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Author Topic: How to divert traffics away from istock and fotolia  (Read 45395 times)

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« Reply #125 on: February 16, 2011, 01:42 »
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I think many folks underestimate power of this. Lets see, there are 273 million of photographers (according to SS todays stats) and about 10% of them are really active contributors. If just half of them decide to pull their links from website, its 13000-14000 photographers. We can suppose that most of them will pull at least 2 links (personal website, phorum link etc.) but more likely each will pull 10 or even more links. So in the worst scenario, aprox 27000 links to IS and FT will disappear. Even this is a huge blow for them, imagine if most of us have much more links then just 2. This will be double hit - first lost referred buyers and photographers (whats worse for IS and FT, we can forward them to their competition!) and second it will make serious blow to SEO and ranking in search engines.

Eg. one photographer with several hundreds posts in this phorum and IS and FT links in his signature pulls it - suddenly several hundred links are gone from ONE SINGLE photographer. Many ppl will pull several links from their personal websites, facebook, twitter, local language phorums (most of us are worldwide) and so on - this could in fact result in up to several hundreds thousands links deleted. Not something FT or IS will be proud of and it will hurt them quite a bit.


lagereek

« Reply #126 on: February 16, 2011, 02:15 »
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This Op and hers alike, they got nothing to loose but a few DLs per month but some of us have got a hell of a lot more to loose.
We shouldnt encourage these idiot-threads and especially not with people that are small fry.

* * __ I just can't stand it any more. THE WORD IS LOSE, not loose, LOSE. If you are setting something free (or referring to 'loose change') you can use the word 'loose'. Otherwise the word is LOSE. Got it?

lol. please repeat your post on every other forum on the internet too....

though in lagereek's case, I believe English is not his first language so he gets a pass.


I use reading spectacles, a bit shortsighted so sometimes I get the spelling wrong but I tell you what, my spelling were not as bad as the guy mentioning Pandoras-Pox when it should have been Box!
The pox happens to be a fatal infection.

Gotswyck is in fact a teacher in English so I can understand his frustration over faulty spelling. ;)

« Reply #127 on: February 16, 2011, 05:04 »
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..Gotswyck is in fact a teacher in English so I can understand his frustration over faulty spelling. ;)
I'm probably wrong but I also think he might just have a tiny anger management problem :)  Whatever you do, don't get a word wrong or he will loose it :)

« Reply #128 on: February 16, 2011, 05:16 »
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.
« Last Edit: February 16, 2011, 05:19 by john_woodcock »

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #129 on: February 16, 2011, 05:49 »
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Here are my numbers in order of highest pay per download, I use this as my guide to direct buyers where to go.

dreamstime  $1.69
canstock       $1.42

bigstock        $1.15
Istock           $0.92*
123rf            $0.65
Fotolia          $0.64*
Shutterstock  $0.55

*all numbers are an average of the past 12 months these are numbers not taking into account the recent commision cut since they just happened, so presumably fotolia and IS will have roughly 20% lower numbers in the coming year.


I've seen more and more people promoting this idea and I totally agree with it. On a related note, are photographer RPD's really this low at all the sites. You guys seem to be getting the short end of the stick with higher operating costs and lower prices. Here's mine for reference.

Veer            $13.15
my site    $10.00
Clipartof      $7.40
G Leftovers   $5.20
iStock      $2.67
Canstock      $2.15
Bigstock      $1.15
Fotolia      $1.03
Stockfresh      $1.00
Dreamstime  $0.94
123RF      $0.78
Crestock      $0.76
Shutterstock $0.57
Vectorstock  $0.42


I've only read this thread up to this post.  It's good to see independents trying to take control and drive the market.  That's what you should always do.  As for the exclusives bitching about this thread, it's no surprise that they're going to be a little upset if their buyers go elsewhere seeing that they're locked into these money-hungry agents.  I do feel for them but at the same time they were never worried about the consequences to independents when they sold their souls to IS/FT so you shouldn't worry about how your decisions affect them either.  The independents shouldn't have to walk on eggshells waiting for exclusives to implement their exit strategy.  As soon as they leave IS/FT, they'll be following your footsteps.  It makes no sense for independents to continue directing traffic to sites that continue to shaft them.  Why on earth would an independent want their buyer to buy their product at the agent that gives them the lowest cut?  No way!

