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Author Topic: Clustershot.com  (Read 31350 times)

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« Reply #25 on: October 01, 2009, 19:11 »
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Are pro accounts $20 per month or per year?  The word "subscription" leads me to believe it is per year?


« Reply #26 on: October 02, 2009, 01:08 »
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It is per year.

« Reply #27 on: November 02, 2009, 12:52 »
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no ftp?

« Reply #28 on: November 02, 2009, 13:15 »
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no ftp?
You can if you want uplload a zip folder with xxxx amount of images in it.

Fotonaut

« Reply #29 on: November 02, 2009, 13:30 »
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I must say I like the ClusterShot model. And PhotoShelter and SmugMug etc. I have a hard time understanding why contributors want to sell through a system earning them (you) as low as $0.20 per image with these alternatives in existance. So much of the work I see from people here is worth ten if not a hundred times that amount.

I used to be an art director buying for thousands of dollars over the years from iStockphoto when I discovered that service. The low prices felt like stealing. We could and would have payed more.

« Reply #30 on: November 02, 2009, 15:11 »
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The reason someone would sell on iStock and not clustershot is because you get very good sales on iStock (or the other big 6)

What I am really concerned about is how much I earn per shoot and if I am making a profit.

If I get 90% of the sale price and there is only 5 sales at $100 each that isn't going to pay the bills.
If I get 20% of the sale price and there is 1,000 sales at $5.00 each I will start to make money.

That is the different between iStock and other sites like clustershot or even hosting them yourself.

« Reply #31 on: November 02, 2009, 16:04 »
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Do you think it would be worst my time to upload my portfolio to clustershot.com? Or do you have to advertise your port yourself?

« Reply #32 on: November 02, 2009, 16:10 »
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well they do sell from their site as well.

I don't know, I thought it was worth a try since I was looking for a way to have my 'own store' to sell through and it wasn't any work to get the images online.  I just set up the local drive thing and copy and pasted all the images there, and presto my images were online.

« Reply #33 on: November 03, 2009, 08:55 »
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Yes, it looks like the image uplaod goes fast with this.

Is there somewhere a place to the your account balance and views?
How are you integrating the site in you website or do you just place a link on your website?

« Reply #34 on: February 14, 2010, 19:11 »
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This site looks very interesting. I would be happy to use it with my own domain as a 'private' store. But I have two serious concerns:
1. I f upload like 10k photos and they fade away in a few months then I wasted a lot of time and effort.
2. 20$ for a year? I sounds a bit low for me. Will they exist longer than a few months?

« Reply #35 on: February 14, 2010, 21:30 »
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I don't like their webdav upload feature. On my setup it has transfer problems and I have to set it to autoskip with the result that quite a few files don't get uploaded. I wish they would set up a proper FTP upload or a solid Java uploader.

« Reply #36 on: February 15, 2010, 02:16 »
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Yes, it looks like the image uplaod goes fast with this.

Is there somewhere a place to the your account balance and views?
How are you integrating the site in you website or do you just place a link on your website?

you can see views and other stats in the account area
https://www.clustershot.com/account

« Reply #37 on: February 15, 2010, 03:17 »
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If a lot of us used clustershot, it might be worth paying for our own marketing.  I am holding off for now, the site doesn't quite do what I want.  Hopefully they will improve it and I will give it a go.

If they add different sizes and let us link our portfolios, I will be more interested.

« Reply #38 on: February 17, 2010, 14:27 »
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If a lot of us used clustershot, it might be worth paying for our own marketing.  I am holding off for now, the site doesn't quite do what I want.  Hopefully they will improve it and I will give it a go.

If they add different sizes and let us link our portfolios, I will be more interested.

Thanks for the feedback. We have a slew of new features currently under development. We'll be rolling them out in the coming months. Some are trivial, others are more substantive.

Can you let me know what other features, other than the two you listed, would interest you? Also, can you clarify what you mean when you say "link our portfolios"?

Cheers,
Dan

« Reply #39 on: February 18, 2010, 05:05 »
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By linking portfolio I mean a way of searching within a group of portfolios.  There have been several threads here about starting our own site but it has never happened.  Having a searchable collection on clustershot could be another option.

« Reply #40 on: February 18, 2010, 05:30 »
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I think your ideas are a good way forward sharpshot. Clustershot appear open to suggestions I hope this is one they pursue.

« Reply #41 on: February 18, 2010, 09:19 »
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By linking portfolio I mean a way of searching within a group of portfolios.  There have been several threads here about starting our own site but it has never happened.  Having a searchable collection on clustershot could be another option.

Ok, this sounds like something that will be doable with our new feature set. I'll keep you posted.

« Reply #42 on: March 28, 2010, 12:50 »
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So you heard it from us first:

During a round of upgrades and new feature launchs Paypal has deemed that we are an escrow company. As a result our account, which is our entire payment processing system, is restricted until we sort out a mountain of paperwork and by necessity change-up our business model.

