Creating a social media website can seem like a daunting task. At first glance, the number of features and functionalities can make the process seem more tedious than it actually needs to be.
It is possible to simplify the process with the right website builder. WordPress is an obvious solution in this regard and allows you to create many different types of websites, including social media sites.
How does the process work? The following sections will explain how to create a social media website using WordPress.
Step 1: Install the BuddyPress plugin on your WordPress website
BuddyPress is an open-source WordPress plugin, a sister project of WordPress. It essentially enables you to transform a simple WordPress website into a social network website.
It has over 100,000 plugin installs. While plenty of solutions allow you to build a social media website using WordPress, BuddyPress is often seen as the most reliable.
Installing BuddyPress is a simple process. Within your WordPress admin panel, navigate to Plugins > Add New and search for BuddyPress in the search bar. Install and activate the plugin to start using the plugin.
Step 2: Configure BuddyPress settings
Once BuddyPress is active on your website, you can configure its settings according to your preferences.
There are three tabs that allow you to customize your settings:
- Components: These are native BuddyPress sections that you can activate within your site. These are typical features and functionalities that one associates with social media websites. Some examples are editable profiles, account settings, notifications, and more.
- Pages: When you install BuddyPress, certain pages are created on your WordPress website by default. You can associate these pages with key BuddyPress directories. You can also customize these pages’ design, structure, and title and configure those settings within BuddyPress accordingly.
- Options: These are basic settings you can configure for your site. In most cases, the default options will work fine. You can manage settings like profile picture & cover image upload, toolbar display, and more.
Step 3: Add social network pages to your website
When you install BuddyPress, pages such as login, signup, and more are created automatically. You can customize all these pages within WordPress with the settings available within the WordPress Block Editor or the old Classic Editor.
If you’re using another page builder plugin like Elementor, you can use that to customize your pages as well. To actually make your turn your website into a social media platform, you would need to add these pages to the main navigation of your website. The most obvious way to do this is via your website’s menus.
Simply add the pages created via your website to the main navigation of your website. This option is available within your WordPress admin panel. Simply navigate to Appearance > Menus in your WordPress backend and add your BuddyPress pages to the website. These can include Groups, Members, the Activity page, Registration, and more.
In case you use other plugins to add forums to your website, you can add those pages to the navigation as well.
Step 4: Moderate user activity and groups
Within the Activity screen of your WordPress admin panel, you will be able to see all the posts your users are making. You can mark posts as spam, and delete them if they don’t meet your community guidelines.
Please keep in mind that you’d need to enable user login within the website so new users can sign up and register. You can enable this option within your WordPress admin panel’s settings.
Create a social media app with your website
Now that your social media website is ready, you can also create a mobile app for it. There are plenty of no-code solutions that allow you to transform your WordPress website into a mobile app.
AppMySite’s no-code mobile app builder is one of them. It allows you to create mobile apps in minutes without coding. With its support for custom post types and taxonomies, you can sync the content created via BuddyPress with your mobile app.
Since your website’s users will also be able to log in to the app, you can easily create a premium social media app in minutes.
In conclusion
Building a social media platform can seem like a daunting task. There are a lot of features and experiential functionalities that we expect from a typical social media site. In this article, we’ve covered how you can create a social network website using BuddyPress. You can also create a mobile app for your social media website using automated & no-code solutions like AppMySite.
