I love playing Wordle, so I thought, "Hey, why not create my own version for my website?" Initially, I planned to make it a private feature for my personal website, but then I figured I'd put it on Wisedocks for everyone to enjoy. It’s simple at the moment, but I aim to enhance it over time. I’m considering tying it into the membership feature, allowing members to track their past games and scores.
Ultimately, I want to add more games to Wisedocks, making it a fun, interactive site. I’ve probably put more thought into this site than I care to admit. I’ve always envisioned Wisedocks as a hub for engaging content, and an arcade-like experience has always appealed to me. However, setting up and managing a full arcade is quite time-consuming, and it's not as popular as it used to be. So, I’m exploring smaller, casual games like Wordle—now known as Wisedockle to me. It feels like a good compromise, offering a bit of fun without overwhelming complexity.
I plan to keep adding small features to the site as ideas strike me. For example, last week, I added a QR Code builder. I once struggled to find a decent, free QR generator online, so I built my own and decided to share it with everyone. You can find it under the "Tools" section of the website.
I’m baffled by why Wisedocks is underperforming in search engines. Most of my traffic comes from social media, mainly Pinterest. Facebook, on the other hand, has been a dead end. They discourage users from clicking external links, and even if I share one, it hardly gets any views. In contrast, a simple photo post without a link can rack up thousands of views. It’s clear that the algorithm is designed to keep users on the platform.
As for search engines, I’ve shuffled a lot of content between Wisedocks and FartDump, which probably confused the search engines. The duplicated content across domains may have been flagged. Oddly enough, when I moved content from Wisedocks to FartDump, it got better exposure. But once I brought it back to Wisedocks, traffic tanked, even after setting up proper 301 redirects.
It seems like search engines can’t figure out what Wisedocks is all about. Meanwhile, my new site, EchoChamberEffect.com, already has ten times the search traffic despite having only 20 funny but mediocre articles, compared to Wisedocks' thousands of pages.
I’ve considered launching a new site with a different name. “Wisedocks” might be too similar to other sites, making it hard to stand out. Several people have even mentioned they can’t find it on Google. A search for "Wisedocks" doesn’t bring it up until about four pages deep, which is frustrating. Despite extensive optimization efforts, I can't seem to solve this ranking issue.
So, I’ve decided to stop stressing about it. It’s not a huge deal—after all, this is just a hobby. I’ve been using Wisedocks as a testing ground for new code, especially since traffic is already low. It’s disappointing, given the effort I've put into it, but I’m not letting it get in the way of doing what I love. Maybe Google will eventually recognize Wisedocks, but if not, that’s okay.
It is exciting to launch a new website and see content getting indexed and served properly in search engines. It makes me realize that the issue isn't just how I build these sites, but the nature of the content itself. Google seems to prefer niche sites that focus on a single topic and do it well. I understand that; after all, you wouldn’t go to National Geographic to learn how to rebuild an engine, right? People in general seem to prefer niche-focused content. The challenge with Wisedocks is that it covers a wide range of topics. If you asked me to describe what the site is about, my first thought would be “random.”
Ironically, I’ve tried to make Wisedocks more niche by moving content around. At one point, it was purely a quotes site for 18 months, but Google still didn't seem to like it. I eventually gave up and started restoring the original content.
Ideally, I’d love to consolidate everything from my five websites under one umbrella—Wisedocks. But realistically, I don’t see that happening anytime soon.
Many of the posts on StellarHistory.com were originally hosted on Wisedocks. They performed poorly here, but I liked them, so I moved them to Stellar History when I transitioned Wisedocks to a quotes site. This is the search history for that site over the last three months:
While the performance isn’t groundbreaking, it has been fairly consistent since the site launched. Wisedocks has also shown consistent results—even with the same articles—but the difference is clear. See for yourself.
The difference is night and day. Stellar History ranks for over 1,000 keywords on Google despite having only about 60 articles. Meanwhile, Wisedocks ranks for just one organic keyword, despite having thousands of pages, including around 150 blog posts similar to this one. And that one keyword? It’s “Tontitown Dump.” It doesn’t even relate to the post it ranks for. I lived in Tontitown, Arkansas, for a couple of years and mentioned “Tontitown” once in a post—never even referring to the dump that the town is, unfortunately, known for.
All I can do is keep moving forward. Maybe Wisedocks will gain some traction eventually, or maybe it won’t. Either way, I enjoy what I’m doing, and I’m pretty familiar with working hard without much recognition. I do it every day at work, so I guess it’s fitting that my hobby follows the same pattern.
Just kidding… but yeah, I’m crying on the inside, lol. Let’s file this post under Rants, because I’m definitely bitching a bit too much. Sound good? Doesn't matter—I’m doing it anyway.
