I'm not sure if this would be helpful, because it is purely opinion.
This will be a lot of text, I would advise reading it carefully, and I also apologise for any strange paragraphs or awkward phrases.
I believe, when building and upgrading buildings (your main "agenda" for the first few months of this game, to get you started), one should focus on Warehouse first (there is no real need to go beyond a lvl 2 upgraded warehouse, 50 items is plenty unless you are stocking a lot).
Then likely, after that, the Cartographer's guild is VERY important for catching wild pets. Instead of spending a lot of money on guesswork, misplacements and Observer catchers, you will simply write down the location of _____ pet, and wait 3 hours, write down the location, another 3 or so hours, write down the location, and then at the end of the day, be able to place your Reptile/Mammal/Bird catcher at the appropriate location where the animal is expected (and documented) to be.
This, I believe, saves a lot of money (perhaps the Cartographer's guild will be changed soon, I am unsure). However, initially, building this guild is very expensive, and you will have to explore the islands a lot to find resources (a labourous process), or perhaps buy or ask materials of another Beast Keeper. Your "builder pets" must also be of quite a high level, or have (lucky) green stats, to be able to start a specific construction project, and you will also need building items, that must be crafted, by equally skilled pets. Furthermore, you will need the right blueprints and schematics to be able to build a building, and/or craft an item that is required for that building (for instance, the Townhall lvl 2 building/upgrade, requires not only basic materials, but a ruby ring item as well, which must first be either crafted with materials or aquired elsewhere).
A side note, you can stack many schematics up to 5 times to lower the monetary costs of constructing that building. You can also find written all the materials, silver coins, and required "ingredients" on this page, which is located under the Help > List of Recipies tab menu.
Where was I.
After capturing a few wild pets, and exploring a lot, you will probably either want to pound them immediately (especially if they have many red stats), as this gives a sum of 1000 silver currently (I believe this might be changed soon), or sell them on to other users at the sum of around 2000 or 3000 silver (if you manage to research their genes, or they have a lot of green stats visible, or they are of rare colour, they will obviously be of a much higher price - 10,000, 30,000, etc). Wild (no mother or father), nameless pets often sell for more than Bred, named pets, so keep that in mind.
If you manage to find a golem scheme, those cannot be stacked with other golem schemes. Creating golems after amassing a small amount of _____ material, will generate slowly, a greater amount of materials than you had to begin with, however, it takes anywhere between 5 to 10 days or so, and you will have to make do with (usually very little) current material stocks in the meantime, which means you will not usually be able to craft, or build, anything requiring said materials (this is why it is good to plan, and also constructive to build all your golems at the same time, so you will immediately be able to build and craft items when the golems are finished producing their materials "all at once").
Bandages, for exploring, are stupidly useful. Save up lots of cotton and laminaria and craft as many bandages as you can. When exploring the islands, collect materials and gold first, then move to attack the monsters in the lowest lvl order (you can view the lvl of the creature by hovering your mouse over it). After that, attack the red or pink monsters (which will usually result in a draw, or 1 loss of energy). Collect treasure chests + items etc. Your pet will probably have 4 energy at this point, which is 1 too low to move through the portal and onto another island - this is the time when you should use the bandages...On the "2nd" island, be very careful exploring and prioritize gold coins (which are actually silver coins) first.
Explore with all of your noncrafting, nonquesting and nonconstructing or pregnant pets as possible. You WILL use up your "portals to explore", as there are only 20ish (can't remember the exact number) and you will be needing a lot of xp, materials, items etc.
Do not trade any materials for vermillion. Likewise, if you see that there is a building/tradesman on the island who is trading vermillion FOR an item, accept - you can sell off the vermillion for a lot (100-250 a piece currently), or use a golem to multiply it for pretty much infinite profit possibilities, or a stable source of vermillion for researching the genes of pets.
In the beginning, you will likely be paying a lot for food, but once you stockpile food items up, this will not become an issue, and your Townhall lvl 1 should cover any monetary costs for the time being, unless you expand your stables and pets too quickly, or run into some dire financial issues (note: researching pet genes is EXPENSIVE, also hiring hunters is expensive, these will be your major money sinks).
Some of the first items you will be crafting will be the Climbing Gear and Boat, both of which are essential for capturing wild pets.
Druid Invites, vermillion, specific [Species] Magician Invites, Trainer Invites, Sex change scrolls, rainbow jars, amnesia potions, Geneticist Invites, Magic Bombs, and already crafted "building items" sell for a lot and are profitable. They are also very useful.
The Sanctuary is useful if you have 1 pet who is very good at crafting or building, and is needed a lot more for crafting multiple items and buildings in one day.
The pedigree page automatically shows 3 generations, clicking on the show-more button shows further generations. Anybody within (before clicking show-more) is in danger of incest if bred with the pet or other relatives. Inbred pets have bad genes.
If you are going to explore a lot, the State Portal Service Branch is useful for getting rid of bad-gened or unwanted, etc, pets, but you do not get any money for them currently. You do get energy-flow cards, which cannot be sold or traded, but provide you with 5 extra portal/explores. They stack up very quickly so you will likely not ever run out of islands to explore, or portals to find. At the moment, the Pound is struggling with a lot (thousands!) of low-quality gene pets. So I would suggest, putting unwanteds in the pound, and genetic-disasters to the Branch.
I'm not sure I have anything further to say without being confusing or potentially starting a site-world debate on strategy and build-orders :P
EDIT: I'm sorry that was A LOT MORE than I had intended to write. I hope I didn't forget anything.
