If your looking to start a dating or personals website, then you definitely need to take a look at eMeeting Dating Script.  The software includes everything you need in order to start a successful site in that niche.  Our team was able to get a 10 day trial of the software and we were up and running within 10 minutes!  The amount of awesome features included along with the low cost of the software make this script a must have.

Super Simple Installation and Administration

The team behind eMeeting Dating Script make installing and administering the software a snap.  Prior to downloading the actual software, you are able to download both an installation guide and and administration guide.  These two documents provide a very easy to read and follow guide to installing the software, as well as setting the appropriate permissions and creating a database.  The administration guide goes over all of the back end features of the script, the most useful will be featured in a section below.  Their are two installation packages available as well.  You can manually upload the files and set the permissions on your web host, or you can launch their automated installer which will automatically upload the files and set the appropriate permissions.  Once the files are on your server, all you need to do is create your database with your hosting platform, and launch the guided installer.  After the installation is complete, your site is ready to roll.

Ease of Customization

If you’re not a web designer, eMeeting makes it simple to change the look and feel of your site by providing  you with a bunch of templates to help with the customization of each site.  Some of the templates included would be unique for straight dating sites, swingers, gay sites, interracial, or even fetish sites.  If you don’t like any of the bundled templates, you can go to eMeeting’s website and download additional templates.   The templates are also customizable via the administration section of the site.  If you want to modify the pictures or colors of a template, it is easily controllable in the Design section of the administration area.  If you are more skilled in web design, you can easily modify the existing themes by editing the HTML and CSS files, or you can completely design your own theme for the site.

Awesome Included Features

Most of the scripts I have seen come with some good features but end up charging for some additional things that are definitely wanted in a social networking or dating platform.  This really isn’t the case with eMeeting Dating Script.  All of the features that you can really ask for are integrated with the script from the moment you finish the installation.  The most beneficial features have been listed below.

• Multiple Payment Gateways
• Easily created membership groups with access control
• Subscription Packages
• SMS messaging ability
• Fake account creator
• Random members online
• Instant Messenger
• Profile Field Editor
• Image Captions
• Multiple Admins/Moderators
• Videos
• Music
• Games
• Event Calendar
• Classified Ads
• Email newsletters with tracking code
• Email reminders for members who haven’t’ visited in X amount of days.

If you want to start a paid dating site this script is perfect!  Most of the other scripts reviewed on this site only offer PayPal or 2Checkout as a payment gateway by default.  eMeeting offers over 10 gateways, with the ability to add more!  The gateways offered include: NOCHEX, 2Checkout, eGold, AlertPay, Paymate, WorldPay, Authorize, CCBill, Moneybookers, Google Checkout, Saferpay, and Bank Wire.  In case you wanted to start a more adult type site, you should be aware that sites like PayPal or 2Checkout do not allow adult content to be processed.  This is where eMeeting shines as they have included payment processors like CCBill and AlertPay, as well as others who will accept payments for adult content.

The Membership creation and access controls are easy to use and allow you to create new memberships for members to subscribe to.  If you wanted to allow people to try the site out, but limit their features such as sending messages or instant messages, or viewing photos, it is very easy to control who has access to what.  In the subscription settings, you can allow members to upgrade their account by offering subscription packages on various payment cycles.  It is also easy to control the currency a member will be paying for their membership, so you are not limited to a specific currency with this excellent piece of software.

Another unique aspect of this script is that is has the option to send SMS messages to member’s mobile phones.  Just like Facebook sends messages to members alerting them to new messages or requests, this script can also do this out of the box!  Keep your members informed and they will keep coming back for more!

The built in instant messenger is also a great tool as members like to engage with one another.  People can still send personal messages, but rather than send a message and wait for the person to read it and respond, the instant messenger allows for live interaction with multiple members on the site.

Another unique tool to this script is the Fake Account creator, on the ability to simulate site activity.  Within the administration area, you can create as many fake accounts as you would like.  This is perfect for any new website starting out as it will make your site seem bigger than it is, and with the simulator, it will make new members believe the site is large and active already.  This is great as it will help you gain additional real members quickly as people want to join a community that is large and established versus a new website with no activity.

While I am not covering all of the features of this script, the last one is also pretty awesome.  The email features in this script are really good.  You can send newsletters to your members, as well as reminder requests to members who have not visited the site in a set amount of time.  While these features might not seem unique, what really is great is that the script has the ability to track whether or not your emails were read or not and does some pretty good reporting.

