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Author Topic: Improving?  (Read 11641 times)

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« on: June 05, 2014, 21:18 »
+1
Anyone else seen improving sales? The past two months I have had a lot of iStock credit sales and got stronger Getty and PP sales. I haven't had a single iStock subscription sale yet, but that mixed with new China market, I have to say I'm excited.


Goofy

« Reply #1 on: June 05, 2014, 21:50 »
+1
I will hold off on any words until I personally see more $$  8)



ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #2 on: June 05, 2014, 22:00 »
0
After a good first three weeks in April (more sales, ELs, higher value sales), something changed around the 22nd and the end of the month til now has been pretty poor. Only the incredible good luck of having a good (for me, for now) 100% day made May bearable.
I don't do PP, but got 6 sub sales (I'm not excited about having been forced into subs).

« Reply #3 on: June 05, 2014, 22:04 »
+3
Good for you Dingles.  Wish I shared your good luck.

« Reply #4 on: June 05, 2014, 23:06 »
0
Of course it good just be a fluke. Things have looked up in the past only to disappoint. * staying positive is tough ;)

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #5 on: June 06, 2014, 06:47 »
+1
Of course it good just be a fluke. Things have looked up in the past only to disappoint. * staying positive is tough ;)
Hopefully it's an upturn for you. I had a freaky-good-for-me month last Feb, then it sank again, so I managed to keep my hopes managed in April.
If you're selling new files, you could be on to a winner!

Milinz

« Reply #6 on: June 09, 2014, 19:29 »
0
Anyone else seen improving sales? The past two months I have had a lot of iStock credit sales and got stronger Getty and PP sales. I haven't had a single iStock subscription sale yet, but that mixed with new China market, I have to say I'm excited.

Almost doubling every kind of sale, FT, IS and looking forward to subs. Something has made a lot of more sales and money for me.

« Reply #7 on: June 09, 2014, 19:35 »
+10
I had a good month once, but then they told me I was overpaid and they took it back! In face, I'm still paying it back.

« Reply #8 on: June 10, 2014, 01:45 »
+1
I think the best match is definitely favouring independents this week, since my sales have crashed through the floor.

Either that or all the customers have finally left...

shudderstok

« Reply #9 on: June 10, 2014, 02:09 »
0
i think IS/GI are favoring the independents as well, it only makes financial sense to do so. why would any company in today's corporate world want to pay 'exclusives' 35% - 40% when they can pay the independents 15% - 20%?
my bet says that with the totally manipulated RC system, IS/GI will intentionally over time make sure we all get our minimum amount due to us as 'exclusives' so that we are more competitive with the independents and less of a 'liability' to the bottom line. this is how GI plays, they always have, and they always will.


ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #10 on: June 10, 2014, 03:41 »
+1
I think the best match is definitely favouring independents this week, since my sales have crashed through the floor.

Either that or all the customers have finally left...

I don't see any change in my usual 'best match' searches to favour indies, though that's only a very few searches. However, on one of them, there are only about 5/200 files om the first page with <10 dls and in the other, it's 0/200 at a quick shuftie. So still, new files, even with quick downloads, are being badly hit.
At other times though, I've noticed that different searches have different best match results, so that in one search, exclusives  have a higher weighting, and other searches performed at the same time may have a clear pattern of indies having highter weighting (so that on several different searches e.g. positions 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10 are indie, even if they have lower sales).

« Reply #11 on: June 10, 2014, 04:22 »
+1
I don't do searches to check how best match responds, I can tell from my sales when they've turned exclusives 'off'. The fluctuation is too great and the date / image collection sold is too regularly grouped for it to be random.

« Reply #12 on: June 10, 2014, 04:46 »
+3
I don't do searches to check how best match responds, I can tell from my sales when they've turned exclusives 'off'. The fluctuation is too great and the date / image collection sold is too regularly grouped for it to be random.

My daily sales look to be about 15-20% down on March but I guess that's well within the norm for seasonal variation.

I do seem to be selling the same, relatively few images from my portfolio over and over again ... even if they happen to be fairly crappy images from 2006 say. The images that sell regularly are largely the ones that appear at the top of the sort-order when viewing my own portfolio (set to best match). There's no logic to it at all.

