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Author Topic: Shameless Self Promotion  (Read 33215 times)

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fotorob

  • Professional stock content producer
« Reply #75 on: April 20, 2009, 10:16 »
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Just for the record: You don't need to enter your postal address, a valid email adress is enough - and there are plenty of temporary ones.

I've read your free report and it sounds true what you write. On the other hand: It sounds obvious as well.

"You need a business plan" and "be an entrepreneur"...

I've heard that so much, lost count a while ago...  ::)


« Reply #76 on: April 20, 2009, 10:37 »
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Flemish - in response to your post #53 above...

I basically agree with all you stated. The wrong message for the wrong audience. Ellen Boughn is a fine example of somebody very credible about stock and who doesn't shoot herself. The CV of Ellen on the other hand is very precise with names and dates. Researching sources like Google reveals Beate Chelette sold "a" photo agency (which one?) once to what sounds like Corbis but especially that she wrote a book about some new age  "ego rythm", the kind of voodoo that only gullible desperate housewives fall for.

Apart from that, the landing page is garish, slick and contains no hard info whatsoever, except an address form in which you have to fill in your home address. It is obviously written for search bots and SEO, not for humans, with high-ranking Google keywords in bold and 10 (!) times "free".

Quote
Before you tell someone to get lost, make sure you know that your paths never will cross - because you just don't know where they end up and your success could depend on their opinion somewhere down the road.

Did you feel threatened?  ;)

Just because someone sold a photo agency to Corbis doesn't mean that the agency was good or Corbis is at all competent.  We've noticed that part B of that equation is far from competent, so it coudl definitely have been a giant waste of money?

« Reply #77 on: April 20, 2009, 11:18 »
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I have known Beate for many many years as a colleague in PACA. I asked her to write a short paragraph for my upcoming book on how users utilize photos of residential interiors. She gracefully responded with great insights as her stock company was primarily images of interiors. She is very aggressive and thus successful. She sold her business to Corbis and worked there for a time. On the other hand she is learning the painful lesson that I also had to learn that stock business lessons of the past do not easily translate to microstock. Nor do the old promotional methods work in the new world. I have no doubt though that Beate will quickly figure that out and be back to you with a more appropriate offering.

I'm certain she has a lot of good information to share but probably not of a lot of use to most microstock photographers unless they want to head out to being full time assignment or stock photographers with a trad agency. Beate has fought her way up to the point she could sell her business and I know it wasn't always easy. Along the way, I know she has learned valuable lessons she could share.

I haven't reviewed her class or spoken to her about this post. It had been many years since we had been in contact when I contacted her about the book.

« Reply #78 on: April 20, 2009, 11:19 »
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oops. Forgot to sign my post with my real name in case anyone wanted to know. I'm Ellen Boughn who wrote the blog "Stock Shots that Sell" for Dreamstime for 2 years.

« Reply #79 on: April 20, 2009, 11:29 »
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Thanks for stopping by Ellen.  Nice meeting you at UGCX for that minute or two...

« Reply #80 on: April 20, 2009, 11:34 »
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Read Ellen Boughn's response in the string. She just asked me to write a piece about interior photography for her new book about stock photography. She makes a few excellent points. One of which is that Microstock is only one aspect of photography.

My career has been on the business side of photography. I am not specialized in microstock. I teach about the business behind photography.  My company was called Beateworks, if you go to Corbis and search for collections Beateworks, Outline@home and InsideOutPix you will see all three of my brands.

As an Entrepreneur I take advantage of opportunities. Yes I wrote a book and I developed a concept called ego-RHYTHM. This concept is trademarked and my literary agent is shopping for a publishing deal. The book is for women called "Women Who Want It All and Get It, Too," to help women to become successful and manage the demands of wanting a family, career and 'everything else.' The women who are in the test group love it and my concept is already taught at the George Washington University in their Entrepreneurial program. I was voted one of the favorite cases and was a finalist with my program.

My right to be here and say what I have to say is equal to your rights to speak your mind. I only ask - can we please keep it at some level of professionalism and to topic? Some of you seem to be so into the bashing and negativity and others in this group have send me personal messages and apologized for the first group.

