MicrostockGroup
Agency Based Discussion => iStockPhoto.com => Topic started by: Cogent Marketing on November 16, 2011, 15:17
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Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/ (http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/)
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Funny how the IS graph states there is no competitor information to show, there is, it's here.....
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Come on __ keep up! We've been discussing those graphs for the last couple of days on this thread;
http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/istock-raises-prices-for-some-e-files-and-video/msg227753/?topicseen#new (http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/istock-raises-prices-for-some-e-files-and-video/msg227753/?topicseen#new)
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Thanks gostwyck for your usual ignorant response. I had to log out to read your response because like so many other members here I have you on ignore as well. Take a guess why ???
That'll be 30 seconds I'll never get back again.
Perhaps if you were not so trigger happy with your smart rebukes (as well as being a complete recognised knob) you'll have seen my text stating apologies if this has been mentioned before. ;D
EDIT: and for the record look down three to see nruboc's response. ;D
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Well I knew via a few "insiders" the situation was bad but this smells of catastrophy. At this rate I doubt they will be around at all in 2012. Anyhow, what do they care, I mean they have Lobo, right. He will no doubt save the situation. :D
BTW, dont mind gotswyck, this is his happy-hour, after a few shots he gets sour.
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Well I knew via a few "insiders" the situation was bad but this smells of catastrophy. At this rate I doubt they will be around at all in 2012. Anyhow, what do they care, I mean they have Lobo, right. He will no doubt save the situation. :D
BTW, dont mind gotswyck, this is his happy-hour, after a few shots he gets sour.
I know - hopefully he'll fall asleep. I posted the link from above on the IS site - within ten minutes my forum privileges have been suspended! That has got to be a record, they were only re-introduced following a nine month ban last week and today was my first post, they said, and I quote
"The administration team at iStockphoto has locked your forum privileges. Comments from iStockphoto Administrators (if any):"
Result. PS The discussion topic has been removed. I think their a little touchy. My post is below.
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Thanks for the embedded links, they didn't catch my attention in the other thread.
This chart matches what I'm seeing at ShutterStock, explosive growth, couldn't have happened to a better company. I love watching IStock's demise!!!!!
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Well I knew via a few "insiders" the situation was bad but this smells of catastrophy. At this rate I doubt they will be around at all in 2012. Anyhow, what do they care, I mean they have Lobo, right. He will no doubt save the situation. :D
BTW, dont mind gotswyck, this is his happy-hour, after a few shots he gets sour.
I know - hopefully he'll fall asleep. I posted the link from above on the IS site - within ten minutes my forum privileges have been suspended! That has got to be a record, they were only re-introduced following a nine month ban last week and today was my first post, they said, and I quote
"The administration team at iStockphoto has locked your forum privileges. Comments from iStockphoto Administrators (if any):"
Result. PS The discussion topic has been removed. I think their a little touchy. My post is below.
Bloody hell! you posted this in the IS forum? no wonder they exploded, they must have had a major coronary occlusion.
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Well I knew via a few "insiders" the situation was bad but this smells of catastrophy. At this rate I doubt they will be around at all in 2012. Anyhow, what do they care, I mean they have Lobo, right. He will no doubt save the situation. :D
BTW, dont mind gotswyck, this is his happy-hour, after a few shots he gets sour.
I know - hopefully he'll fall asleep. I posted the link from above on the IS site - within ten minutes my forum privileges have been suspended! That has got to be a record, they were only re-introduced following a nine month ban last week and today was my first post, they said, and I quote
"The administration team at iStockphoto has locked your forum privileges. Comments from iStockphoto Administrators (if any):"
Result. PS The discussion topic has been removed. I think their a little touchy. My post is below.
Bloody hell! you posted this in the IS forum? no wonder they exploded, they must have had a major coronary occlusion.
I know. I couldn't resist it. It got three responses before it got flamed (with me). One was from Sean which was really funny, he said "we know there has been some stagnation!!!!!!!" I responded with This is not stagnation. Stagnation is usually a flat line, maybe slightly dipping. I think that was what did it. The END.
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Well I knew via a few "insiders" the situation was bad but this smells of catastrophy. At this rate I doubt they will be around at all in 2012. Anyhow, what do they care, I mean they have Lobo, right. He will no doubt save the situation. :D
BTW, dont mind gotswyck, this is his happy-hour, after a few shots he gets sour.
I know - hopefully he'll fall asleep. I posted the link from above on the IS site - within ten minutes my forum privileges have been suspended! That has got to be a record, they were only re-introduced following a nine month ban last week and today was my first post, they said, and I quote
"The administration team at iStockphoto has locked your forum privileges. Comments from iStockphoto Administrators (if any):"
Result. PS The discussion topic has been removed. I think their a little touchy. My post is below.
:D :D I salute you, sir.
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Well I knew via a few "insiders" the situation was bad but this smells of catastrophy. At this rate I doubt they will be around at all in 2012. Anyhow, what do they care, I mean they have Lobo, right. He will no doubt save the situation. :D
BTW, dont mind gotswyck, this is his happy-hour, after a few shots he gets sour.
I know - hopefully he'll fall asleep. I posted the link from above on the IS site - within ten minutes my forum privileges have been suspended! That has got to be a record, they were only re-introduced following a nine month ban last week and today was my first post, they said, and I quote
"The administration team at iStockphoto has locked your forum privileges. Comments from iStockphoto Administrators (if any):"
Result. PS The discussion topic has been removed. I think their a little touchy. My post is below.
Bloody hell! you posted this in the IS forum? no wonder they exploded, they must have had a major coronary occlusion.
I know. I couldn't resist it. It got three responses before it got flamed (with me). One was from Sean which was really funny, he said "we know there has been some stagnation!!!!!!!" I responded with This is not stagnation. Stagnation is usually a flat line, maybe slightly dipping. I think that was what did it. The END.
Ha, ha, well I say this, you do have some guts, for sure. Anyway, you didnt care did you. Typical polite and wry answer from Sean though. Dont think he cares too much either, by the sound of it.
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Well, the graph actually looks better than the monthly report thread over there. I wonder how long it will be before we're told that individuals don't have a broad enough view of the sales position, so the subject shouldn't be discussed.
I'm still waiting to see how TS did in October but, of course, it is verboten even to ask when they think that the stats run might start, by order of Reichsmarshal Lobo (in what is possibly the most stupid forum ruling of all).
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I posted the link from above on the IS site - within ten minutes my forum privileges have been suspended!
iStock acts like a communist state. "Everything is going fine, don't believe the rumors about the sinking sales, it's capitalist propaganda. Remember, it's not money that is going to make you happy, only work and production is going to make us happy. P.S. If you disagree you will put in jail and tortured."
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lagereek Ha, ha, well I say this, you do have some guts, for sure. Anyway, you didnt care did you. Typical polite and wry answer from Sean though. Dont think he cares too much either, by the sound of it.
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I don't really care, but I do have some sympathy for their loyal exclusives being treated like mushrooms. My port on IS is so small it is completely insignificant, me and my company (were) exclusive buyers from IS for about three years solid - I decided to change that about two years ago and now it's DT and SS (occasionally FT). It's their loss too, I actually approved over 1400 image downloads from IS in the first year we were with them (on behalf of clients), but frankly, now, they don't deserve my business and no longer get any.
Above all, nothing gives me (and a few in the office) greater pleasure than taking the **** out of Lobo.
PS- Have you noticed there are no locked threads in the month of November? New IS policy - simply remove the thread. Looks better to the uninitiated?
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Here is some competitor information information
(http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u97/hlehnerer/Forums/istockcomp.png)
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Here is some competitor information information
([url]http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u97/hlehnerer/Forums/istockcomp.png[/url])
I think I'm going to frame this and put it on my wall.
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Thanks for posting that graph Oboy. I haven't figured out how to do comparisons in the same graph on Compete. Would like to see one with Fotolia included.
I'm actually pretty distressed to see the increase in traffic at 123 because it isn't reflected in my sales at all.
I am absolutely shocked to see Istock is on a par with Depositphotos. Did DP even exist a year ago?
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Traffic is a very imprecise indicator of performance. If iS and Deposit Images get the same traffic and sell the same number of images, iS will generate many, many times as much revenue.
123's ranking looks odd to me as well. Of course, unique visitors include buyers and sellers so the spike might be due to sellers as much as it is to buyers. A growth in the number of sellers doesn't favour established suppliers. Some sites seem to favour established artists, others push new material.
Any set of indicators probably fails miserably to represent what different individuals are experiencing because we are all "special cases" in some way or other.
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Here it is with Fotolia included
(http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u97/hlehnerer/Forums/MSG/fotoliacomp.png)
compete use to this function directly on their website, now you have to embed this into website.
<a href='http://siteanalytics.compete.com/'><img src='http://grapher.compete.com/shutterstock.com+fotolia.com+istockphoto.com+123rf.com+dreamstime.com_uv.png' /></a>
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Traffic is a very imprecise indicator of performance. If iS and Deposit Images get the same traffic and sell the same number of images, iS will generate many, many times as much revenue.
123's ranking looks odd to me as well. Of course, unique visitors include buyers and sellers so the spike might be due to sellers as much as it is to buyers. A growth in the number of sellers doesn't favour established suppliers. Some sites seem to favour established artists, others push new material.
Any set of indicators probably fails miserably to represent what different individuals are experiencing because we are all "special cases" in some way or other.
True, but. (there's always a but).
This site is using a level playing field in regard to the criteria they use to measure unique visitors. Therefore as a trending tool it is useful to observe - the trends of 'hits' is what is important, not necessarily the 'value' of what those hits 'create', ie sales/downloads.
Inevitably, if you get fewer and fewer 'hits' does it not follow that in the end you will get fewer and fewer sales? aka your market attraction is diminishing month after month?
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Here it is with Fotolia included
([url]http://i166.photobucket.com/albums/u97/hlehnerer/Forums/MSG/fotoliacomp.png[/url])
compete use to this function directly on their website, now you have to embed this into website.
<a href='[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/'>[/url]<img src='[url]http://grapher.compete.com/shutterstock.com+fotolia.com+istockphoto.com+123rf.com+dreamstime.com_uv.png'[/url] /></a>
Cool. Thanks for the explanation and for including FT :)
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Traffic is a very imprecise indicator of performance. If iS and Deposit Images get the same traffic and sell the same number of images, iS will generate many, many times as much revenue.
123's ranking looks odd to me as well. Of course, unique visitors include buyers and sellers so the spike might be due to sellers as much as it is to buyers. A growth in the number of sellers doesn't favour established suppliers. Some sites seem to favour established artists, others push new material.
Any set of indicators probably fails miserably to represent what different individuals are experiencing because we are all "special cases" in some way or other.
True, but. (there's always a but).
This site is using a level playing field in regard to the criteria they use to measure unique visitors. Therefore as a trending tool it is useful to observe - the trends of 'hits' is what is important, not necessarily the 'value' of what those hits 'create', ie sales/downloads.
Inevitably, if you get fewer and fewer 'hits' does it not follow that in the end you will get fewer and fewer sales? aka your market attraction is diminishing month after month?
Yes, a decline in hits has to be bad news for the company as a general principle. My point wasn't that iStock is not losing market position, it was that 123's stats are not necessarily a reflection of how well suppliers to that site are doing (with reference to Lisa's post). Long term, the growth in 123 traffic has got to result in good things for that site regardless of whether it is mainly from buyers or sellers but right now we may not see that in our own earnings.
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Yes, a decline in hits has to be bad news for the company as a general principle. My point wasn't that iStock is not losing market position, it was that 123's stats are not necessarily a reflection of how well suppliers to that site are doing (with reference to Lisa's post). Long term, the growth in 123 traffic has got to result in good things for that site regardless of whether it is mainly from buyers or sellers but right now we may not see that in our own earnings.
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Sorry, I misunderstood your point. I agree with your point now.
KelvinJay has site mailed me stating why my posting of the link to Site Analytics was removed from IS, see below:
Written by "kelvinjay" at 03:50 PM, November 16, 2011:
Hi,
I just moderate the forums and try to keep things on topic and civil. If doing either of those things seems to be beyond you, please feel free not to partake in the forums.
Cheers
Kelvin
I simply pasted the link. Nothing else. What a strange little man....
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The stats wouldnīt worry me at all, if the istock management openly commented on what we see and gave us their own view where istock stands in the general marketplace.
It is the fact that they ignore the subject and apparently ban all discussion about it that makes the problem huge, scary and threatening.
Every exclusive I know is following these statistics. Itīs been a major discussion topic for most of the year
Personally, as long as the competitors donīt post how much they pay out to contributors every week, I will assume that the 1.9 Mio that istock pays out every week means that istock is still leading in royalty payouts. I am sure if anyone else came close to the 1 Mio Dollar mark, they would advertise it.
There is a lot of smoke and mirrors in a competitive market. But istock has the power to end the discussion, by either explaining what we see or simply reversing the visible trend.
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KelvinJay has site mailed me stating why my posting of the link to Site Analytics was removed from IS, see below:
Written by "kelvinjay" at 03:50 PM, November 16, 2011:
Hi,
I just moderate the forums and try to keep things on topic and civil. If doing either of those things seems to be beyond you, please feel free not to partake in the forums.
Cheers
Kelvin
Wow! I doubt if we'll ever discover what was "off topic" or "uncivil" about your posts. Perhaps he meant "sycophantic and supine" rather than "on topic and civil". Some people have trouble expressing themselves clearly.
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... 123's stats are not necessarily a reflection of how well suppliers to that site are doing (with reference to Lisa's post). Long term, the growth in 123 traffic has got to result in good things for that site regardless of whether it is mainly from buyers or sellers but right now we may not see that in our own earnings.
Makes sense. I would love to see some of that improved traffic translate to a significant bump in sales. Guess it will happen eventually.
FWIW, a designer friend of mine switched from IS to 123 a couple of years ago and loves them. Hardly ever buys anywhere else. They must be doing something right.
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KelvinJay has site mailed me stating why my posting of the link to Site Analytics was removed from IS, see below:
Written by "kelvinjay" at 03:50 PM, November 16, 2011:
Hi,
I just moderate the forums and try to keep things on topic and civil. If doing either of those things seems to be beyond you, please feel free not to partake in the forums.
Cheers
Kelvin
Wow! I doubt if we'll ever discover what was "off topic" or "uncivil" about your posts. Perhaps he meant "sycophantic and supine" rather than "on topic and civil". Some people have trouble expressing themselves clearly.
The funny thing is I only posted the link Nothing else, absolutely nothing. No comment, no sarky or terse remark nothing, just the link. That's it. Off topic and uncivil. It was posted in the October sales forum discussion - I thought it might be pertinent. Obviously not.
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FWIW, a designer friend of mine switched from IS to 123 a couple of years ago and loves them. Hardly ever buys anywhere else. They must be doing something right.
It's not keywording. I've just done a few of my standard searches, and it's as badly spammed, (or ignorantly keyworded) as anywhere else.
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Personally, as long as the competitors donīt post how much they pay out to contributors every week, I will assume that the 1.9 Mio that istock pays out every week means that istock is still leading in royalty payouts. I am sure if anyone else came close to the 1 Mio Dollar mark, they would advertise it.
I don't know about that. The only one in the same league is SS and they might well be paying that or even more and still choose not to advertise it, They don't brag about what they are doing, they just get on with it.
How long ago was that iStock figure last stated? Is it still true?
Ultimately, what matters is the individual's earnings at the end of the month and global payout figures have nothing to do with that. You can put me and Yuri in the same pot and say that on average, the two of us earn many tens of thousands of dollars a month. It doesn't mean that I am making more than a pittance. It's just a statistic.
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I'm actually pretty distressed to see the increase in traffic at 123 because it isn't reflected in my sales at all.
Interestingly, it does reflect mine. 123RF isn't far behind iStock over the last year, and it's ahead for the last three months.
I am absolutely shocked to see Istock is on a par with Depositphotos. Did DP even exist a year ago?
My first sales at Deposit date back to February, 2010. So yes, they did.
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FWIW, a designer friend of mine switched from IS to 123 a couple of years ago and loves them. Hardly ever buys anywhere else. They must be doing something right.
It's not keywording. I've just done a few of my standard searches, and it's as badly spammed, (or ignorantly keyworded) as anywhere else.
Of course it's not keywording!
It's price!
It's kindness towards customers and contributors..
It is great commissions..
I always refer people to 123rf without even needing to use referral links because I know I will get a good return eventually..
I used to refer people to IS.. Back in when they were a community friendly company..
They screwed it so badly that putting our commission back to %20 wouldn't fix it!
I would need them to pay me %90 to gain the trust they lost!
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1.9 mio is recent number mentioned by vcr (head of video) and also dittmar (europe) here in Germany. Somewhere on the video forum is a link, maybe I'll post it later.