It appears to me that we are simply witnessing the inevitable slow death of a once-great business that has been appallingly mis-managed for several years. I'm just waiting for a major announcement from Getty that they are 'consolidating' some of their agencies, shedding (more) staff and closing (more) outlying offices.

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #13 on: June 10, 2014, 05:32 »
0
I don't do searches to check how best match responds, I can tell from my sales when they've turned exclusives 'off'. The fluctuation is too great and the date / image collection sold is too regularly grouped for it to be random.
When my sales slump (too often nowadays), that's when I check my best sellers' best match position.
Usually, its just that my sales have slumped.
Sometimes its that indies are being favoured in certain searches.
I haven't managed to 'catch', since late 2012, a time when new files were showing well in heavily populated searches.

Shelma1

  • stockcoalition.org
« Reply #14 on: June 10, 2014, 05:59 »
+4
I'm indie, and my sales have plummeted. So I definitely don't feel favored in any kind of match.  ;)

dpimborough

« Reply #15 on: June 10, 2014, 06:00 »
0
Nope no change always the same amount every month from iS and PP sales

Except for a Getty sale last month which bumped things up but then the photo was de-activated by iS so I expect to get a credit notification soon.

As to iS subs well nothing from April but it's too early to say.

All in all fairly lack lustre performance hampered by the ridiculous keyword vocabulary they employ  :(

« Reply #16 on: June 10, 2014, 06:12 »
+2
i think IS/GI are favoring the independents as well, it only makes financial sense to do so. why would any company in today's corporate world want to pay 'exclusives' 35% - 40% when they can pay the independents 15% - 20%?
my bet says that with the totally manipulated RC system, IS/GI will intentionally over time make sure we all get our minimum amount due to us as 'exclusives' so that we are more competitive with the independents and less of a 'liability' to the bottom line. this is how GI plays, they always have, and they always will.

I still think iStock see value (for them) in having searches returning a mixture with a fair amount of exclusive content. Whether they sell exclusive or indy content, they still get to keep the lion's share of what the customer spends.. they'd much rather keep 'only' 60-75% of what's paid for exclusive work (plus the very lucrative exchange rate skim and whatever else), than see the customer go to Shutterstock or elsewhere.

IMHO since 2010 a key aim has been to find the exact point where they're paying exclusives as little as they possibly can, right up to (but not over) the point where significant numbers of exclusives take the plunge and go indy, because they believe they'd earn more that way.

Guess they haven't found that point just yet, but they're getting ever closer. Of course it's basically a game of chicken, and going too far could take their current woes to a completely new level.

« Reply #17 on: June 10, 2014, 06:37 »
+1
I'm indie, and my sales have plummeted. So I definitely don't feel favored in any kind of match.  ;)

Same here.

« Reply #18 on: June 10, 2014, 07:18 »
+4
"It appears to me that we are simply witnessing the inevitable slow death of a once-great business that has been appallingly mis-managed for several years. I'm just waiting for a major announcement from Getty that they are 'consolidating' some of their agencies, shedding (more) staff and closing (more) outlying offices."


I think so.

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #19 on: June 10, 2014, 07:25 »
+1
Notwithstanding what gclk says above, which I agree with, it could also be that more of the buyers who are left are looking at what's available at $ first, and buying there if they find something suitable, without ever looking at files costing $$ and above.

« Reply #20 on: June 10, 2014, 08:56 »
+1
No improvement in sales and the site is so slow that it is taking me ages to withdraw the pittance they have paid me.  Wish they had an automatic withdrawal, would save me a lot of time.

« Reply #21 on: June 10, 2014, 09:09 »
0
This is crazy, still can't get on the request earnings page, I get taken to the home page every time I press the link.  Have they stopped paying us now?

« Reply #22 on: June 10, 2014, 09:22 »
0
No improvement in sale, and today the site is very slow for me .. other are ok but istock very slow, having issues with uploading ... ahhwww

« Reply #23 on: June 10, 2014, 09:29 »
+1
I have given up trying to withdraw my money.  Another 30 minutes of my life ruined by istock :)

Goofy

« Reply #24 on: June 10, 2014, 09:35 »
+3
Sum up in one word- NO


 

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