Does someone know how long does it take for GL to payout after you request it?  With over 800 images online (I stopped uploading after that due to some - in my opinion - strange rejections I was getting from them) - I managed to reach payout in (roughly) a year or so.  Not too much selling going on there, is it?  Anyhow, requested payout couple days back and am wondering how long before that happens... 

I believe there site says within 15 days of the request. 

Quote from: klsbear on August 15, 2013, 15:38
I believe there site says within 15 days of the request.

Ok thanks.

"I guess it depends on how $30 compares to what someone is getting elsewhere. For some, $30 a month anywhere is good. For others, it's terrible."

To be honest it was a bit of a stupid statement on my part. All sorts of parameters would come into play when deciding if $30 a month is good or bad. 1 file uploaded, making $30 a month, good, 1000 files uploaded making $30 a month, not so good etc etc.

\

Quote from: tickstock on August 15, 2013, 17:34According to the poll.  The average contributor from MSG who is on GL makes $9/month.

Then I'm well below average this month so far. At this rate I might make enough for a latte at Starbucks.

hey,  a latte (Grande) at star bucks is a lot of $$ 

Oh ! I thought payout was at 50, my mistake 

Not that that makes a huge difference..

Quote from: tab62 on August 15, 2013, 20:36
hey,  a latte (Grande) at star bucks is a lot of $$ 

True. But I'm more likely looking at a Tall the way my GL earnings are going.

Which, by the way, are on track to put GL at the bottom of my earnings list for August, out of the 21 sites I'm on.

yeah, I had to cut them. we are moving house and I'm tidying up, throwing away things I don't need, and that's spilling over into other areas of my life. I can't justify the time spent uploading and then recording 0 sales each month. I am hoping to cull my list down to just 5.

I made sales at the start, got a couple of payouts, then over time it dried up.  Over the last year GL has been talked up a lot as a place to go for people bailing out of IS, etc, because they pay fair commissions and have reasonable standards. I suspect quite a few medium to large portfolios arrived there, causing huge dilution of earnings for existing contributors, because the buyers weren't there yet.  And more recently they said they've been hammered by changes at Google, which I don't understand, but apparently it was pretty bad and they had to cut some staff.

Maybe they just grew too fast and outran what market they had.  Obviously a new agency wants as many salable images as it can get. But there has to be some sensible numeric relationship between sales volume and number of contributors, or we get discouraged and give up.   I don't have the answers and would have no idea how to successfully bootstrap a business like this.   

I guess I'm staying there and hoping that in time, things improve.  I still get a sale once in a while.

Quote from: stockastic on August 17, 2013, 02:06
I made sales at the start, got a couple of payouts, then over time it dried up.  Over the last year GL has been talked up a lot as a place to go for people bailing out of IS, etc, because they pay fair commissions and have reasonable standards. I suspect quite a few medium to large portfolios arrived there, causing huge dilution of earnings for existing contributors, because the buyers weren't there yet.  And more recently they said they've been hammered by changes at Google, which I don't understand, but apparently it was pretty bad and they had to cut some staff.

Maybe they just grew too fast and outran what market they had.  Obviously a new agency wants as many salable images as it can get. But there has to be some sensible numeric relationship between sales volume and number of contributors, or we get discouraged and give up.   I don't have the answers and would have no idea how to successfully bootstrap a business like this.   

I guess I'm staying there and hoping that in time, things improve.  I still get a sale once in a while.

So by finding a new fair outlet and trying to help the agency with more images, we destroyed the agency? That makes me wonder, who is responsible for managing the profitability and strategy of the agency? I would think the agency owners/management. If what you say is true, or the case, shouldnt they have managed the influx of images differently? Shouldnt they have known their market and how their market behaves? Knowing the market mechanism and the market in which you are selling is key to a successful business anyways.

Like I said: I don't have the answers.

'I still get a sale once in a while'

I've only got a few hundred pics there but not a sale in over 2 months.

!

I had 2 nice EL sales recently.  Good to get to the cash out level with 2 sales.  I know that doesn't happen often but it makes it worth uploading for me.

after a terrible August with 0 sales, this September looks "nice" with 6 sales, they have my support as well!

Two sales, $1.04 in 9 months with a port of 875. It could be better!

1 sale in 5 months, 450 images. not worth my time, not even if its a 1 second uploading process.

50% of nothing is nothing.

Not sure why peeps keep uploading. How do you justify that 1 or 6 or whatever pathetic sales number is enough to compensate your time and effort. Honest question.

I will support GL regardless of the ebb and flow. The staff are wonderful, the upload process is the best in the industry and they pay a fair rate.

If it was ebb and flow I would support them too, but there is no flow at all, at least not for me. You are better off supporting CanStockPhoto as they do have sales, and pay 50% as well.

sharphot just said he recently at 2 ELs.  Different people sell at different places.

Like others, I stick with them because they pay fair royalties and their upload is streamlined.  I've dropped all the other non-sellers but I think of GL as a bet on the future.   I'm done with giving photos to new sites that end up competing on nothing but price.

If Sean and Lisa dont do well on an agency, I am not even going to try it. I am not going to determine the succes of an agency on 2 random ELs. One person's experience doesnt change anything for me compared to the dozens of people with thousands of images having no sales.

Each to his own, still dont get it. If the agency would have taken off, it would have happened back in February. They have said themselves Google killed them. Nothing changed since then.

I'll leave my 450 file sit there because I am not even wasting more time on deleting them.

And as mentioned before, CanStockPhoto is also paying 50% and they do have sales but no one is actively supporting them. Duncan is a nice guy too, so I dont see the difference.

Cheers.

Nothing against CanStock, just never tried them.  Like many people, I got significant sales at GL early on, then they faded away.  Obviously things changed, but they can change again.  Google giveth, and Google taketh away, and maybe Google bringeth back at some point.   

Quote from: Ron on September 26, 2013, 19:01
And as mentioned before, CanStockPhoto is also paying 50% and they do have sales but no one is actively supporting them. Duncan is a nice guy too, so I dont see the difference.

I am sure that contributors submitting outside the usual top5 are supporting CanStockPhoto already, just don't mention it as often (as GL)

Also 50% of you set the price at GL can be a nice sum, 50% of say .50 at CS isn't all that much.

I had a number of good months when I started at GL with nice EL's and a lot of promise, since then and especially since the google search change I suppose only a few a month. Hopefully google search or something can change again and sales will pick up. I think of it as an investment against the IS and FT and SS domination of the stock market.

One thing with getting a lot more images at a site is that it dilutes individual contributors earnings, but might not effect the site's bottom line much at all.