In September 2010 kelly posted 1.7 Mio in his announcement of the rc system on the forums.
of course it is true that individual numbers are the most important, but when you choose a business partner, you also want to know how "real" they are. I have no personal experience with ss, although at the mexpo they gave a very professional presentation.
I have just never heard anyone else posting a real number, and nearly 2 Million a week, is very serious money.
eta:
link
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=336155&page=1 (http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=336155&page=1)
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I posted the link from above on the IS site - within ten minutes my forum privileges have been suspended! That has got to be a record, they were only re-introduced following a nine month ban last week and today was my first post, they said, and I quote
"The administration team at iStockphoto has locked your forum privileges. Comments from iStockphoto Administrators (if any):"
Result. PS The discussion topic has been removed. I think their a little touchy. My post is below.
Seriously, are you suffering from Aspergers or a similar condition? Apart from being crassly insensitive it was an idiotic and provocative post with obvious repercussions which you didn't seem to have thought through. I found it particulary bizarre that you appear to be so proud of yourself that you even kept a little screen-shot of your post so you could show everyone how clever you (thought you) have been. Whatever.
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When I saw these stats early last month, and seeing my own sales were 50% down, I was worried. Since then sales have been great! Well, what goes up must come down, so they say. For me, IS was/is the last MS site where I earn dollars for my work, not cents. Soon it will all be cents I guess and then just not worth the effort - hope not though, right now its good!
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lagereek Ha, ha, well I say this, you do have some guts, for sure. Anyway, you didnt care did you. Typical polite and wry answer from Sean though. Dont think he cares too much either, by the sound of it.
I don't really care, but I do have some sympathy for their loyal exclusives being treated like mushrooms. My port on IS is so small it is completely insignificant, me and my company (were) exclusive buyers from IS for about three years solid - I decided to change that about two years ago and now it's DT and SS (occasionally FT). It's their loss too, I actually approved over 1400 image downloads from IS in the first year we were with them (on behalf of clients), but frankly, now, they don't deserve my business and no longer get any.
Above all, nothing gives me (and a few in the office) greater pleasure than taking the **** out of Lobo.
PS- Have you noticed there are no locked threads in the month of November? New IS policy - simply remove the thread. Looks better to the uninitiated?
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Yes! I have noticed and I think its absoloutely disgusting. This site, right now and in everything they do, is just so bad, so unorthodox, etc. How on earth can even the most die-hard exclusive swallow all this garbage? being treated like school-kids, etc?
I agree with you and I feel for them, years of work down the drain.
Could it be a method in the madness? could it be that they actually want the site to deteriorate, before the migration, Getty/TS, will then step in as a golden saviour, etc? Im thinking out loud thats all.
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If you compare Alexa and Compete, the graphs don't agree. Alexa shows iStock having a precipitous drop in page views, about a 50% fall within one month, at the end of 2010, followed by more-or-less flatlining ever since.
Compete, on the other hand, shows a more gradual three-month decline in unique visitors beginning only in May 2011, admittedly ending up even worse, more than 60% down from the peak.
Granted, these are not measuring the same parameter, but you might expect the general trends to agree.
To make matters more confusing, the Alexa graph of Reach ("Estimated percentage of global internet users who visit istockphoto.com") shows growth in the first quarter of 2011, followed by a sudden 20%-odd fall around the end of the quarter, but that only puts the numbers back to average 2010 levels.
I really don't know what to make of all this. None of these graphs bears the slightest resemblance to my sales on iStockphoto.
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If you compare Alexa and Compete, the graphs don't agree. Alexa shows iStock having a precipitous drop in page views, about a 50% fall within one month, at the end of 2010, followed by more-or-less flatlining ever since.
Compete, on the other hand, shows a more gradual three-month decline in unique visitors beginning only in May 2011, admittedly ending up even worse, more than 60% down from the peak.
Granted, these are not measuring the same parameter, but you might expect the general trends to agree.
To make matters more confusing, the Alexa graph of Reach ("Estimated percentage of global internet users who visit istockphoto.com") shows growth in the first quarter of 2011, followed by a sudden 20%-odd fall around the end of the quarter, but that only puts the numbers back to average 2010 levels.
I really don't know what to make of all this. None of these graphs bears the slightest resemblance to my sales on iStockphoto.
'
Hi!
well count yourself as a lucky boy because everyone I know at IS, exclusives and independants see these graphs mirrored in their sales.
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well count yourself as a lucky boy because everyone I know at IS, exclusives and independants see these graphs mirrored in their sales.
But that's not really possible because the graphs are different from each other. I didn't say my sales were soaring; I just said I couldn't see any correlation between them and any of these graphs.
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Hi!
well count yourself as a lucky boy because everyone I know at IS, exclusives and independants see these graphs mirrored in their sales.
I guess i am a lucky one to cause my graph is different as well :). But probably this has to do with the fact that I am more active now than 2009-2010.
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If you compare Alexa and Compete, the graphs don't agree. Alexa shows iStock having a precipitous drop in page views, about a 50% fall within one month, at the end of 2010, followed by more-or-less flatlining ever since.
Compete, on the other hand, shows a more gradual three-month decline in unique visitors beginning only in May 2011, admittedly ending up even worse, more than 60% down from the peak.
Granted, these are not measuring the same parameter, but you might expect the general trends to agree.
To make matters more confusing, the Alexa graph of Reach ("Estimated percentage of global internet users who visit istockphoto.com") shows growth in the first quarter of 2011, followed by a sudden 20%-odd fall around the end of the quarter, but that only puts the numbers back to average 2010 levels.
I really don't know what to make of all this. None of these graphs bears the slightest resemblance to my sales on iStockphoto.
Same here, my growth this year has been good overall. Those traffic stats have absolutely no correlation to sales imo.
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This is bittersweet to be sure.
We were asking for buyers to shop elsewhere last year when iStock announced it's "earned credit" scheme - and now they have gone.
Ironic I guess.
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This is bittersweet to be sure.
We were asking for buyers to shop elsewhere last year when iStock announced it's "earned credit" scheme - and now they have gone.
Ironic I guess.
Many contributors are buyers. You bite one you bite them all.
By the way, Alexa collects data on browsing from computers which have the Alexa toolbar installed. How many of the world's computers have the toolbar. Less than half maybe?
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By the way, Alexa collects data on browsing from computers which have the Alexa toolbar installed. How many of the world's computers have the toolbar. Less than half maybe?
A good many less than half, I would expect. But still enough to be a statistically valid sample.
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Alexa collects data on browsing from computers which have the Alexa toolbar installed. How many of the world's computers have the toolbar. Less than half maybe?
Almost none % more likely! I think that compete.com bases its results on a small survey sample IIRC. Server stats and Google analytics are what mostly matter these days IMO. Even with respect to general trends, the rest often seem like witchcraft and hokum. Perhaps survey samples made more sense back in the days when total web use was much smaller.
I do not doubt that website traffic is down at istockphoto.com. Probably mostly as a result of reduced forum traffic :)
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...Personally, as long as the competitors donīt post how much they pay out to contributors every week, I will assume that the 1.9 Mio that istock pays out every week means that istock is still leading in royalty payouts...
I hope most of the exclusives still believe that as well. Judging by the lack of a mass dumping of the crowns, I'm assuming they do.
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...Personally, as long as the competitors donīt post how much they pay out to contributors every week, I will assume that the 1.9 Mio that istock pays out every week means that istock is still leading in royalty payouts...
I hope most of the exclusives still believe that as well. Judging by the lack of a mass dumping of the crowns, I'm assuming they do.
Agreeing! hope they all really buy that or else we have a mass exodus of dropped crowns.
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Personally, as long as the competitors donīt post how much they pay out to contributors every week, I will assume that the 1.9 Mio that istock pays out every week means that istock is still leading in royalty payouts. I am sure if anyone else came close to the 1 Mio Dollar mark, they would advertise it.
Of course. Remember that any "all free" sites have much more downloads than any ms (paying site). And when you need 10, 50, 100 or 300 "hits" or downloads at subs B to match just one at PAYG A, things get complicated to calculate. No matter how much glee you get from selling at 0.30, any size.
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Istock is not performing as well as I had hoped.
However, I must say that I am getting more sales in the second half of the year than than the first so the graph does not make sense to me.
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Personally, as long as the competitors donīt post how much they pay out to contributors every week, I will assume that the 1.9 Mio that istock pays out every week means that istock is still leading in royalty payouts. I am sure if anyone else came close to the 1 Mio Dollar mark, they would advertise it.
Of course. Remember that any "all free" sites have much more downloads than any ms (paying site). And when you need 10, 50, 100 or 300 "hits" or downloads at subs B to match just one at PAYG A, things get complicated to calculate. No matter how much glee you get from selling at 0.30, any size.
Yep, Flickr wins!!! ;)
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Not necessarily flirck or just personal use... at sxh bestsellers are in the 200.000 + more dl's. Legal for commercial use, medium quality to say the best...
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Same here, my growth this year has been good overall. Those traffic stats have absolutely no correlation to sales imo.
Those traffic stats have absolutely no correlation to YOUR sales, anyway. And maybe a few others. But apparently it's correlating to a huge majority.
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Same here, my growth this year has been good overall. Those traffic stats have absolutely no correlation to sales imo.
Those traffic stats have absolutely no correlation to YOUR sales, anyway. And maybe a few others. But apparently it's correlating to a huge majority.
Hmm, we actually don't know anything about general sales stats because all we have is a self-reporting sample, which is about as far from randomised as you can get. In two words: statistically worthless.
I, for one, have felt inhibited for months about reporting my sales because they're not nearly as bad as those of most of the people posting. On the contrary. But it seems tasteless to be smug while others are mourning, and I'm sure many others feel that way too. And then of course there's the worry that if you stick your head above the parapet the copycats will descend in droves on your portfolio.
But if we take sjlocke's self-reported sales as an example, we can possibly draw some conclusions. Sean's sales must be as close to a representative sample of general iStock performance as we can get -- he's been around a long time, he uploads consistently, the quality of his work is stable. He says his sales are flat year-on-year despite something like a 25% portfolio increase in the past 12 months.
Now, Yuri once made the very good point that your new uploads have to compensate for the best match decay of your old images and their dilution by the flood of new competition. At some point an equilibrium will be reached: you won't be able to enlarge a big portfolio at such an ever-increasing rate that you can do any more than replace the losses. And eventually you will start losing ground. This, I suppose, is why Yuri is on a mission to scale up his business.
In Sean's case, and mine for that matter, stagnation can be explained quite feasibly by Yuri's theory. The phenomenon doesn't necessarily imply any overall decline on iStock. Nobody is immune to it, and infrequent or haphazard uploaders will obviously suffer sooner and worse.
As an iStock exclusive 99% of whose income comes from Calgary, and who has a formidable number of dependants to support, I worry constantly about the possibility of a sudden collapse of iStockphoto. The dodgy developments of the past year have trebled my anxiety. However, as yet I see no signs of anything except an end to the fast-rising tide that used to float all ships.
What follows now will be interesting. The apparent boom at Shutterstock could mean a migration of buyers from iStock, but then again it could mean only that iStock is not attracting new buyers but Shutterstock is. iStock could continue bumping along at roughly its present level for years or, as sometimes happens to ailing Internet market leaders, it could suffer a catastrophic collapse within months as buyers and exclusive contributors desert it en masse.
My point, though, is that with the scanty information we have there is no way of making predictions. I wish there was.
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But apparently it's correlating to a huge majority.
Judging by what? A tiny tiny minority of people who report in forums, some of whom report downturns, others report BME? Statistically worthless.
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I don't think all the people that report in the istock forum and here are statistically worthless. I also think that there's lots of reasons to think that Getty and their owners are deliberately downsizing istock. Why else would they keep pushing prices up and making lots of changes that buyers aren't liking? Why would they be so blunt with them in the forums and tell them to use Thinkstock?
SS had stagnated for me but the past few months have been very good. I do think they are getting buyers from istock. It seems unlikely that earnings would flatten and then suddenly they find lots more new buyers that have never used other sites. Is it just a coincidence that so many of us have seen earnings fall with istock and improve with SS?
This is all speculation and we don't know 100% what's going on but it seems highly unlikely that istock is doing just fine. I think they know this and they aren't concerned. I'm sure they have a plan but it doesn't make much sense to most of us, as were only interested in our earnings from istock. It looks to me that their plan is to make istock much smaller and higher priced. That might work but it's a big gamble, when so many buyers are used to lower prices. Why would they take this risk? They must think it will strengthen Getty. I think that if they were only concerned with making the most money possible with istock, they wouldn't of made so many changes and they would of done much more to keep buyers and suppliers happy.
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It looks to me that their plan is to make istock much smaller and higher priced. That might work but it's a big gamble, when so many buyers are used to lower prices. Why would they take this risk? They must think it will strengthen Getty. I think that if they were only concerned with making the most money possible with istock, they wouldn't of made so many changes and they would of done much more to keep buyers and suppliers happy.
I think you've hit the nail on the head.
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SS had stagnated for me but the past few months have been very good. I do think they are getting buyers from istock. It seems unlikely that earnings would flatten and then suddenly they find lots more new buyers that have never used other sites. Is it just a coincidence that so many of us have seen earnings fall with istock and improve with SS?
Not necessarily, but quite possibly. Shutterstock may have doubled its ad spend. Or it may have quadrupled its sales force. We just don't know. It's quite possible that SS would spend more than IS on marketing at the present time because it doesn't have to deliver every last cent of profit to a demanding shareholder.
This is all speculation and we don't know 100% what's going on but it seems highly unlikely that istock is doing just fine. I think they know this and they aren't concerned. I'm sure they have a plan but it doesn't make much sense to most of us, as were only interested in our earnings from istock. It looks to me that their plan is to make istock much smaller and higher priced. That might work but it's a big gamble, when so many buyers are used to lower prices. Why would they take this risk? They must think it will strengthen Getty. I think that if they were only concerned with making the most money possible with istock, they wouldn't of made so many changes and they would of done much more to keep buyers and suppliers happy.
I share your puzzlement about the behaviour of iStock's masters in the past year. But I doubt the plan is to diminish iStock itself. About six months ago, the last time I heard the numbers, iStock's revenue was about a third of Getty's, and rising, whereas Getty itself was flat. It would take an unusually deranged MBA to decide wilfully to shrink the growing business in the hope of reviving the stagnant one, particularly when there's plenty of competition.
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About six months ago, the last time I heard the numbers, iStock's revenue was about a third of Getty's, and rising, whereas Getty itself was flat.
Link?
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About six months ago, the last time I heard the numbers, iStock's revenue was about a third of Getty's, and rising, whereas Getty itself was flat.
Link?
No link, sorry. "Private communication", as they say in the academic journals. You'll have to take my word for it I'm afraid.
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Ah, so you have a private and privileged entree into the inner workings of IS eh?
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Ah, so you have a private and privileged entree into the inner workings of IS eh?
Not so. I have no more idea than you of the inner workings, nor do I have any kind of communication with anybody in a position of authority or influence at IS. You may freely discount those figures I mentioned because I'm not going to breach any confidences by explaining how I heard them.
Added: In any case, it doesn't matter whether my source was right or wrong as far as my line of argument is concerned. None of us will doubt that iStock was a strongly growing concern a year ago, and the management's present policies were hatched before then.
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I, for one, have felt inhibited for months about reporting my sales because they're not nearly as bad as those of most of the people posting. On the contrary. But it seems tasteless to be smug while others are mourning, and I'm sure many others feel that way too. And then of course there's the worry that if you stick your head above the parapet the copycats will descend in droves on your portfolio.
That in itself says more than just the words. A couple of years back, when most people were regularly reporting improving sales, people who weren't doing so well felt inhibited about posting their less than stellar stats.
How things change.
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That in itself says more than just the words. A couple of years back, when most people were regularly reporting improving sales, people who weren't dointg so well felt inhibited about posting their less than stellar stats.
How things change.
Yup, Sue, you certainly have a point there. But there may be yet another confounding factor, and that is the shabby treatment of contributors starting last year. I might have mentioned that I also feel inhibited under the circumstances about posting anything that might be mistaken for a woo-yay. In fact, I don't post there any more at all.
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...My point, though, is that with the scanty information we have there is no way of making predictions. I wish there was.
You are right about that. And generally I tend to avoid drawing any conclusions from a few forum posts. But you have to admit, this time around it all seems like more than just forum speculation and wild predictions. We've got an unusually large number of folks reporting losses at istock, and not just a few bucks here and there. I'm among those seeing enormous losses, with my earnings down to just 1/10th of what they used to be a couple of years ago. Meanwhile folks at SS are on a generally upward climb, again myself included. And not by small amounts. I expect to surpass my BME at SS within a few days, probably by Monday. Then there are these site statistics, from different sources, all showing rising traffic at SS and a few other sites, while traffic at istock declines.
On their own, these stats are certainly meaningless. Together they don't really even amount to much statistically valuable info. But in total they add up to something that is a little more than a coincidence.
