Blog Entries
Minor Updates and Unlimited members now on Lite Plan.

We have lifted the member limit on Lite plans. Now all our plans offer unlimited members. Go to http://spruz.com_name/?page=info to view all of our plan options.

Our Lite plan is our most affordable plan option. Upgrading to Lite removes advertisements, expands your file space by 10X or more and gives you priority support ticket response times.

Other recent changes include;

  • Adding content to profiles has just gotten much more apparent. We have removed the Plus Sign to go with more of an inline menu for things like adding elements, widgets, photos and videos. This was done based on feedback from members that contact us about how to add things to their profile. We noticed the + sign was not an apparent way to display how members can add things to their profile pages.
  • Free sites now have an Edit This Page option that makes it easier to know where to go to customize a page. The edit this page will not show on upgraded sites.
  • We have made some adjustments to the blogging system to make it easier for users to share your posts on sites like Facebook, Email, Digg and so on.
  • New Share Options have been added to the bottom of pages on Free websites, we will have a how-to for our upgraded members so you can optionally add a share this at the bottom of all your pages.
  • The Blogging system is still getting reworked to add post approval options, make it easier to edit and delete categories and much more.
  • New and Improved Community Search page to give active communities more focus. We have 1000's of visitors per month that are just looking for networks to join. Check it out by going to http://spruz.com_name/?page=spruz&cmd=search

We have some many cool things that we are working on for release over the next few months.

Spruz, Inc. Surpasses 250,000 social sites created
Category: Press Releases

Spruz, Inc. Defies Weak Economy with Explosive Growth

East Tennessee technology firm boasts 250,000 social networking websites—and counting
KNOXVILLE, TN, July 7, 2009 – Knoxville-based Spruz, Inc. (www.spruz.com), the developer of a technology platform that enables users to build highly-customized social networking websites, announced today that more than 250,000 users have created sites on the company’s innovative proprietary platform.
“This is a major milestone for us,” said Jay Roberts, Spruz, Inc. President and CEO, who founded the company in March 2007 with David Furman. “New users are building sites at the rate of 10,000 per month and growth shows no signs of slowing.”
 
Featuring highly-customizable social websites, the robust Spruz website platform gives users the ability to create member profiles, groups, discussion forums, and blogs as a quick example. Anyone can create a white label social website community around common interests, friends or business.
For Roberts, the company’s success has been especially gratifying given the nation’s economic woes. Even more remarkable is the company’s funding story, a David-and-Goliath tale of success despite the absence of capital from outside sources. “We’re a bootstrapped company whose growth has been completely organic, unlike our major competitors,” Roberts said.
 
Competitor Ning parlayed more than $100 million of funding into 1 million social websites since its launch four years ago. Another competitor, WetPaint, has relied on more than $40 million in outside venture capital to build a company that today hosts about 1 million websites.  
Roberts believes that his company’s success story is proof that a great idea developed proactively and managed sensibly can produce results that rival those of better-funded competitors. “In just over two years, we have built a business model that delivers a high-quality experience for users,” Roberts added. “We are pleased to offer a solution that makes sense for so many people.”
 
 
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New Videos Section on Profiles

We have just completed another update that brings the addition of Video adding to the member profiles. This update allows users to create a video to display on a page from YouTube. All a member has to do is use the URL or share link from YouTube and fill out some basic information.

The videos allow full comment and tag based searching. We will add support for other adding videos from other places in the future based on your feedback.

Some other recent improvements include; improved member searching on the member search page, video searching, fixes for the sub menu drop down on the site navigation and other odds and ends.

Items we are working on now and over next few weeks;

  • New Event Calendar that will have many improvements over the current calendar system
  • Updates to the Site Blog System, including blog approval and better category structure/management.
  • Member Point/Rank System
  • Improved Sharing with Facebook and other sites to help your site grow more.
  • Member Reminder Emails

As always please report any problems or issues to us via support ticket.

Happy 4th of July!

We want to wish everyone a Happy and Safe 4th of July! Independence Day is more than a chance for family and friends throughout our country to gather for barbecues and fireworks displays, it is an annual celebration to commemorate the courage and faith of our founding fathers in their pursuit of liberty.

Let’s remember our independence was from high taxes, large government, and to live the way we want. The power by the people for the people!
 
Have a Happy Holiday!
 
Member Subscriptions and Profile Styling Released

One of the many benefits our users have with the Spruz platform is the frequency we roll out new updates and improvements.

We have applied an update today to all sites that bring back member controlled styling to member profiles. With the new styling feature members can set background color and images and change their profile box color and background. This combined with Style Accents really gives you a great deal of control over how your members design their profiles.

To access the profile styling option first make sure you do a manual refresh of the page because we have updated a number of client side files in this release. Next go to your profile page and click the + icon, in the drop down list you will see Add/Edit Style. Clicking on that will load the editor options for customization. One really cool feature about the new style controls, you can see your changes in real time!

We have been working on new ways for you to make money from your website. As part of this effort we have rolled out a new member subscription system. This allows you to charge a small monthly fee that is paid directly to you via PayPal for higher levels of site access for your subscriber. The system is fully automated so when you get a payment in via PayPal the users subscription due date will be adjusted properly.

You can access the new member subscription configuration by going to the Green Community tab in your site administration/manage area and click on subscriptions.

Last but not least we have fixed a few user reported bugs and problems.

As with any update that has new features there are bound to be problems and issues. Please report any issue you find directly to us through support ticket. We hope you enjoy these new improvements.

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