Were you guys checking out Misticpets when it was supposed to open up its doors on July 19, 2007 at 4 pm EST? Well if you were, then you know Misticpets was doomed from the start. Not only did they build hype for their site, they also couldn’t handle their server load.
Misticpets isn’t growing and its hype is gone now. Can Misticpets still open up with a bang? We don’t believe so because all of its hype is gone - and users aren’t checking for them anymore. You can’t even register on their off-site forums. If that’s the case, then when will we see Misticpets? Never, because it might be sold off in the near future. The owner is currently making new sites and isn’t focusing on Misticpets anymore - and with the thought of becoming a big virtual pet site it was still doomed. First of all, Misticpets you don’t plan to become a large pet site without being able to handle your server load, have features & content all finished. You need to be a working site before you start to build hype.
I’m sure some people are still checking for Misticpets, but once it opens - it’ll be a bust and won’t become a large pet site. Its art is wonderful and very attractive, however; the features are next to none just like “Zetapets” and will only grow because it’ll become a social networking site for friends (like Myspace).
If Misticpets wants to get out of this “doomed” age, they should start introducing new items, art updates, and features to the public to try and build up its hype again. Will Misticpets ever have hype again? How can you go from the talk of the town - to not being talked about at all anymore? We’re clueless just like you are, but we believe Misticpets should be sold off to someone - and re-started (recoded) and then the new owner should be up the hype again.
Moral: Misticpets is a failure.
Why Powerpets‘ recode won’t have much of an impact on the virtual pet community. If you’ve been watching Powerpets for the past few years then you’re already aware that its main focus is already real life animals and saving them from the bad owners; however, isn’t Powerpets also a virtual pet site? Well, they don’t advertise nor promote to the internet users.
If Powerpets wants to get larger like the other pet sites, then they’d should do the following:
-Launch an advertising campaign and cap it at $5,000 not only would this help them bring in new members, it’ll help them attract a whole new audience.
-Redo the layout. Let’s face it, their current layout sucks and doesn’t really attract anyone new. Where are the links on the homepage? It’s a splash page. Splash pages are so old and shouldn’t be used in a design anymore.
-The butterfly project. What’s up with this? Shouldn’t they just be recoding behind the scenes without letting us know? If they really think the butterfly project will be a large recode, then think again because their site isn’t easily navigatable - and if the butterfly project fixes this, then we’ll see.
-The lack of new content. Has anyone noticed that Powerpets doesn’t post a lot of small updates but focuses on the Powerpress? Users love to see big updates - introducing new features and not just reading a newspaper every week.
We’re not sure if Powerpets is making any money, but if they are why don’t they re-invest into their site and attract new people? After all, they’ve grown over 800,000 players in just 5 years which is very small if you take a look at the other pet sites. Why is Powerpets having a tough time growing? Not only are their active members’ rate going down, it seems like nobody wants to play Powerpets anymore. What is the deal? Why does everyone not like Powerpets?
We believe if Powerpets puts more effort into the development and advertising of Powerpets then they’ll be one big pet site in the future. Did you know that Powerpets deletes users? What if a user decided to quit for 2 years and then decided to come back and play again? That’s not right.
Virtual pet communities and how hard they’re to start up.
Do you remember how the Virtual pet forums and Virtual pet list were competing against each other before they merged? Well, we’d like to tell everyone how hard it is to start up your own discussion forum for virtual pets. It’s not an easy task at all. Why should users come to your forum and not the bigger one? Users prefer to chat with other fans - like them, however; if your community is lacking, then you need to look at it like a user would.
Let’s just say you should ask yourself the following questions: Is the content unique? Will my content be found on another virtual pet forum? Who’s the main competitor? If you want to beat your competitior, then be sure to do it better than them. If you can’t beat the best, then join the best. It’s up to you to succeed - users want interaction, not duplicate content. Put yourself into the game, make yourself work harder to succeed. Also; never give up. Is someone beating you? I sure hope so - so work harder, bust out new content and never let up.
They’re so hard to start up because the virtual pet community is still small - and not a lot of users know about them. They’d rather chat on a Neopets cheats community than talk about virtual pets. Why is this? Well, because Neopets is the largest virtual pet site and is also the oldest.
We hope you the best of luck on creating your own virtual pet community and if you know of any other ways to help your virtual community succeed, then feel free to let us know to - so we can all work together and make our community even bigger!