MicrostockGroup

Ok, this month I made up a graph for all the agencies I actively submit to, so instead of just 'all the rest' like previous months I have separated Canstock, Veer, Panther etc.

Surprises for this month
iStock's percentage of my sales was the highest it's ever been.  They didn't earn me the most, but they earned me 17%, which is more than ever before.  Bigstock and Fotolia went up 1% and Shutterstock went down a couple percent but nothing crazy.  I was surprised how well Pond5, Veer and panther did this month as well.

Oh yeah, and don't forget to vote in the polls
http://www.microstockgroup.com/pollsvote/

October would've been a BME if Istock would not have gone down significantly compared to last year's October.
Shutterstock really surprised me with the first BME of this year.  I may be wrong, but I have the impression they started pushing new files a bit more, and the results are positive.  Istock is doing the opposite (almost hiding new files!) and I'm not happy with the results.
Remember the Istock big "redeemed credits" announcement, where they said that most contributors sell 50% of their sales in the last 3 months of the year  NOT TRUE.  (at least not in my case, it's closer to 30%).

SS 30,5%,  14,5% up (BME)
FOT 22%, 10% up
ISP 18,5%, -9% down
DST 15%, 40% up (2 ext. lic.) BME
12Rrf  4,5%, 60% up, BME
BST 2,8%, 43% up
CAN 1,5%, BME (started 2010)
GLO 0,1% (started 2010)
CUT, 0% no sales
ROD 4,1%, 5% down

Rodeo did not do well, but that's not surprising at all!  They have not even added my 500-image submission of last July to the collection, because they're "too busy reorganizing the site".  They've also been too busy to pay anybody since August.  Must be a HUGE site reorganization if they're even too busy to add any files!

nice to hear your overall $$ is getting close to your BME.  November has always been my biggest month so perhaps you can break your record this month.

An interesting month.  SS was up 30%, iStock down 22%, DT up 69%, Ftl was flat.  I decided to upload the rest of my port to Deposit, which paid off at least for the month; they were 8% of my total.  And they paid out within hours of my asking, which was nice too.

Monthly breakdown: SS 33%, iStock 16%, Ftl 10%, DT 9%, Deposit 8%, 123RF 7%, BigStock 5%, CanStockPhoto 4.5%, Veer 2.5%, StockXpert (remember them?) 2%, Crestock 1.4%, Zoonar .6%.

I went exclusive at IS about 3 months ago, and while I can't say it was a BME (2008 was just awesome) it was easily the best month of the year.

It was a best month ever for me. It crushed any other month this year by $500. Hopefully, it continues in November.

I took them out of the poll because they aren't really a site anymore.  You can't submit images to StockXpert / thinkstock, people can only get earnings that are left over from the days of StockXpert.  Technically they should be included in your iStock earnings if anything.

October was good, not spectacular. My 2nd BME (March '10 is BME).

$$ were up slightly (1.5%) over Sept '10 and and 30% over Oct '09.

DLs were up 22% over Sept '10 and down 15% on Oct '09

I normally upload lots of Christmas stuff, but haven't done so this year, so perhaps it's a very good result considering.

I no longer have any Vetta files (I pulled out when they said the files were headed for Getty with no opt out) and I don't do E+.

Istock exclusive.
October 2010 well down on October 2009, which was a huge drop down from 2008. Exactly 5/8 the $$$ I got in Oct 08.
Acceptances getting fewer and fewer _ I've gone from over 90% to below 50%.
Files accepted in the past two years are hardly moving. My sales are mostly from old images I wouldn't even dream of submitting now.
The theft of our EL money is the last straw.

Congrats on the new job Oldhand - and also to Epantha who made a similar post in another thread.   

With micro being so volatile I think you both probably make the smart move.

@Gostwyck, seems like you and I are both locked in a gradual decline.  From what I gather reading some of your past posts it sounds like we have similar size portfolios and around the same amount of time in micro.  Guess it isn't surprising that we have similar stats too . 

At least it provides some evidence that what's happening is likely to be more market forces and less just disinterest in what I have been producing the last year or so.   

First month of being at least partially independent I don't think I can compare this month to just about anything with any certainty other than to say not as bad as I feared it would be.

October 2010   % of income        Total files online   
iStock              76.77%               2999
Dreamstime        1.74%                 451
Shutterstock       20.21%                 344
Fotolia                 0.65%                 106
Bigstock                 0.25%                 158
Canstock                 0.38%                 229

The big challenge is getting the bulk of the files keyworded and uploaded to the other main sites.  Focusing on Dreamstime/Fotolia/Shutterstock first then I'll worry more about the others.

Total income down about 20% from last month - but two weeks of no Vetta and E+ took more of a toll than the other sites could pick up during this transition period.   Still for every dollar I lost on iStock I know they lost more.   

What is interesting is my daily downloads at iStock didn't take as big a hit as I feared, of course the only thing being found is older files with enough downloads to keep them in the best match results.

I am definitely noticing this.  Looking at images uploaded in the last year or so (which is some of my best work), they just don't take off like they would have in 2008 or before.  It's a hard fact I guess most of us are having to deal with.  The days of instant gratification when you upload a new series seem to have gone away. 


This is very encouraging news Mark.  You and the others who dropped exclusivity were brave and principled to do so.  It's nice to hear it hasn't been devastating to your income at this early stage.  Hope it turns out to be the best choice for you, ITLR

The 4 best agencies for me were this month:

1. Shutterstock
2. iStockPhoto
3. Fotolia
4. Dreamstime

Overall it was much lower the last month. I update and sorted my list of agencies at
http://stock.hlehnerer.com/SA.html