Best Dating Script To Date

Based on all of the features of this script, the helpful support provided by eMeeting, and the low cost of the script I have to say that this is probably the best dating or personals script on the market.  The support staff at eMeeting are also very helpful.  I put in tickets requesting help and support and I received helpful responses within 12-24 hours.  Outside of their support, eMeeting also has a community forum whereby other customers can interact and help one another out.  I give this script a 5 out of 5 when it comes to dating and personals sites.

Looking for an awesome all in one solution for social

networking and video sharing?

If you answered yes to the above question then DZOIC is the social networking software for you.  Having been in the video streaming and social networking industry for over 10 years DZOIC has been through many itterations of it’s software.  They produce both social networking scripts as well as video tube scripts.  With DZOIC Handshakes, you get a sweet social network with the added benefit of DZOIC’s video streaming technology!

Great Social and Video Features

DZOIC Handshakes is a great script and features the following:

• Easy to use Administrator Backend
• Simple Installer
• Image hosting and photo crop tool
• Instant form validation
• Open Social Integration!
• Video Ads Plugin
• Video Grabber Plugin
• Video Chat!
• Recording Features
• Music
• Videos
• Flash Chat Instant Messenger and Chat Rooms
• Hot or Not
• Blogs
• Events
• Forums
• Subscription Module
• Polls

Some of the more unique features of this software include the Open Social integration, video chat, video grabber, and recording features.  A lot of popular web applications on the big social networks were written to be ran as Open Social applications.  With Open Social integrated into your site it’s a simple process to install widgets that your community will love!

Video chat is another amazing feature.  Not even MySpace or Facebook offer integrated video chat.  People with webcams love to see who they are talking with and get to know each other on a more personal level.  Unfortunately, most social networking sites do not have any integrated video chat feature which forces users to look to third party tools such as Yahoo Messenger.  Having video chat built right in gives you a leg up in the world of social networking!

The video grabber plugin is also very unique.  While having videos on social networking sites is nothing new…this plugin makes life so much easier when it comes to grabbing videos from video sharing sites such as youtube.  All you need to do is provide the link to the video and the grabber plugin will pull in the video, title, description and tags.  You have the option of embeding the video so it stays on the original site and doesn’t use up your bandwidth or copying it to your site so it resides with you as long as you want it.

DZIOC Handshakes’ recording features are also very unique to this platform.  With this feature set you can do the following:

Active User Community and Support

Once you start with DZIOC, you’ll definitely want to join the user community forums.  This is the place to go for excellent assistance with your site from other members who have started using the software and built amazing social networks.  This helpful place will be your number one spot for customization and module information as well as general troubleshooting.

If you run into an issue that the forum can not fix, DZIOC offers lifetime support free with purchase of their software.  The support team will assist in troubleshooting and resolving whatever issues you might run into.

4 of 5 Stars

DZOIC Handshakes is a great script with some very unique features built in.  It isn’t one of the most used scripts so it’s not currently probed for attacks as often as scripts like Dolphin and Social Engine.  The video features of this script are really it’s core winning values.  No other social networking script provides you the video chat and recording features that DZOIC give you out of the box with this script.  The only real drawbacks to Handshakes is that their isn’t a large market for custom development.  This script is pretty much good to go once it’s setup but doesn’t have an easy route for integrating new and additional features.  If your happy with a low maintenance site that’s easily setup in a matter of minutes then you’ll love DZOIC Handshakes!

Learn more about DZOIC Handshakes by visiting DZOIC here!

Over 50,000 Webmasters can’t be wrong!

Dolphin is a pretty popular online community script.  It has been used to create both Social Networks, as well as Dating Networks.  Dolphin was created by BoonEx in 2001. With almost 10 years of experience, the BoonEx team have built the script through 7 versions over the years.  Dolphin version 7 is the most recent release of the social script.  It has been totally redesigned from the ground up.  Dolphin is easy to install and get up and running.

Did I Mention Dolphin is 100% Free!

One major plus with BoonEx’s Dolphin is that BoonEx offers a free version of the social script with no limitations! If you want to build a social network with no startup software costs Dolphin 7 is one of the best open source scripts availiable.  Now I’m sure your wondering Why would BoonEx build an awesome script and just give it away? The only catch with Dolphin is that BoonEx brand’s their script so that people know that you are using their software.  For some people this is fine and dandy as they don’t really care about site branding; however, if you are going to be running a professional social network in a niche market, you probably don’t want to tell the world your using BoonEx as your content management system.  Imagine how easy it would be for someone to just steal your idea and create their own BoonEx Dolphin site if you told everyone the FREE software you were using! To get around this problem, BoonEx offers licenses that allow you to remove the BoonEx branding.

