MicrostockGroup
Microstock Photography Forum - General => General Stock Discussion => Topic started by: Stonefirewon on November 14, 2015, 15:26
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Anyone selling there? Pixels.com?
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I sold a license back when it started, but since then nothing. I'm not surprised as I didn't see any reason licensing would take off there.
I wonder if someone who had art and did not license stock through agencies might have seen a bit more business?
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Pixels.com is FAA. I sell a couple prints there every month, despite having zero advertising or promotion of my own. But the site seems to be morphing into another Zazzle/Cafe Press. You can still set your own commissions, but I wonder how long that will continue. I watch their forum and I don't think I've seen anyone say they sold a license.
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Any time this subject is brought up on the FAA forums there is a loud silence.
For licensing FAA doesn't offer anything besides a shopping cart and hosting. And for this they take 30 percent.
I'd rather pay 50 percent to people with:
1. Customers
2. Industry contacts
3. Customer service
4. Knowledge of the industry
etc.
Just put in your bio that interested parties should contact you for licensing and deal with the customers (if any appear) directly. Pocket the 30 percent.
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The product expansion unfortunately has lead to multiple vendors of varying quality which has overburdened the customer service staff of two.
FAA partnered with a stellar supplier for the prints and framing but it seems the products went to the lowest bid. T-shirts appear to come from China. For a few extra bucks it will probably end up costing the company in terms of reputation.
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I joined FAA because I wanted to sell fine art. I was doing well. Unfortunately the site seems to be very confused by its growing greed.
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Funny. Because i read this thread I went to check FAA (which I haven't in ages) and it said that I didn't renew Jan 16th because my credit card was past its expiration date, so they've suspended all my premium features.
Things weren't so great last year - the $30 membership more than paid for itself in sales but the last sale was in September and I'm not sure it's worth continuing to pay FAA to not sell my prints.
Crated is certainly not doing well (I haven't uploaded to them in a long while). Is somewhere taking the business from FAA? Do people no longer buy prints in the same volume as before? I don't care about the artist web site; the main FAA site is pretty dated looking; pixels.com never went anywhere (I don't consider selling one license going anywhere!); I don't think that phone cases etc. really represent much of an opportunity...
I guess I can't see much value in giving them the new expiration date for my credit card :)
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Never sold anything on Crated. No buyers?
faa seems to think everyone is their competition from snapfish to getty to 500px to cafepress. No real strategy, just copies everyone and anyone. No focus, just goes off on tangents. Recently they seem to be trying to attract photographers more than artists.
My guess is the real money is in people buying their own stuff - like snapfish or CVS photolab.
They don't have any curation so that can't go upscale like Saatchi. So instead they seen to be getting rid of the "fine art" part of their name and going down scale with "pixels" and adding low end products. There are more bad photographers then good ones so the growth is in attracting anyone who just bought a camera.
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Agree with all above. I mean art.....on a shower curtain?
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FAA sells prints with illustrative editorial imagery (like Elvis and Michael Jackson). I assume they can do it because fine art prints are a different thing than licensing. Now that they are branching in tshirts and pillows doesn't that create the possibility of issues with entities that control and manage celebrity merchandising?
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Whatever their business models is.. but I really like the domain name pixels.com :)
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What's a name without branding? At least Fine Art America told you what you should expect. Most people know Pixels as a failed movie.
As far as the products, yeah its a whole new ball game when you are up against trademark holders for products. Fine art gives you leeway with parody and fair use laws. T-shirts are a whole different animal.
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I have an artist friend who paints and draws. Fine Art America was attractive to her.
Pixels just sounds like a photo site (and then not very upmarket).
I don't know if she will go with Pixels, but I wonder how many non-photogs will be put off, like her, by the name.
Shame.
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yes "Pixels" sounds very digital (i would say last century digital), where "fine art" is analog (for most of the people)
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They announced a couple of months ago that Pixels.com is now their main domain name, and presumably that's where the marketing will be. I expect the Fine Art America name to be deemphasized and eventually allowed to fade away. IMHO, Pixels is a dumb name that already sounds dated; FAA is owned and run by a guy who's design inspiration is apparently AOL from the 90s. But he wants to shed the "Fine Art" image and sell more t-shirts.
I was selling a couple prints a month through last October, then it completely died. No idea why, but since any sales I made were via keyword search, I suspect something to do with Google indexing, and maybe the domain change. FAA has been dilligently working to capture keyword searches and direct them to their promoted sellers ("Collections"). They're no doubt winning that game.