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Topic: StockFresh - Is the opportunity passing?  

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peter_stockfresh
« Reply #25 on: December 22, 2011, 07:21 »

Hi Everyone,

I know you all have very high expectations of Stockfresh, and we're trying to live up to that. However, please don't forget that we're a small team with limited funding as opposed to other newer agencies who have either had huge investments (Depositphotos) or have a massive community to build on (Photodune). Without those it's simply not realistic to expect stellar growth so soon. Stockxpert started off quick because we had 500,000 potential customers on SXC already, but keep in mind that it took 4 years for SXC to grow that big. It's very easy to build on a huge community, but when you start literally from zero, it takes time to build a customer base, get your name out, establish yourself, saturate the search engines etc. It's a lot of work and whoever thinks it's possible to become successful within just 1-2 years has no idea what it takes to establish a business like this. Anyway, we're working on it, I believe we're on the right track because traffic is growing nicely and even though sales might be disappointing at the moment, I hope one day you'll all be satisfied! Smiley

Happy holidays!
Peter


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DepositPhotos.com
velocicarpo



« Reply #26 on: December 22, 2011, 08:53 »

Thanks for the update Peter! I am definitly continuing to upload and know perfectly what you talk about when you say it takes time to establish a new business.


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Microstock Posts



« Reply #27 on: December 22, 2011, 09:00 »

Yes true, it does take a while for an agency to establish itself. I would say that we should keep supporting sf and stay patient. If it does take off eventually then at least sf aren't the kind of agency who would do a money grab like ft and IS, or so I would hope.


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helix7


« Reply #28 on: December 22, 2011, 15:32 »

Thanks for the reply, Peter.

I do understand that it takes time to build up the company, especially from scratch and without the boost from a very popular free image site like SXC. But no one is expecting stellar growth, either. Just some sign of life. A lot of people here make more money with their own personal websites than they do with StockFresh, and that just doesn't make any sense when SF does have a lot going for it. It's not just another 1 million+ collection. I don't know about everyone else, but I didn't upload all of my old junk from years ago. What you've got on SF is the better and most recent 50-60% of my portfolio. I'd assume that most people focus on their more recent work when uploading, so your collection is a bit more refined than most. It's 1 million strong images, not many millions of images propped up by old stuff.

I'm still pulling for you, Peter, I really am. It's just not so easy to stay positive with almost zero earnings.

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Noedelhap



« Reply #29 on: January 10, 2012, 21:23 »

I'm staying in as well. Uploading takes no time (I upload to all sites at once) so there's nothing to lose. But I think more marketing couldn't hurt.


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luissantos84

Dreamstime GaugeiStock Gauge
« Reply #30 on: January 10, 2012, 21:41 »

I'm staying in as well. Uploading takes no time (I upload to all sites at once) so there's nothing to lose. But I think more marketing couldn't hurt.

my exact thoughts, I would say until then lower the min payout to 30$


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Mantis
« Reply #31 on: January 10, 2012, 21:48 »

I'm staying in as well. Uploading takes no time (I upload to all sites at once) so there's nothing to lose. But I think more marketing couldn't hurt.

my exact thoughts, I would say until then lower the min payout to 30$

I am staying in as well, but I don't think they'll be around for another year.


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sharpshot


Dreamstime GaugeiStock Gauge
« Reply #32 on: January 11, 2012, 04:01 »

Thanks for the update Peter.  I will stick with SF for a few more years.  Had my first payment, sales are slow but at least there are some.  FeaturePics has been around for years with low sales and I make more there now than I used to.  It looks like slow growth is possible, it's very hard with us impatient contributors though.

I'm not surprised some people do better with their own site, they have no competition on their site.  Are they including all the software and hosting expenses though?  SF doesn't cost me anything other than the very little time it takes to process my new uploads.


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Wim


« Reply #33 on: January 11, 2012, 05:07 »

Application review took over a week so I cancelled out.

Maybe I'll give them another try someday.


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cthoman



« Reply #34 on: January 11, 2012, 10:45 »

Are they including all the software and hosting expenses though?  SF doesn't cost me anything other than the very little time it takes to process my new uploads.

Those costs really aren't that much and they are business expenses. Anyway...

It will be interesting to see how SF develops over the next few years. I like that they've been pretty open with communication and listening to their contributors.


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RT

Dreamstime GaugeiStock Gauge
« Reply #35 on: January 11, 2012, 11:24 »

It's a lot of work and whoever thinks it's possible to become successful within just 1-2 years has no idea what it takes to establish a business like this.

I've been with Photodune less than a month, only half of my portfolio is online and I've made more money with them that I have with Stockfresh since it started 18 months ago. Sorry Peter you're a nice guy and I wish you the best but I've had enough of the excuses and empty promises, I upload my photos to agencies so that they can market and actually sell my work, I've lost faith that's ever going to happen with Stockfresh.


