Urgent request to campground owners

This is digressing but have to chuckle when I think of the questions by Roundtwo-40.

I have been taking pictures all my life but due to a course of events including a hiking fall, complete shoulder re-construction and no more golf mandate in 2008-2009, I got more interested oin my photography.

In 2009 our photo club had a spot at a local arts and crafts show and people were to sell their pictures. I told them I was not going to participate as I did not sell my pictures. They insisted I have some of my work on display so I agreed to do that - no pricing. I printed up some 5x7" pix and put them in $3-5 WalMart frames.

A lady in the next booth INSISTED she had to buy one of them. Harranged me the whole weekend. I kept telling her I did not sell my work. She was like a dog on a bone, so finally at the end of the weekend I told her, "OK, $35" and she was writing a check before you knew it.

I looked at her and the others there and said, "I guess I just became professional".

To me that is when you cross over between hobbyist amateur and professional - when you sell something.

I guess I have been blessed with some talent as now things are going quite well along those lines - invitations to do one person gallery exhibits, being published in newspaper and magazines including a cover shot this fall of a widely distributed annual magazine, and selling pix from 4x6" black and white to 3'x4' three section canvas prints.

But I am reminded of what a very good professional once told me when I said I really did not sell that much, but people sure enjoy getting pictures I take locally and from our travels when I put them out on Picasa to an over 100 person Photo List. And see my exhibits.

He asked, "Do your photographs bring enjoyment to others" and I answered yes.

He said, "People's appreciation is a far greater reward than monetary."

I have never forgotten that.

So enjoy, and if you - and presumably like I - bring enjoyment to yourself and others; just consider it a blessing. I do.

Lauren

Roundtwo and Valhalla:

In my opinion, could someone build their own great wedsite? Yes! Could I no. As for difference between a pro and amature photographer, maybe not much. But it would have to be someone who has an idea about which shots, angles etc are going to look best. And how to edit them.

A website I agree should be simple and clean, And targeted to the people you want to attract

In the camping world do you want families or hunters? And how about the wording?

A good ad guy will come up with attractive wording I never would have thought of.

Then there is the search engine optomization thing. You could design your own great website, but if it does not contain the correct key words, There you are on page 14 of google. No one will ever find you

If I ran a rv park I would make sure the person I hired was an rver, as he would have a much better idea of what we want to see.

For some smuck like me I would probably have hundreds of hours into trying to produce my own site. And would probably have thrown three or four computers against the wall in frustration.

If a person enjoys that type of work and wants to learn then I think it would be very doable. Me, my eyes glaze over. Truth is I don't want to learn it or do it. And if I did do it, you can bet it would come out crummy.

And that crummy website, would hurt business much more than it would help. And you do see a number of crummy rv websites. Yeah they were cheap, but they do a lot more harm then good I think. And the sad thing they could have the greatest park on the planet. But people will never know, if the website turns them off

winnietrey wrote:
But rarely if ever will it match a pro web guy and a pro photographer.

Ok, a little segway here:

I am curious, (and not picking on you winnietrey)but it made me ask the question, at what point do you become a pro photographer? Is there a registry test or something? At what level are you no longer considered amature?

winnietrey wrote:
Search engine optimization, key words, photos without glare, wide angle vs regular photos. (you will know the difference) Words used in the website, placement of text and photos.

How many pages to use and on and on.

Not to mention a e-mail contact form, A payment center form,and so on.

Many times if a website is not well done, the prospective consumer thinks hmm cheese ball website, must be cheese ball place. (Which often is not true)

A really great website, the going price is 5k to 7500. And yes I know it can be done cheaper, by someone who does it on the side. But rarely if ever will it match a pro web guy and a pro photographer.

This I know from personal experience with my own business

Oddly, I've found a lot of the "professional" websites are worse than the homemade ones. They get so caught up in snazzy graphics and transitions, it becomes hard to find the basic information (rates, location, open dates, contact info, photos)

Yes, you need to keep it up to date and you don't want it to look cheesy but sometimes less is more.

Jim Shoe wrote:

SDcampowneroperator wrote:
I would like to reply. Forum rules prohibit owners response.
PM me please.
Max

As far as I can remember, you are part of a very small number of members on here that actually own and operate a CG. Maybe you can answer. I'm guessing that most owner/operators don't build their own web sites or take the pictures for it. They're built by folks that make a living doing that and have the time and talent to do it. Everybody think back to the last wedding you attended. The pix taken by the guests seem to always have somebody with their eyes closed or somebody bent over when facing away from the camera, which often requires a wide angle lens. :)

.
Thanks Jim,
You are right, few camps of any type do design their page. We manage, update,post our pics & other info that appeal to our demographics.
Credibility is the issue I see with campsite pictures, as 'staging' , 'view angle' are so suspect when taken by management.
Hey, when did your meal at a restaurant look exactly like the pic.on the menu?
Only a 3rd party campsite photo view from a disinterested party, such as photoed FREE ,hosted for FREE on a site I cannot name, , can private camps gain credibility, unbiased, realistic day by day site views.
Gregs Mustard based Carolina Bbq sauce is a fun recipe

RV park websites don't have to be up to "professional standards". Geez...we're RVers. We dump tanks and roast marshmallows!! RV owners - take your telephones out to your sites and snap a picture of the whole site. You can be sure we'll look at it even if it's not professional.

winnietrey wrote:
But rarely if ever will it match a pro web guy and a pro photographer.

Haha...as one who photographs models "on the side", I see your argument from other photographers oh so much. No one wants to pay for photographers anymore...Point and shoot cameras have come a long way today and everyone thinks their little casio does just as good of a job. And the only difference between a "pro" photographer and an amateur is a pro has gotten paid.

CKNSLS wrote:

Sue Bee wrote:

Veebyes wrote:
A CG having a pic of every site on their website is impossible. All empty sites look about the same anyway. A sample shot covering a group of sites to give an idea of spacing & tree coverage is good enough. A pic of happy kids is fine. You have to have people in there somewhere.

Having been in the hospitality business as a small operator you don't have the money to farm out photographing & such to proffessionals. You make do with what you can do & afford for promotion.

Glitz costs money & that has to be recovered at the cash register.

There are plenty of free picture hosting sites like Photobucket, and any mildly computer savvy RV Park owner with a halfway decent digital camera, a download cord, a computer and internet access (which a campground owner should have these skills and items for other purposes as well) could easily go through their park, take a few pictures of each site, and link to these pictures on their website, all in a few hours, or the set up a Facebook page with same information.

Yes, if one hires a person to do this for them, it would get expensive, but I think that it is a matter of some owners not being tech savvy.

Some owners are not tech savvy as you mentioned. To put together a decent looking website costs money...contrary to what some people on here say.

Most hosting sites have templates. A few hours is all they need. The site doesn't have to do anything, but show information. No reservations, no shopping cart, but just show proper information in a pleasing and modern manner.

Veebyes wrote:
A CG having a pic of every site on their website is impossible.

Disagree...if they can have 100 pictures of the dog parade, watermelon eating contest and the potluck dinners, then they can have 100 pictures of each and every one of their sites.

They don't want you to see the sardine cans.