MicrostockGroup

So, it seems most of the offshore keywording companies ask around 0.4$ per image for keywording + captioning, (some even include uploading).

My idea instead would be something like this :

1 - I shoot xxx photos every month
2 - I edit all the pics with PS or LR
3 - I burn the final pics on a DVD or USB key
4 - I ship the dvd/usb via UPS to my keyword monkey in india or whatever.
5 - My keyword monkey has a contract with me to keyword and upload all the pics he receives from me
6 - profit !


now, a few questions :

1 - Where can i hire someone fluent enough in english, experienced with photo agencies and stock images and of course talented in keywording, able to FTP etc etc all by himself without any baby sitting ?

2 - How much could be a decent salary for him ?



I had a look at many jobs sites, even freelancing ones like Guru or Elance but so far found nothing...
Basically, the deal would be to get an average cost of 0.2$ per image for keywording/captioning/uploading.
I could guarantee around 500 pics a month that means 100 bucks a month, not much but a nice addon in places like India, Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, Indonesia, Philippines...

Any ideas ? Any similar experience ?

broadband internet in those countries ain't cheap too

and you might have better luck finding someone if you eliminate the words 'slave' and 'monkey'

Wow, even monkeys are doing stock now? I wonder if I can get one to take pictures for me.

Well, if you're looking for help based in the United States with 12 years of retouching experience and 5 years working in microstock for photographers who can to help you focus on shooting by handling retouching, keywords, titles, descriptions, uploading and submissions, know of an outfit that can help you. But if you're not high volume (100 new images a week), it may not be worth hiring out.

If you want a slave, there's plenty out there. But you get what you pay for.  

Send me a direct message.

ditto

You do realise you are a slave yourself, right?

You do all the shooting, keywording and uploading for peanuts, while agencies earn millions of dollars for doing nothing..

I agree with others.. slave!... monkey!... not funny!..

Another vote here for dropping the 'slave' term... Good keyworders are worth their weight in gold. There really is a difference between an image with crappy keywords and an image with awesome (relevant, accurate and clear) ones.

Leaf already mentioned my keywording service on picWorkflow... it's the most cost-effective solution around for the price-sensitive among us (myself included). You choose how many keywords you want and a per-keyword rate, the keyworders then add the most relevant keywords till they hit your limit. Payment is between 0.5 cents and 2 cents per keyword. The best keyworders in the system generally work for or above 0.9c/k, which would give you 25 excellent keywords for 22.5 cents per image (and upto 50% of that cost back for free distribution), though some tips on getting the most out of the keywording service can be found here. (We do captioning too)

Well, I'm done pimping Please keep in mind that keyworders (even cheap india/phillipines-based ones) are people too, and if you want quality work, you're going to have to pay a bit more than peanuts

... Good luck

I have collaborators who profits with me from my stock growth. Try teaching monkeys to crap in your hands if you want, won't help you with that.

To my collaborators, I give them all in all 400-500 images to keywords per month, at .46 to .50 cents each. No upload. I would think uploading and processing the images to the site should be at least worth another 0.50$. I prefer uploading the images myself to the sites, then ask someone to process them in bulk at .15 to .20 $ depending on the site complexity and time it takes to process them to the site. I would refer my partners but not to anyone who treats them like slave .

Good luck with you Zoo business.

it's not my fault if most of the south and south-east asians i dealt with so far would be unemployable for western standards.

but i also understand pretty well that doing a job like keyworder/uploader is frustrating to say the least, that's actually exactly why i want to outsource and since price is the king factor you can't expect a bargain.

1$ keywording + uploading, sounds reasonable.

per agency?

1$/photo.

By crowd-sourced, I mean the picWorkflow keyworders are 'normal' people just like the rest of us here (home-workers)... all of them are either experienced in keywording their own 1000+ image microstock portfolio (and use pw to earn a bit more on the side) or have keyworded for some of the biggest microstock photographers around. Some details on how the system maintains quality, processing time, and tips for better keywords etc here