Even at that, though, you're right, there's no way to make predictions from this, even if it is more than a coincidence. Who knows where istock is headed, especially while the shareholders still have their hands on the wheel.
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I too feed my family via iStock, now I shoot video and am exclusive. I see some good trends on my end. First is quality of collection, iStock still has a great exclusive collection. Next is iStock offers different collections, now some of you don't like this but it works in retail and business. My sales have been good this year and better than 2010. I don't think iStock is going to lose a lot of ground to SS.
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About six months ago, the last time I heard the numbers, iStock's revenue was about a third of Getty's, and rising, whereas Getty itself was flat.
Link?
No link, sorry. "Private communication", as they say in the academic journals. You'll have to take my word for it I'm afraid.
On record is that IS used pay out an average 28% of revenue as royalties
I suspect that they have driven that down a little lets say they have managed it down to 25%
& say they pay out an average of 2 million a week
that makes for a turnover of approximately 400 million so you are saying gettys turnover is 1.2 billion?
If anyone has better date for % payout or weekly payout that would make for a better calculation?
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I too feed my family via iStock, now I shoot video and am exclusive. I see some good trends on my end. First is quality of collection, iStock still has a great exclusive collection. Next is iStock offers different collections, now some of you don't like this but it works in retail and business. My sales have been good this year and better than 2010. I don't think iStock is going to lose a lot of ground to SS.
The video market is in its infancy, all agencies will see growth in that area for many years to come. And I agree that istock has fantastic collections. However on the photo side, if you look at the other agencies you quickly realize they have the same high quality content. They just donīt present it to the customer with edited collections. But how long will it take until they do? It si very easy for an editor to select images copying the "style" preferred in Vetta, Agency, or the different collections on Getty.
The biggest supplier of images are the stock factories, they produce extremely high quality content in exceptional quality. They supply all agencies. istock still has many talented exclusive artists, but more and more professional photographers are moving into microstock, many even from getty, so the exclusive advantage is unfortunately shrinking. Also because istock shows visible download numbers it is easy to copy successful photographers. That is why I opened a thread here asking if visible download numbers are still necessary at this stage of the industry development.
Getty is more clever - they donīt show download numbers to protect the value of their edited collections. Getty has many collections - but you will never know which one of them is selling well, which style is the "goldmine".
istock unfortunately makes it easy for the competition...
I am an istock photo exclusive, but I have always looked at other agencies to compare where we stand and I must admit that quality has risen dramatically in the last 18 months.
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I too feed my family via iStock, now I shoot video and am exclusive. I see some good trends on my end. First is quality of collection, iStock still has a great exclusive collection. Next is iStock offers different collections, now some of you don't like this but it works in retail and business. My sales have been good this year and better than 2010. I don't think iStock is going to lose a lot of ground to SS.
The video market is in its infancy, all agencies will see growth in that area for many years to come. And I agree that istock has fantastic collections. However on the photo side, if you look at the other agencies you quickly realize they have the same high quality content. They just donīt present it to the customer with edited collections. But how long will it take until they do?
The biggest supplier of images are the stock factories, they produce extremely high quality content in exceptional quality. They supply all agencies. istock still has many talented exclusive artists, but more and more professional photographers are moving into microstock, many even from getty, so the exclusive advantage is unfortunately shrinking.
I am an istock photo exclusive, but I have always looked at other agencies to compare where we stand and I must admit that quality has risen dramatically in the last 18 months.
100% true! during all my years as an RM supplier, Jeez! if I told you some of the names of top-shooters, hiding behind pseudos and supplying or starting to supply to micro, you wouldnt believe it! youll call me a lier, for sure. Its no ducks walk anymore and its getting tougher and tougher. I know for a fact, only during the last year I have recommended two Image-Bank photographers to try out SS and they are truly happy.
As I see it, all these figures, monies and turnovers people are coming up with, well, they are quite irrelevant really. I mean its not exactly a secret or guessworks anymore, that IS have been losing ground and thats for the past two years, everyone in this business knows that, its like a global fact.
Sadly I feel that if it wasnt for the meddling, wheeling and dealings by Getty, then IS, would most probably be THE agency, the market leader. However, that wasnt to be. Instead we are all, indies and exclusives, sitting here getting smacked in the balls. :D
best.
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& say they pay out an average of 2 million a week
that makes for a turnover of approximately 400 million so you are saying gettys turnover is 1.2 billion?
That'd be about right, yes, give or take a couple of hundred million. The total value of the global image market is said to be several billion: I forget the exact figure, but $4 billion seems to ring a bell. That includes news. Not sure if it includes footage.
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I, for one, have felt inhibited for months about reporting my sales because they're not nearly as bad as those of most of the people posting. On the contrary. But it seems tasteless to be smug while others are mourning, and I'm sure many others feel that way too.
Speaking as someone whose Istock sales have dropped by about 2/3 over the past few months, I would urge anyone sitting on the sidelines and not reporting good sales to jump in. My feelings won't be hurt, and I am sure most others won't either. I believe most of us participating in the monthly stats threads are doing it to create as accurate a picture as possible of the sales trends on the various sites. Any information you can add is helpful in rounding out that picture. Personally, I would be relieved to learn things aren't as dire at IS as I have feared. :)
As for copycats - well, nothing we can really do to avoid them. Pseudonyms are always an option if you are super concerned about it.
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I'm among those seeing enormous losses, with my earnings down to just 1/10th of what they used to be a couple of years ago. Meanwhile folks at SS are on a generally upward climb, again myself included.
Count me in!
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Oh, I should propably consider myself lucky, I'm down only 50% from my best month. ::)
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& say they pay out an average of 2 million a week
that makes for a turnover of approximately 400 million so you are saying gettys turnover is 1.2 billion?
That'd be about right, yes, give or take a couple of hundred million. The total value of the global image market is said to be several billion: I forget the exact figure, but $4 billion seems to ring a bell. That includes news. Not sure if it includes footage.
That figure (I think $4bn is probably right) didn't include microstock, it was meant to cover all the macro agencies.
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I don't participate in the monthly sell threads, but I'm seeing solid sells from istock. Both money and downloads are up over last year. Most of the other contributors I've talked to in the last three months are reporting the same. The ones that have reported flat sells still seem to be happy because overall money earned is still on the raise.
Don has some very good points.
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I, for one, have felt inhibited for months about reporting my sales because they're not nearly as bad as those of most of the people posting. On the contrary. But it seems tasteless to be smug while others are mourning, and I'm sure many others feel that way too.
Speaking as someone whose Istock sales have dropped by about 2/3 over the past few months, I would urge anyone sitting on the sidelines and not reporting good sales to jump in. My feelings won't be hurt, and I am sure most others won't either. I believe most of us participating in the monthly stats threads are doing it to create as accurate a picture as possible of the sales trends on the various sites. Any information you can add is helpful in rounding out that picture. Personally, I would be relieved to learn things aren't as dire at IS as I have feared. :)
As for copycats - well, nothing we can really do to avoid them. Pseudonyms are always an option if you are super concerned about it.
Well, my sales are somewhat down compared to last year, but my royalties are up. Way up, over last year.
But I've posted the same in the iStock sales thread.
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I, for one, have felt inhibited for months about reporting my sales because they're not nearly as bad as those of most of the people posting. On the contrary. But it seems tasteless to be smug while others are mourning, and I'm sure many others feel that way too.
Speaking as someone whose Istock sales have dropped by about 2/3 over the past few months, I would urge anyone sitting on the sidelines and not reporting good sales to jump in. My feelings won't be hurt, and I am sure most others won't either. I believe most of us participating in the monthly stats threads are doing it to create as accurate a picture as possible of the sales trends on the various sites. Any information you can add is helpful in rounding out that picture. Personally, I would be relieved to learn things aren't as dire at IS as I have feared. :)
I think I said before, but my sales are way up over last year as well, albeit my 100% growth years are over :). I think what we're seeing is pro-acting (high quality/quantity) exclusive istockers doing well and less active excl and non-exclusives suffering in varying degrees. Generalization I know, there are exceptions.
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As a small fish, things seem pretty consistent, picking up this fall. It may be that iStockphoto is more suitable for small players like myself.
I also have to wonder why somebody keeps pounding this drum, when they are really no longer a player in iStock, have no real interest in it, except to gripe constantly about it? Hard to understand. Maybe they should move on?
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By the way, Alexa collects data on browsing from computers which have the Alexa toolbar installed. How many of the world's computers have the toolbar. Less than half maybe?
Probably much less, but what's more, it is installed on irrelevant computers. Public PC's in netcafes for instance or with users so dumb they install it accidentally then don't know how to remove it. Not buyers in any case since they need all the screen real estate for content. The only reliable measurement could come from Google for those sites that have Google Analytics on but I'm sure Google won't release those numbers for free.
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By the way, Alexa collects data on browsing from computers which have the Alexa toolbar installed. How many of the world's computers have the toolbar. Less than half maybe?
Probably much less, but what's more, it is installed on irrelevant computers. Public PC's in netcafes for instance or with users so dumb they install it accidentally then don't know how to remove it. Not buyers in any case since they need all the screen real estate for content. The only reliable measurement could come from Google for those sites that have Google Analytics on but I'm sure Google won't release those numbers for free.
That is all well and good but then why do the stats look the way they do for the other micros? You mean istock users somehow have different computer use behaviour - somehow inherently different to SS users? SS buyers are active at public computers but IS buyers are not? We can argue the accuracy of the actual numbers perhaps but I don't think you can argue against the trending - how do you explain IS trending down and the other sites trending up? Can anyone seriously put forth an argument that IS need not be concerned that their trend is down and their competitors are trending up?
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That is all well and good but then why do the stats look the way they do for the other micros? You mean istock users somehow have different computer use behaviour - somehow inherently different to SS users? SS buyers are active at public computers but IS buyers are not? We can argue the accuracy of the actual numbers perhaps but I don't think you can argue against the trending - how do you explain IS trending down and the other sites trending up? Can anyone seriously put forth an argument that IS need not be concerned that their trend is down and their competitors are trending up?
It will of course be the same for all agencies but my point was rather that Alexa's data are pretty irrelevant for sales on all sites. Why a trend might go down? Perhaps because they catch less random traffic (by Google Images for instance) by some non-sales related events. iStock is for instance losing ground on Google Images while SS and DT are very prominent on the first search page. For a site depending on views and clicks for ads at the contrary, Alexa might be very relevant as the toolbar-installers are a fair statistical sample of the general population. I don't feel that netcafe visitors are a fair sample of professionals going to buy a > 20$ specific product.
You can as well hypothesize that iStock did a good job averting useless random traffic that just eats resources watching their Google Analytics. I remember as a student walking in a very fancy Ferrari showroom in Brussels long ago with worn out sneakers. A very friendly salesman suggested me to leave the premises as apparently I hadn't pockets deep enough to buy one of those goodies. A good salesman has a nose for those things. I was just "random traffic" and he didn't want to waste his time.
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wrong thread.
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You can as well hypothesize that iStock did a good job averting useless random traffic that just eats resources watching their Google Analytics.
Yes but does anybody seriously think this is what is actually happening? I mean we could hypothesies all day but nobody really believes that do they?
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You can as well hypothesize that iStock did a good job averting useless random traffic that just eats resources watching their Google Analytics.
Yes but does anybody seriously think this is what is actually happening? I mean we could hypothesies all day but nobody really believes that do they?
Yes, I can confirm from my own statistics that both buyers and contributors are useless random traffic in their opinion.
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I think I said before, but my sales are way up over last year as well, albeit my 100% growth years are over :). I think what we're seeing is pro-acting (high quality/quantity) exclusive istockers doing well and less active excl and non-exclusives suffering in varying degrees. Generalization I know, there are exceptions.
With respect to exclusives, you are probably right that the pros with high quality/quantity are managing to keep their heads above water. But with respect to non-exclusives - pro or amateur, quality or quantity - NOTHING seems to make a difference.
Sample searches support that. Non-exclusive files are pushed waaaaay back in the searches. Tempting to think Istock is "rewarding" its loyal exclusives. However, considering how they've treated all their contributors the last year, it's more likely that they are trying to hide the erosion of their customer base both from the exclusive contributors, and also to the shareholders, using the best match to artificially inflate profits.
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I, for one, have felt inhibited for months about reporting my sales because they're not nearly as bad as those of most of the people posting. On the contrary. But it seems tasteless to be smug while others are mourning, and I'm sure many others feel that way too.
Speaking as someone whose Istock sales have dropped by about 2/3 over the past few months, I would urge anyone sitting on the sidelines and not reporting good sales to jump in. My feelings won't be hurt, and I am sure most others won't either. I believe most of us participating in the monthly stats threads are doing it to create as accurate a picture as possible of the sales trends on the various sites. Any information you can add is helpful in rounding out that picture. Personally, I would be relieved to learn things aren't as dire at IS as I have feared. :)
I think I said before, but my sales are way up over last year as well, albeit my 100% growth years are over :). I think what we're seeing is pro-acting (high quality/quantity) exclusive istockers doing well and less active excl and non-exclusives suffering in varying degrees. Generalization I know, there are exceptions.
You know I have been exclusive to the Getty-RM, ( came from Stones), since 1993, working under private and studio name, I know exactly what exclusivity means. In the RM, it does work well, have never been any problems at all.
I remember some years ago when talking to the creative-director ( friend) at Getty office in London who laughingly talked about micro and how insane it was to even think of the word exclusivity in conjunction with internetbased sites such as micros, there were maybe all in all no more then 10 million files in micro at that time, today its more like 50 million, all in all.
Now you refer to the word pro, professional, pro-istockers, professional works both ways you know, the very least you can expect from a photo-agency is to meet a professional photographer in a professional way.
During the last two years, IS, have acted irresponsible, arrogant and in the most discusting ways against its contributors, even more so against YOU! their very own exclusives, with claw-backs, RCs, and what nots but YOU lot have got no option but to stand for it. We, the others, dont. Thats the differance.
all the best.
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I've seen this report and I got to say I'm not surprised at all. Sales numbers are heading south for majority of IStockers ... the question is why we see such a drastic drop in traffic? ???
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
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I've seen this report and I got to say I'm not surprised at all. Sales numbers are heading south for majority of IStockers ... the question is why we see such a drastic drop in traffic? ???
My guess would be that buyers are just plain tired of:
1. rising prices
2. prices that change from week to week, depending on how much profit istock wants to realize for any given week
3. a poor search engine (and yes, there will be lots of cheerleader istock contributors jumping in here and saying how great the search engine is...of course, they have been immersed in it for years and know how it works, but buyers who don't have a lot of time to try and figure it out...not so much)
4. having images that they don't really want shoved in their face in the first few pages of the search
And contributors have gotten really tired of the same old bull$hit every day from them and they are focusing their efforts elsewhere.
I'm sure I've forgotten many other reasons...
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That in itself says more than just the words. A couple of years back, when most people were regularly reporting improving sales, people who weren't dointg so well felt inhibited about posting their less than stellar stats.
How things change.
Yup, Sue, you certainly have a point there. But there may be yet another confounding factor, and that is the shabby treatment of contributors starting last year. I might have mentioned that I also feel inhibited under the circumstances about posting anything that might be mistaken for a woo-yay. In fact, I don't post there any more at all.
I think this may account for a big chunk of the lost traffic. Between the LoboNatrix and the Kelvinator, the forums are pretty much a wasteland. There are so many taboo subjects and so many ways to incur the wrath of the moderators that only a few people bother to post at all. The result is a few very bland boring posts and often long intervals where nothing is even posted in many of the forums. Most questions are ignored in forums like Editorial and Partnership and there's always some junior honorary moderator willing to blast anyone who asks a question that has come up before.
Imagine tens of thousands of contributors who used to sign in multiple times a day or stay on continuously that now pretty much completely ignore the site. Istock would do themselves a favor by promoting Lobo to night janitor IMO.
As for Istock however, they are probably pretty happy with their site. Like Kelly said, it is a well oiled machine. With the extra revenue form Agency and Edstock files, the Vetta collection and plus pricing, they are probably doing quite well. For example: the Agency collection has only been online for just over a year. One contributor, Rubberball has over 8400 dl's at prices from 50 to 250 dollars a crack. Considering EL's as well that is probably close to a million in gross revenue from a single Getty contributor in one year, with Getty collecting 80% of the take. I imagine what's her name in charge of Istock is probably looking for a nice Christmas bonus for her stellar performance.
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I think this may account for a big chunk of the lost traffic. Between the LoboNatrix and the Kelvinator, the forums are pretty much a wasteland. There are so many taboo subjects and so many ways to incur the wrath of the moderators that only a few people bother to post at all. The result is a few very bland boring posts and often long intervals where nothing is even posted in many of the forums. Most questions are ignored in forums like Editorial and Partnership and there's always some junior honorary moderator willing to blast anyone who asks a question that has come up before.
