Some direction on Gardens.com?

I've been looking at Gardens.com for a while now and trying to figure out what the best use of this name is. The issue is that Gardens.com is an awesome domain name but we don't really know what to do with it.

It's been targeted toward new gardeners and that's worked decently well, but not as much I was hoping. For some reason, it hasn't really "taken off" and I feel like in some ways it's a waste of time.

The question I've been thinking about is: what can we do with Gardens.com? As I say, it's an incredible name, easy to say and remember, and we should take advantage of the fact that we own it.

One idea that I've had is to scrap what we've done so far, and remake it as our Go Gardening feature. That makes sense to me, because "Gardens" really signifies to me finding garden centers, parks, arboretum, etc. This way, you could load up gardens.com, type your location in and right away see a map and a list of all the local gardening resources.

We would keep the articles and newbie forums, for sure, though.

Do any of ya'll have any thoughts on this? Does anyone even care?

Dave

Dave sorry it didn't work out like you had hoped. I know as a member of DG for several years, I just don't go over to the other site - there are so many forums here that I could spend my entire day look, reading and replying. Seems like a duplication of sorts. And yes, I'm sure many care!!

Add some garden planning software for users. Something simple and easy to use.

DG is a site where people get to "know" each other and for me, it is a family that doesn't criticise my table manners and is interested in what my cat is eating and whether my flowers are blooming or not - which my family could care less about. Gardens.com could be less "warm and fuzzy" and more get the info and go plant it oriented.

What about a calculator that does square feet to number of plants. "How many crocus should I buy for my 20' x 3' walkway?"

What about tabs for each planting zone with specific information for that zone? Suggestions for Scout and 4H projects, butterfly and bird gardens?

I think you might be giving up too soon - we are all so oriented in nano-seconds that we sometimes forget to stop and smell the roses.

I think that's a great idea, Yank Cat!

I think those are some good ideas.

Can I ask what your target demographics are for Gardens.com versus Dave's Garden?

We don't have target demographics. We just want to serve gardeners... The original idea was to make Gardens.com an easier and more accessible website, and keep DG featureful and rich.

dave

I think Yankee Cat's ideas are very good. And yes, there are lots of us who do care!

Good luck!

From my perspective, it is a lot of duplication. Just about everything on Gardens.com is available from davegarden. I do read the beginner forums, but from davesgarden. One problem is that there is no return link or link to davesgarden when we go to Garden.com. Unless there is some outside advertising to bring outsiders in, davesgarden members are going to be the major users for awhile until the word gets out. I don't have any concrete ideas how, but it does need to be different to attract a different clientel. I would also suggest a link to davesgarden for its particular features.

I googled gardens and the second thing I looked at was Wikipedia meaning of gardens. Very interesting in that all areas of gardens were addressed and a vast array of photos of gardens worldwide.

DG is an internation clientele with access to personal photos worldwide. Perhaps Gardens.com could be more international rather than personal as is DG.

Just my 2cents.
Candee

Whoa - would that be cool to see gardens all over the world? What about listing gardens to visit when you go to Gremany or Thailand?

I'm a relative newbie, so I probably don't know all the issues involved here ... but I was reading your other thread on the cost of membership dues and it struck me that the answer may lie in gardens.com. Why not structure it so that gardens.com supports davesgarden.com and helps defray some of the membership dues?

First, turn gardens.com into a site with advertising to generate revenue. Second, add a clause to the davesgarden.com membership agreement that the cost of membership will be defrayed by allowing you to post worthwhile material from davesgarden.com to gardens.com. The agreement would stipulate that if you find good material (such as Claire Corre's links and guides on the Plumeria Forum), you will ask the author if it is ok to post it on gardens.com. If the author agrees, you can edit and post the material, but the author reserves the right at any time to have the material pulled.

My guess is that if the gardens.com material shows the author's name and the author knows that some portion of their davesgarden.com subscription will be defrayed, you should get plenty of takers. Plus you run a great service and I'm sure there is an army of people out there who would want to help.

One other idea - I've yet to find an easy to use web site for beginning gardeners. What if you added a section on gardens.com on beginning gardening using resources from davesgarden.com? You could also ask some of the regulars on the major forums to contribute material. At the end of each article you could add a "Have any questions" link that would allow the user to post a question on the applicable davesgarden.com forum and see the replies, plus it would provide an incentive for the user to become a subscribing member.

This is great conversation - thank you! I think we're going to nail this down eventually.

If I can boil this down, I see two main options:

1) Enhance the site to make it even more friendly for newbie gardeners, and also cater to international gardening more. Link to DG where applicable and appropriate.

2) Focus the site on gardens (rather than gardening in general and newbie gardening in particular). This is where Go Gardening would fit in.

Looking at #2, this was my original idea and I wonder if there is some merit here and more than I originally thought. Currently Go Gardening simply lists the entries (Parks, Public Gardens, Garden Centers, etc), gives a map and then reviews from the members.