Tons of Awesome Features

Dolphin was built with the most common social networking features and then some! You get the standard things such as:

• Profiles
• Browse
• Friends
• Shoutbox
• Chat
• Instant Messanger
• Polls
• Blogs
• Articles
• News
• Videos and Sounds
• Store
• Ads
• Groups
• Forums

And some things you might not expect such as an awesome mobile application for smart phones! The mobile application is also a free branded product that you can license to get your own custom branding on.

BoonEx Unity Market Place

If your looking for tons of other add-on’s for your social network, BoonEx created and hosts Unity.  Unity is a place for social network owners, and developers to meetup and discuss add-on’s that they would like to see.  Unity also consists of an online marketplace that developers can post both Free and Paid add-on’s for Dolphin! Their are currently over 500 add-on’s listed on Unity for Dolphin.  The current users and BoonEx staff review the add-on’s and post honest critiques. 

Easily Customizable and Fast!

Dolphin has really been built right with it’s latest release.  It is extemely easy to customize the layout of your social network with it’s new modular layout.  If you want to change the locations of different modules such as the shoutbox, all you need to do is drag the module around in the site designer within your administrator control panel.  If you don’t want a module on a certain page it’s as simple as just dragging it away. 

In addition to the ease of customization, BoonEx has made this software extemely fast.  The load time between pages is almost instant if you have a good webhost. Think of the speed you can move around when on Facebook and BoonEx has done a pretty good just of streamlining their code to allow for the same speed.

4 of 5 Stars

BoonEx put a lot of awesome features into Dolphin 7.  It is a great open source free script that I highly recommend.  The only down side to BoonEx is that it lacks some advanced coding features that you can find in other social networking scripts like phpFox and Social Engine.  The script is so streamlined it also cuts out the potential to add Flash content in comments or in profiles.  Their may be add-ons that will allow for this, but it should come by default.  Another issue with this script is that since it is free, popular and opensource, it has known to have issues with people trying to hack sites.  Typically these hacks don’t last long as the community and developers work quickly to patch exploits, but it is something you have to be aware of in order to grab the most up to date patches.  If the script wasn’t free and so fully functional, the hack problems from the past would have totally ruined my opinion of the script.  Dolphin 7 seems to be pretty stable and secure and I have not read any reports of exploits on this version of the script. 

Grab a free copy of Dolphin 7 by visiting BoonEx here!

If your looking for a very user friendly, full featured, and easily customizable social networking platform then phpFox is the clear cut winner. phpFox was created by Benc Enterprises and released in 2005. Over the years, the staff at Benc Enterprises have revised and rebuilt the entire script to vastly improve both the user experience for your potential members, but also make it extremly simple to install, customize, and administer your social network. The current version of phpFox is version 2.x, with new builds being released as additional feature requests are approved.

No knowledge of web design whatsoever.

The installation of phpFox takes only a few minutes. The process is extremely simple as the installer walks you through the steps in a user friendly, easy to follow process. Once the installation is complete, your site is ready to start accepting members. The basic installed site isn’t customized for any particular social network niche, so your going to want to make some customizations such as the name of your site, the banner image, and your site description. Everything is easily customizable within the Admin Control Panel (CP). Within the AdminCP, you can change the layout and design of your site by installing either free or paid themes, or if you are into web design, you could easily create your own theme. The AdminCP lets you control all of the modules that phpFox comes with. These include the following:

• Instant Messenger
• Activity Feed
• User Group Manager
• Subscription program
• Blogs
• Events
• Polls
• Forum
• Photo and Video sharing
• Shoutbox
• Personal Messaging
• Bulletins
• Market place
• Advertising Module
• Facebook Connect

The included features are the core products you should have to be successful when creating a social network. If you want features that are not provided in the core phpFox product you can either request the feature be added, or look to a third party developer to have the module created. Some popular 3rd party modules available include: 

• Spamtrawler – Excellent Spam Filtering module
• Arcade – Let your members play flash games online and compete with others for the top ranks
• Chat room integration
• Contact Importer – Let your members import their email contacts and invite friends to join your community
• SMS Mobile Alerts – Let your members update their information by sending SMS messages to your site.