On whether you think you need help or not, you are right. If your business is working and you make the money you need - good for you. If you don't then maybe a little bit of an investment into education or new ideas might be in order. With whom I don't care as I certainly would not work with some of the photographers I have encountered here. I am not here to convince anyone, I am here for those who are open to evaluating if there is something that they might be able to use for their own businesses.

And on that notice, May 20th I will have a free call with Stephen Mallon. Very interesting story about copyright and how you can loose it as a photographer. Posted in the blog section of this forum.

lisafx

« Reply #81 on: April 20, 2009, 11:51 »
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Ellen, you certainly do have the credentials to speak on Microstock, as well as other aspects of the photography business. Your blog was always enjoyable reading at Dreamstime and was a perfect example of applying traditional stock know-how to the microstock arena.  

I have to admit I am skeptical of strangers promoting microstock get quick schemes under pseudonyms, and that was my first impression of the initial post here.  

However I do disagree with some of the comments in this thread which imply that successful traditional photographers have nothing to teach microstock photographers.  The principles of good photography transcend time and trend,  and so do basic good business practices.

I would suggest that anyone who is on the level about teaching any aspects of the photography business (or anything else) be very clear about what they are offering and what their credentials are to claim the expertise to teach others.  Otherwise they run the risk of being perceived as spammers, which we all see a lot of in these groups.  

I still contend that the people (with the exception of Yuri) who are most successful in microstock aren't teaching others how to compete with them.   And with Yuri's overhead for photo shooting, maybe he is finding it is more profitable ITLR to blog, post referral links, and offer support services such as keywording, post processing, uploading, and mentorships.  

If the top seller in microstock is moving toward other revenue streams, it probably means that the rumored point of dimishing returns is a reality we will all have to deal with.   In that case a class on how to succeed in other aspects of photography might be quite useful.  

alias

« Reply #82 on: April 20, 2009, 12:18 »
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If the top seller in microstock is moving toward other revenue streams, it probably means that the rumored point of dimishing returns is a reality we will all have to deal with.

Can you usefully extrapolate anything from what one photographer does? Surely you have to look at trends, cost:earnings ratios etc. Personally I always wondered whether his costs were running rather high.

Only he knows what his business model is. Then again building his brand may be more important than just selling pictures at a profit. Perhaps he wants to try to use that brand for something else. Who can tell?

« Reply #83 on: April 20, 2009, 12:36 »
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... And on that notice, May 20th I will have a free call with Stephen Mallon. Very interesting story about copyright and how you can loose it as a photographer. Posted in the blog section of this forum.

 :)  Nice.  Now that's something microstock photographer's can sink their teeth into (besides you that is).

lisafx

« Reply #84 on: April 20, 2009, 12:45 »
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If the top seller in microstock is moving toward other revenue streams, it probably means that the rumored point of dimishing returns is a reality we will all have to deal with.

Can you usefully extrapolate anything from what one photographer does? Surely you have to look at trends, cost:earnings ratios etc. Personally I always wondered whether his costs were running rather high.

Only he knows what his business model is. Then again building his brand may be more important than just selling pictures at a profit. Perhaps he wants to try to use that brand for something else. Who can tell?

Excellent point about Yuri's costs, Mike.  I thought the same thing:
 
And with Yuri's overhead for photo shooting, maybe he is finding it is more profitable ITLR to blog, post referral links, and offer support services such as keywording, post processing, uploading, and mentorships.  


You are right of course, who knows why Yuri is branching out?   Nor was my (rather lengthy) post intended to be about Yuri per se.  Obviously Yuri is only one piece of the puzzle in the many sources of data available about this industry.  :)

« Reply #85 on: April 20, 2009, 15:07 »
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If the top seller in microstock is moving toward other revenue streams, it probably means that the rumored point of diminishing returns is a reality we will all have to deal with.  

I don't think most of us as individuals are anywhere near at that point, the trendline on my graph is still very positive. I think it more proves the case that microstock is simply not that easy to scale-up as a business model __ something which I am not sorry about at all.