Imagine tens of thousands of contributors who used to sign in multiple times a day or stay on continuously that now pretty much completely ignore the site. Istock would do themselves a favor by promoting Lobo to night janitor IMO.
As for Istock however, they are probably pretty happy with their site. Like Kelly said, it is a well oiled machine. With the extra revenue form Agency and Edstock files, the Vetta collection and plus pricing, they are probably doing quite well. For example: the Agency collection has only been online for just over a year. One contributor, Rubberball has over 8400 dl's at prices from 50 to 250 dollars a crack. Considering EL's as well that is probably close to a million in gross revenue from a single Getty contributor in one year, with Getty collecting 80% of the take. I imagine what's her name in charge of Istock is probably looking for a nice Christmas bonus for her stellar performance.
The traffic monitoring sites generally count unique visitors per given time period (not how many clicks each of them makes) so no, forum activity should make little or no difference to the stat's.
Rubberball might be doing OK but is that extra money to Istock or just money that would have been spent on work by another contributor anyway? It's funny how when Istock's traffic was rising everyone was happy that it proved how the business was growing strongly. Now that the traffic is falling off a cliff then some folk are trying to find every excuse under the sun to dismiss the figures.
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I've seen this report and I got to say I'm not surprised at all. Sales numbers are heading south for majority of IStockers ... the question is why we see such a drastic drop in traffic? ???
My guess would be that buyers are just plain tired of:
1. rising prices
2. prices that change from week to week, depending on how much profit istock wants to realize for any given week
3. a poor search engine (and yes, there will be lots of cheerleader istock contributors jumping in here and saying how great the search engine is...of course, they have been immersed in it for years and know how it works, but buyers who don't have a lot of time to try and figure it out...not so much)
4. having images that they don't really want shoved in their face in the first few pages of the search
And contributors have gotten really tired of the same old bull$hit every day from them and they are focusing their efforts elsewhere.
I'm sure I've forgotten many other reasons...
Agree to all that! plus, buyers dont care about who has taken the picture, buyers dont care if the artist behind the shot is exclusive or not, couldnt give a toss. BUT, buyers do care about paying twice as much for a shot only because its exclusive!
Then they will move on and find just as good/bad shot elsewhere.
This is Micro and most buyers are at the bottom of the pitts, scraping for a living and so are their clients. There is a reason why you buy micro: its cheap.
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Thinkstock is up:
http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/ (http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/)
;)
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Thinkstock is up:
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/[/url])
:( >:(
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Photos.com is also showing a nice upswing after the slow summer:
http://siteanalytics.compete.com/photos.com/ (http://siteanalytics.compete.com/photos.com/)
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Thinkstock is up:
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/[/url])
;)
Because it is cheap - micros are about price - period. There is a little wriggle room to raise prices but not very much - low prices and high quantity of sales - isn't that the argument everyone made to the pros who said micro was crap and destroying the profession - and we all said "I prefer my 200 sales at a dollar to your one sale at $100.". This is microstock - IS has forgotten that very basic concept and are now suffering the consequences.
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...This is microstock - IS has forgotten that very basic concept and are now suffering the consequences.
I'm sure they're suffering. No way they can't be with traffic as low as it seems. But I wonder how much they really are suffering, and if it's as bad as we might think. It's been fairly obvious for a while now that istock was moving towards some sort of midstock pricing model. Their prices are at the very high end of what could debatably still be considered microstock. Meanwhile they have Thinkstock serving the purpose of their lower end bulk offering. It stands to reason that the price increases and lower sales volume was all part of the plan.
It's possible that they haven't forgotten what microstock is about, and are just choosing to try a different pricing model and leaving microstock behind. I don't happen to agree with that position, if that is in fact what they are doing, but it does put things in a different perspective. In theory, things might not be so bad at istock HQ and they may just be planning to try and ride out the current slow-down in sales volume while slow and steady price increase up their profits.
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...This is microstock - IS has forgotten that very basic concept and are now suffering the consequences.
I'm sure they're suffering. No way they can't be with traffic as low as it seems. But I wonder how much they really are suffering, and if it's as bad as we might think. It's been fairly obvious for a while now that istock was moving towards some sort of midstock pricing model. Their prices are at the very high end of what could debatably still be considered microstock. Meanwhile they have Thinkstock serving the purpose of their lower end bulk offering. It stands to reason that the price increases and lower sales volume was all part of the plan.
It's possible that they haven't forgotten what microstock is about, and are just choosing to try a different pricing model and leaving microstock behind. I don't happen to agree with that position, if that is in fact what they are doing, but it does put things in a different perspective. In theory, things might not be so bad at istock HQ and they may just be planning to try and ride out the current slow-down in sales volume while slow and steady price increase up their profits.
Yes I agree with you on this - but I also don't think there is much of a market where they are going - there are too many great images available at the micro level - and I am not sure they are at the mid-level of stock either - they are quite close to where the original Getty prices used to be. Or at least the Getty I used to buy at (in Asia I think they were somewhat cheaper).
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Thinkstock is up:
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/[/url])
;)
That's a curious factoid, but my PP sales have been descending steadily towards the floor since I signed up in April, I think it was. The October sales now being reported are no better. So perhaps it all goes to show that these traffic graphs aren't very reliable.
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It's possible that they haven't forgotten what microstock is about, and are just choosing to try a different pricing model and leaving microstock behind. I don't happen to agree with that position, if that is in fact what they are doing, but it does put things in a different perspective. In theory, things might not be so bad at istock HQ and they may just be planning to try and ride out the current slow-down in sales volume while slow and steady price increase up their profits.
There's some truth in that. In my own experience downloads have been more or less flat for a couple of years now but the money has risen very nicely, thank you.
I think Getty realised -- correctly -- when it bought iStock that there was a lot of potential pricing upside for the micro market leader. My worry is that they may be overreaching under the lash from H&F.
Internet markets are virtually frictionless and it's reasonable to imagine that at some point a critical mass of buyers will have had enough and will desert in numbers huge enough to crash the business.
There's also another concern, that true market leadership requires the most customers and the most widgets sold. By raising prices and reducing the customer base, you're sacrificing the marketplace buzz and conceding it to competitors -- in this case, apparently Shutterstock. No doubt Aston Martin makes a tidy little profit, but it can't touch Toyota.
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Thinkstock is up:
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstock.com/[/url])
;)
That's a curious factoid, but my PP sales have been descending steadily towards the floor since I signed up in April, I think it was. The October sales now being reported are no better. So perhaps it all goes to show that these traffic graphs aren't very reliable.
There's a warning on that graph saying that the sample numbers are low which makes it less accurate. What I find odd is the Photos.com is way ahead of TS, though most of the sales come from TS, and traffic is so far below BS, though it consistenly provides me with between two and five times as much income as BS.
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The correct url for thinkstock is thinkstockphotos.com.
Thinkstock.com is just a pointer. The traffic is higher for thinkstockphotos.com but it also has taken a big drop like Istock.
http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/ (http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/)
My pure speculation on this thread topic is that Istock is building up the V/A collections to be the only midstock agency and at some point all of the main collection will be mirrored at Thinkstock to try and compete with Shutterstock for the micro market. The cream is being separated from the milk.
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Thanks for that! i really was looking at the wrong url all the time.
So this shows the same decline being reported in the pp threads.
cheers
jasmin
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The correct url for thinkstock is thinkstockphotos.com.
Thinkstock.com is just a pointer. The traffic is higher for thinkstockphotos.com but it also has taken a big drop like Istock.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/[/url])
Thinkstock is not exactly competing with SS is it? Just 45K unique visitors ... compared to 2M.
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...This is microstock - IS has forgotten that very basic concept and are now suffering the consequences.
...It's possible that they haven't forgotten what microstock is about, and are just choosing to try a different pricing model and leaving microstock behind. I don't happen to agree with that position, if that is in fact what they are doing, but it does put things in a different perspective. In theory, things might not be so bad at istock HQ and they may just be planning to try and ride out the current slow-down in sales volume while slow and steady price increase up their profits.
Yes I agree with you on this - but I also don't think there is much of a market where they are going - there are too many great images available at the micro level - and I am not sure they are at the mid-level of stock either - they are quite close to where the original Getty prices used to be. Or at least the Getty I used to buy at (in Asia I think they were somewhat cheaper).
If you look at this old (June 2011) blog post by John Lund (http://blog.johnlund.com/2011/06/new-door-opens-for-traditional-stock.html), he's very happy to see the Agency Collection (in which he already participated) being distributed on iStock at Getty prices. From that blog "I am missing a huge segment of the stock photography market
until now." and "Think about it
now I can have images that are available through both Getty and iStockphoto
and all without having to license the images at microstock prices! Is that cool or what?"
If iStock could have managed this clever trick without driving away buyers for their regular collection, it could possibly have been a win-win. I think that the massive best match shifts in favor of Vetta/Agency and the long time before they grudgingly implemented a price slider (that even KKT admitted in that interview in Milan was something that users in their testing didn't even notice was there; I know some think it's OK, but I still think it's a poor implementation) drove regular buyers away.
I'm guessing they thought they could do both chunks of the market and keep Getty/H&F happy while continuing business as usual in the market segment that made them successful. They messed that up big time and the only remaining question is whether they have to retreat to being Getty lite and give up the microstock area to Thinkstock or whether they can make enough corrections to fix what they broke.
When you're big and the market leader you have much more leeway than other players to mess up and fix things. I have to say that the continuing eff up in software development isn't reassuring - I'm assuming they're on a very tight leash for spending and can't get the expertise they so clearly need.
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Nice analysis JoAnn.
Helix's comment about planning to ride out the slowdown made me think of all the companies that thought they could ignore problems until they went away, only to go to the wall while they waited.
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"Wait and see" is a terrible business strategy. Usually happens when the management is out of touch with the market.
Decisionmakers have to have a "feeling" for trends. If they donīt, bring in new decision makers with better instincts. Because it is very unlikely that those who didnīt anticipate the market reaction correctly the first time, will make any better decisions the second time. Either you have it or you donīt. No matter how many statistics and data points you have, it all boils down to the decision makers.
It is true that large companies can survive bad decisions better than smaller ones. A small company will often die with the first fatal mistake.
But unless you have a patent or complete market dominance, large companies can suffer greatly, especially if they work in a very competitive environment. If your competition is sleeping or more stupid than yourself you can make more mistakes. If the competition is very aggressive and very clever...well...things can go fast, especially if you have additional pressure from outside market events (depression).
And if you lose customers, everyone doing a business degree probably learns in first year how extremely expensive it is to win customers back. If the competition is strong you sometimes have to simply concede the market share to them and start looking for customers elsewhere (territory, target group)
So I sincerly hope that the customers they have now will be treated as the valuable treasures they are.
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The correct url for thinkstock is thinkstockphotos.com.
Thinkstock.com is just a pointer. The traffic is higher for thinkstockphotos.com but it also has taken a big drop like Istock.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/[/url])
My pure speculation on this thread topic is that Istock is building up the V/A collections to be the only midstock agency and at some point all of the main collection will be mirrored at Thinkstock to try and compete with Shutterstock for the micro market. The cream is being separated from the milk.
Just wondering what if any effect CDN (content delivery networks) have on site analysis
Like akamai hosting?
Does it show as akamai traffic
site traffic or something else?
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The correct url for thinkstock is thinkstockphotos.com.
Thinkstock.com is just a pointer. The traffic is higher for thinkstockphotos.com but it also has taken a big drop like Istock.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/[/url])
Thinkstock is not exactly competing with SS is it? Just 45K unique visitors ... compared to 2M.
I don't see Thinkstock ever being a legitimate threat to Shutterstock. Istock as a V/A midstock agency could fill a niche that isn't there. We'll see whether or not that is a good strategy if that is the plan.
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The correct url for thinkstock is thinkstockphotos.com.
Thinkstock.com is just a pointer. The traffic is higher for thinkstockphotos.com but it also has taken a big drop like Istock.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/thinkstockphotos.com/[/url])
My pure speculation on this thread topic is that Istock is building up the V/A collections to be the only midstock agency and at some point all of the main collection will be mirrored at Thinkstock to try and compete with Shutterstock for the micro market. The cream is being separated from the milk.
Just wondering what if any effect CDN (content delivery networks) have on site analysis
Like akamai hosting?
Does it show as akamai traffic
site traffic or something else?
I don't know anything about the technical aspects of site analysis. I just noticed a few months ago that thinkstock's url had changed and I found it odd that it wasn't announced. I guess the conspiracy theorists can speculate on why it was done. ;)
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IS trying to take on SS by promoting Thinkstock makes me think of how Microsoft is now promoting Windows Phone 7 against iPhone and Android. WP7 is actually a good product but it's taken maybe 2% of the smartphone market. It's just too little, too late, and the marketing isn't focused well enough, and there's no compelling reason to switch.
IS will compete on price, which obviously at 25 cents commission is pretty close to the floor right now. So why am I even leaving my (tiny) portfolio on IS? I quit submitting long ago. Now I'm just waiting for 10 cent Thinkstock sales to show up and prove to me that I'm only hurting myself by keeping anything there.
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Can we at least stick with facts rather than inventing stuff to make things look worse than they are? The TS minimum commission rate is 28c, not 10c or 25c.
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Can we at least stick with facts rather than inventing stuff to make things look worse than they are? The TS minimum commission rate is 28c, not 10c or 25c.
Like I said, I'm waiting for 10 cents, once they start seriously competing on price. Where else would you think this is leading? Am I to believe that IS wants to compete directly with SS by paying contributors more?
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The competition, such as it is, between Thinkstock and SS will be over the prices buyers pay, not commissions to contributors.
To beat SS for a buyer's business they're already cheaper for an annual subscription, they offer 10% off images at Getty and there is some content not on the micros in the mix. So far that hasn't stolen SS's thunder as far as I can tell (although I obviously don't have any access to data to back that up). I think the flow of new content into SS is considerably greater than it is at Thinkstock which matters more to subscription buyers than pay as you go buyers.
If IS really wants to get exclusive content onto Thinkstock en masse, especially from the top sellers, they'll either have to offer more for royalties or remove the opt out (which they've already done for Getty contracts). Having that new content might get them some leverage to have buyers from SS consider TS, but they'd be giving up all that extra independent content that isn't on IS because of the teeny tiny upload limits and buyers might not find that compelling.
If they want to get the existing independent content from IS onto TS they need to fix whatever's busted in the internals that transfer files from A to B. It's now nearly 2 months since we were forced into the PP and none of the files have made it over. So SS gets to have the busy season unmarred by additional competition from TS in any way.
By the time IS/Getty/H&F get their act together it may be like Bing vs. Google: even if Bing works OK, if a happy Google user (e.g. me) has no reason to switch, you stay where you are.
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I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
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If IS really wants to get exclusive content onto Thinkstock en masse, especially from the top sellers, they'll either have to offer more for royalties or remove the opt out (which they've already done for Getty contracts).
I think they will remove the opt out. The only people at that point who would be financially motivated to stay exclusive are the ones with large V/A portfolios. I bet IS/Getty is just waiting for the V/A collection to reach a certain size before this is done.
The problem with Thinkstock is who other than Getty wants it to be a success? If my main collection stuff goes there and I'm not making a large sums from my Vetta files then I see no reason to stay exclusive. If other contributors feel that way then that is good news for every agency other than Istock.
ETA: I might just do something else rather that upload 1300+ files to 10 different agencies if that happens. I can't imagine the folks with 10,000+ files looking at that option.
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Since this migration to TS, is unavoidable, Im going to cut a deal for myself. No less then, 4.50, bucks per sale. I recon thats a pretty good deal Im offering, considering Im allowing them to take a 30% agency commission.
Mailed them this morning about it.
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I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
I would take Istock's inspectors any day over Shutterstock's, or at least the Istock rules for image acceptance. If you were able to purge from Shutterstock what Istock would normally reject they could clean up their collection, have more salable product, and actually have a system where photographers are encouraged to upload.
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The money that I make at SS is pretty strong encouragement...
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I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
I would take Istock's inspectors any day over Shutterstock's, or at least the Istock rules for image acceptance. If you were able to purge from Shutterstock what Istock would normally reject they could clean up their collection, have more salable product, and actually have a system where photographers are encouraged to upload.
Well Mantis! for the IS reviewer, images are accepted on the basis that its technically sound, thats all, hence we have gazillions of files floating around, irrelevant material clogging up every search.
You think thats a good idea? :)
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1) Nice analysis JoAnn.
2) Helix's comment about planning to ride out the slowdown made me think of all the companies that thought they could ignore problems until they went away, only to go to the wall while they waited.
3) Can we at least stick with facts rather than inventing stuff to make things look worse than they are? The TS minimum commission rate is 28c, not 10c or 25c.
