rpi year 2009

wiseguy

« on: December 30, 2009, 07:23 »

#link

Hi

Today I have calculated the yearly RPI (earning of the year divided by number of images online today) of FT DT and SS, the three agencies where I submit. Something interesting to report:

FT is number one by long with a 4.12 RPI/year
SS is second with a 2.29 RPI
and DT last with a mere 1.98

Interesting because that seems to indicate that going up in ranking at FT does bring some great improvement of earnings, despite the higher prices bring down slightly the number of sales.
SS is fairly stabilized and in line with last year, but down respect 2007. That was to be expected, due to large increase in contributors and images at SS.
DT is down and is the last in my personal ranking and I suppose their continue changing prices for buyers and percentage structure for contributors didn't do exactly well. For me at least.

Overall 2009 is better than 2008 as for RPI (averaged) of the agencies where I submit in micro. Mostly due to the great jump at Fotolia.

Average RPI/year for my three agencies is 2.29 in 2009. Last year was at 1.85.

What are your RPI/year? Positive or negative changes respect 2008?

happy new year to everybody!


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Perry

« Reply #1 on: December 30, 2009, 08:05 »

#link

My RPI's for 2009:

IS $4.53
SS $2.32
DT $2.02
SX $0.80
FT $2.45

BIG 5 total RPI $12.12
Year 2008 I had a RPI of $10.40, so we are definitely going to the right direction.
The rise depends propably on 2 things: The economy looked a bit less gloomy this year and uploaded file sizes increased thanks to 5D mkII.

I have other agencies also, but they are propably something like $1 combined (too lazy for doing the maths)


« Last Edit: December 30, 2009, 08:11 by Perry »	Ignore \| Logged

Kngkyle

« Reply #2 on: December 30, 2009, 08:54 »

#link

iStockphoto $10.48
Shutterstock $1.25
Fotolia $1.20
Dreamstime $1.04
Crestock $0.65
StockXpert $0.63
123RF $0.44
Bigstockphoto $0.31

Total $16.00

Throwing in the odd sales from Canstockphoto, Veer, and Zymmetrical would probably add another $1. So $17.00.

Having only 62 images on iStock kind of skews my results. The others have 200-400 images. I uploaded very little this year.


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sjlocke

« Reply #3 on: December 30, 2009, 08:57 »

#link

I don't believe you are calculating total RPI correctly. Just adding up those numbers doesn't sound like it would make sense. That's assuming you have most of the same images across the agencies. I'm not a statistician, and it's early, so maybe it does make sense in some way.


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wiseguy

« Reply #4 on: December 30, 2009, 09:04 »

#link

Quote from: sjlocke on December 30, 2009, 08:57

Correct! It should be divided the total amount by the number of agencies, to get an average at least. is not 'perfect' but more realistic. That is why my average RPI/year is 2.29. KNGKYLE for example, would have an average RPI/year of 2, dividing the total by 8 (number of agencies)


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Stu49

« Reply #5 on: December 30, 2009, 09:08 »

#link

Quote from: sjlocke on December 30, 2009, 08:57

They need to divide by the number of agencies, at the least (and that's very rough) !

That would give : $2.4 for perry and $2 for kngkyle.

Really u need to multiply out at each agency and add together for same images and divide by the total of images, etc.. Phew !! ;-)


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« Reply #6 on: December 30, 2009, 09:48 »

#link

RPI 2009 (per agency: $ in 2009/N online Dec 1 2009)
IS = 0.79$
DT = 0.92$
SS = 1.24$
FT = 0.44$
BigStock = 0.24$

RPD 2009 (per agency: $ in 2009/N downloads 2009)
IS = 1.13$
DT = 1.24$
SS = 0.46$
FT = 0.72$
BigStock = 1.13$


« Last Edit: December 30, 2009, 10:14 by FD-amateur »	Ignore \| Logged

PowerDroid

« Reply #7 on: December 30, 2009, 10:47 »

#link

Here are my totals... this was my first complete year in microstock, so I'm only showing 2009...

SS = 7.62
IS = 5.55 (just started there in Nov 09)
FT = 3.42
DT = 3.08
BigStock = 1.09
StockXpert = 3.87

Total for 2009, including the other oddball sites, = 20.51 (total of all revenue divided by port size at the site that accepted the most images, so it's not a grand total of the numbers above. I only started at IS in November, so that skews thins as well.)

The thing I'm most pleased about is that I began the year with a $.10 daily RPI, and ended the year at the exact same number. I was expecting my "honeymoon" in microstock to end and see my RPI plummet, but it has held steady. Knocking on wood and hoping that continues into 2010.