Anyway back to this post... lightscribe and cthoman, you're both on the right track sending your buyers to the sites that have the highest RPD but you're forgetting one thing.  You're not taking into account the percentage of downloads.  It's fine to try and boost these low performing sites, but in the meantime, work with the ones that are putting the most money in your pockets.  If DT is your number one site, don't go suddenly directing all your traffic to GL just because their two downloads gave you the highest RPD.  The number of downloads have to be considered if you want to make good business decisions and that's why you need to make your decisions based on the weighted average RPD, not just the RPD.  I know many of you aren't accountants so I want to help you out.  There are a lot here that I've butted heads with in the past but just put that crap behind you for a second.  Don't ignore this advice just because you don't like me.  I'm genuinely trying to help. 

To get the average weighted RPDs, list your revenue and downloads for each agent and total them.  Then list your RPDs for each agent and the total.  To assign weights to these, calculate the percentage of total downloads for each agent and then multiply your RPD with the assigned weight to get the weighted average.   I've probably confused some of you so I've attached a copy of my own figures over a period of time below:



You can see from my figures that the agent with the highest RPD is Graphic Leftovers but if you take downloads into account it's one of my worst performing agents.  These agents take at least 50% of your earnings so they should do their own marketing to drive traffic to their sites.  It's okay to promote them to some extent but you should promote your highest performers.  Also because the microstock business is so volatile, I'd avoid making decisions based over long periods of time.  Using 6 monthly data is plenty.  I personally would be focusing on the last three months or look at both.  So for me, I drive most of my traffic to DT and Canstock, having the highest weighted average RPDs but because GL has the highest RPD and has potential for future earnings, I promote them a little as well.

I hope I've helped some of you.

Cheers :)

lagereek

« Reply #130 on: February 16, 2011, 05:54 »
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..Gotswyck is in fact a teacher in English so I can understand his frustration over faulty spelling. ;)
I'm probably wrong but I also think he might just have a tiny anger management problem :)  Whatever you do, don't get a word wrong or he will loose it :)

Are you sure its not LOSE it??  nah maybe your right it must be loost it. ;)

Microbius

« Reply #131 on: February 16, 2011, 06:08 »
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Not sure why there's any argument here. It's common sense that you don't direct buyers to sites with lower RPD.
No one should be sending buyers or linking to IStock or Fotolia anyway (unless their exclusive of course, but then again this thread clearly doesn't apply to them)
Some buyers will be leaving IS, but for the most part these will be ones that are also contributors unhappy with their treatment.
The biggest impact will be on new buyers that don't know microstock and will use the first site they are directed to, and are likely to stick to it when they realize the content across all the sites is pretty similar.

« Reply #132 on: February 16, 2011, 09:57 »
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 ::)
« Last Edit: February 16, 2011, 11:15 by john_woodcock »

« Reply #133 on: February 16, 2011, 10:19 »
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Anyway back to this post... lightscribe and cthoman, you're both on the right track sending your buyers to the sites that have the highest RPD but you're forgetting one thing.  You're not taking into account the percentage of downloads.  It's fine to try and boost these low performing sites, but in the meantime, work with the ones that are putting the most money in your pockets. 

I didn't quite understand this. Why does the sales part matter? It seems like if you factor in sales, you're back to promoting the status quo. Plus, sites with more downloads usually have a lower RPD because they sell volume (like SS subscriptions).

I'm only promoting my own site now, so the point is probably moot. But, I wouldn't mind hearing it because I didn't understand.

