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Author Topic: This is how an agency CEO should act  (Read 6940 times)

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RT


« on: October 18, 2010, 13:50 »
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Not mentioning any names here  ;) but this is how I feel every agency CEO should act in reply to their suppliers concerns:

http://www.alamy.com/Blog/contributor/archive/2010/10/18/4845.aspx


ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #1 on: October 18, 2010, 13:57 »
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Not mentioning any names here  ;) but this is how I feel every agency CEO should act in reply to their suppliers concerns:
http://www.alamy.com/Blog/contributor/archive/2010/10/18/4845.aspx


Yup. Good to read.
We all mess up - it's what we do about it which matters.

« Reply #2 on: October 18, 2010, 14:13 »
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Good to know.

« Reply #3 on: October 18, 2010, 14:31 »
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Thumbs up for James

lisafx

« Reply #4 on: October 18, 2010, 14:32 »
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Agreed.  Nice to see a mistake admitted and steps taken to fix it :)

I hadn't known anything about the "more" feature.  I gather from that post that they had taken images in a series out of the main search and just hidden them away behind one representative image with a link to "more" if you want to see the rest?  

Does that explain why sales at Alamy have been so bad for the last couple of months?  Or is it just my sales that tanked there?

« Reply #5 on: October 18, 2010, 14:40 »
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Getty has been doing this for a while.  They say it should help sales, because more artists can fit on one page, instead of results all from one contributor.  Which would be even worse on Alamy, because they tend to upload their entire shoot of similars.

ShadySue

  • There is a crack in everything
« Reply #6 on: October 18, 2010, 15:51 »
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Agreed.  Nice to see a mistake admitted and steps taken to fix it :)

I hadn't known anything about the "more" feature.  I gather from that post that they had taken images in a series out of the main search and just hidden them away behind one representative image with a link to "more" if you want to see the rest?  

Does that explain why sales at Alamy have been so bad for the last couple of months?  Or is it just my sales that tanked there?


It was announced on 7th October, http://www.alamy.com/Blog/contributor/archive/2010/10/07/4844.aspx and discussed in many threads on the Ask the Forum forum since then.

Xalanx

« Reply #7 on: October 18, 2010, 15:51 »
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Not mentioning any names here  ;) but this is how I feel every agency CEO should act in reply to their suppliers concerns:

http://www.alamy.com/Blog/contributor/archive/2010/10/18/4845.aspx


Exactly. I too had several email exchanges with them regarding this problem and I was extremely surprised to see how fast they admitted it's not a good change. This IS professionalism.

« Reply #8 on: October 18, 2010, 18:02 »
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I think the idea they had was good and if it is implemented properly it should help buyers and that will keep contributors happy.

« Reply #9 on: October 18, 2010, 18:09 »
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I like the way it works, in which images from the same contributor appear mixed in the results page, so you get more variety. This recent change however, if it's what I saw yesterday, only showed one result by each contributor, and you have to click on "more" to see the rest of them. Maybe not too bad when a search returns tons of images and so the buyer may skip the similars faster, but in the case I saw there were few results, so it looked odd not to visualize all of them at the same time.

lisafx

« Reply #10 on: October 18, 2010, 18:29 »
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It was announced on 7th October, http://www.alamy.com/Blog/contributor/archive/2010/10/07/4844.aspx and discussed in many threads on the Ask the Forum forum since then.


Thanks for the link Sue.  I never think to follow the Alamy forums.  Working with 10 sites I don't spend much time on any site forums except Istock's, and even there I have cut way down on forum activity recently.

If it only went into effect October 7th then it wouldn't explain my poor sales in September.  Wonder if they did a reranking in Aug. or Sept.? 

RacePhoto

« Reply #11 on: October 18, 2010, 18:36 »
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I think the idea they had was good and if it is implemented properly it should help buyers and that will keep contributors happy.

True. The other problem was little control over what showed as the first image of a series. I could have an event with 72 photos and the first one might be Winners Circle, two guys with a trophy, while the other 71 were shots of cars or drivers. ??? They did say that what was first before would be the top of the stack, and I figured out how to control that, but maybe I won't need to worry for another year, while they work out the kinks in the system.

I don't know how showing the buyers less and making them click through for more, makes viewing easier, unless it was supposed to direct them to a bunch of similar images to the first one.

Admitting a mistake, how refreshing!



If it only went into effect October 7th then it wouldn't explain my poor sales in September.  Wonder if they did a reranking in Aug. or Sept.?

I think the whole idea of Alamy Rank is overblown. I know that some of my series are on page one, some in the first two rows, some searches I'm the first photo, and none of those have ever sold. Also the whole mysterious ranking plus diversity, means that many more people get a good exposure before someone with a bazillion similars or a series of the same model, moving an inch ;) won't fill the page with that junk.

One that did sell, is RM and first on the page, but that's after the re-rank. It used to be further down the page. We can only guess, but I suspect that sales have more to do with rank than that whole complex, views, zooms, purchases = CTR formula.

According to the information I found the last re-rank was September 7th with the usual gnashing of teeth and complaints of positions dropped, less views Etc. So maybe it matters but not for someone with mostly one subject. As people have pointed out to me more than once, it';s the big picture, years vs years or long term trends, not one month vs last month. I find no pattern to sales on Alamy for myself. When I least expect it, someone buys something. Now I'm in the off season so I'd expect less sales. Here's hoping that I'll find another one of those surprise sales. :)
« Last Edit: October 18, 2010, 18:49 by RacePhoto »

« Reply #12 on: October 18, 2010, 22:34 »
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Quote from: sharpshot link=topic=11542.msg167146#msg167146 date=
I think the idea they had was good and if it is implemented properly it should help buyers and that will keep contributors happy.

+1

RT


« Reply #13 on: October 19, 2010, 01:08 »
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If it only went into effect October 7th then it wouldn't explain my poor sales in September.  Wonder if they did a reranking in Aug. or Sept.? 

You need to count back at Alamy, a lot of buyers have a 45day honour period, so in actual fact your poor sales in September are really poor sales from the July/August summer holidays period.

« Reply #14 on: October 19, 2010, 05:40 »
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My sales and views probably aren't a good representation, but I found that my views tanked for a couple of months, now seem back to normal.

The system seemed to punish those who actually had diverse content and reward those who have endless number of similars.


Ok scratch that - the "more" issue is still there from what I can see - no idea what's going on with the view count! I have images of Chicago, Nicaragua, New York and Colombia hiding behind one of Costa Rica, etc etc.
« Last Edit: October 19, 2010, 05:48 by holgs »

« Reply #15 on: October 19, 2010, 09:08 »
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Quote from: sharpshot link=topic=11542.msg167146#msg167146 date=
I think the idea they had was good and if it is implemented properly it should help buyers and that will keep contributors happy.

+1
+2

lisafx

« Reply #16 on: October 19, 2010, 14:08 »
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You need to count back at Alamy, a lot of buyers have a 45day honour period, so in actual fact your poor sales in September are really poor sales from the July/August summer holidays period.

Ah, I didn't know that.  Thanks Richard. :)

Pete, if they did to a reranking, beginning of Sept, that could also account for some of my sales drop.  I don't shoot just one niche, but a wide variety of subjects. 

Whatever the reason, the drop was very noticeable and completely without precedent in the year and a half I have been there. 


 

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