#1 +1 for JS
#2 Yes a Blockbuster Epiphany, while they ignored the upstart NetFlix. I love that one. ThinkStock is not a bumbling idiot operation. Well, not totally? ;) Aw heck, I can go to Borders and get a book, or maybe shop at Circuit City for electronics?
#3 While I agree in principle that people should debate with facts not emotions or invention of negative remarks misrepresenting the opposition. ThinkStock pays 25c for sales through StockXpert, so it's not 28 cents in all cases. Sorry.
Yeah, who's afraid of the big bad wolf, (ThinkStock) why, I have a fine house made of straw. (or is that straw man arguments?)
I don't think SS has any problem staying ahead of ThinkStock in the market. I do think that everyone else, below those two, needs to be watching out for the freight train about to overtake and run them down.
Not sure about the analytics, because of multiple domain locations. thinkstockphoto.uk does it count? And what about SS with all their servers around the globe. I just don't know...
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I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
I would take Istock's inspectors any day over Shutterstock's, or at least the Istock rules for image acceptance. If you were able to purge from Shutterstock what Istock would normally reject they could clean up their collection, have more salable product, and actually have a system where photographers are encouraged to upload.
LOL, another post from a brilliant Anonymous poster, with all signs showing ShutterStock eating IStock for lunch, Mantis steps forward and posts this masterpiece...LOL.. saleable product...LOL
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#3 While I agree in principle that people should debate with facts not emotions or invention of negative remarks misrepresenting the opposition. ThinkStock pays 25c for sales through StockXpert, so it's not 28 cents in all cases. Sorry.
Thanks for the correction. I don't have any StockXpert legacy files so I didn't know that.
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I am absolutely shocked to see Istock is on a par with Depositphotos. Did DP even exist a year ago?
Lisa, the only thing to consider in these charts is the trend. The overall traffic number is highly flawed, so you are correct that there is no way DP is on par with IS as of now. The trend is the important data to consider.
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If IS are doing so bad, how come they are ranking close to SS on this ratings list tier at 5.6 ? I don't get it.
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Because istock is a pay as you go site with high prices, SS is a subscription site with much lower prices. So even with less traffic, istock still makes more money.
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If IS are doing so bad, how come they are ranking close to SS on this ratings list tier at 5.6 ? I don't get it.
1. We don't (or at least I don't) get a chance to vote in the rankings every month. I get a chance about every 3 months.
2. The $$ bandings are very wide. In the band I'm usually in, my income can fluctuate very widely yet I'm still in the same band, so apparently flatlining. I guess that may or may be balanced out by someone else whose income fluctuates within a narrow range but over the cusp of two bands.
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If IS are doing so bad, how come they are ranking close to SS on this ratings list tier at 5.6 ? I don't get it.
The intervals in the survey aren't even so it's not a linear comparison
over 6 could in fact be twice between 5 and 6
and IS includes exclusive and none exclusive, one could argue that for the sake of comparison ISX and ISNX should be separate
I PMed Leaf with that suggestion too
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Because istock is a pay as you go site with high prices, SS is a subscription site with much lower prices. So even with less traffic, istock still makes more money.
Remember traffic is number of visitors not number of downloads or number of visits, so one visitor to SS could mean one monthly credit package download worth a few hundred dollars, while a visit to iS might mean a 10 credit bundle. The unique visitors to each site don't translate into any meaningful info about earnings between sites.
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If IS are doing so bad, how come they are ranking close to SS on this ratings list tier at 5.6 ? I don't get it.
The intervals in the survey aren't even so it's not a linear comparison
over 6 could in fact be twice between 5 and 6
and IS includes exclusive and none exclusive, one could argue that for the sake of comparison ISX and ISNX should be separate
I PMed Leaf with that suggestion too
As an Exclusive, I've never voted in the poll - doesn't seem meaningful to me when I have only one site that's relevant. Perhaps I should do...
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Because istock is a pay as you go site with high prices, SS is a subscription site with much lower prices. So even with less traffic, istock still makes more money.
Remember traffic is number of visitors not number of downloads or number of visits, so one visitor to SS could mean one monthly credit package download worth a few hundred dollars, while a visit to iS might mean a 10 credit bundle. The unique visitors to each site don't translate into any meaningful info about earnings between sites.
I know, but for practical purposes I am assuming that most traffic comes from people who go to the site to find an image. Surely that must be where the majority of traffic comes from?
istock also sells huge credit packs to their corporate (getty) customers. At the microstockexpo, I met a lady from getty who said, she was just starting to sell the new 5000 credit packs to her clients.
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Because istock is a pay as you go site with high prices, SS is a subscription site with much lower prices. So even with less traffic, istock still makes more money.
SS is not just 'a subscription site' and hasn't been for some time. OD and EL sales have been growing strongly for the last couple of years and now make up nearly 50% of my total earnings at SS. Last month my OD/EL sales alone at SS were 77% of my total earnings at Istock (and at a far higher average commission per sale).
I think you're probably right and Istock is still making more money than SS but, with the way the industry is changing, I'm not sure for how much longer that will continue.
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O, that is interesting to hear. I have read that they are offering pay as you go, but I thought that 90% would still come from subscriptions. This must be a major headache for istock.
So it is now down to the exclusive collections, Vetta or the special collections from getty (hulton archive, csa etc...) as a USP.
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gostwyk's numbers are similar to mine. This month so far the subscription $$ are 41% of my total at SS
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^^ Same here. 50% of my SS earnings come from sub sales.
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I've never looked at my SS numbers from that perspective. Very interesting! This month I'm seeing around 40% made up from subs so far.
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Same here. %49 from sub sales.
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Same here, less then 50% are subs. Plenty of sales-on-demands and ELs.
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This is getting off-topic, but I just had to do the maths too...
SS earnings October 2011 (the last whole month):
Subscriptions 51%
On-Demand 29%
Extended licences 19%
Single & Other downloads 1%
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Because the difference in prices (although being OD and El sales very much lower in income than at IS any non subs sale beats a 0,35 sale) this 50% OD sales seems to indicate more o less about 1 OD-EL sale every ten7fifteen subs sales? ŋIs that right?
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ah, are you guys comparing money? then I would expect the income from pay as you go to be at least 2-3 times more than from subs.
What do the percentages look like if you just compare number of downloads? (sales volume, not money volume)
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ah, are you guys comparing money? then I would expect the income from pay as you go to be at least 2-3 times more than from subs...
Why? SS used to be subscription-only, and subs are still a major part of the business. On-demand packages haven't been around all that long, and single-image sales are brand new. No way anyone would expect those sales to overtake subscriptions that quickly and that significantly.
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isnt one pay as you go sale several times more than a subscription?
ss has a lot of customers, i am not surprised that many are taking up pay as you go. and if istock customers are migrating, i would expect them to choose a plan with what they know.
when v/a was pushed to the front of the search engine for months, many customers must have moved to the next big brand they know - shutterstock.
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...ss has a lot of customers, i am not surprised that many are taking up pay as you go. and if istock customers are migrating, i would expect them to choose a plan with what they know...
True, migrating customers would probably go with what they're familiar with, that being PPD. But I think those options at SS are still too new overtake subscription earnings any more than they have. That might change over time, but so far it seems to boil down to a pretty even split between sub earnings and PPD/OD earnings.
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True, migrating customers would probably go with what they're familiar with, that being PPD. But I think those options at SS are still too new overtake subscription earnings any more than they have. That might change over time, but so far it seems to boil down to a pretty even split between sub earnings and PPD/OD earnings.
I'm not implying you're wrong, but I do wonder just how long you think it might take?
Isn't PPD about 3 years old now?
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I'm not implying you're wrong, but I do wonder just how long you think it might take? Isn't PPD about 3 years old now?
Strictly speaking the 'PPD' sales on SS are actually sold via 'Image Packs' which limit the buyer to a number of images at a specific size (large or small). They are only just starting to test the market for 'Single Image' sales where the buyer can just buy an individual image at the required size.
I don't recall recall SS ever failing when they've entered a new market so it should be interesting to see what happens when they roll out the Single Image sales worldwide.
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The only thing SS withdrew from, and I assume it was because it just didn't generate enough business (I know I never got many sales through it) was the precursor to on demand which was at a different site. There were several of them and then the shut them all down - I think it was SS-owned sites, not partnerships, but I don't remember.
As far as the comparison of a download at SS with a DL at IS, my all time low (as an independent and excluding the original 10/20/30 cents of 2004) was 12 cents, and I've never had a download that low at any other site that I recall. So even the subscription download looks pretty good by comparison. The Single image royalty compares pretty favorably with the XL and sometimes XXL downloads on iStock, so although that's the newest and I've seen the fewest, it's doing a great job for boosting overall earnings.
And SS is beating the pants off IS this month in terms of total $$, which shouldn't be happening, but it is.
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As far as the comparison of a download at SS with a DL at IS, my all time low (as an independent and excluding the original 10/20/30 cents of 2004) was 12 cents, and I've never had a download that low at any other site that I recall.
Last year, if I remember correctly, I had a 6c sale at IS. 'Ancient credits' was the explanation. Fortunately that was before they reduced the commissions or I'd have got even less.
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Re PPD versus Subs sales on SS and IS:
Like IS, SS has another site. If we are going to talk about the ratio of Subs to PPD on SS, should we not include the PPD sales we get on BigStock?
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Re PPD versus Subs sales on SS and IS:
Like IS, SS has another site. If we are going to talk about the ratio of Subs to PPD on SS, should we not include the PPD sales we get on BigStock?
Probably, but in my case it wouldn't alter anything much as the BS numbers are so small.
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well all I can say is here in Australia things are looking good :P
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Iīm an iStock exclusive at the diamond level and have been contributing there since 2007 (let the guessing begin). For my own reasons Iīve chosen to remain anonymous at this time and this is my first ever post here on MSG.
This thread as well as other recent conversations both here and in the istock sales threads have me very worried about the future of istock. Is iStock becoming the Myspace of the microstock world? I certainly hope not, but my faith in IS has been slowly eroding for over a year now and this month it is the worst ever.
A year ago I used to average about 30-40 DLs on a normal weekday. This year that number dropped to 20-30 per weekday. This month it has dropped to 10-20 per weekday. Yesterday I only had 5 DLs, which for me is unheard of on a regular working Tuesday, normally my best day of the week. I have a good number of Vettas and a smaller number of Agency files but royalties from those few sales are not near enough to balance the loss of revenue from decreasing DLs. I know these are just my numbers so they are anectdotal at best. But that said, something is seriously wrong with this picture. I donīt upload as much as I could, but I do try to upload regularly. So, what does all this mean?
Itīs causing me to seriously question staying exclusive at IS and for that matter, itīs causing me to question the concept of microstock in general (yeah, I know that sounds a bit dramatic). I really don't know what to do but itīs clear that something has to change and they say that change begins with "me". It's just hard when you've invested so much with one agency and now you're getting a big fat turd in return.
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Iīm an iStock exclusive at the diamond level and have been contributing there since 2007 (let the guessing begin). For my own reasons Iīve chosen to remain anonymous at this time and this is my first ever post here on MSG.
This thread as well as other recent conversations both here and in the istock sales threads have me very worried about the future of istock. Is iStock becoming the Myspace of the microstock world? I certainly hope not, but my faith in IS has been slowly eroding for over a year now and this month it is the worst ever.
A year ago I used to average about 30-40 DLs on a normal weekday. This year that number dropped to 20-30 per weekday. This month it has dropped to 10-20 per weekday. Yesterday I only had 5 DLs, which for me is unheard of on a regular working Tuesday, normally my best day of the week. I have a good number of Vettas and a smaller number of Agency files but royalties from those few sales are not near enough to balance the loss of revenue from decreasing DLs. I know these are just my numbers so they are anectdotal at best. But that said, something is seriously wrong with this picture. I donīt upload as much as I could, but I do try to upload regularly. So, what does all this mean?
Itīs causing me to seriously question staying exclusive at IS and for that matter, itīs causing me to question the concept of microstock in general (yeah, I know that sounds a bit dramatic). I really don't know what to do but itīs clear that something has to change and they say that change begins with "me". It's just hard when you've invested so much with one agency and now you're getting a big fat turd in return.
Note it's not a regular Tuesday it's two days before thanksgiving in the US which is a major market for IS.
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michealo: "Note it's not a regular Tuesday it's two days before thanksgiving in the US which is a major market for IS."
I understand that, but it still doesn't explain the continued drop off and last week was not much better than this week.
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I think it is important to look at what happens in January/February. Last year there was a terrible drop after the New Year, presumably buyers who didnīt renew their contracts and went elsewhere.
Then youīll need the new RC targets, are they staying at 150k or lowering them significantly or proportional to the perceived loss in traffic.
Are they announcing any new initiatives (better than microstock...ahem...)?
And what do the monthly sales threads look like beginning of the year?
Do you have good sales on getty? Do you have a house or PC contract? The you could try to weather the storm by uploading more to them, at least that is what I am doing.
I would also wait to see the "next stage" of uploading that Kelly talked about.
But in the end, it is your decision. It all depends on how painful things are.
I really donīt believe that microstock is dead, absolutely not. The needs for images is steadily growing, because more and more markets are maturing, i.e. paying their staff enough that buying from a stock site is cheaper than spending hours searching the internet to steal one...
And of course you can think of adding a new and different subject theme to your portfolio to attract different customers.
On the other hand, many people here have gone from being exclusive to independent, then back and and again independent. So it is doable. UL systems also seem to be easier on most sites.
Whatever you decide, I wish you all the best.
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Cobalt, thanks for the levelheaded advice. I probably will hold on a bit longer but it is becoming quite unsustainable from a personal income aspect. I do have a house contract at Getty and have started to upload more there. That is partly what I was refering to with regard to leaving microstock. It's just been really hard to decide between uploading to iStock or Getty, but IS is making that choice easier. On the other hand it will probably take a while before I start seeing significant returns on Getty and if the returns i'm seeing from V/A files on Getty is any indication, it's not very encouraging.
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IMO, you're not going to win any contests by shifting uploads to Getty.
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IMO, you're not going to win any contests by shifting uploads to Getty.
I respect your opinion Sean, but if iStock isn't not working for me anymore, what other options do I have without leaving exclusivity? And don't say the Partner Program (I know you won't Sean).
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IMO, you're not going to win any contests by shifting uploads to Getty.
I respect your opinion Sean, but if iStock isn't not working for me anymore, what other options do I have without leaving exclusivity? And don't say the Partner Program (I know you won't Sean).
Not many. I feel your pain. My download numbers are less than a third of what they were a couple of years ago.
Someone (Rapideye perhaps) suggested making sure all your images are keyworded with non-cv terms embedded now so the transition to independence won't be as painful or slow when iStock becomes financially unviable for full time exclusive photographers.
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The other thing to consider is the holding time for images on getty.
If you are really giving up exclusivity, I think you will lose your house contract. But getty has much longer holding times than istock, you cannot sell those files anywhere else as long as they have exclusive rights to them.
Of course you will still get paid on any sales, but you can't take them with you after 30 days.
I have no idea how long their lock up period lasts.
Maybe your portfolio is good enough and they keep you, might be worth negotiating directly with them.
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Iīm an iStock exclusive at the diamond level and have been contributing there since 2007 (let the guessing begin). For my own reasons Iīve chosen to remain anonymous at this time and this is my first ever post here on MSG.
This thread as well as other recent conversations both here and in the istock sales threads have me very worried about the future of istock. Is iStock becoming the Myspace of the microstock world? I certainly hope not, but my faith in IS has been slowly eroding for over a year now and this month it is the worst ever.
A year ago I used to average about 30-40 DLs on a normal weekday. This year that number dropped to 20-30 per weekday. This month it has dropped to 10-20 per weekday. Yesterday I only had 5 DLs, which for me is unheard of on a regular working Tuesday, normally my best day of the week. I have a good number of Vettas and a smaller number of Agency files but royalties from those few sales are not near enough to balance the loss of revenue from decreasing DLs. I know these are just my numbers so they are anectdotal at best. But that said, something is seriously wrong with this picture. I donīt upload as much as I could, but I do try to upload regularly. So, what does all this mean?
Itīs causing me to seriously question staying exclusive at IS and for that matter, itīs causing me to question the concept of microstock in general (yeah, I know that sounds a bit dramatic). I really don't know what to do but itīs clear that something has to change and they say that change begins with "me". It's just hard when you've invested so much with one agency and now you're getting a big fat turd in return.
Well if you have a wife, husband, brother, sister. Have them set up a company, have this company contribute to other agencies. Have them contract you as a photographer, retoucher, keyworder, uploader. And provide you the equipment office space etc. In your spare time you can continue to upload to IS / Getty
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Well if you have a wife, husband, brother, sister. Have them set up a company, have this company contribute to other agencies. Have them contract you as a photographer, retoucher, keyworder, uploader. And provide you the equipment office space etc. In your spare time you can continue to upload to IS / Getty
Sneaky, not sure if it's a legal loophole or simply breaking the contract.