Microbius

« Reply #134 on: February 16, 2011, 10:53 »
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I don't get why the numbers of previous downloads are relevant either.
The new purchase is worth more to me on a site with better RPD, irrespective of which site has historically given me more downloads (even if that means that site has given me a bigger income overall in the past)

« Reply #135 on: February 16, 2011, 11:14 »
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My RPD at istock (exclusive: 40% regular dl's and ELs, 28% Vetta and Agency) is around 5 dollars, and I'm sure that this a humble figure compared with the ones of others photographers, better and more successful than me. But RPD it isn't so important; you can have, for instance, 200 photos at some macro, sell one yearly by 100 $ and then your RPD there would be 100-- so you would had got less than 10$/month from your 200 photos.  RPI --retour per image-- tells more but even so it doen't tell all the story: numbers of photos you're allowed to upload, acceptance levels, best match placement etc play a role too.

SNP

  • Canadian Photographer
« Reply #136 on: February 16, 2011, 11:20 »
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My RPD at istock (exclusive: 40% regular dl's and ELs, 28% Vetta and Agency) is around 5 dollars, and I'm sure that this a humble figure compared with the ones of others photographers, better and more successful than me. But RPD it isn't so important; you can have, for instance, 200 photos at some macro, sell one yearly by 100 $ and then your RPD there would be 100-- so you would had got less than 10$/month from your 200 photos.  RPI --retour per image-- tells more but even so it doen't tell all the story: numbers of photos you're allowed to upload, acceptance levels, best match placement etc play a role too.

thank you for posting this. it amazes me how many 'facts' here are spun out of RPD extrapolations that mean essentially nothing in terms of actual income.

« Reply #137 on: February 16, 2011, 11:32 »
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thank you for posting this. it amazes me how many 'facts' here are spun out of RPD extrapolations that mean essentially nothing in terms of actual income.

Actually, RPD has a lot to do with how much you make. If I sold the same number of images that I sold on iStock on a site like Graphic Leftovers, I'd make twice as much as I would on IS. IF I sold the same amount on my own site, I'd make 4 times as much as IS. The problem is you can't really change RPD unless you can adjust prices or hit a higher royalty level. Only a few sites let you adjust prices which I think is a good direction to move in for the industry. Many sites let you hit higher royalty levels, but that seems to be a stacked deck now a days.

lisafx

« Reply #138 on: February 16, 2011, 11:36 »
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I always wondered what Jesus's middle name was.

I thought it started with an F... ??? ;)

« Reply #139 on: February 16, 2011, 12:06 »
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I always wondered what Jesus's middle name was.

I thought it started with an F... ??? ;)

LOL! me too!

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #140 on: February 16, 2011, 19:13 »
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Anyway back to this post... lightscribe and cthoman, you're both on the right track sending your buyers to the sites that have the highest RPD but you're forgetting one thing.  You're not taking into account the percentage of downloads.  It's fine to try and boost these low performing sites, but in the meantime, work with the ones that are putting the most money in your pockets. 

I didn't quite understand this. Why does the sales part matter? It seems like if you factor in sales, you're back to promoting the status quo. Plus, sites with more downloads usually have a lower RPD because they sell volume (like SS subscriptions).

I'm only promoting my own site now, so the point is probably moot. But, I wouldn't mind hearing it because I didn't understand.

I'm not sure why you cannot see that the "sales part" matters.  If you just consider RPD, it means nothing.  If you sell one image at GL for $10 in one month, your RPD is $10 and your average income is $10/month.  If you then sell nothing else all year on GL, your RPD is still $10, but now you've only averaged $0.83 per month.  You should be looking at the weighted average because it takes into account the overall performance of the agents, not just their RPD.  You can direct all the traffic you like to GL based on that $10 RPD but that doesn't mean buyers will flock to them.  They're small fry compared to other sites and buyers may be avoiding them for many reasons, including the lack of confidence in them, overall reputation, userfriendliness, horror stories or whatever.  You should be promoting the sites that are performing and who put the most amount of money in your pockets and that have a reasonable RPD.  As I said, it's fine to also promote GL, but not at the expense of the ones that are making you money.  If you do that, you're shooting yourself in the foot.

