Author Topic: Top Video Producer Going Non-Exclusive (Read 13606 times)

jjneff · « **on:** December 08, 2011, 07:02 »

Here is an interesting read would love your thoughts!
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=338025&page=1

ShadySue · « **Reply #1 on:** December 08, 2011, 09:47 »

A very polite and measured post. I'm sure he knows exactly what he's doing, as he left photo exclusivity last September as a result of the RC shenanigans announcement. The RC targets hit those with mixed media portfolios especially badly and the scheme is a very hard kick in the teeth for them.
I also read from his iStock blog that he was excited when Video Vettas were announced, and can only imagine that didn't work for him as well as he had hoped.
Good luck to him. Though his skills are so impressive, I'm sure he won't need 'luck'.

helix7 · « **Reply #2 on:** December 08, 2011, 10:26 »

Not much of a surprise given his mixed portfolio, as Sue stated. Seems like a very calm and calculated decision.

jjneff · « **Reply #3 on:** December 08, 2011, 11:37 »

He has amazing work and my guess he doesn't even need iStock to pay his bills. I do feel this is a huge loss for iStock! they don't see it this way but when work of this quality starts to show up at ShutterStock I have a fear many buyers will follow.

Eyedesign · « **Reply #4 on:** December 08, 2011, 12:06 »

jjneff, work of his quality is already on ShutterStock and another other stock site that you search. As helix said with a mix portfolio I would think he's made a sound business decision.

helix7 · « **Reply #5 on:** December 08, 2011, 12:09 »

Shutterstock does indeed have a solid collection of work of this quality already. One more person migrating over from istock isn't going to change much. But if this is indicative of a trend, it would have some effect as more people make the switch.

pancaketom · « **Reply #6 on:** December 08, 2011, 14:16 »

I could be off base here, but it seemed like for a year or 2 IS was able to prop up exclusive earnings at the expense of indys. Maybe now that is no longer the case. I never did understand why they separated out RC for different media let alone having different levels for them... I certainly would not look forward to rekeywording and uploading to many new sites although I would look forward to the possibly greater stability it would afford. I suppose being able to do it one media at a time would help balance out the short term drop in earnings though.

jjneff · « **Reply #7 on:** December 08, 2011, 17:20 »

I am not saying there is not amazing talent at ShutterStock! There are a lot of people there who have a lot more talent than me! I am saying that for a Diamond level to drop exclusive status is a big deal. He is probably going from 40% to 18% Ouch.

gostwyck · « **Reply #8 on:** December 08, 2011, 17:31 »

Quote from: helix7 on December 08, 2011, 12:09

Shutterstock does indeed have a solid collection of work of this quality already. One more person migrating over from istock isn't going to change much. But if this is indicative of a trend, it would have some effect as more people make the switch.

The traffic stat's suggest it is a trend that has been underway for some time. What I do find strange is that Istock seem unwilling or utterly powerless to do anything about it. Of course that could mean it is not happening, so no need for action, or they are happy that it is happening. Alternatively the lack of a CEO means there's nobody, close enough to the situation to understand it, with the authority to actually do something meaningful. I can't help thinking that if Istock had not sold out to Getty and had remained independent they would be in a much stronger position today.

Eyedesign · « **Reply #9 on:** December 08, 2011, 19:17 »

Quote from: jjneff on December 08, 2011, 17:20

I am not saying there is not amazing talent at ShutterStock! There are a lot of people there who have a lot more talent than me! I am saying that for a Diamond level to drop exclusive status is a big deal. He is probably going from 40% to 18% Ouch.

Big deal that a person drops exclusive status, not really! Is he dropping from 40% to 18% maybe! Maybe he was already below 40%. Maybe he got a better offer for his content from another site. The only person that would know the answer to this is the Artist. As he wrote "changing my distribution plan" sounds like he's a smart guy that has a business to run. The RC system Penalizes artist with mix portfolio so if artist with a mix portfolio drop exclusive status I fully understand. As Sue said "Seems like a very calm and calculated decision. "

I wish him Luck!

jjneff · « **Reply #10 on:** December 08, 2011, 19:45 »

No doubt he knows what he is doing and I wish him the best, I will be watching his blog and noting his progress!

antistock · « **Reply #11 on:** December 08, 2011, 23:19 »

exclusivity in microstock is simply a joke, makes no sense, the only reason to do it is for the higher payout.

there are nofamous photographers apart Yuri, and he's not exclusive anywhere, moreover clients don't give a sh-it about who's the photographer.

actually the only way to differentiate an agency from the other is their pricing.

