Author Topic: August is not to blame for low sales at FT? (Read 6856 times)

Peter · « **on:** August 11, 2008, 03:49 »

Hm.... Just a theory. Few days ago FT changed again search engine relevance order. Since then (my) sales dropped dramaticaly.

It does not matter any more how many keywords image has. Now I think it favorizes images with more sales (which is totaly redundand with "Sort by downloads" filter). So new images with less sales are pushed back in relevance order. Circulus vicious, I would say.

leaf · « **Reply #1 on:** August 11, 2008, 04:12 »

how right you are... at least more or less

I don't think most sales returns a very good search result either.

Do a search for coffee and you would think you did a search for business meeting. Sure most of them have a small coffee cup as a prop..... but really..

Peter · « **Reply #2 on:** August 11, 2008, 04:25 »

Yeah. Totaly inacurate.

The best system was: keyword order (primary criteria) + rating (secondary criteria) + date by newest first (third criteria)

(which was before may 2008).

leaf · « **Reply #3 on:** August 11, 2008, 04:31 »

why would date by newest first (third criteria) be important. Why would an image uploaded today be a better match than an image uploaded yesterday?

The first two however I would agree with. Since fotolia says they put keyword order into use, I am surprised their search relevance isn't putting this to more use.

Peter · « **Reply #4 on:** August 11, 2008, 04:33 »

What if 2 images have the same keywords, keyword order, and revirewer rating? Which one will go first? I would give a new one a chance in front of old one. This is third, least important criteria. First and most important would be keyword order, and second rating.

These days keyword order at FT is not important at all.

leaf · « **Reply #5 on:** August 11, 2008, 04:46 »

there has to be a good way for the best images to rise to the top. If newer ones are always placed on top of older ones, the good ones wouldn't be able to rise up.

i think it should be
keywords order
proven track record (on a keyword basis, not on a overall bases - which is maybe what dreamstime is doing.... where when someone searched for coffee, the images that are downloaded are given a good track record for JUST that search, not other search words that also happen to be in the keywords)
reviewer rating
age

Dreamframer · « **Reply #6 on:** August 11, 2008, 05:37 »

Quote from: leaf on August 11, 2008, 04:31

why would date by newest first (third criteria) be important. Why would an image uploaded today be a better match than an image uploaded yesterday?

The first two however I would agree with. Since fotolia says they put keyword order into use, I am surprised their search relevance isn't putting this to more use.

Because someone will want to look at fresh pictures instead of pictures used many times in many places.
And about keyword order. It's really boring editing keyword order after upload when you use programs like adobe bridge which places keywords in alphabet order.

stokfoto · « **Reply #7 on:** August 11, 2008, 06:20 »

Although this type of changes effects my sales significantly (sometimes in a good way sometimes in a bad way)I don't disagree with them because by doing this I think they are giving everyone the chance to show their work to buyers.if it always remained the same way it'd mean very same contributors /files would be favored. Like on some other sites if you search for a certain file you see most popular files showing up first but usually "success" of these files due to the fact that they had been uploaded long time ago and got so many downloads when the libraries weren't that big so no matter if there were way better files than the ones they still got more chance to sell.this kind of changes at least should give newer files more exposure thus chance to gain "popularity".

to sum up as long as it is not a glitch and done deliberately I am all for it.

Peter · « **Reply #8 on:** August 11, 2008, 07:25 »

This way FT is promoting only emerald members, and best sellers. So much about share for new members.

stokfoto · « **Reply #9 on:** August 11, 2008, 07:35 »

Quote from: Peter on August 11, 2008, 07:25

This way FT is promoting only emerald members, and best sellers. So much about share for new members.

I see your point Peter.
I hope they will switch the search pretty soon ,they should at least have a mixture of popular and new files together having only most dowloaded files doesn't sound fair to me either

Peter · « **Reply #10 on:** August 11, 2008, 07:46 »

Mixing would be fair.

Fred · « **Reply #11 on:** August 11, 2008, 10:46 »

Quote from: Peter on August 11, 2008, 07:25

This way FT is promoting only emerald members, and best sellers. So much about share for new members.

Maybe subscription holders get different search results.

leszek · « **Reply #12 on:** August 12, 2008, 05:21 »

As far as I am concerned - Fotolia is pretty much dead. Sure, I had a payout and the second one is closing, but Fotolia became extremely picky regarding acceptance - and somehow it goes hand in hand with very poor sales and very poor number of views. It is quickly becoming No 7 on my list...oh, well...

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Author Topic: August is not to blame for low sales at FT? (Read 6856 times)

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