It's a shame that people have to be so f*ing greedy when you can actually make a good living at this without wrecking the industry that provides it. In unregulated industries there's always some individuals who will 'overfish' until there's no fish for anyone. Personally I'd like to see upload limits to a maximum of 50 images per week at all established agencies as IMHO no individual contributor can consistently produce more genuinely different and creative images than that.

Personally I'm happy enough to bimble about, doing my own thing and taking lengthy breaks for travel, etc whenever I choose. I've never had a 'job' before when I could just drop everything and pretty much disappear for months at a time without even noticing a significant drop in income. No need to even have a phone with you provided you can get on the internet once a week. The longer this lasts the better as far as I'm concerned.

batman

« Reply #86 on: April 20, 2009, 15:48 »
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It's a shame that people have to be so f*ing greedy when you can actually make a good living at this without wrecking the industry that provides it. In unregulated industries there's always some individuals who will 'overfish' until there's no fish for anyone. Personally I'd like to see upload limits to a maximum of 50 images per week at all established agencies as IMHO no individual contributor can consistently produce more genuinely different and creative images than that.

wow, that's thinking out of the box, but definitely a good point , gostwyck.
there is danger in over fishing, like the real world of the fishing industry. you allow the rogue countries to dredge your oceans bottom until there is no life left.  the same can be said about the inevitable death of microstock for those offering subs.

in a nutshell , the ugliest consequence would be: site X makes tons of money with subs,
then after the f##king greedy buyers have taken all they wanted, and stopped buying.
site X closes down and say bye to all the contributors. take any hypothetical percentage of contributors with a balance unpaid. that could still give site X a good amount to take way
after declaring themselves insolvent.
unlike a real cooperation, there are no debtors to pay, no forfeiture of assets, etc..
just close up shop and laugh your way into oblivion.

scary. but you just painted a worst case scenario of "over fishing". only losers being the contributors.
time to find a new day job???

 8)

lisafx

« Reply #87 on: April 20, 2009, 15:57 »
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If the top seller in microstock is moving toward other revenue streams, it probably means that the rumored point of diminishing returns is a reality we will all have to deal with.  

I don't think most of us as individuals are anywhere near at that point, the trendline on my graph is still very positive. I think it more proves the case that microstock is simply not that easy to scale-up as a business model __ something which I am not sorry about at all.


That's an excellent point.   I admit I will also be somewhat relieved if the big conglomorates all eventually discover that the micro model won't support their outlay.  

My graph is trending upwards too, but each year the ascent is more gradual and the amount of work needed to keep the numbers going up seems to increase.  


Quote
It's a shame that people have to be so f*ing greedy when you can actually make a good living at this without wrecking the industry that provides it. In unregulated industries there's always some individuals who will 'overfish' until there's no fish for anyone. Personally I'd like to see upload limits to a maximum of 50 images per week at all established agencies as IMHO no individual contributor can consistently produce more genuinely different and creative images than that.


I would love to see that too.  I can't see any way that it would be in the best interests of the agencies to set such limits though.  I am sure from their perspective they don't care whether their sales come from a small individual supplier or a huge conglomorate.  

Heck, I would like to buy a nicer house with more studio room.  We can afford it right now with both our incomes but I always have in the back of my mind that at some point this bubble could burst.   And probably a lot sooner than it would take to pay off a 15 year mortgage...


tan510jomast

« Reply #88 on: April 20, 2009, 19:13 »
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EDITED FOR BREVITY
Heck, I would like to buy a nicer house with more studio room.  We can afford it right now with both our incomes but I always have in the back of my mind that at some point this bubble could burst.   And probably a lot sooner than it would take to pay off a 15 year mortgage...

The saddest part of this doomsday theory is that ,for us newbies, it could mean we would never get to enjoy the spell of good income from contributing to microstock. If , as I understand, there is a slowdown
being felt by you long-timers, I can imagine how pessimistic it is for us who just started a year ago.