Gannet77 · « **Reply #12 on:** December 09, 2011, 06:41 »

Quote from: antistock on December 08, 2011, 23:19

exclusivity in microstock is simply a joke, makes no sense, the only reason to do it is for the higher payout.

So a higher payout makes no sense?

Michael Lancaster · « **Reply #13 on:** December 09, 2011, 06:54 »

Quote from: Gannet77 on December 09, 2011, 06:41

So a higher payout makes no sense?

Yes, if you are selling once at a high price instead of selling it 5 times at lower prices.

antistock · « **Reply #14 on:** December 09, 2011, 07:31 »

Quote from: Gannet77 on December 09, 2011, 06:41

Quote from: antistock on December 08, 2011, 23:19
exclusivity in microstock is simply a joke, makes no sense, the only reason to do it is for the higher payout.

So a higher payout makes no sense?

yes but micro agencies have no reason to mess with exclusivity as there's absolutely no return on investment.
exclusivity should simply have no space in microstock.

Sean Locke Photography · « **Reply #15 on:** December 09, 2011, 07:54 »

Quote from: antistock on December 08, 2011, 23:19

moreover clients don't give a sh-it about who's the photographer.

Actually they do.

"Can you see “branding” by a stock photographer as having any importance?

Possibly if I am interested in certain look I will change my search to only that photographer’s name/work."
http://blog.johnlund.com/2011/12/art-buyer-jessica-mirolla-interview.html

fujiko · « **Reply #16 on:** December 09, 2011, 07:58 »

Exclusivity may make sense with percentages higher than 60%.

jbarber873 · « **Reply #17 on:** December 09, 2011, 10:52 »

My sales on the same video files at Istock and shutterstock on average generate just about the same RPD between the 2 sites, although with the new pricing at SS, I expect that to change in favor of SS. There are rare occasions when IS will pay a dollar or two higher on an individual sale, but it's not statistically significant. The big difference is that video at SS is growing at a fast rate, whereas IS is standing still or slightly dropping. Keep in mind that this is with a non-exclusive status at IS. Exclusives get far more per download, so it's not really a slam dunk to say that going independent will pay off. There are far less files in a video search, so a standout file will get seen and sell. As I see it, the pluses to IS exclusive is only uploading once, a much higher payout rate and high traffic at the video side. The downsides are the extremely long review times ( at least a month), the soviet era upload system and the overall decline at the whole site. Pond5, Revostock and SS are major sellers, but it may not result in an overall higher payout at this time. The real question is if you look out into the future, what are the trends. There was a point where IStock could have owned the video business, but I'm afraid they missed the chance, being too focused on the drama at the still side to pay attention to the promise of video.
The artist in question will do well in video at all the sites, but for many of the video artists at Istock, the quality is not up to today's standards, and the collection needs some serious culling to get rid of the awful junk from the " we'll take anything that moves" days of initially building the collection. There doesn't seem to be anyone at the video side of Istock thinking strategically. There are just a small group of people putting out fires day by day. Maybe that will change.

cobalt · « **Reply #18 on:** December 09, 2011, 11:08 »

I think the video market is a good indicator of the success off he different business strategy teams of the different agencies.

Video is a growth market, it is new. I would expect significant growth year over year for at least the next 5 years.

There is so much material missing, which means so many customer projects cannot even be started because the stock content is not there. Because video has even more variation possibilities than photo, I think you will need a much bigger video collection than photo collection to cater to the needs of the clients.

It worries me a lot to see that istock diamond exclusives are reporting a drop in sales. I can understand the photo business hitting a saturation point, but not video.

And I agree they could have completely dominated the video market if they had wanted to. But you cannot become the market leader if it takes months to bring the products to the market. All the other sites have much fresher content than istock.

