Interesting.
My sales are pretty consistant, apart form that foltlia gaining ground, probably because of my european content.
% of september:

SS:   25%
DT:   29%
FOT: 46%

year un til now:
IS:     5,9%
SS:    20,3%
DT:   21,4%
Alamy: 24,4%
FOT:   28%


Delleted everything on IS
New on CS, BS, CD and YAY - no sales there yet - still adding pics.

September was a big improvement over August.  Thank goodness!  I am up 20% over August, which was just dismal.  

I am still down 10% from last September.  But, hey, I'll take it.  It's nice to see any forward movement after such a terrible summer.  

Although most sites gained in % of my income over last year, that is a result of the closure of StockXpert, more than any actual gain in total royalties earned.  As far as royalty % gains or losses, all the numbers below the top four are so small they are pretty statistically insignificant.  

Sept '10   Sept '09    $ down or up
ISP    40% (41)        (-13%)  
SS    18%  (15)        (+8%)
DT    13%  (11)       (+8%)
Fot    19%  (17)       (+2%)
BigStock    4%   (3)        (+20%)
123RF  2%  (=)       (-21%)
Crest    1%  (=)       (-2%)
CanStockPhoto    2%    (1)       (+29%)
Almy    1%   (3)      (-55%)
 

Lisa, it's interesting to see that FT is still (relatively) not a top player in your totals - you're emerald there and I thought for some at the highest levels, FT was beginning to rival SS & IS for earnings power. Is it the number of subs sales or overall volume?

My September was slightly up over August for $$ and 66% up over Sept 09 - a second BME (March '10 is current BME).

DLs were 17% lower than Sept 09

Actually, for the last year FT has been my number two site, so it has surpassed SS in my totals....

I have always sold best at Istock.  They are consistently around 38-40% of my income.  No other site has ever surpassed 20% for me.  FT has moved up to take the #2 spot, although SS seems to be rallying and they are neck-and-neck. 

Roughly 1/3 of my FT sales are subscriptions, so the doubling of my credit prices has no affect on those.

Sites rallying and competing in a race up sounds good - we need to look for small positives in the current cut-back-the-contributor-share environment

Definitely!  I am pleased to see sales picking up across the board. 

Sept '10   Sept '09    $ down or up
ISP    40% (41)        (-13%)  
SS    18%  (15)        (+8%)
DT    13%  (11)       (+8%)
Fot    19%  (17)       (+2%)
BigStock    4%   (3)        (+20%)
123RF  2%  (=)       (-21%)
Crest    1%  (=)       (-2%)
CanStockPhoto    2%    (1)       (+29%)
Almy    1%   (3)      (-55%)
 

Interesting to see your stats Lisa.  I am surprised too that your Shutterstock, Dreamstime and Fotolia are all relatively close.  My SS is way ahead of the others, then Fotolia and DT is way down on the list (You can see my %'s lower down in an earlier post)

BME for us at IS (exclusives).
up 11% from last month (before PP's are in).

Enjoy ... for now. Unless you happen to be amongst the Top 100 or so you've got just 3 more months before it's bye-bye to BME's as an Istockphoto exclusive.

Istockphoto's 'How was your month?' thread is going to be a blood-bath come January and every month afterwards.

gostwyck: we are not yet at the top 100 or anywhere near that, but working out it 
Since we are now at 25%, we will retain our 25% for next year and bump up to 30% sometime near July.
I don't know why you think its going to be a blood bath but we always have the option of becoming independent.

