Pros and Cons of Using a Self-Hosted Social Media Network for Businesses

In the current era, social media networks have an unavoidable role in every individual’s life. No matter where you are living or what you are doing, you need to have an account on at least one social media platform to monitor your competitors’ activities, listen to your customers and discover trending topics and marketing strategies. However, finding the best social channel for your business can be a little perplexing and that’s why some marketers prefer to use a self-hosted social media network for their businesses. But is it worth the time and energy?

Well, to answer this question, you’d better take a piece of paper and take some notes while reading this article. In the following, I’m going to take a closer look at the merits and demerits of using a self-hosted social media network to help you figure out if it’s a good idea to put some effort into building your own channel. So, stick around and follow me to the end of this article.

# – Advantages of a Self-Hosted Social Media Network

Let’s start with the benefits of using a self-hosted social media network for businesses. In the following, you will find 5 pros of self-hosted social media networks and you can also see why each reason helps you better grow your brand. But before we go through each advantage, take a look at the following infographic to have an idea of what’s going to be covered:

#1) You Can Design a Flawless Channel for Your Needs

The first and also the most important benefit of a self-hosting social media channel is that you can design a platform that meets every single marketing need you are looking for. Provided with this opportunity, you can decide whether your channel supports visual content, texts, voice messages, or even complete blog posts. So, regarding what you offer in your business, you can set your own content rules, sell your products and services directly through your own channel, and use the best eCommerce payment gateway.

#2) It would Be Easier to Attract Your Target Audience

One of the biggest concerns of social media marketers is how to attract a target audience on a platform. No matter if you choose Instagram or LinkedIn, you have to take your time to learn the algorithm behind each one’s engagement rate and always keep track of the new strategies to win the marketplace. But if you use a self-hosted social media network, you save a great deal of time and energy on this part. This is because you are the person who defined the rules, basic concepts, and the algorithm of the social channel. So, you are definitely the one who knows how to attract a target audience and get more impressions better than the other users.

#3) You Set Your Own Rules

Another reason for having a self-hosted social media network is that you can have your own rules! Sometimes users complain about a social channel’s community guidelines, privacy policies, and terms of use. By the way, by building your own channel, you can set your own rules for the most advantages and build a community that you think is perfect.

#4) You will Never Run Out of Content

Yes! If you use a self-hosted social media network, you’ll never ever run out of content! But why?

Well, just think about one of the social media networks you know! Any of the platforms you think about belonging to a person that is not necessarily posting on their channel consistently, but the network is always full of users’ content and this is what exactly is going to happen with your channel.

As soon as your network is public and users join it, you can stop worrying about what to share, when to post, and setting a content calendar. Audiences you have attracted will take on this and keep your channel active. So, after a few months, you can save a great deal of time on this step.

#5 You Can Simply Monetize Your Self-Hosting Social Network

Since you are the one who sets rules for your social channel and defines algorithms behind users’ popularity, you know how to make money using your own channel. Apart from this, after you turn to a huge brand among other social channels, you can sell your own channel and earn a huge amount of money to invest in other aspects of your business. For instance, in 2012, Facebook bought Instagram for 1 billion dollars. So, if you have an astonishing idea and build a brand new channel that covers a wide range of demands, you can think of it as a long-term investment that could bring you revenue in many ways.

# – Disadvantages of a Self-Hosted Social Media Network

Until now, I mentioned 5 reasons to use a self-hosted social media network for your business. However, like most marketing strategies, this can have some huge disadvantages that might not worth your time and energy. To make the right decision, here, I’m going to note a few demerits of a self-hosted social media network. So, keep on reading.

#1) It would Be Hard to Appear in the List of Top Social Networks

Let me be honest with you! With the existence of huge social network monsters like Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and now, Clubhouse, you have a really small chance to be seen and attract billions of users to your channel in a short period of time. In this respect, growing your business through your self-hosted social network takes more time than joining an existing network and learning their strategies to win the marketplace. Hence, if you are thinking about fast growth in a year or so, you’d better give up on building a whole new channel.

#2) Lots of Data to Keep and Care About

When you host a social media network, you are in charge of collecting users’ personal information and you have to level up your team in order to keep all this data properly. To collect and keep such a huge amount of data, you have to use some great virtual servers, make sure to stay secure from cyber-attacks, and spend millions of dollars to struggle with hackers. Honestly, this is arduous work to do and you can’t expect to manage it all by yourself or just by hiring a small team of developers. So, if you have a small budget, you’d better invest it in one of the existing social networks.

#3) It is Not an Economical Choice

Frankly speaking, using a self-hosted social media network is going to cost you millions of dollars. This is because you have to:

Hire a team of professional developers to build your channel,
Advertise on popular websites and platforms to make your network viral,
Hire a team for customer/user support,

And etc. But if you choose to use one of the existing social media networks for your business, you might not need to even spend a penny! All you have is to sign up using your email address and start promoting your products and services. So, before trying to build your own network, you have to make sure that you have enough financial resources.

#4) Takes Time to Become Perfect

Think about one of the social media platforms you have been using for a few years! How much they have changed from the time you started using them? Exactly! Any platform you think about has been constantly being updated and new features are being released regularly to keep users more satisfied. Therefore, if you start building your own platform, you have to constantly moderate it and you can’t expect to have a perfect platform in 1 week, month, or even a year.

Also Read: 5 Reasons Why Your Business Should Use Dedicated Servers in 2022

#5) You Need More Human Resources

Another disadvantage of using a self-hosted social media network is that you have to hire hundreds of employees to get your work done. When you use an existing social media network, you can do all the tasks on your own or at last, hire 1-2 social media managers to do a nice job. But for a self-hosted social media network, you need developers, Q&A testers, a customer service team, content managers, and more.

# Closing Thoughts

To sum it up, using a self-hosted social media network can help your business grow much faster. However, the process of building a new social media network that people like and join is time-consuming, expensive, and not easy at all. So, read the merits and demerits mentioned here carefully and decide whether it’s worth building a new network or not.