Building the Rafter O Website: A Journey from GoDaddy Template to WordPress

I don’t consider myself particularly tech-savvy, but I’ve really enjoyed building and maintaining the Rafter O farm website. It’s a lot of fun choosing which photos to feature and especially exciting to update the site each spring when the new kids arrive!

When I first launched RafterO.com, I used GoDaddy’s Business Plus Website Builder. It was user-friendly and customizable, which made it a great starting point. However, it did have its limitations—most notably, once you chose a template, you were locked in. Changing it meant losing everything. Yikes!

Eventually, GoDaddy announced it was discontinuing that builder, which turned out to be a blessing in disguise. It gave me the push I needed to explore new options and redesign the site.

During my time as Vice President of the Hill Country Mini Milkers (now the Texas Mini Milkers), I built the club’s website using GoDaddy’s GoCentral builder. I was impressed with how easy it was to use, and it looked great on mobile devices—which is super important these days! Unfortunately, the original RafterO.com site didn’t look great on mobile, to the point where I actually disabled mobile view. Not ideal, considering about half of all internet traffic now comes from phones and tablets.

Even though GoCentral worked well for the club site, I wanted more flexibility and customization for Rafter O. That’s when I took the plunge into WordPress.

With very little prior knowledge, I dove headfirst into building a new WordPress site—still hosted on GoDaddy. The learning curve was steep, but incredibly rewarding. I discovered widgets, plug-ins, themes, and even dabbled in a bit of coding. And now, I’m thrilled with how the site turned out!

If you’re a fellow goat farmer wondering whether a website is worth the time and effort—my answer is a resounding YES! While the setup can be time-consuming, the payoff is absolutely worth it. A well-designed site is a great way to showcase your herd and share information with customers. There are tons of options for website building and hosting out there, so do your research and find what works best for you. And if you ever have questions or need help, feel free to reach out—I’m happy to share what I’ve learned.

Website Tools I Use (Update)
I often get asked about the theme and plug-ins I use on my WordPress site, so here’s a quick breakdown:

• Theme: While WordPress offers many free built-in themes, I didn’t find one that fit the look and feel I wanted for Rafter O. I ended up purchasing a theme from Ancora Themes on ThemeForest. It cost $59 and includes one year of support and ongoing updates. Many premium themes also come bundled with helpful plug-ins, making them a worthwhile investment.
• Plug-ins: In my opinion, plug-ins are the best part of using WordPress! They allow you to add just about any feature or function to your site. Most plug-ins offer a free “lite” version with the option to upgrade to a premium version for more advanced features.

Here is a list of the plug-ins I use on the site:

• WP Bakery Page Builder – This plugin came with my Theme, and it is the #1 WordPress Page Builder Plugin. Once I got used to how it worked, it is so easy to create pages.
• Breedr – Breedr for WordPress is the #1 WordPress plugin for breeders all over the world.  Breedr is the (only..) perfect out-of-the-box solution. You can create and manage your breeding stock, manage their litters, health screenings, achievements and titles earned.
• WooCommerce – This plugin also came with my Theme. WooCommerce is the world’s most popular open-source eCommerce solution. I use it to list goats for sale on my site, but it has A TON of functions I don’t even use. Anyone that has inventory such as goat milk soap will find this program invaluable!
• Gravity Forms – You will need a good form builder for your goat website. This one came with my theme. I use forms for Wait List Application, General Contact Us, and the Rafter O Doellars Reward Program.
• Ninja Tables – I use this plugin to create my Breeding Plan table.
• Envira Gallery – This is a very easy to use image gallery plugin. I create image galleries for each goat, a goat’s kids, a goat’s pedigree photos, etc. The images format really nicely on both computer and mobile. I also utilize a few add ons, including the watermark feature.
• Easy Watermark – More and more unethical online behavior is taking place where folks are stealing images from websites and using them as their own. Watermarking your images is one way to protect yourself.
• Slider Revolution – Slider Revolution is a WordPress plugin that allows you to create responsive sliders with many animation effects, text, image, and video layers, and many other features.
• Boxzilla – Flexible pop-ups or slide-ins, showing up at just the right time.
• Image Hover Effects Ultimate – This is an impressive, lightweight, responsive Image hover effects gallery plugin.
• WP Online Contract – WordPress Online Contract is the original plugin that allows you to create, manage, and save contracts online through WordPress. You can customize contracts using flat text files and shortcodes and view revisions of your existing contracts. I use this for the Rafter O Sales Agreement. I received feedback that the PDF version I was using was very cumbersome to “sign” and send back. This plugin takes it all online and makes it super easy!
• MC4WP Mailchimp – This plugin helps you grow your Mailchimp lists and write better newsletters through various methods. You can create good looking opt-in forms or integrate with any existing form on your site, like your comment, contact, or checkout form.
• Smash Balloon Social Post Feed – Displays Facebook posts on your WordPress site.
• Yoast SEO Premium – The #1 WordPress SEO Plugin.
• Smush – Compress images & optimize images with lazy load, WebP conversion, and resize detection to make your site load amazingly fast.
• Hummingbird – Optimize site speed with the best WP cache plugin. Cache, minify CSS & minify JavaScript, defer critical CSS & JS, smush & lazy load images.
• Akismet Anti-Spam – The last thing you want on your beautiful site is spammers! Akismet checks your comments and contact form submissions against our global database of spam to prevent your site from publishing malicious content. 

Why Every Goat Farm Needs a Website

Whether you’re breeding registered dairy goats or selling handmade goat milk products, a well-designed website can be one of the most powerful tools for your farm. Here are just a few of the many benefits:

🐐 Showcase Your Herd

Your website is your farm’s digital storefront. It’s the perfect place to highlight your animals—pedigrees, accomplishments, milk production, and even quirky personalities. Potential buyers love browsing photos and reading about your does and bucks before making a decision. A dedicated “For Sale” page makes it easy for visitors to see what you currently have available.

🌱 Build Trust and Credibility

A professional-looking website tells visitors you take your farm seriously. You can include testimonials, awards, certifications, and health testing info—all of which build confidence in your breeding program.

🧼 Promote Your Products

If you sell goat milk soap, lotions, cheese, or other farm goods, your website can serve as an online store. Even if you’re not ready for full e-commerce, you can showcase your products, list prices, and let customers contact you for orders or pickup info.

📅 Keep Customers Updated

With a blog or news section, you can share updates about kidding season, upcoming shows, breeding schedules, or farm events. It helps customers feel connected to your farm and gives them a reason to keep coming back to your site.

📲 Reach a Wider Audience

Most people start their search for animals or products online. A website—especially one optimized for mobile—makes your farm visible to people far beyond your local area. Combine your website with social media and you’ve got a powerful outreach combo.

💬 Centralize Communication

Tired of answering the same questions over and over? Use your website to post FAQs, contact forms, policies, and breeding schedules. It saves you time and ensures consistent communication.

📚 Document Your Journey

A website can also serve as a digital scrapbook of your farm’s growth and story. Over time, you’ll build a beautiful record of your herd, milestones, and memories.

🐾 Support for the Goat Community

If you’re part of a breed club, 4-H, or other organization, you can share resources, shout out fellow breeders, and link to goat care tips. It’s a great way to give back and support the larger goat-loving community.

Having a website isn’t just about selling—it’s about connecting, educating, and showcasing the heart of what you do. Whether you’re a hobby farm or a full-fledged dairy operation, a website gives your farm a home on the web that’s always open for visitors.

So whether you’re wrangling kids (the goat kind!), crafting creamy soaps, or proudly watching your herd grow—your website can be right there with you, telling your story to the world. It doesn’t have to be perfect, and it doesn’t have to be fancy—it just has to be you. 🐐💻

Now go on, grab a cup of coffee (or fresh goat milk!), fire up your laptop, and start building your little corner of the internet. Your goats deserve the spotlight—and let’s be honest, you do too!

Happy goating, and happy clicking!