pancakes

MicrostockGroup Sponsors


Author Topic: level 0 is so sweet  (Read 22549 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #50 on: May 06, 2011, 10:36 »
0
That's what I thought. I guess that's not too bad, in the grand scheme of things, since as you stated, may give an otherwise forgotten, brand new or buried image a jump start.

As microstock and early images mature, I think that those images with hundreds and thousands of DLs, although excellent images, may be a turnoff for buyers, as that means the image is going to turn up everywhere. When I search, I typically search by DL and spend a few minutes going through the images with 0 downloads. I can't help but think that there is an excellent photographer out there who has just finally decided to jump in and has uploaded some excellent images with no sales yet.

I agree about images with lots of downloads end up putting off some buyers but I think thats the case already.  Unless the image is unique, it will have to slow down.  That doesnt bother me so much though.  Those level 5 sales are still nice when they come around, even if its once in a while and the subs for them are easier to swallow.
 
I usually search by relevancy, especially if its a saturated subject and Im looking for something specific.  For example if I do a search for beach ball by relevancy, I come up with mainly isolated beach balls.  If I flip over to searching by downloads, Ill get all sorts of images of beaches and balls of any sort. 

I think buyers search different ways depending on a lot of things.  Those that are in a hurry and cant be bothered sifting through bad or irrelevant images are most likely to search by download descending.  Those who are price sensitive but not so fussy are likely to sort by downloads ascending.  Those who want fresh content will search by uploads descending and so on.   As long as we have a mixed bag with something to suit every time of buyer, we should be good.  That's how I see it anyway.


« Reply #51 on: May 06, 2011, 10:41 »
0
DT and SS definitely seem to be pulling ahead for me, as IS fades away.   My real concern, with all 3, is the steady creep towards subscriptions.  We get announcements of changes that contain some good news, plus a bit of bad news about subscriptions.  If I say that I think the agencies would really like to slowly herd all their customers onto subscriptions, would that be negative or just realistic?

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #52 on: May 06, 2011, 10:42 »
0
Yes, that's right, it's:

Level 0 (0 downloads)
Level 1 (1-4 downloads)


I depends on the customer though. Nothing changed for the old customers. I think Dreamstime is working on making their pricing as confusing as possible.  ;D


LOL I know!  As if it wasn't confusing already!

Actually looking at my recent sales, I think the new pricing stucture applies to all buyers now.  Either that or I'm just really lucky.  They've also updated the pricing on the Designer's Area tab too:

http://www.dreamstime.com/aboutimages

Are you still getting sales with the old pricing?

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #53 on: May 06, 2011, 10:55 »
0
Dreamstime and Shutterstock definitely seem to be pulling ahead for me, as IS fades away.   My real concern, with all 3, is the steady creep towards subscriptions.  We get announcements of changes that contain some good news, plus a bit of bad news about subscriptions.  If I say that I think the agencies would really like to slowly herd all their customers onto subscriptions, would that be negative or just realistic?

I don't think it's negative, it's just an observation or a suspicion.  I don't know if subs are what the agencies want... they lose money with subs like we do.  I think however there's pressure to offer subs and most of that pressure's coming from shutterstock and fotolia.  I dumped fotolia and refuse to join shutterstock because of subs.

And don't worry about being negative.  It's better to speak up and be negative looking for a solution with others than to stew on a problem quietly on your own.  Personally, overly enthusiastic people (like the ones you find in the DT forum) are more annoying than overly negative people.  I can't even take them seriously because I can't help think that every post of theirs are premeditated to suck up to the admins. 

« Reply #54 on: May 06, 2011, 11:07 »
0
Are you still getting sales with the old pricing?

To be honest, I don't know. My sales numbers seem to line up with the new pricing. Did they just switch everybody over to it? I guess that was a short test period then.

« Reply #55 on: May 06, 2011, 11:23 »
0
OK, I found this in the forum...

Quote
Update: Level 0 has now been extended to old members as well. Everyone should be able to see now level 0 for the files that have no download. These files will automatically move to level one after the first download.