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Well if you have a wife, husband, brother, sister. Have them set up a company, have this company contribute to other agencies. Have them contract you as a photographer, retoucher, keyworder, uploader. And provide you the equipment office space etc. In your spare time you can continue to upload to IS / Getty
Sneaky, not sure if it's a legal loophole or simply breaking the contract.
Well it depends on the conditions of section 2 a of the artist's supply agreement and Canadian and International laws.
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IMO, you're not going to win any contests by shifting uploads to Getty.
I respect your opinion Sean, but if iStock isn't not working for me anymore, what other options do I have without leaving exclusivity? And don't say the Partner Program (I know you won't Sean).
My view: Im Diamond myself but independant, and youre right, its an ordinary Tuesday and Wednesday, never mind Thanks-giving and never mind all these ebb and flow excuses. Its just down out BAD and thats the way it is. Unfortunately, not much to do about it.
I would take Cobolts and Joannes advice and hang on, untill after x-mas and new-year and if no change, run for your life! and I really mean that.
best.
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Well if you have a wife, husband, brother, sister. Have them set up a company, have this company contribute to other agencies. Have them contract you as a photographer, retoucher, keyworder, uploader. And provide you the equipment office space etc. In your spare time you can continue to upload to IS / Getty
Sneaky, not sure if it's a legal loophole or simply breaking the contract.
There's at least one person who openly on an iStock forum stated that she has a shooting partner/buddy, shoots the same scenes and she uploads them as an iStock exclusive and he as an independent. She claimed that she had cleared this with iStock. Win-win IMO, share the cost of shoots, spread the risks. NB, I don't have a shooting buddy or anything else - don't shoot the messenger.
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If you do that then the company in the name of your spouse is the legal copyright holder. Which means you need a stable marriage ;-) or at least excellent contracts in case you fall out. And obviously it cannot have a small print saying that basically everything is owned by you, because then you are breaking exclusivity...youīll definetly need a good lawyer if you want to go that route.
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In any case, you'd best clear that with IS/Getty first.
Remember, they don't have to justify cancelling their contract with you, any more than you need a reason to cancel your contract with them.
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I agree, if you want to work for a business registered with your partner, I would clear it with istock first.
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In any case, you'd best clear that with IS/Getty first.
Remember, they don't have to justify cancelling their contract with you, any more than you need a reason to cancel your contract with them.
True, no more than they need to justify lowering royalty rates. We already found that out the hard way.
Anyways, I'm not a "go behind your back" sneaky type even if Getty is, so I'll either be exclusive or not openly (all spoken anonymously, of course ;-). A little time will tell.
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...Itīs causing me to seriously question staying exclusive at IS and for that matter, itīs causing me to question the concept of microstock in general (yeah, I know that sounds a bit dramatic). I really don't know what to do but itīs clear that something has to change and they say that change begins with "me". It's just hard when you've invested so much with one agency and now you're getting a big fat turd in return.
It's certainly a time of change for microstock - in particular, agencies getting powerful enough that they think they can throw their weight around and increase their slice of the (in some cases shrinking perhaps) pie. On the other hand I don't see the demand going away and in spite of the many free options, I don't see the paid microstock market going away either.
So, that leaves you a few options other than the "hanging and hoping" one of remaining an exclusive. It was probably easier for me to leave exclusivity than some because (a) I'd been an independent for a long time prior to being exclusive, (b) I'd already given up Vetta in Sept 2010 and (c) I'm part of the successful middle class at iStock, not one of the top sellers. However, at some point you have to look at past success, loyalty and all those hopes for the future at iStock as a sunk cost and just look forward at what your options are. I do think there's a realistic option to stay with microstock and become independent, but that's obviously only one.
Given the eagerness to dump Getty content onto iStock, I have to believe that thinking about Getty as the salvation when iStock sales decline is a strategy that probably doesn't have long term legs. But others can give you data about how that's performing for them (I never contributed to Getty). There are lots of people here to answer questions and give perspective on independence so you can consider.
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Well, I seem to be an exception among those reporting, but the fact is that being exclusive is still working fine for me - which was a surprise, because after the change to RCs I did drop a royalty level, and although my downloads have dropped my royalties are still getting BMEs and show good increases compared to 12 months previous.
But I'm very much a middle ranking Gold, and the changes seem to be affecting Diamonds and above more. If iStock are paying any attention, I would think they would be looking to address that somehow; just my thoughts though. I have no inside knowledge of their plans.
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In any case, you'd best clear that with IS/Getty first.
Remember, they don't have to justify cancelling their contract with you, any more than you need a reason to cancel your contract with them.
True, no more than they need to justify lowering royalty rates. We already found that out the hard way.
Anyways, I'm not a "go behind your back" sneaky type even if Getty is, so I'll either be exclusive or not openly (all spoken anonymously, of course ;-). A little time will tell.
That's the best policy in my opinion (humble, of course). The "rating rings" weren't technically breaking any laws but they are supposed to have been punished, maybe expelled. I'm not sure if they really were. At one time, a "copycat" shooter or two were chucked out, as well - but that happening is probably ancient history.
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Itīs causing me to seriously question staying exclusive at IS and for that matter, itīs causing me to question the concept of microstock in general (yeah, I know that sounds a bit dramatic). I really don't know what to do but itīs clear that something has to change and they say that change begins with "me". It's just hard when you've invested so much with one agency and now you're getting a big fat turd in return.
Microstock is doing fine. Just not necessarily at Istock. As it happens I had a terrible Friday but then yesterday was my best day for sales at IS for the entire month. As sales generally slowdown, then on a day-to-day basis, the fluctuations are likely to become more severe.
Start making plans to go independent. You owe it to yourself and your portfolio and certainly not to Istockphoto. Your income should be more stable, you'll have far more EL's (which always cheer me up) and there's a limit to how much the vagaries of one agency, in responding to targets set by their masters, can influence your income. Istock have let you, me and pretty much every other contributor down on several occasions over the last couple of years. Everything from the original RC swindle, the broken promises about canister protection, the fraud fiasco, the search screw-ups, the site outages ... oh and this latest nonsense. Hell, Istock can't even provide up-to-date statistics and haven't been able to for several years. Pathetic. Every other agency has instantaneous sales data. Why can't Istock?
From what you've written it is probably not a question of 'if' you should go independent but only 'when'. Start working on the 'when' bit immediately. If I were you I'd be handing my crown back in today so that the 30-days will expire just before the Xmas dead-period. Get your port up and running at the other agencies ready for the busy period from mid-January until the end of March.
Give yourself something to look forward to __ you're probably not going to get that at Istock. Good luck with whatever you decide.
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As it happens I had a terrible Friday but then yesterday was my best day for sales at IS for the entire month. As sales generally slowdown, then on a day-to-day basis, the fluctuations are likely to become more severe.
Yesterday was a terrible day for me, after I edited the keywords for some older images and pressed "continue", the site said that "The file is not available for download. Please contact customer support" or something like that. But the day before yesterday was fantastic. I always suspect that IS somehow take some ports on and off the search in a rotation system.
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well all I can say is here in Australia things are looking good :P
lol :D
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well all I can say is here in Australia things are looking good :P
lol :D
Yeah but they have always been a bit wonky there down under, they read and write from right to left. :)
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Even with a nice EL boost to give me a head start at the beginning of the month, sales have fallen the last week or two and I am again well under what I should be. As a silver who can no longer get images passed, who hasn't bothered submitting any for well over 12 months I am going to drop my exclusivity at the end of this month and go with as many others as I can. Wow, I might be able to get into SS but that would be nigh on impossible after already 4 attempts.
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Even with a nice EL boost to give me a head start at the beginning of the month, sales have fallen the last week or two and I am again well under what I should be. As a silver who can no longer get images passed, who hasn't bothered submitting any for well over 12 months I am going to drop my exclusivity at the end of this month and go with as many others as I can. Wow, I might be able to get into SS but that would be nigh on impossible after already 4 attempts.
Personally i am not in a hurry to join IS. I past the SS contributor 1st review from the first attempt with a very good score 9/10 pics submitted. On the IS at the first attempt i was rejected ( despite the fact that i submitted the same pictures as SS). At the second try i was rejected again and i submitted the best selling pics from SS. Now i tried the 3th time .... if i will be rejected again i will never try again.
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One thing to remember when thinking of dropping exclusivity is model releases. Some of my friends dropped exclusivity and their istock model releases weren't honoured by other site. This would cause me a major headache if I was to go independent.
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One thing to remember when thinking of dropping exclusivity is model releases. Some of my friends dropped exclusivity and their istock model releases weren't honoured by other site. This would cause me a major headache if I was to go independent.
Which sites don't accept the IS release? I just chop the top bit off with IS details and have used the same release across multiple sites. (I don't submit people shots to IS now though, I refuse to jump through any hoops for the greedy *(&*&**, even signing a release)
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All I can say is it's sooooo soooooooooo depressing.
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If you are concerned about model releases it is the time to send a message to the agencies you are interested in and explain your situation. When the first fiasco hit IS a couple competing agencies announced that they would manage the IS releases if you wanted to drop exclusivity - but I don't know if that was a one-time offer or not. Worth some e-mails if you are seriously considering kicking the crown.
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If you are concerned about model releases it is the time to send a message to the agencies you are interested in and explain your situation. When the first fiasco hit IS a couple competing agencies announced that they would manage the IS releases if you wanted to drop exclusivity - but I don't know if that was a one-time offer or not. Worth some e-mails if you are seriously considering kicking the crown.
true. but really, all you have to do is photoshop out the istock logo and the istock address at the top. that's it. the model releases are accepted at the other agencies.. at least I've had no problem with them at dreamstime, shutterstock, veer, stockfresh, alamy and fotolia. easy-peasy.
oh, and then there's a generic model release that I got from Getty, when I was uploading there through the iStock program, that is exactly that - the istock release without the logo and istock name/address. I've attached it here. I use that now for all my shoots.
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If you are concerned about model releases it is the time to send a message to the agencies you are interested in and explain your situation. When the first fiasco hit IS a couple competing agencies announced that they would manage the IS releases if you wanted to drop exclusivity - but I don't know if that was a one-time offer or not. Worth some e-mails if you are seriously considering kicking the crown.
true. but really, all you have to do is photoshop out the istock logo and the istock address at the top. that's it. the model releases are accepted at the other agencies.. at least I've had no problem with them at dreamstime, shutterstock, veer, stockfresh, alamy and fotolia. easy-peasy.
oh, and then there's a generic model release that I got from Getty, when I was uploading there through the iStock program, that is exactly that - the istock release without the logo and istock name/address. I've attached it here. I use that now for all my shoots.
Isn't one committing some sort of fraud by Photoshopping out parts of a legal document?
I've been using the generic Getty one for more than a year now, just in case.
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Isn't one committing some sort of fraud by Photoshopping out parts of a legal document?
I've been using the generic Getty one for more than a year now, just in case.
I doubt if it would be fraud because the electronic copy is simply evidence that a legal release exists between the photographer and the subject. The presence or absence of a logo would not invalidate it. (I'm not a lawyer blah, blah blah...)
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I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
I would take Istock's inspectors any day over Shutterstock's, or at least the Istock rules for image acceptance. If you were able to purge from Shutterstock what Istock would normally reject they could clean up their collection, have more salable product, and actually have a system where photographers are encouraged to upload.
LOL, another post from a brilliant Anonymous poster, with all signs showing ShutterStock eating IStock for lunch, Mantis steps forward and posts this masterpiece...LOL.. saleable product...LOL
Well folks, I am going to defend my position once again against the chest thumpers in here who seem to not embrace common business principles in the field of design and demand, microstock being one of those fields. I am a MS buyer, a MS contributor and a business design executive. I do not do MS full time, but I do design business processes full time and, as a result, understand customer needs. Although I am anonymous on this forum Nubrocs BRILLIANT comment only shows his own incompetence and breadth to hear and understand others opinions on a topic for which he disagrees. To be fair, he may be a good photographer, but going against the grain via others opinions seems hard for him to accept. Same with Lagergreek
I think he calls himself Christian. Hes a good photographer, too, but in my opinion failed to understand my point.
Now, back to defending my comments about SS inspection policy being sub-par to Istocks.
I make these comments for very good reason and based not on just my experiences. Shutterstock turns a blind eye to experienced photographers who know what they're doing. When I shoot I conduct research then set up the shoot around that research. I am not just snapshooting away and hoping what I shoot will sell. Then there is the work that goes into prep and submissions. So LCV rejections begin. The photographer (including me, among other very active contributors) try to share with SS WHY these images are salable and not LCV. Here are ways I personally have used to try to educate the ding dong inspectors at SS.
Stats of the same Images from other sites...as Joanne stated earlier. I have shared data with them from IS, Alamy and DT showing that the very images they claiming to be LCV are in fact researched and selling elsewhere. The response is all rejected for LCV.
Sometimes I am extending a successful series, explain to them what that series is, reference image numbers to show actual salability on their own site and they get rejected for LCV.
Other times I point out how my submissions are adding to gaps within their own collection and that they are fresh, new content, not versions of a bazillion other "apple" shots. Rejected for LCV.
Now you (Nubroc and Lagergeek) are probably in the minority of contributors who may not experience a lot of LCV but the bulk of contributors I speak with who are perhaps in the top 25 percent of all contributors in terms of quality content and volume are getting slammed with LCV rejections.
So I make my statement based on that very anorexic ear the SS peeps have in terms of listening and hearing what their experienced contributors have to say about their revenue killing inspection standards. Yes, they ARE leaving money on the table, both for SS and the contributor.
I am personally okay with rejections but when I can quantify or strongly qualify the value of an image set and it goes in one ear and out the other, that tells me a lot about a huge gap in their system and that they could care less about what constructive feedback contributors offer.
I have a higher than 90 percent acceptance on IS so I know it's not quality or composition. Funny that the last batch they rejected (90% rejection) had sales within days at DT, IS and Alamy. So that in and of itself proves them wrong.
So in a nutshell, that is why I say what I say and I stand by my comments. Don't get me wrong, though. I am speaking specifically about their inspection standards as an opportunity for serious, fair improvement. The rest of the company seems pretty solid short of seeing their financials.
So, my original comment: This is completely accurate. They are leaving money on the table and have inspectors that make unfounded judgement calls on saleability. This is the one are where SS sucks. They also do not listen to contributors, rather ignoring them is something they perceive as value added. Just because they are currently at the top, or close to it, doesn't mean they don't have significant room to become the king of micro. Their whole inspection process is so poor that uploading there is an honest crap shoot, a gamble that is a result of their unwillingness to bring fairness and commercial realism to their inspection process. They are by far the most shameful agency in this regard. ACCURATE, Nubroc. Tic, tic, tic , tic, tic. as long as they accept yours then its okay, right?
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I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
I would take Istock's inspectors any day over Shutterstock's, or at least the Istock rules for image acceptance. If you were able to purge from Shutterstock what Istock would normally reject they could clean up their collection, have more salable product, and actually have a system where photographers are encouraged to upload.
LOL, another post from a brilliant Anonymous poster, with all signs showing ShutterStock eating IStock for lunch, Mantis steps forward and posts this masterpiece...LOL.. saleable product...LOL
Well folks, I am going to defend my position once again against the chest thumpers in here who seem to not embrace common business principles in the field of design and demand, microstock being one of those fields. I am a MS buyer, a MS contributor and a business design executive. I do not do MS full time, but I do design business processes full time and, as a result, understand customer needs. Although I am anonymous on this forum Nubrocs BRILLIANT comment only shows his own incompetence and breadth to hear and understand others opinions on a topic for which he disagrees. To be fair, he may be a good photographer, but going against the grain via others opinions seems hard for him to accept. Same with Lagergreek
I think he calls himself Christian. Hes a good photographer, too, but in my opinion failed to understand my point.
Now, back to defending my comments about SS inspection policy being sub-par to Istocks.
I make these comments for very good reason and based not on just my experiences. Shutterstock turns a blind eye to experienced photographers who know what they're doing. When I shoot I conduct research then set up the shoot around that research. I am not just snapshooting away and hoping what I shoot will sell. Then there is the work that goes into prep and submissions. So LCV rejections begin. The photographer (including me, among other very active contributors) try to share with SS WHY these images are salable and not LCV. Here are ways I personally have used to try to educate the ding dong inspectors at SS.
Stats of the same Images from other sites...as Joanne stated earlier. I have shared data with them from IS, Alamy and DT showing that the very images they claiming to be LCV are in fact researched and selling elsewhere. The response is all rejected for LCV.
Sometimes I am extending a successful series, explain to them what that series is, reference image numbers to show actual salability on their own site and they get rejected for LCV.
Other times I point out how my submissions are adding to gaps within their own collection and that they are fresh, new content, not versions of a bazillion other "apple" shots. Rejected for LCV.