Hope it makes more sense now.

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #141 on: February 16, 2011, 19:14 »
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My RPD at istock (exclusive: 40% regular dl's and ELs, 28% Vetta and Agency) is around 5 dollars, and I'm sure that this a humble figure compared with the ones of others photographers, better and more successful than me. But RPD it isn't so important; you can have, for instance, 200 photos at some macro, sell one yearly by 100 $ and then your RPD there would be 100-- so you would had got less than 10$/month from your 200 photos.  RPI --retour per image-- tells more but even so it doen't tell all the story: numbers of photos you're allowed to upload, acceptance levels, best match placement etc play a role too.

lol there you go.  You get it!

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #142 on: February 16, 2011, 19:18 »
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thank you for posting this. it amazes me how many 'facts' here are spun out of RPD extrapolations that mean essentially nothing in terms of actual income.

Actually, RPD has a lot to do with how much you make. If I sold the same number of images that I sold on iStock on a site like Graphic Leftovers, I'd make twice as much as I would on IS. IF I sold the same amount on my own site, I'd make 4 times as much as IS. The problem is you can't really change RPD unless you can adjust prices or hit a higher royalty level. Only a few sites let you adjust prices which I think is a good direction to move in for the industry. Many sites let you hit higher royalty levels, but that seems to be a stacked deck now a days.

So here you're actually taking "potential" sales numbers into account with all the IFs, but you shouldn't be too concerned about all the IFs.  You should be concerned about what's happening now because IF you promote GL at the expense of the ones who are performing for you now, GL could go bust in a few month and where does that leave you?  If you're going to take IFs into account take that one too.
« Last Edit: February 16, 2011, 19:20 by pseudonymous »

« Reply #143 on: February 16, 2011, 20:03 »
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So here you're actually taking "potential" sales numbers into account with all the IFs, but you shouldn't be too concerned about all the IFs.  You should be concerned about what's happening now because IF you promote GL at the expense of the ones who are performing for you now, GL could go bust in a few month and where does that leave you?  If you're going to take IFs into account take that one too.

That's pretty much why I started a site to sell my own work. It's a contingency plan and may take a lot of the worry or guesswork out of what these agencies will do next. I don't see any need to promote any of these agencies. Especially the ones at the top. That's what those large percentages I'm paying them are for. That said, I'm still on most of those agencies because they do sell, but they are on their own for drumming up customers. I'd rather focus my energy on things that are going to have the most profit potential. Otherwise, I'm just doing the same thing and getting the same results. You know those results like declining royalties, upload arms races, questionable partner programs, etc.

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #144 on: February 16, 2011, 20:55 »
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So here you're actually taking "potential" sales numbers into account with all the IFs, but you shouldn't be too concerned about all the IFs.  You should be concerned about what's happening now because IF you promote GL at the expense of the ones who are performing for you now, GL could go bust in a few month and where does that leave you?  If you're going to take IFs into account take that one too.

That's pretty much why I started a site to sell my own work. It's a contingency plan and may take a lot of the worry or guesswork out of what these agencies will do next. I don't see any need to promote any of these agencies. Especially the ones at the top. That's what those large percentages I'm paying them are for. That said, I'm still on most of those agencies because they do sell, but they are on their own for drumming up customers. I'd rather focus my energy on things that are going to have the most profit potential. Otherwise, I'm just doing the same thing and getting the same results. You know those results like declining royalties, upload arms races, questionable partner programs, etc.

cthomas, I agree with you, but that's another issue.  The point here is about driving our customers to the best performing agents.  It's not about promoting the agencies as a whole but more about promoting our own portfolios and directing the customer to the site that will result in the best deal for us.  Ofcourse, avoiding the middleman altogether and directing people to your own site is always going to make more sense than directing them to an agent but a lot don't have their own site and so when we display our work or galleries, it's still a question of which site to link to.  Making this decision purely based on RPD, isn't always the best option.  