I don't know what that means for the other levels. I was only half kidding about it being complicated. I guess I didn't realize how complicated it was.  ;D

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #56 on: May 06, 2011, 11:41 »
0
OK, I found this in the forum...

Quote
Update: Level 0 has now been extended to old members as well. Everyone should be able to see now level 0 for the files that have no download. These files will automatically move to level one after the first download.

I don't know what that means for the other levels. I was only half kidding about it being complicated. I guess I didn't realize how complicated it was.  ;D

lol I was just reading the same thing.  I think they first introduced the level 0 images on the 18th of April with the same credits as the level 1 images without changing the rest of the levels.  My last sale with the old pricing was on 17th April but I see others on the thread complaining about not recieving the new prices right until 20th.  I didn't think they planned to roll out the new structure for quite some time but I reckon they just got sick of everyone whining... either that or they were just as confused as we were and switched them over early  ;D

« Reply #57 on: May 06, 2011, 12:08 »
0
My only real complaint with the level 0 is the 25%. That doesn't make the sale any cheaper, it just gets us less. If they had gone with the level 0 scheme without the 25%, I'd be 100% for it.

What's next, level -1 with 20%, and then level IS with 15%?

Did they change level 1 to 1-4 downloads, it used to be 0-5 as I remember, same for level 2, they now say 5-9 and it used to be 6-10 as I remember? That is nice if it is in fact true.

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #58 on: May 06, 2011, 20:29 »
0
My only real complaint with the level 0 is the 25%. That doesn't make the sale any cheaper, it just gets us less. If they had gone with the level 0 scheme without the 25%, I'd be 100% for it.

What's next, level -1 with 20%, and then level IS with 15%?

Did they change level 1 to 1-4 downloads, it used to be 0-5 as I remember, same for level 2, they now say 5-9 and it used to be 6-10 as I remember? That is nice if it is in fact true.

No they didn't change the levels.  I copied both the Jan 2010 prices page and the Jan 2010 commissions page a while ago and both of them show the downloads for each level as they are today.

« Reply #59 on: May 06, 2011, 21:07 »
0
My only real complaint with the level 0 is the 25%. That doesn't make the sale any cheaper, it just gets us less. If they had gone with the level 0 scheme without the 25%, I'd be 100% for it.

What's next, level -1 with 20%, and then level IS with 15%?

Did they change level 1 to 1-4 downloads, it used to be 0-5 as I remember, same for level 2, they now say 5-9 and it used to be 6-10 as I remember? That is nice if it is in fact true.

No they didn't change the levels.  I copied both the Jan 2010 prices page and the Jan 2010 commissions page a while ago and both of them show the downloads for each level as they are today.

That's odd, as I thought the 5th sale was still level 1... In fact I had the 6th sale of an image today (level 2), and the 5th sale was level 1 on 3/22/2011 with 2010 credits.

After some reflection I suppose that still fits what you are saying, as it had sold 4 times before. Just a different way of looking at the number of times it has sold before vs. the number of that specific sale.

TheSmilingAssassin

    This user is banned.
« Reply #60 on: May 06, 2011, 21:33 »
0
That's odd, as I thought the 5th sale was still level 1... In fact I had the 6th sale of an image today (level 2), and the 5th sale was level 1 on 3/22/2011 with 2010 credits.

After some reflection I suppose that still fits what you are saying, as it had sold 4 times before. Just a different way of looking at the number of times it has sold before vs. the number of that specific sale.


You're right, the 5th sale is sold as level 1 and I agree that it's wrong to do that.  I've seen a few complaining about this issue in the forums before but Dreamstime doesn't see it that way.

All I'm saying is that their pricing structure download levels have remained the same... not that I think they're correct or that I agree with them lol.

Nikitu explains it on this thread.  

http://www.dreamstime.com/thread_22673

« Reply #61 on: June 07, 2011, 16:27 »
0
I have lots of 0 level sales lately. Anyone else?