Now you (Nubroc and Lagergeek) are probably in the minority of contributors who may not experience a lot of LCV but the bulk of contributors I speak with who are perhaps in the top 25 percent of all contributors in terms of quality content and volume are getting slammed with LCV rejections.
So I make my statement based on that very anorexic ear the SS peeps have in terms of listening and hearing what their experienced contributors have to say about their revenue killing inspection standards. Yes, they ARE leaving money on the table, both for SS and the contributor.
I am personally okay with rejections but when I can quantify or strongly qualify the value of an image set and it goes in one ear and out the other, that tells me a lot about a huge gap in their system and that they could care less about what constructive feedback contributors offer.
I have a higher than 90 percent acceptance on IS so I know it's not quality or composition. Funny that the last batch they rejected (90% rejection) had sales within days at DT, IS and Alamy. So that in and of itself proves them wrong.
So in a nutshell, that is why I say what I say and I stand by my comments. Don't get me wrong, though. I am speaking specifically about their inspection standards as an opportunity for serious, fair improvement. The rest of the company seems pretty solid short of seeing their financials.
So, my original comment: This is completely accurate. They are leaving money on the table and have inspectors that make unfounded judgement calls on saleability. This is the one are where SS sucks. They also do not listen to contributors, rather ignoring them is something they perceive as value added. Just because they are currently at the top, or close to it, doesn't mean they don't have significant room to become the king of micro. Their whole inspection process is so poor that uploading there is an honest crap shoot, a gamble that is a result of their unwillingness to bring fairness and commercial realism to their inspection process. They are by far the most shameful agency in this regard. ACCURATE, Nubroc. Tic, tic, tic , tic, tic. as long as they accept yours then its okay, right?
Awaiting you and Lager to reciprocate. You know what that means, right?
-
Isn't one committing some sort of fraud by Photoshopping out parts of a legal document?
I've been using the generic Getty one for more than a year now, just in case.
I doubt if it would be fraud because the electronic copy is simply evidence that a legal release exists between the photographer and the subject. The presence or absence of a logo would not invalidate it. (I'm not a lawyer blah, blah blah...)
Right. If called into question i have the original document on file without any white-out over the logo. :). I am not changing the signature or any of the relevant parts of the contract.
-
I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
I would take Istock's inspectors any day over Shutterstock's, or at least the Istock rules for image acceptance. If you were able to purge from Shutterstock what Istock would normally reject they could clean up their collection, have more salable product, and actually have a system where photographers are encouraged to upload.
LOL, another post from a brilliant Anonymous poster, with all signs showing ShutterStock eating IStock for lunch, Mantis steps forward and posts this masterpiece...LOL.. saleable product...LOL
Well folks, I am going to defend my position once again against the chest thumpers in here who seem to not embrace common business principles in the field of design and demand, microstock being one of those fields. I am a MS buyer, a MS contributor and a business design executive. I do not do MS full time, but I do design business processes full time and, as a result, understand customer needs. Although I am anonymous on this forum Nubrocs BRILLIANT comment only shows his own incompetence and breadth to hear and understand others opinions on a topic for which he disagrees. To be fair, he may be a good photographer, but going against the grain via others opinions seems hard for him to accept. Same with Lagergreek
I think he calls himself Christian. Hes a good photographer, too, but in my opinion failed to understand my point.
Now, back to defending my comments about SS inspection policy being sub-par to Istocks.
I make these comments for very good reason and based not on just my experiences. Shutterstock turns a blind eye to experienced photographers who know what they're doing. When I shoot I conduct research then set up the shoot around that research. I am not just snapshooting away and hoping what I shoot will sell. Then there is the work that goes into prep and submissions. So LCV rejections begin. The photographer (including me, among other very active contributors) try to share with SS WHY these images are salable and not LCV. Here are ways I personally have used to try to educate the ding dong inspectors at SS.
Stats of the same Images from other sites...as Joanne stated earlier. I have shared data with them from IS, Alamy and DT showing that the very images they claiming to be LCV are in fact researched and selling elsewhere. The response is all rejected for LCV.
Sometimes I am extending a successful series, explain to them what that series is, reference image numbers to show actual salability on their own site and they get rejected for LCV.
Other times I point out how my submissions are adding to gaps within their own collection and that they are fresh, new content, not versions of a bazillion other "apple" shots. Rejected for LCV.
Now you (Nubroc and Lagergeek) are probably in the minority of contributors who may not experience a lot of LCV but the bulk of contributors I speak with who are perhaps in the top 25 percent of all contributors in terms of quality content and volume are getting slammed with LCV rejections.
So I make my statement based on that very anorexic ear the SS peeps have in terms of listening and hearing what their experienced contributors have to say about their revenue killing inspection standards. Yes, they ARE leaving money on the table, both for SS and the contributor.
I am personally okay with rejections but when I can quantify or strongly qualify the value of an image set and it goes in one ear and out the other, that tells me a lot about a huge gap in their system and that they could care less about what constructive feedback contributors offer.
I have a higher than 90 percent acceptance on IS so I know it's not quality or composition. Funny that the last batch they rejected (90% rejection) had sales within days at DT, IS and Alamy. So that in and of itself proves them wrong.
So in a nutshell, that is why I say what I say and I stand by my comments. Don't get me wrong, though. I am speaking specifically about their inspection standards as an opportunity for serious, fair improvement. The rest of the company seems pretty solid short of seeing their financials.
So, my original comment: This is completely accurate. They are leaving money on the table and have inspectors that make unfounded judgement calls on saleability. This is the one are where SS sucks. They also do not listen to contributors, rather ignoring them is something they perceive as value added. Just because they are currently at the top, or close to it, doesn't mean they don't have significant room to become the king of micro. Their whole inspection process is so poor that uploading there is an honest crap shoot, a gamble that is a result of their unwillingness to bring fairness and commercial realism to their inspection process. They are by far the most shameful agency in this regard. ACCURATE, Nubroc. Tic, tic, tic , tic, tic. as long as they accept yours then its okay, right?
Awaiting you and Lager to reciprocate. You know what that means, right?
A Bitter anonymous poster who's been rejected at ShutterStock no doubt....LOL
-
I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
I would take Istock's inspectors any day over Shutterstock's, or at least the Istock rules for image acceptance. If you were able to purge from Shutterstock what Istock would normally reject they could clean up their collection, have more salable product, and actually have a system where photographers are encouraged to upload.
LOL, another post from a brilliant Anonymous poster, with all signs showing ShutterStock eating IStock for lunch, Mantis steps forward and posts this masterpiece...LOL.. saleable product...LOL
Well folks, I am going to defend my position once again against the chest thumpers in here who seem to not embrace common business principles in the field of design and demand, microstock being one of those fields. I am a MS buyer, a MS contributor and a business design executive. I do not do MS full time, but I do design business processes full time and, as a result, understand customer needs. Although I am anonymous on this forum Nubrocs BRILLIANT comment only shows his own incompetence and breadth to hear and understand others opinions on a topic for which he disagrees. To be fair, he may be a good photographer, but going against the grain via others opinions seems hard for him to accept. Same with Lagergreek
I think he calls himself Christian. Hes a good photographer, too, but in my opinion failed to understand my point.
Now, back to defending my comments about SS inspection policy being sub-par to Istocks.
I make these comments for very good reason and based not on just my experiences. Shutterstock turns a blind eye to experienced photographers who know what they're doing. When I shoot I conduct research then set up the shoot around that research. I am not just snapshooting away and hoping what I shoot will sell. Then there is the work that goes into prep and submissions. So LCV rejections begin. The photographer (including me, among other very active contributors) try to share with SS WHY these images are salable and not LCV. Here are ways I personally have used to try to educate the ding dong inspectors at SS.
Stats of the same Images from other sites...as Joanne stated earlier. I have shared data with them from IS, Alamy and DT showing that the very images they claiming to be LCV are in fact researched and selling elsewhere. The response is all rejected for LCV.
Sometimes I am extending a successful series, explain to them what that series is, reference image numbers to show actual salability on their own site and they get rejected for LCV.
Other times I point out how my submissions are adding to gaps within their own collection and that they are fresh, new content, not versions of a bazillion other "apple" shots. Rejected for LCV.
Now you (Nubroc and Lagergeek) are probably in the minority of contributors who may not experience a lot of LCV but the bulk of contributors I speak with who are perhaps in the top 25 percent of all contributors in terms of quality content and volume are getting slammed with LCV rejections.
So I make my statement based on that very anorexic ear the SS peeps have in terms of listening and hearing what their experienced contributors have to say about their revenue killing inspection standards. Yes, they ARE leaving money on the table, both for SS and the contributor.
I am personally okay with rejections but when I can quantify or strongly qualify the value of an image set and it goes in one ear and out the other, that tells me a lot about a huge gap in their system and that they could care less about what constructive feedback contributors offer.
I have a higher than 90 percent acceptance on IS so I know it's not quality or composition. Funny that the last batch they rejected (90% rejection) had sales within days at DT, IS and Alamy. So that in and of itself proves them wrong.
So in a nutshell, that is why I say what I say and I stand by my comments. Don't get me wrong, though. I am speaking specifically about their inspection standards as an opportunity for serious, fair improvement. The rest of the company seems pretty solid short of seeing their financials.
So, my original comment: This is completely accurate. They are leaving money on the table and have inspectors that make unfounded judgement calls on saleability. This is the one are where SS sucks. They also do not listen to contributors, rather ignoring them is something they perceive as value added. Just because they are currently at the top, or close to it, doesn't mean they don't have significant room to become the king of micro. Their whole inspection process is so poor that uploading there is an honest crap shoot, a gamble that is a result of their unwillingness to bring fairness and commercial realism to their inspection process. They are by far the most shameful agency in this regard. ACCURATE, Nubroc. Tic, tic, tic , tic, tic. as long as they accept yours then its okay, right?
Awaiting you and Lager to reciprocate. You know what that means, right?
A Bitter anonymous poster who's been rejected at ShutterStock no doubt....LOL
Long winded too
-
@Mantis : if your photos are so good why don't you join Getty and make some fat sales there ?
SS sucks and bla bla bla ? excuse me but what else do you expect from a company selling products for as low as 0.5$ ??
actually considering their tight costs you're even lucky they're writing you back saying your pics are of LCV.
-
MANTIS!
Whoever you are or whatever, hiding behind this pseudo. This is a small world and I happen to know an IS, inspector/reviewer, who jumepd ship just over a year back and yes IS will accept anything just technically sound ( not cats, dogs, flowers though) and thats a fact.
You say SS, dont bother to check-out Bona-fide photographers. This is totally wrong, yes I have a high acceptance rate at SS, only because I know my stuff, even so there have been times when I have had plenty of rejects, etc.
All this is totally unimportant and I will tell you for why.
There SHOULD NOT! be any room for diletants in todays stock-files. This is not a charity organization where some poor young photographer should be given chances, etc, this is a cut-throat business and all of us here in this forum are in serious competition with each other, no matter how friendly we, here, in postings, etc.
Stock photography is the same as anything else. You have to EARN your place, earn your position and rights, end of story. Thats what IS, forget all the time and right now you have rookie-files way up front in everyone of their searches.
Now if you have been rejected at SS, well no big deal, you have to try again and again and again. Thats the way it is.
-
I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
I would take Istock's inspectors any day over Shutterstock's, or at least the Istock rules for image acceptance. If you were able to purge from Shutterstock what Istock would normally reject they could clean up their collection, have more salable product, and actually have a system where photographers are encouraged to upload.
LOL, another post from a brilliant Anonymous poster, with all signs showing ShutterStock eating IStock for lunch, Mantis steps forward and posts this masterpiece...LOL.. saleable product...LOL
Well folks, I am going to defend my position once again against the chest thumpers in here who seem to not embrace common business principles in the field of design and demand, microstock being one of those fields. I am a MS buyer, a MS contributor and a business design executive. I do not do MS full time, but I do design business processes full time and, as a result, understand customer needs. Although I am anonymous on this forum Nubrocs BRILLIANT comment only shows his own incompetence and breadth to hear and understand others opinions on a topic for which he disagrees. To be fair, he may be a good photographer, but going against the grain via others opinions seems hard for him to accept. Same with Lagergreek
I think he calls himself Christian. Hes a good photographer, too, but in my opinion failed to understand my point.
Now, back to defending my comments about SS inspection policy being sub-par to Istocks.
I make these comments for very good reason and based not on just my experiences. Shutterstock turns a blind eye to experienced photographers who know what they're doing. When I shoot I conduct research then set up the shoot around that research. I am not just snapshooting away and hoping what I shoot will sell. Then there is the work that goes into prep and submissions. So LCV rejections begin. The photographer (including me, among other very active contributors) try to share with SS WHY these images are salable and not LCV. Here are ways I personally have used to try to educate the ding dong inspectors at SS.
Stats of the same Images from other sites...as Joanne stated earlier. I have shared data with them from IS, Alamy and DT showing that the very images they claiming to be LCV are in fact researched and selling elsewhere. The response is all rejected for LCV.
Sometimes I am extending a successful series, explain to them what that series is, reference image numbers to show actual salability on their own site and they get rejected for LCV.
Other times I point out how my submissions are adding to gaps within their own collection and that they are fresh, new content, not versions of a bazillion other "apple" shots. Rejected for LCV.
Now you (Nubroc and Lagergeek) are probably in the minority of contributors who may not experience a lot of LCV but the bulk of contributors I speak with who are perhaps in the top 25 percent of all contributors in terms of quality content and volume are getting slammed with LCV rejections.
So I make my statement based on that very anorexic ear the SS peeps have in terms of listening and hearing what their experienced contributors have to say about their revenue killing inspection standards. Yes, they ARE leaving money on the table, both for SS and the contributor.
I am personally okay with rejections but when I can quantify or strongly qualify the value of an image set and it goes in one ear and out the other, that tells me a lot about a huge gap in their system and that they could care less about what constructive feedback contributors offer.
I have a higher than 90 percent acceptance on IS so I know it's not quality or composition. Funny that the last batch they rejected (90% rejection) had sales within days at DT, IS and Alamy. So that in and of itself proves them wrong.
So in a nutshell, that is why I say what I say and I stand by my comments. Don't get me wrong, though. I am speaking specifically about their inspection standards as an opportunity for serious, fair improvement. The rest of the company seems pretty solid short of seeing their financials.
So, my original comment: This is completely accurate. They are leaving money on the table and have inspectors that make unfounded judgement calls on saleability. This is the one are where SS sucks. They also do not listen to contributors, rather ignoring them is something they perceive as value added. Just because they are currently at the top, or close to it, doesn't mean they don't have significant room to become the king of micro. Their whole inspection process is so poor that uploading there is an honest crap shoot, a gamble that is a result of their unwillingness to bring fairness and commercial realism to their inspection process. They are by far the most shameful agency in this regard. ACCURATE, Nubroc. Tic, tic, tic , tic, tic. as long as they accept yours then its okay, right?
Awaiting you and Lager to reciprocate. You know what that means, right?
A Bitter anonymous poster who's been rejected at ShutterStock no doubt....LOL
It figures that this would be your response. No substance, no reasonable response. Really shows you lack of objectivity.
-
By the way, for everyone here, I am trying to be objective and offer up a different opinion on acceptance criteria. What Steve is saying, in my opinion, is as long as his are accepted then there isn't a problem. That, in and of itself, is the problem with this debate. I would honestly love to hear his opinion on acceptance criteria but I get the impression that his swollen head wont allow that to happen.
-
@Mantis : if your photos are so good why don't you join Getty and make some fat sales there ?
SS sucks and bla bla bla ? excuse me but what else do you expect from a company selling products for as low as 0.5$ ??
actually considering their tight costs you're even lucky they're writing you back saying your pics are of LCV.
SS doesn't suck. I never said that. I said they are a good company with room to improve the way they review and determine salable images. I shoot my images base on the reason I buy (or don't buy) images. When I am creating a safety video, for example, I need choice. Placing text in the right place is important and when I can't find the right image or composition of an image that creates more time for me to produce my videos. I NEVER SAID MY WORK WAS SO MAGNIFICENT that it should be accepted everywhere, but I do shoot based on the frustrations I have as a buyer from not finding what I want. So please read my posts more carefully before responding. And I am speaking for not just me in particular but the bulk of image suppliers that were/are automatically deemed LCV buy Shutterstock's unrealistic assessment and lack of defined acceptance standards. Funny, speaking for me, whatever I shot and submitted before 4-6 months ago sold on SS and made us both money. Now they just sell every else. By the way, PLEASE show me where I said SS sucks bla bla....please. Just curious where you made that up.
-
I hate to rejoice in anyone's demise. But they deserve it. ::) On the other hand, if they fess up for being tyrannical, then they deserve a second chance.
After they disappear, let's hope their reviewers don't get jobs at SS, 123RF, etc. Maybe we can be the reviewers and reject all their work as "not suitable for stock."