Lisafx, for you, at least you had already wisely alloted your income from microstock into a more viable investment (ie. real estate), so even if the micro bubble bust, you're well on your way as real estate is traditionally a more capable vehicle for both income and growth. i'd sooner invest in real estate than microstock.
 


« Reply #89 on: April 20, 2009, 19:50 »
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The saddest part of this doomsday theory is that ,for us newbies, it could mean we would never get to enjoy the spell of good income from contributing to microstock.

Yep __ I guess it's pretty much all over if you missed the boat! Never mind, it looks like designing App's for iPhones is 'the next big thing' judging by all the hype in the media. Staggering money being made apparently. Makes microstock look like mere bagatelle.

NB: Sorry to Sean and others for the use of the apostrophe in 'App's'. It's just how I was brought up.

« Reply #90 on: April 21, 2009, 00:37 »
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The bright spot in the doomsday black cloud is that the number of users of microstock are almost infinite. As long as the prices stay low, buyers will come tumbling in as the number of blogs grows hourly and the number of people using photos on websites also explodes. And no one photographer or group of photographers can serve all those needs for images. Check your local businesses on the web...I bet a lot of them are still showing those grim no photo web designs of 10 years ago. Slowly each will be replaced with a new design w/photos and illustrations. I'm totally bullish on microstock. And on the wonderful variety of images that are found there...creativity that would have never made it into the traditional world that I left. So newbies stay the course. Like Bob Dylan said: What is new will be old...or something like that.-ellen boughn

tan510jomast

« Reply #91 on: April 21, 2009, 10:25 »
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The bright spot in the doomsday black cloud is that the number of users of microstock are almost infinite. As long as the prices stay low, buyers will come tumbling in as the number of blogs grows hourly and the number of people using photos on websites also explodes. And no one photographer or group of photographers can serve all those needs for images. Check your local businesses on the web...I bet a lot of them are still showing those grim no photo web designs of 10 years ago. Slowly each will be replaced with a new design w/photos and illustrations. I'm totally bullish on microstock. And on the wonderful variety of images that are found there...creativity that would have never made it into the traditional world that I left. So newbies stay the course. Like Bob Dylan said: What is new will be old...or something like that.-ellen boughn

awesome Ellen, coming from you I must say you lifted that doomsday black cloud for me.
 and yes, i will soldier on..
stay the course. like Dylan also sang, "everybody's in despair... but when Quinn the Eskimo gets here,
everybody's gonna jump for joy !" let's hope Quinn is that buyer who likes my images  ;)

btw i miss your blog at Dreamstime, but wish you well of course ("most likely you go your way and i go mine"(BD too).  :)

lisafx

« Reply #92 on: April 21, 2009, 10:29 »
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EDITED FOR BREVITY
Heck, I would like to buy a nicer house with more studio room.  We can afford it right now with both our incomes but I always have in the back of my mind that at some point this bubble could burst.   And probably a lot sooner than it would take to pay off a 15 year mortgage...

The saddest part of this doomsday theory is that ,for us newbies, it could mean we would never get to enjoy the spell of good income from contributing to microstock. If , as I understand, there is a slowdown
being felt by you long-timers, I can imagine how pessimistic it is for us who just started a year ago.


Wow, how is this a "doomsday theory"??  I don't see this as pessimistic at all.  To me it is just common sense.  

Any reading of economic history, including very recent will verify this.  What goes up must come down, bubbles burst, don't count your chickens before they hatch,  etc. (insert your fave cliche here).

To me it is just smarter to enjoy the ride while it lasts and not take on excessive long term debt (like huge mortgage payments) against the vague possibility of future earnings.  Surely the epidemic of foreclosures rampant across the US supports this point of view...?  

The money is nice now.  I hope it lasts.  If it doesn't, I won't be devastated.  

As Gostwyck points out, there is always a "next big thing".

« Reply #93 on: April 21, 2009, 14:12 »
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Now that's something microstock photographer's can sink their teeth into (besides you that is).