WarrenPrice

« Reply #62 on: June 07, 2011, 16:39 »
0
^^ mostly zero level sales but not a lot of any level.  I seriously believe the search engine is adjusted weekly.  I should get a few sales next week ... if my theory holds.   8)


PS:  RPD thus far = 31 cents.   >:(
« Last Edit: June 07, 2011, 16:48 by WarrenPrice »

« Reply #63 on: June 07, 2011, 19:34 »
0
today had a "nice day", 7 sales (6 subs for 0.35$ each)

« Reply #64 on: June 08, 2011, 02:09 »
0
I'm very happy with Dreamstime the last months. Lots of XL sales and Dreamstime is now nr 2 after SS. Istock  has sunk below 123RF and is hardly worth looking at anymore.  Dreamstime is doing well!

« Reply #65 on: June 08, 2011, 10:03 »
0
My only real complaint with the level 0 is the 25%. That doesn't make the sale any cheaper, it just gets us less. If they had gone with the level 0 scheme without the 25%, I'd be 100% for it.

What's next, level -1 with 20%, and then level IS with 15%?

Did they change level 1 to 1-4 downloads, it used to be 0-5 as I remember, same for level 2, they now say 5-9 and it used to be 6-10 as I remember? That is nice if it is in fact true.

That is one way to look at the change, but the other is that now the first sale gets you a wee bit less, but every sale after that gets a 2 credit or so boost.  Unless your plan is to only get one sale per image, this is a big net benefit.  Also consider that there are people at other agencies who only dream of 25% royalties for non-exclusives :)

You can only get level 0 sales for so long before all your images are sold.  Personally, I've seen my RPD go up over the last two months by a fair margin.  Considering the previous year saw my Q2 numbers drop this change has certainly been positive from my perspective.  I'm sure it helps that only 4 out of my last 100 sales were level 0 - but that is where you portfolio must surely head over time...

« Reply #66 on: June 08, 2011, 13:22 »
0
The biggest flaw that I see with the Dreamstime system is that you could have a boat load of subscription sales that launch you into Level 5 territory where most people won't buy your image, and instead will look for level 0 or level 1 alternatives.  Under this situation you'd almost make nothing except subscription sales.

« Reply #67 on: June 08, 2011, 13:42 »
0
The biggest flaw that I see with the Dreamstime system is that you could have a boat load of subscription sales that launch you into Level 5 territory where most people won't buy your image, and instead will look for level 0 or level 1 alternatives.  Under this situation you'd almost make nothing except subscription sales.

This is just speculation. How could you know how many buyers are actually shopping like that?

If they see an image they are looking for, how much does it matter what it costs?

This is not iStock where an image could range from 3 credits to 55 credits for a small file.
At DT a small file is 5 credits for level 1 and 13 credits for level 5 (even for exclusive files).

We're not talking about hundreds of $ price difference.

I have plenty of level 5 sales, which never led me to believe what you're saying.

OTOH, anyone else's mileage may vary in this game.

« Reply #68 on: June 08, 2011, 14:34 »
0
The biggest flaw that I see with the Dreamstime system is that you could have a boat load of subscription sales that launch you into Level 5 territory where most people won't buy your image, and instead will look for level 0 or level 1 alternatives.  Under this situation you'd almost make nothing except subscription sales.

Let us know when you have a boatload of sub sales that launch an image to level 5 and then see it stop selling ;)  It is possible, of course, but I've never seen it.  On the contrary, all my level 5 images have an RPD of about twice that of my average image.  I took a look at my top three level 5 images and all have had one or more downloads every month since June 2010 - so they seem to keep selling.  One, as an example, had 16 sub sales out of the last 50 sales...  That's a lot of credits - the minimum on a Level 5 image XS is 11 credits, and most purchase medium or higher.

Naturally, everyone will have different results - but I call false on the statement that buyers don't bite on level 5 images.

« Reply #69 on: June 08, 2011, 18:43 »
0
The biggest flaw that I see with the Dreamstime system is that you could have a boat load of subscription sales that launch you into Level 5 territory where most people won't buy your image, and instead will look for level 0 or level 1 alternatives.  Under this situation you'd almost make nothing except subscription sales.

This is just speculation. How could you know how many buyers are actually shopping like that?

If they see an image they are looking for, how much does it matter what it costs?

