My first foray into the world of gardening/the care of plant life was also my last. After managing to kill a Bonsai tree in record time I decided my ability to care for a living organism was limited. After much consideration, I decided that I was not fit to be a plant father and instead ended up adopting a cat. Han Solo (yes, I named my cat Han Solo) and I are doing great, but this experience taught me just how tough anything plant-care related can be. Having said this, when I first heard of Aquariumwall.com and of the idea of Aquascaping in general, I was blown away that not only are these guys good at landscaping, they do it underwater! Jagdeep Singh developed Aquariumwall.com using SocialEngine Cloud to provide a space where people passionate about Aquascpaing could gather and share photos and discuss everything from marine plant life to shrimp molting.
I got a chance to chat with Jagdeep Singh, Aquascapist and owner of Aquariumwall.com:
Aquascaping (underwater landscaping ) is my hobby and being a computer professional my other passion is creating websites, which not only have a good functionality but also visually appealing. I always wanted to create something different for aquarium hobbyists, by different I mean something which is not a forum and also visually far more appealing than traditional forums. I was able to achieve this with Social Engine cloud and plan was to create a wall of shared photos of amazing aquatic life growing in aquariums around the world.
How has the adoption rate and engagement been on the site?
We are really happy with adoption rate and engagement on the website. Everyone loved the idea behind the AquariumWall.com and we are blown with the quality of photos and videos that are being shared by hobbyist all over the world. Also in addition to that we are reaching a Milestone of 1000 Likes on facebook. This is a big boost for our website as all these likes are from people / hobbyists who love this hobby and want to see more and more updates on the websites.
What are some tips/tricks for other online communities out there that are just starting out?
Only tip that I can share is to start a community with original idea and different approach. Now a day’s members want something different and fresh. Idea is important but one other most important thing for online community success is website should be updated regularly with new features, contents and design to keep everyone engaged and interested. All this needs to be backed up by a good software team and that was one reason to go with Social Engine Cloud. All this needs to work together for a community to grow.
Tell us about your Photo Contest you’re holding on Aquarium Wall?
Your site is really customized and looks slick. How much time went into the design?they can start voting on Facebook. This competition was loved by everyone and we received big response. Competition is already over and we are in the process of adding results to the website. We will be running these kinds of competitions more often on our website.
With the help of SEC team we were able to achieve the look in just few days. I will give full credit to Social Engine Cloud team for designing a nice piece of software that makes end user life easier. Also as SEC is based on bootstrap so it’s really easy to add new modules and implement design changes through CSS. We added collapse contents and badges to the website using bootstrap functionality; it was easy and end result is also visually appealing.
How was it working/customizing your SocialEngine Cloud site?
It is easiest system to work with and on top of that it’s very stable. Also the team at SEC provide a quick help and answered every question in detail. We are in the process of adding new modules to the website which will make things more interesting and appealing on the website.
What’s next for you?
We are looking forward to new functionalities being released by Social Engine Cloud team as that will help us to implement some new cool features for our members. Also new modules using bootstrap will be added to the website to add new contents, articles to the website. We will keep everyone updated on the new design changes.
Anything else you want to add?
Just want to say BIG thanks to the SEC team, our members and also friends on the SEC community website for helping, supporting us and sharing their ideas. Hope to see some new cool features from Social Engine in near future.
Thanks to Jagdeep Singh and all the members of Aquariumwall.com. If you haven’t had a chance yet, go checkout some really great photos and videos. My personal favorite is THIS video of a Black Cherry Shrimp molting. It made me jump out of chair.