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THP



« Reply #36 on: January 11, 2012, 22:25 »

Stockfresh is one of the slowest performing agencies for me. I to though, like many others, are hoping to stick it out with them in hopes of better times ahead.  But seriously, some advertising should be happening and driving the push for more buyers.

There will come a point where none of us will be too keen to keep hanging on if nothing improves in the near future.


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Artemis


« Reply #37 on: January 11, 2012, 22:52 »

It's going a tad slow indeed, but i see less and less time between different downloads, so i'd think there is some growth. The site excells in its simplicity and user-friendliness and the quality of the collection looks excellent...you guys have a lot going for you, i'm in for the long haul too Smiley (unfortunately im a small fish)
I also like contributors now can convert their royalties into credits (at a nice rate!)!


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peter_stockfresh
« Reply #38 on: January 12, 2012, 12:16 »

It's a lot of work and whoever thinks it's possible to become successful within just 1-2 years has no idea what it takes to establish a business like this.

I've been with Photodune less than a month, only half of my portfolio is online and I've made more money with them that I have with Stockfresh since it started 18 months ago. Sorry Peter you're a nice guy and I wish you the best but I've had enough of the excuses and empty promises, I upload my photos to agencies so that they can market and actually sell my work, I've lost faith that's ever going to happen with Stockfresh.

What excuses? Smiley I'm just telling you what's going on.
Photodune: started with around 1 million potential customers - Stockfresh: started with 0 potential customers.
How on earth would we be able to compete with that at this point?
I'm not going to be ashamed just because we are smaller, especially since traffic is going nicely.
I understand everyone's very impatient (including me), but you have to start somewhere! Smiley


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RT

Dreamstime GaugeiStock Gauge
« Reply #39 on: January 12, 2012, 13:41 »

What excuses? Smiley I'm just telling you what's going on.

Umm here's another one.
Photodune: started with around 1 million potential customers - Stockfresh: started with 0 potential customers.
How on earth would we be able to compete with that at this point?

Call me old fashioned but why not try what every other single business on earth does when it starts up - marketing or advertising. Oh let me save you the time in replying with something like "we don't want to rush in and waste a load of money on marketing until we've ............blah blah blah
I'm not going to be ashamed just because we are smaller, especially since traffic is going nicely.
I understand everyone's very impatient (including me), but you have to start somewhere! Smiley

Who said you should be ashamed because you're smaller? and maybe people are inpatient because almost a year to the day you said on this forum (I've bolded a relevant excuse part):

I'll pop in from time to time, don't worry! Smiley

Well, as you probably already know we have around 560,000 images at the moment, so the collection is shaping up nicely. As for the marketing drive, it's coming but we are not quite there yet. There are a couple of very important things that we need to sort out first. We really don't want to rush it because you can burn money fast if you're not doing things right. We want to be extra careful.

A newsletter is in the works. I also post all the important news on the Stockfresh blog which I'll try to update a bit more often in the future:
http://stockfresh.com/blog

We're also on Facebook and Twitter. If there's something important going on, we definitely post it on both sites.
http://www.facebook.com/stockfresh
http://www.twitter.com/stockfresh


As I said best of luck but I'm no longer going to upload to Stockfresh, I'm in this as a business not a charity.


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Noedelhap



« Reply #40 on: January 19, 2012, 12:08 »

You guys should find some financial investors, because you can't wait 5+ years for a company to flourish, especially not in the stock industry. It takes aggressive marketing and advertising to get those customers in and make some sales. Exactly what are you waiting for? You now have the 1 million+ images, a decent website, quality images, now DO something with it.


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click_click


Dreamstime GaugeiStock Gauge
« Reply #41 on: January 19, 2012, 12:37 »

My fist Stockxpert image uploaded had file ID#150 (around that) so consider it the very beginning of Stockxpert.

After all Peter went through, I have full confidence that he knows what he is doing.

Kindly remember, that he had built a company from nothing that was attractive enough to be picked by bigger macro stock agencies, not everyone is getting such offers, I would think.

Anyway. Considering the stability of the site, review times (!!!) and communication I don't see how they are worse than any other agency in the business. We get a decent commission and Stockfresh is not anyone's sole income from stock anyway, so I don't see the issue here.

Whether it's worth your time performing those few clicks to submit your images after FTPing them or not, is up to you.