What if we pulled Go Gardening completely off DG and remade Gardens.com into a super-enhance Go Gardening? It would have all the above, plus we can add the ability for members to post pictures of the places. So, you could visit public gardens, take pictures and then post them to that entry in Gardens.com. I could see Gardens.com being an incredibly useful feature if we did this.

dave

Chuckle...strangely enough, I was thinking we needed to add photo-upload capability to Go Gardening just last night ;o)

I think that would be very cool. What about Hidden Garden Tours, too? I'll bet you could get advertising dollars in from at least some of the gardens or click through revenue when the user went to get more information. Travel agencies put togther garden themed tours - and they have lots of advertising monies. What about Bed and Breakfasts that have gardens as part of their amenities? Tourism councils should jump in and advertise on Gardens.com like crazy. Vendors like WWF in Litchfield, CT should advertise, too.

I have only checked that site once! There is just too much else to read. And if the experienced gardners are not checking the beginners questions regularly then they wont get much help.

I haven't been to gardens.com since the beginning, because it is exactly a copy of DG and we already have DG. The beginner forums are here also. I like the above ideas, and maybe the feature discussed on another thread about landscaping. Give us the ability to add pics of our paths, arbors, garden features and tag them so that a search would bring up many pictures of different styles to give the gardener a visual idea of what to add to their garden.

What about some simpler version of Plant Scout? Vendors could pay to have their name come up when someone searches on where to buy Forsythia or daylilies or something. I'm thinking more basic than our Genus, species, cultivar way of finding items for sale here.

Prior to DG, Googling a plant to try to find where to buy it was overwhelming. When I joined DG, I wasn't aware of the Plant Scout feature for a while, but sure was glad when I discovered it.

How about an interactive "plant finder" than takes advantage of our Plant Files?

If a new gardener is wondering what they could grow in their particular situation, they could choose from a variety of clickable options. Such as ~

Zone range
Sun / Part Sun / Shade
Annual / Perennial
Flower / Shrub / Tree / Vine
Fragrant / Non-fragrant
~ etc..

I also never visit Gardens.com, I do try and help out answering questions on the beginner forums, but I always access them through DG. But if Gardens had different features than DG, then I would definitely visit it more. I like the idea of expanding Go Gardening, I think that is a great feature. And I also like the idea of doing something more with Plant Scout--I don't know if it needs to be simplified, but I would love to see it expanded to include more companies. It's a great feature, but I've been disappointed a couple times when I found a plant I really liked but it didn't have any listing in Plant Scout so I had to spend hours googling trying to find someone who sold it.

PLEASE add a feature to the Go Gardening search results so that we can print the results on a single page (directions, address, phone #, mini google map, etc but not the feedback) so that we can print and actually 'Go Gardening'

I don't go to Gardens.com either. With everything available on DG and all of my other obligations to life in general...I just don't have the time to dig into Gardens.com.

So, will 'Go Gardening' be removed from DG altogether? No subscription required?

I dunno, but what if we look at it from the point of view of the contributer, the DG subscribers who have/will input the info. Maybe some different issues will arise. Such as, would a subscriber/contributer feel like they are paying for the priviledge of providing free info for the masses? Yes, they will get the benefit of all that information, too, however they may feel it would mean a dilution of the information of 'trusted' subscriber folks under the DG umbrella.

Sandy

I guess I don't see a big difference between Go Gardening and the Watchdog, which has always been free.

Most of the entries for both features have been entered by an admin (errr......namely me, although I'm eternally grateful when others take the time to submit entries to Go Gardening and/or the Watchdog!!!! hint, hint, hint ;o)

The Watchdog has undoubtedly benefited from DG subscribers' comments - and in turn, subscribers have have benefited from having the Watchdog and the reviews at hand.

But through the years, the vast majority of the reviews for the Watchdog have come from non-subscribed members and visitors who register to leave feedback, not from DG subscribers.

My guess is that Go Gardening will be pretty much the same - many subscribers will share what they know about their local garden spots, and also use Go Gardening as a handy reference tool, but in the long run, most of the reviews will come from non-subscribers.

I hope I didn't offend you in anyway Terry, we all appreciate your hard work, that's for sure! I was just playing the devil's advocate. I didn't realize the statistic that most reviews are from non-subscribers.

Sandy

Oh - definitely no offense taken ;o) I was just trying to put Go Gardening into perspective and place it in the same context of the other free features, such as the Watchdog, Bookworm, etc.

Dave - I have an idea on how to use gardens.com: create a "How To" database.

For instance - I have some canna that grew seeds. I wanted to sow them - they're extremely hard. I looked through lots of forums to try and find how to go about "nicking" these seeds - never found anything. I think a "How To" section on DG would be a great asset; you certainly have a huge knowledge base among your members, that you could tap into.

Just a thought.

Steve