You can get more information about what has happened here:
http://www.clustershot.com/blog/archive/2010/march/eatingescrow

This has been a very vocal community and I wanted to make sure that we interacted with you and got your feedback on how we should tweak our business model. The idea we are leaning towards the most is this:

We will become a listing company, much like Ebay. When someone goes to buy a photo they will pay you directly (via paypal, or whatever methods you choose). We will, of course, have a record of the sale and each month we would send you an invoice for the listing fees. Listing fees would be based on percentage of your sales. This, in our understanding, would alleviate our current affliction and I read enough of this board to know that a lot of photographers would appreciate getting the money first. After all, it's your money.

We will of course continue to charge for additional services such as a pro account (we've built awesome new customization tools that we can't launch until this is sorted out) and other additional features.

Let me know your thoughts. We're VERY open to everyone's opinions and feedback. We wanted you to hear this from us first. We pride ourselves in being transparent and forthcoming. We like it when other companies do that so we figured we should too.

« Reply #43 on: March 28, 2010, 14:48 »
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I was disappointed they didn't offer vectors at Clustershot.  :'(  Hopefully, that's in the pipeline.

« Reply #44 on: March 28, 2010, 15:49 »
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So if we are paid directly by the buyer, what then would the commission be to ClusterShot?  Right now its 12%, but that includes the transaction fees also.

« Reply #45 on: March 28, 2010, 16:03 »
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So you heard it from us first:

During a round of upgrades and new feature launchs Paypal has deemed that we are an escrow company. As a result our account, which is our entire payment processing system, is restricted until we sort out a mountain of paperwork and by necessity change-up our business model.

You can get more information about what has happened here:
http://www.clustershot.com/blog/archive/2010/march/eatingescrow

This has been a very vocal community and I wanted to make sure that we interacted with you and got your feedback on how we should tweak our business model. The idea we are leaning towards the most is this:

We will become a listing company, much like Ebay. When someone goes to buy a photo they will pay you directly (via paypal, or whatever methods you choose). We will, of course, have a record of the sale and each month we would send you an invoice for the listing fees. Listing fees would be based on percentage of your sales. This, in our understanding, would alleviate our current affliction and I read enough of this board to know that a lot of photographers would appreciate getting the money first. After all, it's your money.

We will of course continue to charge for additional services such as a pro account (we've built awesome new customization tools that we can't launch until this is sorted out) and other additional features.

Let me know your thoughts. We're VERY open to everyone's opinions and feedback. We wanted you to hear this from us first. We pride ourselves in being transparent and forthcoming. We like it when other companies do that so we figured we should too.

Thanks for your honesty about this.  I decided to try the pro account recently, hope you can sort this out.  I know a few sites have had paypal problems before, delaying our payments while they sorted it out.  Can't you get on the phone and sort this out?  I don't see why all the other stock photography sites are OK but you aren't.  Ask them why and then you will know.  Perhaps it is because they use credits, why is that so bad?  I would like to know your reasons.

« Reply #46 on: March 28, 2010, 17:38 »
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Thanks for your comments and for being a pro-account holder. We greatly appreciate the business. We have some really nice tools that at as soon as we figure this out you'll be able to play with.

What would the commission be if you sold to buyers directly? We're not sure yet and we'll probably be calling it a "listing fee" or something like that. It will not be more than 12%. Probably will be less given the fee issue you point out. We'll look at the #'s and let you know.

I definitely will be doing my best to talk with some other stock sites to figure out how they've dealt with this. Sadly Paypal isn't great for communications so we're left a little to our own devices as well.

We have some ideas and will be setting a direction within the next 24-36 hours. One of the possible directions, as mentioned above, is only facilitating the sale in information only and letting you and a buyer do the actual money exchange. This is Ebay's model. We're going to do our best to figure out the best way for sellers (and buyers) and move that way. Once we do that we can assure Paypal  that we're not criminals of any sort (which we've done already) and that they can reinstate our account for pro-accounts and services.

All-in-all we see this as an obstacle that is forcing us to think how to best do this. We hope to have a solution in place this coming week if all of the stars align.
« Last Edit: March 28, 2010, 17:41 by clustershot »

« Reply #47 on: March 29, 2010, 00:54 »
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all transactions are only in paypal i assume?

« Reply #48 on: March 29, 2010, 01:22 »
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I'm finding their WebDAV upload system is brilliant...so much faster than the usual FTP...wonder why all the micros don't have that feature?????


I don't like their webdav upload feature. On my setup it has transfer problems and I have to set it to autoskip with the result that quite a few files don't get uploaded. I wish they would set up a proper FTP upload or a solid Java uploader.

« Reply #49 on: March 29, 2010, 04:17 »
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I'm finding their WebDAV upload system is brilliant...so much faster than the usual FTP...wonder why all the micros don't have that feature?????


I don't like their webdav upload feature. On my setup it has transfer problems and I have to set it to autoskip with the result that quite a few files don't get uploaded. I wish they would set up a proper FTP upload or a solid Java uploader.
It isn't as good as FTP for me.  It takes longer than using FTP with any other site and the time it estimates to upload is always wrong.  I would much prefer FTP.


 

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