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stockastic


« Reply #42 on: January 19, 2012, 13:28 »

I'm not an expert, just a tiny microstocker, but I read a lot of stuff here as time goes by.  My take on it is that the future belongs to agencies that makie it faster and easier for buyers to find what they want; price is important too, but as long as it's withing budget, it's secondary.  The worst thing you can do is what IS did - make it a big complicated mess where a buyer doesn't pretty quickly get a page of relevant imags, all at roughly  the same well-known price point. 

This means investing time and money in developing better search (and keywording) processes and methods.

Just my 2 cents worth.


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janecat


New Member

Dreamstime GaugeiStock Gauge
« Reply #43 on: February 05, 2012, 00:54 »

A year ago I applied for acceptance - and 2 months went by heard nothing, emailed them - nothing - I watched their site but all they obviously wanted was microstock portfolios of high sellers from other agencies... so to be honest I thought why bother and withdrew and closed account.   They have alienated people by not fulfilling their promises so nope the graphics people and advertisers I work with I do not mention them in my reccomendations.  Sad really big start and no follow through.   


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cclapper
« Reply #44 on: February 05, 2012, 10:02 »

A year ago I applied for acceptance - and 2 months went by heard nothing, emailed them - nothing - I watched their site but all they obviously wanted was microstock portfolios of high sellers from other agencies... so to be honest I thought why bother and withdrew and closed account.   They have alienated people by not fulfilling their promises so nope the graphics people and advertisers I work with I do not mention them in my reccomendations.  Sad really big start and no follow through.   

That can't be true, as they accepted me and I only have 375 images up, and not exactly a high seller. In fact, as of today, a pretty low seller there.

But I do agree with your sentiments. There are a lot of people who didn't get accepted, a long time has gone by without much marketing. But since they are still around, I guess they are happy with what they are getting out of it. Maybe they are getting enough sales and contributors to "sustain".  Cheesy


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Wim


« Reply #45 on: February 05, 2012, 13:14 »

A year ago I applied for acceptance - and 2 months went by heard nothing, emailed them - nothing - I watched their site but all they obviously wanted was microstock portfolios of high sellers from other agencies... so to be honest I thought why bother and withdrew and closed account.   They have alienated people by not fulfilling their promises so nope the graphics people and advertisers I work with I do not mention them in my reccomendations.  Sad really big start and no follow through.    

I applied recently, took weeks to get reviewed and I also canceled out.
Like RT, I'm also in the processing of holding my uploads from agencies that bring nothing in return.
I'm not looking for storage space, I have HDD's for that, I'm looking for sales!
Rejection goes both ways people!
« Last Edit: February 05, 2012, 13:19 by Wim »

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helix7


« Reply #46 on: February 08, 2012, 21:46 »


Peter: Obviously a lot of folks around here are still optimistic about SF. Is there anything we can do besides uploading and keeping our fingers crossed?

You've got a lot going for you being a "fair trade" company. Us artists have extra incentive to see you succeed, so it would be worth our while to help you do that. And everyone likes to see the good guys win. Smiley Maybe there are things you could suggest we do to help boost SF in ways that go beyond just boosting the collection size. Any thoughts?

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mtkang

Dreamstime GaugeiStock Gauge
« Reply #47 on: February 08, 2012, 22:32 »

same thing happened to me, the application status was rejected long time ago, and I have emailed at least 2 times to check how I can re-apply it again, but nothing is heard.


A year ago I applied for acceptance - and 2 months went by heard nothing, emailed them - nothing - I watched their site but all they obviously wanted was microstock portfolios of high sellers from other agencies... so to be honest I thought why bother and withdrew and closed account.   They have alienated people by not fulfilling their promises so nope the graphics people and advertisers I work with I do not mention them in my reccomendations.  Sad really big start and no follow through.   


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jsnover
« Reply #48 on: February 08, 2012, 23:36 »

Great site, too few buyers. Perhaps someone (decent) who wants to get in to the stock business can partner with Peter and put some marketing money and muscle into Stockfresh. I'm leaving my uploads there, but at a grand total of $18 since last summer, it's just not worth uploading more.


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ThomasAmby


Dreamstime Gauge
« Reply #49 on: February 09, 2012, 02:02 »

26 downloads in total and just $3.5 short of a payout - looking forward to being able to withdraw. Earningswise SF is on par with (or perhaps slightly better than) FeaturePics, Cutcaster and YayMicro for me - sites that I also upload to in the hope that I'll get paid once or twice a year - still worth it in my opinion. What's to be impatient about? Get your large payouts every month from Shutterstock and Fotolia while slowly building up extra income from the smaller sites. I understand that some are afraid the small agencies will shut down while keeping unpaid earnings, but has that even happened before ? When Snapvillage closed I received my balance of ~$7 via PayPal. I was paid my due earnings from StockXpert as well when closing my account (after the Getty mess). LuckyOliver perhaps? I never had an account there so can't tell what happened..


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