MicrostockGroup

1. I use sRGB just because it's the default setting in my camera. Don't actually know which is better, sorry.

2. Some sites have a max limit at 50. Some a min at 10. Between 10 and 50 is usually safe. Some sites have problems importing special characters, so it's better to avoid stressed chars and weird signs. One site (Photodune) don't accept numbers.

3. Min 5 words for most sites. Min 7 for BigStock (except through the Shutterstock bridge). Some sites truncate long titles and captions, but it's a very high limit (I can't remember exactly) that you usually don't need to worry about.
Since different sites import different IPTC fields as title (probably in violation of IPTC specification), it's better to repeat the same title as Caption writer, Headline and Object name, just to be sure it is being imported everywhere.

For Editorial, Shutterstock has very strict caption requirements, which are usually accepted by all other sites as well.
I made a little tool for editorial captioning here, by the way: http://www.microstockgroup.com/software-general/editorial-caption-tool

4. Shutterstock automatically removes plurals and verb variations, supposedly because they have a smart engine which finds all variations. Other sites accept all, and some have smart search engines, some not. So it's better to add some variations in my opinion. No other site besides IS has a controlled vocabulary - thankfully - so it's useful to add BrE / AmE variations as well (colour/color, lift/elevator, pavement/sidewalk, _ise/_ize and so on...)

>As far as we can work out it seems best to prep everything to a set of common standards.

Absolutely. Search rules are constantly changing - but you probably already know since you are coming from IS - so it's useless to tweak keywords for any specific site imo.

In practice, I do not worry about limiting the number of keywords or the length of the description, I never seem to exceed the limits, except at Dreamstime, which has a limit of 50 characters for the description, as I recall.

Also I only include plurals, tenses, etc of keywords at Dreamstime. (Shutterstock's system will automatically edit out forms of words when you submit, so you don't have to edit them out especially for SS.)

I always assume that all site's search engines will use descriptions and titles.

I do vectors and I export JPGs in the default RGB from Illustrator.

All in all, I for one do not make any site-to-site adjustments for title, description, or keywords other than those I have mentioned and what Karimala said about the order of words at FT. Good luck!

Thanks, stockpuppet. I'll be following this with interest.

Thanks for the helpful replies so far.


Do you upload Adobe RGB ?

Yep!  uploading in Adobe-RGB, same as IS, they will convert thumbnails into s-rgb.

Hi, I am a former iStock exclusive who left in October last year.  Since then I have been blogging on my experiences, with full earnings disclosure.  I have touched upon a few of the issues highlighted above too.  Here is the link in case it is of any use to you, best of luck whatever you decide to do:

http://stockcube-stockcube.blogspot.com/

There are tens of thousands of isolated images on Veer with the isolated keyword

I just cut the part in question: "Since different sites import different IPTC fields as title (probably in violation of IPTC specification), it's better to repeat the same title as Caption writer, Headline and Object name, just to be sure it is being imported everywhere."

Caption Writer?
Headline?

Can anyone explain this? I don't know any site that I submit to that reads anything except Object Name = (Document Title in some editors), Caption = (Description in some editors)  and Keywords. I put in the Copyright (Copyright Notice) just in case.

SS will question numbers like dates in keywords, but you can just hit OK when it questions the spelling and they are included in the Keywords.

SS will strip out plurals with an alert, but as others have noted, some sites don't, so it doesn't hurt to leave them in.

SS Appears to only import Caption, I don't see Origin/Title anyplace? So this makes Caption more important for me as I concentrate on SS as my primary site now.

Of course, no sites reveal the details of exactly what their searches use and how they are weighted. My point was only that there is no downside to packing your title and description with your best keywords.