Author Topic: High acceptance = low sales? (Read 4731 times)

seawhisper · « **on:** March 08, 2011, 20:34 »

I noticed some trend. It might probably be nothing new, or not very revealing but I didn't see any similar thread, so I decided to share. I'm curious if you have observed similar issue and what do you think about it.

I noticed that the more easy submission procedure and the higher acceptance ratio the lower sales. The best example (though I'm not sure if it's a good idea to give examples because then the acceptance ratio might drop lol) is for me yaymicro. Absolutely wonderful user interface, about 99% acceptance ratio... And absolutely no sales. Similar with depositphotos - lovely interface, high acc ratio, low sales.

Now take a look at fotolia - quite nuisance especially with aligning the keywords from the most important to least, but quite nice sales. IStock - awful procedure taking LOTS of time, and the top tier.

Have you noticed it? While high acceptance and low sales is at some point natural (this concerns usually new stocks), then the easy submission procedure and low sales is for me quite worrying...

disorderly · « **Reply #1 on:** March 08, 2011, 20:47 »

There's a phrase for it in Latin: Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc. It means after, therefore because of, and it describes our belief that events connected in time are also connected in some causal way. Sometimes they are, and sometimes they aren't.

I can come with plenty of counterexamples to your theory:

Shutterstock is a breeze to submit to, and if I don't get too crazy I can get most everything accepted. And yet they're my biggest earner by far.
Contrariwise, Crestock rejects most of what I submit and produces little in the way of sales.
Dreamstime has a somewhat painful upload process, what with requiring that I submit images one at a time, and lately my sales there have taken a nosedive. They've gone from a consistent #3 to #6 over the past year.
DepositPhotos used to be as cumbersome as Dreamstime. Now they're about as easy to submit to as Shutterstock. Low earnings but little effort, which describes several others.

I agree that iStock and Fotolia are a pain to submit to, but I no longer submit to either one. Something about cutting my royalties to the bone, as I recall. But the real correlation is new agencies vs. old. Most of the new looked at their predecessors and developed less painful submission processes. And, because they're new, most of them don't produce much income yet, and maybe never will. But it's their newness that's the common factor, and that's what leads to the rest.

stockastic · « **Reply #2 on:** March 08, 2011, 20:49 »

Yes. It's a cruel reality.

And it doesn't need to be this way.

In some cases I think the submission process is easier at the small sites simply because they're newer, and did things simpler - for example, they're not using categories. And newer sites actually want your photos, whereas I think the established sites need to slow down the input to match the number of reviewering hours they're willing to pay for.

seawhisper · « **Reply #3 on:** March 08, 2011, 20:57 »

Quote from: disorderly on March 08, 2011, 20:47

There's a phrase for it in Latin: Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc. It means after, therefore because of, and it describes our belief that events connected in time are also connected in some causal way. Sometimes they are, and sometimes they aren't.

Sure, but that's why later on ppl invented internet and forums, to discuss such matters.

Btw (useless or maybe not so useless) psychological fact - if you as a person what brand was the blue (or name any other popular colour) car that just passed, hardly noone will be able to switch back in his / her memories to the real colour of that car.

There's one more possible explanation - the new sites are much more usability trend influenced so they got better human - website interaction. But since they accept everything as it goes (because they need to build up the database and possibly fast) they don't have the quality that is or ss worked on for years...

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #4 on:** March 09, 2011, 02:31 »

His point is about acceptance rates not ease of uploading. Of course, the more carefully the collection is sorted to remove bad images the more pleasant the buyer's experience is likely to be and the more popular the site. The difficulty in uploading is not very relevant, though a site with hardly any sales is wise to make uploading easy otherwise suppliers won't bother submitting. Istock can get away with all sorts of upload inconveniences (remember "disambiguation" and the previous categories change?) because the sales have been good enough to justify suppliers making the effort.

lagereek · « **Reply #5 on:** March 09, 2011, 03:00 »

No I dont believe in this. I think its all got to do with good and bad reviewing. Some sites skimp on the reviewing, employing other members to review fellow members shots, well? bound to be trouble, isnt it?
Others can hardly tell the diff between color and monochrome. Should you by any chance upload a toned shot, all hell breaks loose.
Acceptance rate all depend on the editor/reviewers knowledge, nothing else.

borg · « **Reply #6 on:** March 09, 2011, 05:02 »

So, I see one black sheep in your theory, Crestock!

Promille is better measure than percentage for acceptance rate on Crestock, same is for sales there...

seawhisper · « **Reply #7 on:** March 09, 2011, 06:35 »

Quote from: borg on March 09, 2011, 05:02

So, I see one black sheep in your theory, Crestock!

Promille is better measure than percentage for acceptance rate on Crestock, same is for sales there...

Lol I like that one, nicely said.

I don't have account on Crestock so I can't say. But maybe since they're that picky one day they will get to their target that for who they so carefully create portfolio and the sales will raise.