Customization is KING with phpFox

  

If you want something added to the core script, it’s easy to find developers on the phpFox support forum. The developers on the forum are more than happy to review your needs and provide you with a reasonable quote on any custom work needed. When it comes to the look and feel of your phpFox site, you can add as many themes or layouts as you like. You can allow your members to choose from the various themes, or just lock your site down to one particular look. When it comes to displaying information on the various pages of your social network no coding experience is required! phpFox uses a block based system all customizable from within the AdminCP. An example of a block would be the Shoutbox. The shoutbox module resides within its own block. You can add whatever blocks you would like to see on whichever pages you want them displayed.

Easily retain your members

 

With phpFox, it is easy to keep your members informed as to what is going on with the site. Each time a friend request, new comment, or personal message is sent to a member, your phpFox site will automatically email your member affected. In addition, you can send both email based or personal message based newsletters to your members. The automated nature of the email functionality keeps members constantly returning to your site and continuing to be active with other members.

 

Make money with your Social Network

 

Want to make some good extra income while having an awesome social network? phpFox has some great features included for free that will help you make money. The three features included are:

• Advertisement Module
• Market Place
• Subscription Module

Using the Advertisement Module, you can sell advertisement space on your site to members, or companies within your social network’s niche. Additionally, you could sign up to be an affiliate marketer and promote products or services of your choice and collect affiliate commissions.Using the Market Place module, you can sell your own goods on the site. These could be virtual items, or physical items that pertain to your site or the niche you are in. The Market Place can also be used to allow your members to sell their own goods or services.The biggest feature is Subscriptions. With the Subscription module, you can limit access to your site’s standard members, and unlock features to members who subscribe to a higher access plan. You can specify monthly, or annual subscription packages and create various user groups to apply to different subscription packages. If you wanted to make money the way a site like Match.com does, you can allow members to sign up and view profiles for free, but require a subscription to unlock other aspects of the site. Another option would be to lock members out of selling items in the market place unless they subscribe to a user group that has access to sell goods.

The money making potential is limitless with phpFox. Depending on how popular your social network gets and the types of products you sell, types of advertisements, and subscription packages availiable you could easily make over $100.00 a day!

Clear Cut Winner

 

Start your own social revolution in minutes with phpFox! This script is the clear winner when it comes to the best in pre-built social networking software. phpFox comes with 6 months of support and updates. The staff at Benc Enterprises are very helpful and responsive to tickets. The staff also provide free modifications to members on the forum. When it comes to usability for both members and administration it doesn’t get any better than phpFox. When you look at some of the other competitors out their, you’ll realize that it is not easy to really customize the look and feel of the site design. phpFox does not have that problem due to the highly customizable themes and layout features built into the script’s administration controls.

Be sure to visit phpFox to get more information on the script. Check phpFox out today by clicking here

One of the most popular social networking scripts on the market is Social Engine.  This script has been around for quite a while with it’s developers learning and improving the software with each release.  With Social Engine as your social networking content management system, you are given a decent core product with common social networking features such as:

• Profiles
• Share Pictures
• Activity Feed
• Anti Spam Features
• Advertising Modules
• Private Messaging

Tons of Add-On Plugins

One of the best features about Social Engine is the strong support for both 1st and 3rd Party Plugins.  Out of all of the social networking software options availiable, Social Engine has the best options for prebuilt customization for your social network.  Social Engine has plugins availiable from it’s developers on it’s own corporate website; however, that doesn’t begin to scratch the surface of all of the add-on’s Social Engine 3rd party developers have created.  If you search for Social Engine plugins on any search engine, you will find tons of awersome plugins to make your new social network amazing! While the script begins with just the basic features, you can purchase whatever plugins you feel your site might need to help attract additional members and make your site more unique. Some of the additional plugins that you can add to your site include:

• Photo Albums
• Blogs
• Events
• Groups
• Forums
• Chat & IM
• Video & Music Sharing
• Classifieds
• Polls

Upload, Configure, and your good to go!

This social networking script is very easy to setup and install.  You can have a basic social network up and running in under an hour.  The script does come with a Theme editor so you can easily make changes to the layout of your social network.  Plugins are extremly easy to install and manage in the administration section of the site.

Social Engine is both powerful and popular.  It was ranked 4.5 out of 5 mainly due to the fact that the Social Engine script is not as customizable as other social networking site platforms.  If you go with Social Engine, it will take a lot of customization to make the site feel unique and not look like it was a Social Engine script.  Additionally, the core features don’t compare to those included with scripts like phpFox.  If you want the additional features of some of the other scripts on the market, your going to need to shell out some extra cash.  Other than those two cons, the Social Engine script is a wonderful option for easily building your own social network.

Lastly, Social Engine offers a free trial of their product! Give the script a test drive now by clicking here!