However the quality IMO is the best on istock. It is also the only agency that has rejcted my files so far and they´ve added very helpful explanations to the rejection. The video team is doing amazing work, I am so sorry that exclusives are leaving.

And like eyeidea pointed out, the RC system can badly backfire on you if istock itself has a bad sales year even though you yourself have worked hard and improved your portfolio. When the customers leave and buy elsewhere - this is not the fault of the artist, we have no control over that. The RC system can only truly work if there is constant growth.

For a mixed media artist there is also the problem that you can never truly rise with the RC system, because you will never produce enough volume to reach higher levels. Under the old system you could gradually move, it was slow but your lifetime work added up.

antistock · « **Reply #19 on:** December 11, 2011, 04:50 »

Quote from: sjlocke on December 09, 2011, 07:54

Quote from: antistock on December 08, 2011, 23:19
moreover clients don't give a sh-it about who's the photographer.

Actually they do.

"Can you see “branding” by a stock photographer as having any importance?

Possibly if I am interested in certain look I will change my search to only that photographer’s name/work."
http://blog.johnlund.com/2011/12/art-buyer-jessica-mirolla-interview.html

thank you but i was saying that it means jack in microstock unless you're Yuri (probably the only microstocker with a famous "brand").

qwerty · « **Reply #20 on:** December 11, 2011, 05:49 »

Quote from: antistock on December 11, 2011, 04:50

Quote from: sjlocke on December 09, 2011, 07:54
Quote from: antistock on December 08, 2011, 23:19
moreover clients don't give a sh-it about who's the photographer.

Actually they do.

"Can you see “branding” by a stock photographer as having any importance?

Possibly if I am interested in certain look I will change my search to only that photographer’s name/work."
http://blog.johnlund.com/2011/12/art-buyer-jessica-mirolla-interview.html

thank you but i was saying that it means jack in microstock unless you're Yuri (probably the only microstocker with a famous "brand").

yep your total right yuri's the only person in the whole of microstock that people have bookmarked to search his portfolio before wading through the rest of the collections.

sounds like a macrosaur,old hippie type of baiting going on here ?

Jonathan Ross · « **Reply #21 on:** December 13, 2011, 16:10 »

Hi All,

You might wan to check out stock agencies Alexa rating. Check out Istock and Getty's Alexa ratings. Always a good way to follow their traffic. http://www.alexa.com/ Search the Analytics and you can learn some interesting stuff.

Best,
Jonathan

click_click · « **Reply #22 on:** December 13, 2011, 16:31 »

Quote from: Jonathan Ross on December 13, 2011, 16:10

Hi All,

You might wan to check out stock agencies Alexa rating. Check out Istock and Getty's Alexa ratings. Always a good way to follow their traffic. http://www.alexa.com/ Search the Analytics and you can learn some interesting stuff.

Best,
Jonathan

I'm eager to learn! I checked both SS and IS and I can't see any graph on Alexa.com that resembles my sales.

Generating traffic and generating sales are two different things. SS went through the roof in terms of sales 3 months ago (at least for me). When I look at the Alexa graph for the last 6 months I can't see any change that would indicate the increase of sales.

Same goes for IS. Traffic appears to be steady for the last 6 months. I'm sure there are other SEO tools to investigate this further but I've been very hesitant about such traffic ranking sites as it doesn't tell me very much - like I said I'm eager to learn...

On top of everything since most agencies' contributor areas are located on the same domain I bet 30% of the traffic is caused by uploaders, not even real visitors not to mention actual buyers...

What matters here is (I assume) called "conversion rate", turning traffic into customers.

I enjoy looking at my website's visitor status every week but that doesn't tell me one bit how many of those actually closed a deal with me...

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Author Topic: Top Video Producer Going Non-Exclusive (Read 13606 times)

jjneff

ShadySue

helix7

jjneff

Eyedesign

helix7

pancaketom

jjneff

gostwyck

Eyedesign

jjneff

antistock

Gannet77

Michael Lancaster

antistock

Sean Locke Photography

fujiko

jbarber873

cobalt

antistock

qwerty

Jonathan Ross

click_click

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