MicrostockGroup
Agency Based Discussion => General - Top Sites => Topic started by: gostwyck on March 01, 2010, 05:42
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Microstock has undergone some fairly seismic upheavals over the last couple of months and, although it will be some time before the full impact may be evident, the dust could already be settling enough to see the trends.
a) Will Istock's hefty price-rise for exclusive images send significant numbers of buyers elsewhere? February was the first full month that the increase was in place but some existing credits will still be being used.
b) Where will StockXpert's customers decide to spend their dollars in future?
c) What impact will Getty-backed Thinkstock have on the market? Notably the BBC are already usiing several Thinkstock images on their website. Are TS being agressively marketed to big image-users?
d) What effect will the changes to prices and credit packages at DT and FT have on the market?
It'll be interesting to observe how it all pans out in the long-term but it may be worthwhile at this stage to see how the earnings of independent contributors compare.
My own figures for February 2010, when compared to the previous two months and also Feb 2009, suggest some changes. As a percentage of total microstock income was as follows;
Feb 09 Dec09 Jan 09 Feb 2010
IS 38 36 36 32
FT 17 19 22 26
SS 21 21 24 23
DT 13 14 12 12
IS, who have been extremely stable for the last 18 months, now appear to be losing market share to FT. Importantly for me the question of exclusivity is now veering back towards remaining independent. Until last month projections suggested that I would have been about 20% better off as an exclusive under IS's new price structure. On February's results however I would have earned marginally more as an independent. Overall Feb 2010 was 10% up on Feb 09.
How do your results for February compare and what shifts in the market, if any, are becoming apparent?
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My data isn't as meaningful as yours, since my sales are far less. Still, it's a data point, FWIW.
Feb 09 Dec 09 Jan 10 Feb 10
IS 32 38 45 36
FT 10 15 12 13
SS 24 21 16 25
DT 16 12 19 18
January was a bit of an unusual month for me, as IS had never previously been over 41% (and SS never less than 19%).
I can't honestly say I see any trend, but that might just be my portfolio.
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I can't say I've seen much change in the last 6 months. A lot of these changes were big news, but didn't really have much impact on my numbers.
IS and SS continue to hover in the 30-35% range. FT and DT are usually around 10%. So was SX, although usually a little less. Everybody else is between 0-3%.
I do wonder which agencies will continue to grow this year though.
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Interesting comparison. In my case IS dropped from 43% to 37% from the beginning of 09 to the end of 09, but Jan and Feb of this year they are back to 40% again.
Feb 09 Dec 09 Jan 10 Feb 10
IS 43% 37% 40% 40%
SS 16% 15% 15% 17%
FT 16% 19% 18% 19%
DT 12% 13% 13% 13%
For me sales at IS and DT seem to have held remarkably steady, where Fotolia has shown marked growth over a year's time.
The interesting thing is the jump of 2% at SS, which had been somewhat in decline. If others show the same it might indicate that some StockXpert sales have migrated there. Which would be very happy news IMO.
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Thanks for the replies and extra data. Difficult to see any obvious pattern though. Of course one of the distorting factors within the numbers is the currency the contributor is paid in at FT (i.e. earnings there will be worth up to 40% more for a contributor paid in Euros than in $US). Having said that it is a constant factor so it wouldn't affect the general trends.
The price rise for exclusive images on IS should have delivered an increase in earnings of at least 50% if sales had remained constant, probably more than that with Vetta sales included, compared to Feb 2009. However on the IS forums, although many BME's are being reported, I'm not reading much to suggest earnings have increased at that level.
Time will tell.