What are Groupsites? How are they different from Facebook and Linkedin? Are they a listserv like Yahoo! Groups? Are they similar to Sharepoint? These are the same questions I get everyday and it made me think, perhaps a brief explanation is in order.
Groupsite.com is not a destination or social network (like Facebook and Linkedin). We are not software that you buy and need your IT staff to maintain (like Sharepoint). We are not a listserv where emails sent back and forth live in your inbox (like Yahoo! Groups).
We are a platform that powers the creation of Groupsites.
Groupsites are websites for groups. Groupsites enable groups to communicate, share and network to make things happen. They do this by combining the most useful (but not all) features of online groups and listservs (like Yahoo! Groups), collaboration software (like Sharepoint) and Social Networks (like Facebook and Linkedin).
We call this "social collaboration."
We believe groups provide the context for making things happen. Most "social networks" start with you as the center of the world and your "page" as the main focus. You then "friend" or link to others forming a network around you.
We do things differently.
We are group-centric. We start with the group as the center of everything. We are also group-agnostic. Groupsites can be used for professional or social groups, large or small, and private or public groups.
To take advantage of this software as a service, you must first do one of the following:
1. Create a Groupsite (at www.groupsite.com), or
2. Accept an invitation to join an existing Groupsite (80% of Groupsites are private, professional and invite only), or
3. Join or Request to Join a Groupsite that is open to the public. (A list of these Groupsites are available at www.groupsites.com.)
The first time you do any one of the above, we ask you to create a Groupsite.com Account. This account (which includes your email address and password) is your key to logging on to the Groupsite.com platform as well as logging into any and all of your Groupsites.
Even if you create (or join) dozens of Groupsites, you always have a single Groupsite.com account that gives you access only to those Groupsites to which you belong.
Each Groupsite is its own separate sanctuary -- even though they all share the same simple look and feel, have the same powerful features and are driven by the same Groupsite.com engine.
You can even search across all of your Groupsites using our View-all Mode, which is like a dashboard view of everything that is happening within your Groupsites.
When logged-in to one Groupsite, you can easily switch to any of your other Groupsites by using the "Switch Groupsites" button. This button is in the top right corner of every Groupsite page.
Within a single Groupsite, managers can create "sub-groups." Subgroups allow Groupsite members to communicate, share and network in smaller teams or areas of interest. In fact, the system allows managers to rename "subgroups" to anything they choose (like sub-committees, Teams, Chapters and Huddles).
Groupsites are a "freemium" service. This means they are free to create and you can subscribe to premium services.
Thanks for joining us in this primer on the language of Groupsites. As always, we welcome your comments or questions!