As the wheel of time has rolled and now that access to internet has moved from desktops to laptops and from laptops to smartphones and tablets, it has become imperative for everyone to make their presence felt in Social Media! The reason is simple though- people are information hungry; they want to know more!

If you are a frequent WordPress user, with all probability you must have heard about BuddyPress! It is one of the best way to pave way to your Social Networking presence – if you are a business owner, a sports team representative,  a school owner or even if you want to start up a niche community.

In this article, we will give you an overview of how BuddyPress can help you thrive; we will tell you how you can use BuddyPress with WordPress to kick off your Social Networking venture. So here is an introduction and we will talk about the installation of the software, the critical features, the interfaces that BuddyPress supplies, BuddyPress extensions and much more.

A Sneak Peak:

If we are to go by what the creators say about BuddyPress, it is “social network in a box”. BuddyPress is a social network where a user can create his/her profile after signing up. Post creating the profile wherein the user updates the required information, they can make connections with other users based on common interests etc. creates communities and groups, share pictures, updates and statuses. The list doesn’t end here though!

Every business, school, members of a community need to interact and BuddyPress provides the right platform for these interactions to happen. There is more to it! BuddyPress also has the capability to synchronize with your present WordPress site. One of the main capabilities that put BuddyPress ahead in the race with its competitors is the fact that a customized theme isn’t required for the users. It automatically creates a few new pages and options within your theme and WordPress admin area. There are no changes made in the site though; it just works the way you planned it.

Benefits of using BuddyPress:

– A to Z of Social Networking solution through just one plug in
– Synchronizable and adaptable to any WordPress theme
– Forums and additional plugins can all be added and maintained with ease with the extendibility factor
– Ease of use; made for everyone with user friendly interface
– Users can register and contribute thus creating a larger audience for your website.
– A community can be established which would give you the much required push to your website.

How to Install?

Installing BuddyPress is an easy affair! It can be installed like just another plugin. You could get to the admin option of your WordPress and choose the Plugins option. Post that, you need to search for BuddyPress and the first search result that you get should be the installation wizard.

There are a lot of add ons that would make BuddyPress your ultimate choice for this type of a website.