform around the world, you will get many benefits, including: The site will be a social media platform that can be fully managed and controlled away from the policies of social media companies. The site is useful in creating a communication platform between company employees or a group of individuals, safely and without harassment from anyone outside the group.

When creating your own social networking site, you can limit yourself to adding specific members and deregistering any new members. Members can chat among themselves without fear of their data or information being leaked within the chat, and this certainly depends on the degree of security of the site. Social media groups can be created within the site to divide members within the site into different groups according to their interests.

Members can create personal profiles to display their data within their account within the site. Freedom to publish within the site, as there are no policies that prevent you from publishing any type of content as long as you adhere to the ownership rights in the published content.

Steps to create a social networking site with WordPress Steps to create

An independent social networking site in WordPress is not a complicated matter, and you can do it if you possess some simple technical skills and have a background in dealing with WordPress as a content management system specialized in designing and launching websites over the Internet. Here are the four basic steps for launching a social networking site with WordPress: 1- Reserve hosting and purchase a domain. The first step is the basic one in the process of launching the site, as you purchase and prepare the site hosting, which is the online space in which the site’s data and files are stored. Whatever type of hosting you purchase from any of the well-known hosting companies, always try to choose a hosting that has sufficient space and provides the required security options. There is a company that provides specialized WordPress hosting for WordPress sites, as it provides a free WordPress installation tool and many tools to help in setting up and preparing the site.

You must also purchase the domain, which is the introductory link that is used to access the content of the website, and it is in the format www.wpar.net. What is a domain? How does the domain management system work? Explanation for beginners: Try to choose a domain name that is short and easy to recognize. After purchasing the domain, make sure to link the domain to the hosting to prepare the site for the step of uploading WordPress to it.

2- Installing WordPress After preparing the hosting and domain and ensuring that they are connected properly, the next step comes, which is the first practical step in launching the site, where WordPress is installed on the hosting that was prepared before. WordPress is used as a content management system specialized in launching websites in various specializations and fields, as it provides many website management tools with high professionalism. 3- Installing the template After installing WordPress on the hosting, in the next step we install the template. The template is a complete framework for the site that facilitates the design and development phase for us. Once the template is installed on WordPress, the site appears in a consistent and organized manner, and the appearance of the site in this case depends on the type of template installed on it.

Here is a list of various WordPress templates that you can choose from that suit the overall look and feel of the site you want to launch. During our explanation in this article, we will install the Avada template for its ease of use and good appearance, which is appropriate for the specialty of the site that we are creating. Using the Buddypress plugin WordPress relies on plugins that add new functionality or expand existing functionality on your site, and they are used like ready-made programs that perform many actions on your behalf, allowing you to create almost any type of website.

We will use the famous Buddypress plugin, which specializes in installing a social networking system within our WordPress site. This add-on helps us launch an integrated social networking site as it provides us with many tools such as (creating member accounts, activating private chat between site members, creating a feed or publications page, as well as creating public or private groups, and many other options that you can implement within your social networking site) Installing the Buddypress add-on and configuring its settings The first practical step to launching a social media site is installing the Buddypress add-on, and you can see an explanation of installing WordPress add-ons to do this easily. After successfully installing and activating the add-on, you can go to the Settings tab within the control panel, then the Buddypress tab, to open the general settings page for the add-on, in which you will find many options as shown in the following image: You will find that there are many options that you can choose or deselect according to your desire to customize the way the site works, and the benefits of these options can be summarized as follows: Expanded profiles: When you select this option, members will be allowed to create personal files such as the Facebook profile page that contains the picture and personal data.

Account Settings: When this option is activated, members will be able to control their account and make all modifications to it, and they will also be able to delete the account. Friend connections: When this option is activated, members will be able to send contact requests or friend requests to other members. Private messaging: When activated, members within the site will be given the opportunity to open a private chat box between themselves.

Activity streams: When you activate this option, the feed page or activity page will be activated, such as the Facebook home page, which displays all the updates that members post throughout the day. Notifications: When activated, it will be possible to send notifications related to the content that members post and interact with. Member Groups: When activated, members will be able to create their own groups within the site.