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wiseguy

« Reply #8 on: December 30, 2009, 11:29 »

#link

Quote from: PowerDroid on December 30, 2009, 10:47

Hi Powerdroid,

excellent numbers if this is your first year in micro! But your RPI should be around 3 something, dividing your grand total of 20.51 for the six or seven agencies you are in... as mentioned above, RPI/year should be accounted for dividing the total by the agencies where you have photos (not summing it up). Of course stats as this are made also for fun, but analyzing them can bring out some interesting aspect regarding your future course of action. In my case, one is to try to find out why at DT my RPI is so low and another is to keep SS RPI at least where it is.
Your 7.7 at SS is stunning!

wish your good luck to continue in 2010!


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PowerDroid

« Reply #9 on: December 30, 2009, 11:45 »

#link

Quote from: wiseguy on December 30, 2009, 11:29

Thanks for the compliments! There's a hundred different ways to break this stuff down, and all methods seem to have their flaws. Here's how I prefer to look at it... I have a total of 790 images that I have processed and sent out for approvals at all the sites. Some got approved at all sites, some at just certain sites, but I use the number of all processed images for my calculations.

I track my stats daily and I know that my average daily RPI for the month of Dec is $.101. (Was running much higher, but of course Christmas week clobbered me.) That means I'm earning 790 x .101 = $79.79 per day (average for December). Since I know my daily RPI has held steady at 10 cents per image per day for the past year, I feel I can project with some confidence what I'll be making as my portfolio grows. For instance, I expect to be at 1000 images sometime in spring, and if my RPI holds, I'll be doing $100 per day, or $36,500 annualized.

Things get even more interesting when I project hitting 2000 images and $73,000 annualized... just have to hope that RPI holds steady. Knocking all the wood I can find...


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Jonathan Ross

« Reply #10 on: December 30, 2009, 11:52 »

#link

My average RPI in Micro. Total number of sales in dollars divided by number of images in Micro comes to $22.22 annually.

Best,
Jonathan


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willie

« Reply #11 on: December 30, 2009, 17:18 »

#link

Quote from: sjlocke on December 30, 2009, 08:57

i agree Mr Locke.
still i think the calculation is questionable because there are too many variables.

how can you find the average of something if the number of images is consistently increasing across
the year?
you return is not based on a specific number throughout 2009, is it?
eg.
if i had 100 images as at 31 dec 2008, and 350 images at 31 dec 2009.
but 200 images actually were only uploaded in October.
really, only 150 images were there most of the year to earn $xxx for me,
not 350.

not a statistician either.
wouldn't a more realistic calculation be based on what you had on Jan 1 2009 ?


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louoates

« Reply #12 on: December 30, 2009, 17:36 »

#link

IS $4.24
DT $2.68
SS $1.91
FT $1.83
StockXpert $0.71
BigSt $0.67

The others would be too mortifying to calculate.


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Stu49

« Reply #13 on: December 30, 2009, 18:27 »

#link

Quote from: PowerDroid on December 30, 2009, 11:45

I track my stats daily and I know that my average daily RPI for the month of Dec is $.101. (Was running much higher, but of course Christmas week clobbered me.) That means I'm earning 790 x .101 = $79.79 per day (average for December). Since I know my daily RPI has held steady at 10 cents per image per day for the past year, I feel I can project with some confidence what I'll be making as my portfolio grows. For instance, I expect to be at 1000 images sometime in spring, and if my RPI holds, I'll be doing $100 per day, or $36,500 annualized.

If you're certain of that daily rpi, then your annual rpi should be $36.5 (obviously)

Which means you've missed quite a few sales somewhere, or you're dividing by too high a number !?
Maybe your average acceptance rate is about 60%, which gives you about 500 images to divide by

Either way you're doing very well and I hope I can keep up with you Wink


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« Reply #14 on: December 30, 2009, 19:11 »

#link

Quote from: Stu on December 30, 2009, 18:27

Either way you're doing very well and I hope I can keep up with you Wink

You will! All these guys with 1000$ per day and smirky smiles just made me decide to go flip hamburgers.


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Perry

« Reply #15 on: December 31, 2009, 07:17 »

#link

Quote from: Stu on December 30, 2009, 09:08

That would give : $2.4 for perry and $2 for kngkyle.

No. If I have about $16,000 in earnings with between 1100 (jan 2009) and 1600 images (dec 2009) my RPI couldn't be $2.4. It's much closer to my calculation ($12.12)

My calculation is only an estimate, but it's quite accurate.

I have relatively high acceptance ratios (~90%) so I have very similar porfolios across the 5 sites I listed, that's why the adding up of the RPI's makes sense. If I wanted a more exact number I could deduct about 10% from the sales to make up for rejected images.