This is not iStock where an image could range from 3 credits to 55 credits for a small file.
At Dreamstime a small file is 5 credits for level 1 and 13 credits for level 5 (even for exclusive files).

We're not talking about hundreds of $ price difference.

I have plenty of level 5 sales, which never led me to believe what you're saying.

OTOH, anyone else's mileage may vary in this game.

I say what I say, because I have, and continue to play both sides of this game, as a supplier and as a buyer for clients.  There have always been those who were looking for something really unique and were willing to pay for it. But to assume buyers won't shop for bargains in a garden of plenty, is being overly positive.  Not all buyers are running around with their hair on fire, grabbing the first cool thing that works at whatever the cost. They are sitting down with the client, and choosing which ones they like.  And if they can get five images that work for $50, versus 5 that work for $100, guess which ones they will choose.

I also think that those who are doing on demand shopping, versus the subscription route are more likely the smaller design houses, with smaller clients who will pinch pennies.

As for the scenario I painted, all I am saying is its possible, and its not hard to imagine an image to hit level 4, if not level 5 quickly on subs alone. I've hit the equivalent of level 4 in a month or less on Shutterstock, so there is no reason to assume it can't happen on Dreamstime, especially if subs become a greater part of the mix in the future.
« Last Edit: June 08, 2011, 18:51 by gwhitton »

« Reply #70 on: June 08, 2011, 19:06 »
0
I say what I say, because I have, and continue to play both sides of this game, as a supplier and as a buyer for clients.  There have always been those who were looking for something really unique and were willing to pay for it. But to assume buyers won't shop for bargains in a garden of plenty, is being overly positive.  Not all buyers are running around with their hair on fire, grabbing the first cool thing that works at whatever the cost. They are sitting down with the client, and choosing which ones they like.  And if they can get five images that work for $50, versus 5 that work for $100, guess which ones they will choose.

I also think that those who are doing on demand shopping, versus the subscription route are more likely the smaller design houses, with smaller clients who will pinch pennies.

As for the scenario I painted, all I am saying is its possible, and its not hard to imagine an image to hit level 4, if not level 5 quickly on subs alone. I've hit the equivalent of level 4 in a month or less on Shutterstock, so there is no reason to assume it can't happen on Dreamstime, especially if subs become a greater part of the mix in the future.
Well, I never claimed that buyers won't shop for bargains. We're talking about Microstock so I have a hard time to believe that a buyer who needs a good image at level 5 wouldn't have a problem paying 13 credits for it.

If we reached the point in this industry that a license for an equivalent of $13 for an obviously successful image is too much for any buyer then we're talking about being close to turning those "customers" into rapidshare users, downloading images for free.

As long as a buyer can find the same quality image as level 1, sure I can see why they would go with the cheaper one.

But just the fact that an image has been yanked up to level 5 through sub sales, doesn't necessarily mean that credit purchases won't happen anymore.

We have no research studies or numbers on this topic and most likely we never will as those are numbers that every agency wants to keep for themselves, so we are left with speculation.

Now, whether we speculate or not or do our own statistics or not, we all end up uploading our stuff to as many agencies as possible to squeeze out the most money we can get, don't we?

« Reply #71 on: June 08, 2011, 19:10 »
0
Now, whether we speculate or not or do our own statistics or not, we all end up uploading our stuff to as many agencies as possible to squeeze out the most money we can get, don't we?

it will only go up and up.. I dont think exclusives will be exclusives forever..


 

Related Topics

  Subject / Started by Replies Last post
38 Replies
12703 Views
Last post March 10, 2008, 20:09
by madelaide
3 Replies
6271 Views
Last post May 12, 2008, 13:03
by Whiz
15 Replies
9861 Views
Last post November 28, 2009, 11:30
by PeterChigmaroff
4 Replies
4902 Views
Last post January 03, 2010, 20:18
by icefront
16 Replies
7978 Views
Last post July 28, 2010, 23:03
by PaulieWalnuts

Sponsors

Mega Bundle of 5,900+ Professional Lightroom Presets

Microstock Poll Results

Sponsors