Expanding BeardedDragon.org

BeardedDragon.org is a beautiful awesome website why not expand it. It would be awesome if you can put the website into an app or just advertise the website more for more active users! Just some food for thought!

There is a new mobile version of the site which is quite helpful when using a phone or tablet. Probably pretty similar to how it would appear in pure app form. A good way to advertise is by word of mouth. I talk about the site quite often and recommend it to anyone I meet who is involved with or interested in dragons.

I definitely have thought about how to improve traffic on the site. I had tried ads before even. The problem with ads is that there is a significant cost with a pretty small return (in terms of number of visitors who stick). Advertising simply isn't a good option for a site that generates its revenue from ads, as far as I can tell.

As for mobile, I did redesign the styling for the site to adjust its layout depending on the width of the browser (thus small browsers like mobile have a different view). There are three main modes, wide (i.e. computer web browsers), medium (tablets generally), and small (phones primarily).

The apps out there that many sites support often end up bypassing all the ad content. And while ads are annoying, they are what help pay the bills for the site. And the apps that do support advertising are limited, or try to take a cut. So, from my perspective, I have no motivation to support apps that are only trying to undermine the revenue I make. And in many cases, they don't support any ads to be sent back to the sites, but instead put their own ads, which I think is just flat out wrong (making money on other people's content and work and giving nothing back to them). It's borderline copyright violation, in all honesty, since they're modifying content, which includes the ads on the page that help pay for the page to be there.

Word of mouth is the best way. I'm trying to find ways to have more varying content on the home page as well. If I can get more small articles with tips on care, I think it will help boost us back up on the Google rankings for "bearded dragon". As it is, another site "stole" our spot. We used to be in spot 2-3. Not we're bumped down to 6-7 and some other site took 2-3. That other site bugs me, as they've taken my images and used it on their own site (I sent a cease and desist to have them stop it), and some article content I'd found to be taken from other sites even. And yet Google is rewarding them for some reason. If we can get back up to spot 3-4 by providing more and quality content, that will be the biggest boost for visibility and community growth.

Oh! Shoot! That reminds me. A reptile company in the UK offered to let me use a couple articles. I need to review them to get them posted up!

Anyway... I'm up for ideas, for sure. And thanks for the complement. I'm glad you like the site itself. I've put some 15 years into it (along with the help of the moderators and all the active members), and am happy to see the community that has grown here. I would definitely love to see the community become as active as it was a few years ago again.

Cheers,
-Alex