ForestWander Free Nature Photography Success Story
Hello everyone, I hope that my story will be inspiring to those of you who have given up hope or are discouraged. I want to let you know that perseverance and determination do pay off when you do things right and with the right motive.
I began my website in 2004 (that seems like an eternity in Internet years) using FrontPage 2000. I did not have a lot of experience with other web design tools and knew a little html so this was my tool of choice. Since CMS systems have developed and I have learned to use and program a little in PHP it has made updating and growing my site very easy.
My website was inspired from the Gospel song “How Great Thou Art”. There is a line in the song that says “When through the woods and Forest Glades I wander” and that is when ForestWander was born. I have been given a passion for Nature Photography and sharing the slendor of nature with those that enjoy nature.
The main reason for my success in blogging has been the theme “Freely I have received, and Freely I give”. There are not a lot of sites that truly give away anything free nowadays. But I have always allowed my pictures to be used for commercial and personal purposes; all that I ask for is credit in some way such as a link or mention.
For instance our photography of a little country church in West Virginia was chosen for the front CD picture for a popular Gospel Bluegrass release. James King released his CD with out pictures and sure enough we received a credit in the inside cover of the CD. You can see this picture here at the Rounder Records website.
ForestWander Church Picture
This type of motive in turn has given me a huge amount of traffic every month.
We currently receive over 100,000 unique visits each month.
From January 1, 2008 to December 31, 2008
Forestwander Traffic Growing
We have also been featured in the Sports section of our local news paper, I simply wrote an email to our local newspaper the Charleston Gazette and soon a writer contacted me and was interested in writing our story. The reason I say “our” is that I cannot take all of the credit for the nature photography.
My 9 year old son has been hiking with me and taking nature pictures, helping me carry gear and set up camp since he was 4 years old! so without a doubt this has given me great inspiration.
ForestWander Nature Photography
Our free nature photography has also been choosen to appear in the Nature Conservancy’s annual calendar and was a candidate for the image of the year in best protected places. Elakala waterfalls at Blackwater Falls State Park in West Virginia is a very scenic and beautiful waterfall. We have made many trips to this area to photograph the same waterfall. I though that this one trip may have been a waste since we were having a drought but it turned out that the low water made a very picturesque scene.
ForestWander Nature Conservancy contest Candidate Photo
All of the best publicity for my website has been free publicity. It seems as though I am reaping what I am sowing. If I sow in giving free nature photography images I have been given free publicity. We are continuing to grow each year and it seems that the more I give the more I get in return. I also use the free “ADD THIS” service and so many people actually give me free links back to my site from their profiles, etc.
We have also been allowed to put free 16×20 photographs in each of the travel rest areas throughout West Virginia and have expanded to give away free post cards. All of these have links to our website and no doubt are being sent all over the country, if not all over the world! This does cost us the cost of the laminated poster and the cost of the post cards, but again I cannot out give the greatest giver.
We have made enough from donations and adsense on our site to recently purchase a new professional camera and 2 new professional lenses. We are now using a 21 Mega Pixel Canon 5d Mark II with a Sigma 150-500mm wildlife lens as well as a 28-105mm Canon lens. This is a $5,000 professional set up. I would never had imagined that we would make enough with our site to do this. But we continue to grow and to improve by now offering these unparalleled free 21 MP images and free HD video on our site.
One of my dreams is for us to make enough to open a free private school at our church in order to offer free private schooling and education to families and children who cannot afford to pay for private schooling and education. I believe that this can happen if our motives are pure and are focused on others needs rather than our own wants.
We want to thank all of our visitors and those who have donated to us, keep coming back and we hope that we will never disappoint you.
I hope you have been encouraged to keep trying, and keep looking up…
Troy & Rusty Lilly
ForestWander Nature Photography
http://www.ForestWander.com