I also have done my calculations on a monthly base. I have statistics how much I earned on each site at each month, and also how many images I had in the end of the month.


« Last Edit: December 31, 2009, 07:25 by Perry »	Ignore \| Logged

Perry

« Reply #16 on: December 31, 2009, 07:28 »

#link

Quote from: Perseu on December 30, 2009, 17:18

if i had 100 images as at 31 dec 2008, and 350 images at 31 dec 2009.
but 200 images actually were only uploaded in October.
really, only 150 images were there most of the year to earn $xxx for me,
not 350.

I get a good estimate by calculating my RPI for each month. And then adding them up in the end of the year. So each month has its amount of images.


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Stu49

« Reply #17 on: December 31, 2009, 07:47 »

#link

Quote from: Perry on December 31, 2009, 07:17

Quote from: Stu on December 30, 2009, 09:08

That would give : $2.4 for perry and $2 for kngkyle.

Agreed ! If you have the same port at each agency, then yes u should add them. I was assuming a different set of images at each agency to suit their style


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Stu49

« Reply #18 on: December 31, 2009, 07:50 »

#link

Quote from: Perry on December 31, 2009, 07:28

Quote from: Perseu on December 30, 2009, 17:18

I get a good estimate by calculating my RPI for each month. And then adding them up in the end of the year. So each month has its amount of images.

That sounds like the most accurate way to me, as each months earnings is based upon the total number of images online at that time


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dgilder

« Reply #19 on: January 01, 2010, 12:20 »

#link

Code:

IS 3386.10 ~ 45% total income.
SS 2252.69
DT 1117.56
StockXpert 308.10
123 248.21
FT 229.16
-----------
7512.66

Instead of RPI, I'm just going to drop my microstock totals in. I had about 1800 images in my various portfolios. To me, the returns of the overall portfolios are more telling than RPI or other averaged statistics, as most of my images are accepted across all the sites.


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adijr

« Reply #20 on: February 02, 2010, 11:36 »

#link

cool read! nice to see the variety here...

so explain something to me...
If your yearly (total, say, instead of averaged as is being discussed) RPI is 10$ and you've been in the game about, say, 2 years, then your total RPI is, say, ~20$ (if the first year was similar).
Now, if it took you about 1 hour on average per image (fair? including camera time, photoshop time, uploading time, and multi-images etc?), and you had them all 100% accepted, that means that if you stop with microstock right now (for whatever reason) you'll have made an average of 20$/hour?

I'm not really a (good) microstock submitter, just playing learning photography/CGI and submitting only every now and then since September 09, and mostly for testing my (lack of) skills rather than money making. So I might be heavily wrong on this (?)
With a grand total of about 10 pictures at IS, I made about 200$ in 4 months... So i guess 20$ yearly RPI?
Other sites are not worth mentioning for me....

adijr

edit: P.S.
Here's a breakdown of my short earnings - maybe we could all do this sort of thing for the 'Top X'. (Google Charts)


« Last Edit: February 02, 2010, 11:59 by adijr »	Ignore \| Logged

PowerDroid

« Reply #21 on: February 02, 2010, 11:53 »

#link

Quote from: Perry on December 31, 2009, 07:28

I get a good estimate by calculating my RPI for each month. And then adding them up in the end of the year. So each month has its amount of images.

This is a sound method for calculating yearly RPI -- either add up a year's worth of monthly or daily RPI stats if you've been collecting them -- that way the fluctuation in port size is accounted for. I hadn't done so until now, but just went through and added monthly RPI and came up with $37.61/image for 2009.


« Last Edit: February 02, 2010, 15:04 by PowerDroid »	Ignore \| Logged

melastmohican

« Reply #22 on: February 02, 2010, 12:53 »

#link

How do you calculate RPI? Is it $Yearly / (#TotalCurrentYear - #TotalPreviousYear) ?


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PowerDroid

« Reply #23 on: February 02, 2010, 13:53 »

#link

Quote from: melastmohican on February 02, 2010, 12:53

How do you calculate RPI? Is it $Yearly / (#TotalCurrentYear - #TotalPreviousYear) ?

I am already calculating my RPI on a daily and monthly basis. That way you don't have to worry about your fluxuating port size. I simply ran a sum of the column that holds my daily RPI to come up with my total for 2009.

I've always said RPI is the most important number to me. It's how I forecast future growth. As long as my RPI holds steady (and it has for as long as I've been uploading), I can predict with some certainty what I'll make as my portfolio size grows. This keeps me motivated to upload every single day.