Oh my, this is really becoming the Genitives Landmark Thread. That shouldn't be photographer's but photographers:P

batman

« Reply #94 on: April 21, 2009, 15:14 »
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Now that's something microstock photographer's can sink their teeth into (besides you that is).

Oh my, this is really becoming the Genitives Landmark Thread. That shouldn't be photographer's but photographers:P

rofl. Maybe English is not their first language, FD. So here is a quick rundown of when to use ' ( apostrophe) and when to add an ass, i mean s to a noun.

Case of former is to indicate possession. as in  Sean's comment; Yuri's avatar; photographer's teeth.
Case of latter is to indicate more than one, ie. plural.  Microstock photographers; batmobiles; flemishdreams.

Therefore, if you want to say flemishdreams possesses batmobiles, it would read as follows:
flemishdreams' batmobiles  or flemishdreams's batmobiles ; not flemishdreams batmobile's.

You also use apostrophe to indicate the use of a contraction (don't, can't, shouldn't).
Finally, to form the plural of lower case letter (watch how you roll your r's).
 ;D ;D ;D

Then we also have the confusion between loose (not rigid) and lose (do not win, cannot find)... but we won't touch on it today  . Perharps flemishdreams will do that for us ;)
« Last Edit: April 21, 2009, 15:32 by batman »

« Reply #95 on: April 21, 2009, 15:29 »
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Now that's something microstock photographer's can sink their teeth into (besides you that is).

Oh my, this is really becoming the Genitives Landmark Thread. That shouldn't be photographer's but photographers:P

rofl. Maybe English is not their first language, FD. So here is a quick rundown of when to use ' ( apostrophe) and when to add an ass, i mean s to a noun.

Case of former is to indicate possession. as in  Sean's comment; Yuri's avatar; photographer's teeth.
Case of latter is to indicate more than one, ie. plural.  Microstock photographers; batmobiles; flemishdreams.

Therefore, if you want to say flemishdreams possesses batmobiles, it would read as follows:
flemishdreams' batmobiles  or flemishdreams's batmobiles ; not flemishdreams batmobile's.

You also use apostrophe to indicate the use of a contraction (don't, can't, shouldn't).
Finally, to form the plural of lower case letter (watch how you roll your r's).


I always though it would be flemishdreams' batmobiles? But; how many batmobiles are there out there, and why has flemish bought them all?

batman

« Reply #96 on: April 21, 2009, 15:38 »
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I always though it would be flemishdreams' batmobiles? But; how many batmobiles are there out there, and why has flemish bought them all?


no, I always THOUGHT it would be flemishdreams' batmobiles . But, how many batmobiles do we have out there?
- semi colon unnecessary after but. a comma yes, but not semi-colon.
 - a question mark needed after the second sentence, a question.
- no question mark for the first , a statement.
 ;D ;D ;D

tan510jomast

« Reply #97 on: April 21, 2009, 15:44 »
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I always though it would be flemishdreams' batmobiles? But; how many batmobiles are there out there, and why has flemish bought them all?


no, I always THOUGHT it would be flemishdreams' batmobiles . But, how many batmobiles do we have out there?
- semi colon unnecessary after but. a comma yes, but not semi-colon.
 - a question mark needed after the second sentence, a question.
- no question mark for the first , a statement.
 ;D ;D ;D

psst bat, flemishdreams should be capitalized - proper noun ;)

« Reply #98 on: April 21, 2009, 16:34 »
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psst bat, flemishdreams should be capitalized - proper noun ;)

and it should be Flemish's dreams, am I right?
 ;D
Claude

« Reply #99 on: April 21, 2009, 16:45 »
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What is correct: FlemishDreams', FlemishDreams's or some other spelling? In Norwegian we only use ' when in genitiv when the name ends in -s. Otherwise we only add the asses without tails.  

And according to the forum codes I've been thaught, one should adress other participants of the internet forum in the exact way that person spells his/her nick. I'm sorry for writing FlemishDreams' nick with small letters, but would request that you all spell mine without large letters. Unless you're angry with me. Not that anyone has used my nick here, just mentioning it since we already are far out in the forest picking berries.


 

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