Activate the options that you deem appropriate for the social networking site you want to launch, then go to the (Options) tab to get more site control options: As you saw in the image above, in this tab there are many options for controlling the way the site works, such as the ability to show or hide the WordPress toolbar for members registered on the site. There are also many control options that can be made available to members, such as the ability to delete the account, the ability to upload profile pictures and cover photos, and the ability to send an invitation to join the site by current members. Also, within the (Options) tab, you will find more options for controlling groups, where you can allow members to create private groups within the social network, and control the group’s cover image and other options that you can customize in the way that suits you. And do not forget to click on the (Save Changes) button after completing all the required modifications: After that, you will find the (Pages) tab within the general settings page of the add-on, through which you can control the basic pages of the site: As you noticed, the Pages tab is where you can change the default pages of the site, as the add-on by default creates A group of pages within WordPress that are necessary to create a social media network, such as the members page that displays site member data.

As well as the Activity Streams page, which displays the latest posts and updates that members publish, and other pages that can be left as is or changed with other pages that you create yourself. Experiment with the social networking site pages and customize the internal pages. You can now access the Activities or Updates page, which is a page similar to the Facebook home page that displays the latest posts and updates. To enter the Activities page, you can write the website link followed by the word Activity as follows: www.mysite.com/activity, and the main feed page for the site will open in front of you: As you noticed, the feed page is divided into two main boxes, the first contains an input box that the member can use to publish an update or his own post. The second box contains all the posts that other members have published on the site.

You will notice below each post there are control options shown in the following image: You use the control tools located below each post to delete it completely from the site or add it to the list of favorite posts, or even to write a comment below the post. Note that the controls disappear for visitors who are not registered on the site: You can also set the Activities and Updates page as the home page of the site, so that when the visitor enters the home page directly, he can see the updates and publications of other members, as well as publish his own updates. To activate the Activities page as the home page, you can go to the (Settings) tab, then (Reading), then choose the Activity page as the home page: Create private groups and add members within them. One of the most important options that is also available on the site is the option to create communication groups within the site and add specific members to them. You can enter the groups page by adding the word groups to the site link as follows: ww.mysite.com/groups to open the current groups page as well as the (Create a group) link that the member can click on to create the group. His own: When you click on the Create Group button, the Create a new group page opens for you, where you begin adding the group’s details, such as the title and description: Then in the (Settings) tab, you can choose whether you want the group to be public, private, or hidden: After completing the complete group data, you can go to the (Invitation) tab. You invite members to join the group, where you can add the people you have added as friends, or you can add any other member of the site to join the group: You can also add any member of the site as your friend, when you enter his profile, where you will find the option to add A friend, as well as the options for sending private or public messages to the member: You can also view all the members registered on the site by entering the members page by writing members at the end of the site link as follows: www.mysite.com/members.

Thus, you can enter any member's page and send a friend request or start creating a private chat or public chat with him. New visitors can also register on the site and create a personal profile to begin publishing updates, creating the group, and adding other members as friends, by entering the registration page by adding Register to the site link as follows: www.mysite.com/register: Customizing menus and widgets within the site The Buddypress add-on provides many ready-made pages that you can add to the site’s main menu for easy movement of members between site pages such as (personal profile page, notification page, messages page, and other pages...) You can enter the (Lists) tab from within the control panel and create a new list: After creating the list, open the Buddypress Pages tab and choose all the pages or pages that you want to show and click on the (Add to List) button: After adding the pages to the main list, click on the Save List button and now browse the site in the browser and you will notice the appearance of a main menu containing all the important pages that help navigate between pages and sections of the site with ease: The Buddypress add-on also provides many widgets that help manage and browse the site easier, as you can add a login widget in the sidebar of the site to facilitate the login process. For members to add the appropriate widget, you can access the (Widgets) tab from within the control panel, open the search box for widgets, and write the name of the Buddypress add-on to show you all the widgets provided by the add-on, including the widget to show the login box: In the same way, you can browse all the other widgets provided by the add-on and add them to your favorite place on the site. Conclusion: In the end, creating a social networking site is no longer difficult thanks to WordPress add-ons such as the Buddypress add-on, which saves you a lot of time and effort. As you noticed, through some simple steps, we have created a social network through which members can be registered and communicated with each other with ease.

You certainly cannot rely on the Buddypress add-on if you are looking to create a huge social networking site. You may find that the add-on options are limited and you will not be able to provide all the tools that enable you to compete with the major companies specialized in this field.