About Me

Okay, so let me make a quick introduction. My name is Ian Batten, I am a 16 year old student currently living in the UK with my parents, and one sister.

I first became interested in exotic invertebrates when I was about 13, after buying a leopard gecko. The idea of keeping exotic pets really excited me, and I had always heard tales of the praying mantis. After finding out these were available as pets, I was away! The first mantis I bought from a pet shop, which, as expected, was overpriced, and incorrectly labelled. So after buying this "Sphodromantis", I soon found out it was a "Taumantis", which lead me into the world of trading.

A few trades down the link, I had a few more species, and came to the idea of selling these amazing bugs. So, I contacted the local pet shops, and they sure did buy off some of my excess stock. I was told in the pet shop that they sell well online, which was the next step of my venture.

I setup a freewebs site (freewebs.com/mantisinc). It was very basic, I used the freewebs free templates, and that was about it. Had a few emails after advertising on various insect forums, and as other webmasters might know, it was very exciting having your first responses from a website. Anyway, soon after, me and my dad went on a basic HTML course, which would enable me to create my own website, with none of these free templates, or pop-up ads. After a few weeks experience, I created my very first personal website, which sold and gave general information on mantids. After a little advertising, I was getting around 5-10 users a day, which I really was thrilled at!

So, blah blah blah, my love for web design and scripting grew, and I decided to make a more professional website. This was then insectstore.com emerged, in early 2006. The use of a good content management system and shopping cart made it so much easier to conduct sales, and monitor users and statistics. Come the end of 2006, insectstore was turning into a success. It was raking in around 100-150 users a day, and insect sales were sure coming in thick and fast.

I had plans to extend insectstore, and thought by using my web experience, I could create several more related websites. This was when insectchat and insectads came about. A little more time passed, and then emerged insectgalleries, insectpages and insectrank. And finally, my most recent projects, insectlinks and insectsites. I am currently working on insectfind, information on this will be available very soon =]

Currently, insectstore is generating on average 18,000 hits per day. If you are interested in any advertising opporunities, then please contact me.