When I create a new image and upload it to all the micros for instance, I'll chuck a refering link to that image on my facebook fan page.  It becomes a question of which site should I link to?  Right now it's either DT and canstock... ocassionally GL because I want to see them shoot up the charts.  When my port grows, I'll probably create my own site like you have and link to that but for now, I have to choose the best performer.

By the way, you have an awesome portfolio and I love your vectors!  It's great to see that you're selling from your own site and I hope you do really well.
« Last Edit: February 16, 2011, 21:42 by pseudonymous »

« Reply #145 on: February 16, 2011, 22:56 »
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I always wondered what Jesus's middle name was.
I just broke out laughing, my 9 year old is sitting beside me "show me show me" so I did. He said "Howard".  So there you have it!!!  It's Jesus Howard *. 

Oh no, Im going to LOOSE it  :P :P

lagereek

« Reply #146 on: February 17, 2011, 01:56 »
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I always wondered what Jesus's middle name was.
I just broke out laughing, my 9 year old is sitting beside me "show me show me" so I did. He said "Howard".  So there you have it!!!  It's Jesus Howard *. 

Oh no, Im going to LOOSE it  :P :P

Yep!  you have totally looost it! byeee. :P

Microbius

« Reply #147 on: February 17, 2011, 04:46 »
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Number of sales are not relevant to this discussion. Neither is the total income a site brings in for you.
These are a product of the total number of buyers already buying from the sites.
This thread was about where to send new buyers or where to redirect the existing buyers to.
When you take a step back and actually think it through it's pretty clear we are talking about two different things.

If we were discussing where to upload to then all these things are very relevant, but when we are talking about where to send new buyers to they are not.

I can't actually explain it any more simply than that.

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #148 on: February 17, 2011, 05:33 »
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Number of sales are not relevant to this discussion. Neither is the total income a site brings in for you.
These are a product of the total number of buyers already buying from the sites.
This thread was about where to send new buyers or where to redirect the existing buyers to.
When you take a step back and actually think it through it's pretty clear we are talking about two different things.

If we were discussing where to upload to then all these things are very relevant, but when we are talking about where to send new buyers to they are not.

I can't actually explain it any more simply than that.

Microbius, we are definitely talking about the same thing.  I don't understand why you would think that I'm not talking about where to send new buyers.  I want to send new buyers (or any buyers) to the site that has a reasonable RPD but also one that is performing.  If I link to an image, I will be linking to the image where I feel the buyer is more likely to buy from.  The aim is to convert my views to sales and directing new buyers to a small site that's not well established, where they have to sign up and aren't confident about the site, probably won't get me the sale.  I'm not saying to ignore RPD, I'm saying to consider the overall performance of that site by considering both RPD and sales and you can only do that by looking at the weighted average RPD.  Most designers who buy stock have accounts with the big guys and if they're new to the game, they will follow other designers and go to a site that's popular among other designers so if I'm promoting one of my images and linking to a small agency, I probably won't get any new buyers wanting to sign up to the new agency and then I'd lose the sale.  It makes more sense to continue to promote the site that has a good RPD and good sales.  I will still promote the little guy but as I said, not at the expense of the ones that are actually making me some money.  It would be nice to see GL climb up but I don't want to lose potential sales waiting for this to happen because it might never happen.

I have no idea why you would think I'm discussing anything about where to upload to.  This is a thread about two sites (FT and IS who have the lowest RPDs in the industry) and where to redirect these buyers to.  All I'm saying is that it would be great if they go to a site like GL who will make me the most money IF they actually signed up with them.  But I have to factor in the chances of these buyers ACTUALLY signing up with them.  I don't feel confident that they will so I will direct these buyers to a site that has a decent RPD but one that has a good reputation, is well established and is already performing for me. 

lol I too can't explain it any more simpler than that.

lagereek

« Reply #149 on: February 17, 2011, 06:36 »
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As an independant I must say this, IS and FT and SS, are STILL producing good sales, lots of ELs, etc.  So why on earth would anybody want to divert trafic away??
might as well put a gun to your head and pull the trigger. Its cheaper.


 

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