Why are you exclusive for 25% (or 30% for that matter)? You sound ambitious to earn but you are just * money away by being exclusive at that level. If and when you do claw your way up to the (slightly) higher commission you can be sure that Istockphoto will soon move the goalposts and knock you back down again. I have no idea why you have such gushing enthusiasm and loyalty for Istock but I do know that it will not be reciprocated.

gostwyck: My only loyalty is to me and my partners pocket! believe you me I have no stocks at IS/getty.
you forget that uploading to many sites has a huge overhead.  uploading, keywording, disabmiguations, and keeping track of submissions and rejections all takes time. a LOT of time.  This is a huge downside for us since we are essentially a one man crew.
In addition, this brings down our upload quota on IS to 20 instead of 60, and I hope 90 soon. add to that a much higher rejection rate.
Our decision was based purly on our own best economic interest.  If we feel this will change in the future we will not hesitate giving up our crown.
If IS decide to play around with the goals (as I do suspect they will) then again, giving away the crown is ALLWAYS a possibilty.

(I appologize for any spelling mistakes, English isn't my daily language)

Still on the road but trying to complete the monthly survey.  Noticed there is no place for Thinkstock.  Is it considered a part of iStock?
Also, if that is the case, what about the stuff still being reported through StockXpert???

Just wanting to know where to brag about my $6.   

Actually I just fold it into the partner program sales because it's all the same coming from StockXpert or IS at 25c a download. Seems that when IS bought StockXpert and invented ThinkStock, even ProStockMaster decided that they didn't exist anymore, even thought ThinkStock earnings are reported on existing StockXpert accounts. It just vanished?

Wow you're doing good, I had five sales on ThinkStock for StockXpert last month for a whole $1.25! Just about to the point of calling is done, sticking a fork in it and cashing out. It's not doing anything that I can look forward to, and if I lose a dollar a month for a year, I'll have to skip going through the McDonald's drive through one night on the way to the office. But since I didn't have to upload anything and just left them sit long enough, I wanted to give ThinkStock a chance to earn. So far, I'm not excited about the possibilities or future potential.

On Topic portion of the message. Remember I'm small time haven't been uploading for about two months now. I have been taking some entertaining shots, just not getting around to them.

Just finished culling a couple thousand photos from an event, which are now up for sale on a private site that uses Smugmug. Not my site and I made more there last year than on Micro. No complaints with the 50/50 split that he offers me on sales.

IS Sept. doubled what I got in Aug. Don't have PP sales listed yet and I don't expect to see that for weeks. Regular sales were up.

SS ran about the same as usual. I need to prime that pump because the upload boost only lasts a month, and then everything falls down. Always funny because as soon as I upload something new, it seems some old file that's never sold before, gets a hit?

BigStock last sale was June and where they used to get some sales every month, I'm getting to the point of closing that one as well. Waste of time and energy to sell anywhere but SS and IS for me. (personal decision on time vs returns)

That's everywhere for me, four micro sites, which is really only two if you count owners.

Alamy (which isn't micro so I'm not commenting) and direct sales as a second shooter working some events which also isn't micro. Just an excuse why I'm not uploading and working like I could be. Micro returns according to effort. Small effort, small portfolio, small returns. Seems fair enough for me.

I can add that BW3 / Buffalo Wild Wings just opened near me and they have NTN trivia, so I'll be back to that addiction three nights a week.

Record month after three years in micro. SS accounted for 45% of it. IS/FT/DT the same. Hope this continues next month, as it will then be in addition to a regular pay packet / check. After what seem's like a lifetime in this business, the numbers aren't adding up fast enought. It's 9-5 in a suit from next week with all my photo work confined to weekends and evenings.

It was either that, or a painful crawl into an abyss.

I'll keep you posted how this affects earnings in the next few months.

Oldhand the newboy

. After what seem's like a lifetime in this business, the numbers aren't adding up fast enought. It's 9-5 in a suit from next week with all my photo work confined to weekends and evenings.

Oh that's huge, Oldhand.  Just wanted to wish you well with this big change.

Good luck!

ShadySue: then u missunderstood something in the new system at IS. if in the middle of the year you get to the redeemed credits goal you will be immidietly be upgraded to the higher royalty level in addition to the fact that you sart at that royalty rate the following year.

Ah, yes, starting from zero sales on January 1st; if you reach the next level up in RCs in that calendar year, you do indeed rise a level.