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The groups functionality of Ma.gnolia is a big piece of what sets Ma.gnolia apart from other Social Bookmarking tools. Pushing the envelope on the social aspect of these services is something of a priority at Ma.gnolia, and the groups functionality continues to be improved. I have created or joined 46 groups at Ma.gnolia and it really is a great way to find new links and become part of the community. The question is, how do you create a group, maintain it, and get people interested in your group? I am going to try and answer these questions in this article.

Getting Started
Before you do anything else, you will need a Ma.gnolia account. If you don’t have one you will need to register at Ma.gnolia. Get logged in and head over to the Groups page. You can navigate the different areas of Ma.gnolia using the navigation bar at the top of the Ma.gnolia site.

The first thing you should do before creating a new group is search Ma.gnolia to see if a similar group exists. While there is no restriction on creating a similar over even identical group in Ma.gnolia, part of the fun of groups is getting others to add bookmarks to the group and expand the groups knowledge and links on the topic. If your future members already belong to a related group you may not be able to get them to add the same bookmarks to your group.

You can access the Groups search dialog on the Groups page on Ma.gnolia. Simply type a keyword or two that describes the group you want to create and click the Go button. You may want to try a couple of different searches just to make sure you have covered a few possible ways that people could name the groups. If you find a similar group, you may want to join for a few days, and see if the types of information they are collecting is what you are interested in. I would suggest adding some related bookmarks to the group, and seeing how it goes. If you find a good match you won’t need to create a new group on this subject. If you don’t find a related group, or the group does not seem to meet your needs (or even if you just want to create your own), take a look at the next section for information on creating your own group.

Creating a new Group
Creating a new group is a pretty straightforward process, you really only need two pieces of information to get started. I will assume that you have an idea in mind for creating your own group. If you follow these steps you will have your group up and running in no time.

1. Point your favorite web browser to the Ma.gnolia Groups page.
2. Type a short name for your group into the correct dialog.
• The short name will be used in the url for your group. If your short name is foo then the url to your group would be http://ma.gnolia.com/groups/foo/.
• Choose a short name that is short and descriptive. If you use real words you may drive search engine traffic to your group page. My Iron Kingdoms group shows up in Google when you search for IronKingdoms.
  
• One last thing, once you create your group the short name cannot be changed, so be sure you choose carefully.
3. Type a Group name into the correct dialog.

This is the display name, or full name for your group. You should be as descriptive here as possible, again this is how others will find your group. A search on Google for Iron Kingdoms Group will also find my Ma.gnolia group.



4. Type a home page for your group (Optional)

If your group relates to something specific enough to have a main home page you can throw a link to that page into the header of your group. This is optional and can be added or changed later.

5. Type a description into the About the Group field.

You can type whatever you want here to describe your group. Please note that, while you can include paragraph breaks in the dialog, they do not show on the actual group page. I have found that less can be more on the description.


6. Select the type of group you want to create.

You have three choices when it comes to creating groups. You can create Private, Moderated or Public groups.


• Private groups can be used to help you organize your own bookmarks, but obviously cannot be seen by others. You might decide to make a group Private when it is first created and switch it to Public at a later time.
• Moderated groups can be joined by any Ma.gnolia member, but bookmarks can only be added by you or others you designate as moderators. My Just Google group is moderated. I wanted to capture a plain list of Google bookmarks, and provide it to others interested in the same thing. This particular group does not contain articles about Google for example, only actual Google links.
• Public Groups are what most groups should be. Ma.gnolia members can join the group and both view and add bookmarks. The majority of my groups are public.



7. Click the Submit button.

Advanced Group Stuff
Your group is setup now, and you can start adding bookmarks to it. I wanted to point out a couple of extra things you can configure in your group after it gets created. When you visit your group now you will see 4 buttons just below the description of your group. Click on the Edit Group Settings button to configure your group. You should see three tabs in the edit screen. Let’s look at what can be configured on each.

• General: On the general tab you can modify most of the settings you chose when you initially created the group. If you did not add a Home Page when you created the group you can add it here. Pretty much the only thing you cannot change is the short name you gave to your group. Be sure to click the submit button if you make any changes.



• Links Blog: The links blog feature tells you how you can reference the bookmarks for this group as a links blog. If you need the URL for your links blog it is displayed on this tab. The other thing you can configure from this tab is the Ma.gnolia integration with Technorati. Technorati indexes blogs, and links in blogs. You can claim your group in Technorati so that the bookmarks become searchable in Technorati. This is another good way to drive potential interest in your group. You need to have an account on Technorati to use this feature, and the steps to claim a blog on Technorati are best accessed from Technorati. However, you will be given a link from Technorati to embed in your group. Copy the link you are given into the dialog on this tab and click Submit. This will prove to Technorati that you own the page, and they will begin to index it.
• Avatars: The last tab is the Avatars tab. You can assign one of ten predefined Avatars or a custom Avatar to your group. The Avatar will be displayed in the groups list, and on the main page for your group. Be sure you have the right to use any custom image before you upload it.

Using your Group
The most common thing you will do with your group is to add bookmarks to it. Hopefully, others will add bookmarks as well. Once the bookmarks start streaming in you may decide to start up a few discussions. I will try and cover discussions in another posting. I do want to mention a few other things though.

• Posting to your Group: Each bookmark in Ma.gnolia has a button which allows you to add that bookmark to a group. When you click the button you will be presented with a list of all of the groups you have joined (even if you are not the creator). Select the group you want to add the bookmark to from the list, and you will be brought to a screen that looks like you are adding a new bookmark. All of the details about your selected bookmark will be filled in, and you can edit anything you want. Click the Save button once you have the detail you want entered, and the bookmark will be added to the group. If you add the wrong bookmark you can always click cancel. Bookmarks added to groups are separate from the bookmarks in your account. They can have different tags and descriptions. This is nice, because you might have tags which have personal meaning, to read for example, in your bookmarks that would not be as useful in a group. You can also add a bookmark to a group when you initially capture the bookmark by selecting the group name from the Add to Group drop down list.
• Joining a Group: If you come across a Ma.gnolia group that you think sounds interesting you can easily join it by clicking the brown Join Group button from the groups home page.
• Mailing Members: Want to get input from a groups members? Want to point out some changes to the group? Use the Mail Members button from your groups home page to send everyone a message.

That’s it. Creating groups in Ma.gnolia is not to hard, and hopefully this tutorial will encourage you to create a few groups. You can check out all of my groups on Ma.gnolia, and members can feel free to add me as a contact.

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