Site analytic's most recent update - apologies if this is shown somewhere else...
Then I guess you are not interested in debating the facts. One and two word sentences just don't do it.
IS in trouble.
[url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url] ([url]http://siteanalytics.compete.com/istockphoto.com/[/url])
I would take Istock's inspectors any day over Shutterstock's, or at least the Istock rules for image acceptance. If you were able to purge from Shutterstock what Istock would normally reject they could clean up their collection, have more salable product, and actually have a system where photographers are encouraged to upload.
LOL, another post from a brilliant Anonymous poster, with all signs showing ShutterStock eating IStock for lunch, Mantis steps forward and posts this masterpiece...LOL.. saleable product...LOL
Well folks, I am going to defend my position once again against the chest thumpers in here who seem to not embrace common business principles in the field of design and demand, microstock being one of those fields. I am a MS buyer, a MS contributor and a business design executive. I do not do MS full time, but I do design business processes full time and, as a result, understand customer needs. Although I am anonymous on this forum Nubrocs BRILLIANT comment only shows his own incompetence and breadth to hear and understand others opinions on a topic for which he disagrees. To be fair, he may be a good photographer, but going against the grain via others opinions seems hard for him to accept. Same with Lagergreek
I think he calls himself Christian. Hes a good photographer, too, but in my opinion failed to understand my point.
Now, back to defending my comments about SS inspection policy being sub-par to Istocks.
I make these comments for very good reason and based not on just my experiences. Shutterstock turns a blind eye to experienced photographers who know what they're doing. When I shoot I conduct research then set up the shoot around that research. I am not just snapshooting away and hoping what I shoot will sell. Then there is the work that goes into prep and submissions. So LCV rejections begin. The photographer (including me, among other very active contributors) try to share with SS WHY these images are salable and not LCV. Here are ways I personally have used to try to educate the ding dong inspectors at SS.
Stats of the same Images from other sites...as Joanne stated earlier. I have shared data with them from IS, Alamy and DT showing that the very images they claiming to be LCV are in fact researched and selling elsewhere. The response is all rejected for LCV.
Sometimes I am extending a successful series, explain to them what that series is, reference image numbers to show actual salability on their own site and they get rejected for LCV.
Other times I point out how my submissions are adding to gaps within their own collection and that they are fresh, new content, not versions of a bazillion other "apple" shots. Rejected for LCV.
Now you (Nubroc and Lagergeek) are probably in the minority of contributors who may not experience a lot of LCV but the bulk of contributors I speak with who are perhaps in the top 25 percent of all contributors in terms of quality content and volume are getting slammed with LCV rejections.
So I make my statement based on that very anorexic ear the SS peeps have in terms of listening and hearing what their experienced contributors have to say about their revenue killing inspection standards. Yes, they ARE leaving money on the table, both for SS and the contributor.
I am personally okay with rejections but when I can quantify or strongly qualify the value of an image set and it goes in one ear and out the other, that tells me a lot about a huge gap in their system and that they could care less about what constructive feedback contributors offer.
I have a higher than 90 percent acceptance on IS so I know it's not quality or composition. Funny that the last batch they rejected (90% rejection) had sales within days at DT, IS and Alamy. So that in and of itself proves them wrong.
So in a nutshell, that is why I say what I say and I stand by my comments. Don't get me wrong, though. I am speaking specifically about their inspection standards as an opportunity for serious, fair improvement. The rest of the company seems pretty solid short of seeing their financials.
So, my original comment: This is completely accurate. They are leaving money on the table and have inspectors that make unfounded judgement calls on saleability. This is the one are where SS sucks. They also do not listen to contributors, rather ignoring them is something they perceive as value added. Just because they are currently at the top, or close to it, doesn't mean they don't have significant room to become the king of micro. Their whole inspection process is so poor that uploading there is an honest crap shoot, a gamble that is a result of their unwillingness to bring fairness and commercial realism to their inspection process. They are by far the most shameful agency in this regard. ACCURATE, Nubroc. Tic, tic, tic , tic, tic. as long as they accept yours then its okay, right?
Awaiting you and Lager to reciprocate. You know what that means, right?
A Bitter anonymous poster who's been rejected at ShutterStock no doubt....LOL
Long winded too
-
@Mantis : if your photos are so good why don't you join Getty and make some fat sales there ?
SS sucks and bla bla bla ? excuse me but what else do you expect from a company selling products for as low as 0.5$ ??
actually considering their tight costs you're even lucky they're writing you back saying your pics are of LCV.
SS doesn't suck. I never said that. I said they are a good company with room to improve the way they review and determine salable images. I shoot my images base on the reason I buy (or don't buy) images. When I am creating a safety video, for example, I need choice. Placing text in the right place is important and when I can't find the right image or composition of an image that creates more time for me to produce my videos. I NEVER SAID MY WORK WAS SO MAGNIFICENT that it should be accepted everywhere, but I do shoot based on the frustrations I have as a buyer from not finding what I want. So please read my posts more carefully before responding. And I am speaking for not just me in particular but the bulk of image suppliers that were/are automatically deemed LCV buy Shutterstock's unrealistic assessment and lack of defined acceptance standards. Funny, speaking for me, whatever I shot and submitted before 4-6 months ago sold on SS and made us both money. Now they just sell every else. By the way, PLEASE show me where I said SS sucks bla bla....please. Just curious where you made that up.
i may be wrong but if the leading microstock agency doesn't think your photos are worth much perhaps they have their good reasons.
SS in the past used to accept any sort of crap you could throw at them, now they're quite strict, they obviously changed their editorial policy standards and i'm sure they've the data and the numbers to take this sort of decisions to the benefit of their own business.
if they say LCV it means "SS thinks it's LCV", of course other agencies will strongly disagree but hey that's the beauty of the stock business, there are plenty of choices and opposing views.
i've many images that sold well in some agencies and zero in other agencies.
every agency has different targets, customers, and tastes, we must accept it and go on with our lives.
-
This is not a charity organization where some poor young photographer should be given chances, etc, this is a cut-throat business and all of us here in this forum are in serious competition with each other, no matter how friendly we, here, in postings, etc.
exactly.
-
There SHOULD NOT! be any room for diletants in todays stock-files. This is not a charity organization where some poor young photographer should be given chances, etc, this is a cut-throat business and all of us here in this forum are in serious competition with each other, no matter how friendly we, here, in postings, etc.
Stock photography is the same as anything else. You have to EARN your place, earn your position and rights, end of story. Thats what IS, forget all the time and right now you have rookie-files way up front in everyone of their searches.
Just because you are an old schooled photographer doesn't mean that a young photographer can't do better than you. Everybody should have the chance. Old back days are over.
-
There SHOULD NOT! be any room for diletants in todays stock-files. This is not a charity organization where some poor young photographer should be given chances, etc, this is a cut-throat business and all of us here in this forum are in serious competition with each other, no matter how friendly we, here, in postings, etc.
Stock photography is the same as anything else. You have to EARN your place, earn your position and rights, end of story. Thats what IS, forget all the time and right now you have rookie-files way up front in everyone of their searches.
Just because you are an old schooled photographer doesn't mean that a young photographer can't do better than you. Everybody should have the chance. Old back days are over.
Never said that! My last assistant in the studio was IMO, far better a studio photographer then myself, expert in lighting set-ups and thats what studio is all about, lighting. What I said was, that any pictures, old or new will have to earn their place, earn their rights, no gravy-trains, old or young. No differant from any other business? is it and it really havent got anything to do with age either.
After 10 years of Micro, now, the agencies are starting their weeding-out process, i.e. "persona non gratas" will have to go or play second fiddle, simple as that. Tough titty. :)
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"There SHOULD NOT! be any room for diletants in todays stock-files. This is not a charity organization where some poor young photographer should be given chances, etc, this is a cut-throat business and all of us here in this forum are in serious competition with each other, no matter how friendly we, here, in postings, etc.
Stock photography is the same as anything else. You have to EARN your place, earn your position and rights, end of story. Thats what IS, forget all the time and right now you have rookie-files way up front in everyone of their searches. "
Well said Christian.
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If SS sales are soaring with "rookie files" out in front, then it suggests the market is happy with that. What you or I or anyone else think the standard should be is irrelevant if the market thinks something else.
I suspect rejection standards are driven by a desire to limit the inventory for practical reasons rather than to meet market requirements - which are probably mostly satisfied with anything that prints up OK at A4 size.
-
If SS sales are soaring with "rookie files" out in front, then it suggests the market is happy with that. What you or I or anyone else think the standard should be is irrelevant if the market thinks something else.
I suspect rejection standards are driven by a desire to limit the inventory for practical reasons rather than to meet market requirements - which are probably mostly satisfied with anything that prints up OK at A4 size.
Soaring with rookie files: yes! soaring with actual sales: NO ! contrary we all know sales are way, way down, so, the market can not be happy but truly unhappy and on the brink of suicide, volontary suicide. Its a most unsatisfied market.
Ofcourse, since Lobo informed everyone in the IS forum, this is the best match buyers want and since sales are no more then gutter trash. Would you suggest he was right? :-\
-
"There SHOULD NOT! be any room for diletants in todays stock-files. This is not a charity organization where some poor young photographer should be given chances, etc, this is a cut-throat business and all of us here in this forum are in serious competition with each other, no matter how friendly we, here, in postings, etc.
Stock photography is the same as anything else. You have to EARN your place, earn your position and rights, end of story. Thats what IS, forget all the time and right now you have rookie-files way up front in everyone of their searches. "
Well said Christian.
I have to disagree here a bit. It shouldn't be about someone earning their place. It should be about the image. If the image is good enough it should have a chance to go in front of the buyers. If they want it, it should sell.
Now I can see why a site would prefer someone who consistently produces good selling images over someone who only rarely produces one and sends lots of losers too, but they should weed them out with upload limits based on rejections or a hard initial application, not by shooting down the few good images they might produce.
In general I would say that the micro inspection process has a fairly high degree of chance and that images are screened too tightly on pixel peeping quality and that the search engine should help determine what ends up on the front page and if something doesn't sell after a year or 2 or 4 it can be culled. I also think that there is value for the collection in obscure subjects that might only rarely be searched for and bought - but if they aren't in the collection then the buyer goes looking elsewhere and maybe will stay there for the rest of their image needs too.
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"There SHOULD NOT! be any room for diletants in todays stock-files. This is not a charity organization where some poor young photographer should be given chances, etc, this is a cut-throat business and all of us here in this forum are in serious competition with each other, no matter how friendly we, here, in postings, etc.
Stock photography is the same as anything else. You have to EARN your place, earn your position and rights, end of story. Thats what IS, forget all the time and right now you have rookie-files way up front in everyone of their searches. "
Well said Christian.
I have to disagree here a bit. It shouldn't be about someone earning their place. It should be about the image. If the image is good enough it should have a chance to go in front of the buyers. If they want it, it should sell.
Now I can see why a site would prefer someone who consistently produces good selling images over someone who only rarely produces one and sends lots of losers too, but they should weed them out with upload limits based on rejections or a hard initial application, not by shooting down the few good images they might produce.
In general I would say that the micro inspection process has a fairly high degree of chance and that images are screened too tightly on pixel peeping quality and that the search engine should help determine what ends up on the front page and if something doesn't sell after a year or 2 or 4 it can be culled. I also think that there is value for the collection in obscure subjects that might only rarely be searched for and bought - but if they aren't in the collection then the buyer goes looking elsewhere and maybe will stay there for the rest of their image needs too.
Yep! but if you read the posting you will see the words, FIles, pics, should earn its place, etc. Not the actual person, could be a joe-bloggs, who cares? as long as the pics are quality.
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This is not a charity organization where some poor young photographer should be given chances, etc, this is a cut-throat business and all of us here in this forum are in serious competition with each other, no matter how friendly we, here, in postings, etc.
exactly.
I agree who needs their LCV and subpar crap anyway?
http://www.dpchallenge.com/forum.php?action=read&FORUM_THREAD_ID=164121 (http://www.dpchallenge.com/forum.php?action=read&FORUM_THREAD_ID=164121)
Joey L: "01/22/2005 10:54:38 AM This was exactly what my test proved, for all the other people who love photography but are stuck with a "poor quality" camera. Like me, those people are capable of submitting to stock web sites and if they contribute enough they can make a few bucks."
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@Mantis : if your photos are so good why don't you join Getty and make some fat sales there ?
SS sucks and bla bla bla ? excuse me but what else do you expect from a company selling products for as low as 0.5$ ??
actually considering their tight costs you're even lucky they're writing you back saying your pics are of LCV.
SS doesn't suck. I never said that. I said they are a good company with room to improve the way they review and determine salable images. I shoot my images base on the reason I buy (or don't buy) images. When I am creating a safety video, for example, I need choice. Placing text in the right place is important and when I can't find the right image or composition of an image that creates more time for me to produce my videos. I NEVER SAID MY WORK WAS SO MAGNIFICENT that it should be accepted everywhere, but I do shoot based on the frustrations I have as a buyer from not finding what I want. So please read my posts more carefully before responding. And I am speaking for not just me in particular but the bulk of image suppliers that were/are automatically deemed LCV buy Shutterstock's unrealistic assessment and lack of defined acceptance standards. Funny, speaking for me, whatever I shot and submitted before 4-6 months ago sold on SS and made us both money. Now they just sell every else. By the way, PLEASE show me where I said SS sucks bla bla....please. Just curious where you made that up.
Quote from Mantis:
"This is the one are where SS sucks. They also do not listen to contributors, rather ignoring them is something they perceive as value added. "
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I keep thinking this thread will get back on topic of Istock sales and traffic, but instead there are these endless lengthy posts about Shutterstock's reviewing practices. what?!
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I keep thinking this thread will get back on topic of Istock sales and traffic, but instead there are these endless lengthy posts about Shutterstock's reviewing practices. what?!
Ah... men. Sigh. So easily distracted, so little focus when they are taken away, every 2 seconds thinking of se Porsches. It must be hormonal. We nuns don't have that ;)
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I was talking about free images of the week with a friend last night (does it make sense, is the file dead afterwards etc...)
I told here that my own experience was really good. In 2006 (or 2007?) I had a FIOW and the file had over 24 000 free downloads. The file continued to show very healthy sales and still sells today, so I recommended she should just submit a few suggestins or offer up her Portfolio for FIOW.
I then had a look at the recent FIOW and was suprised to see that they had less downloads. 14-16 000. Now this is the year 2011 and I would expect istock to have many, many more customers and who doesnīt love free files?
I then had a look at this lightbox that has quite a large number of FIOW.
http://www.istockphoto.com/search/lightbox/13824/#1e2d34a4 (http://www.istockphoto.com/search/lightbox/13824/#1e2d34a4)
It looks like older files have downloads of over 40 000.
Now I donīt know - are the files of the last 4 weeks less commercially attractive and therefore have less free downloads?
Or is the number of free downloads a good indicator of the number of active, regular buyers?
Personally I would assume that if you define a regular buyer as "buys a few files every month", then at least 20% of them would be downloading the free image of the week? Or would you expect most regular buyers to download the free images? Those of you who are buyers - do you always download FIOW?
Is this a value worth watching and does it correlate with the traffic stats on compete?
What do you think?
ETA: Thanks to the comments on the file I can see it was FIOW in Nov 2006
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Jasmin, That is a very interesting observation (and on topic!). It is certainly curious that FIOWs would be getting consistently fewer downloads now than a couple of years ago.
There may be other reasons besides demise in site traffic, such as sites like DT, FT, and 123 that have built up very extensive free image sections.
But as another piece of the puzzle, along with traffic stats, monthly sales threads, etc., it is potentially useful indicator.
Thanks for pointing it out. :)
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Thanks Lisa!
It is difficult to interpret data like this, especially because as an exclusive I have no idea what other sites are offering.
But the traffic stats are scaring us all and in the absence of an explanation for what the stats mean from HQ we are all reading the tealeaves we have access too.
One thing that would interest me - do the other sites show how many times a free file was downloaded (yes, I usually vote to have them removed but...)
Again this could be an interesting indicator, at least about the size of the market that likes freebies :-)
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As I said, I think its a meltdown, finished. As far as recovering ground? well, really, they have slowly been losing ground for the last 3 years, bit late in the day to try and recover, isnt it?
the weird thing about it, is, they havent even tried.
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Losing customers is one thing. Losing PAYING customers is something else.
But if watching free downloads over the next 3 months shows fewer and fewer downloads, it would add to the data from compete.
I do think the type of file offered makes a big difference, so I really think it is not enough data in itself.
But together with compete, sales threads, etc...just another piece in the mosaic.
And again your own portfolio might still be doing extremely well. I know quite a few exclusives who are celebrating a record year. They did upload a lot of files and have improved the quality of their work.
Reading tealeaves, nothing more.
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One thing that would interest me - do the other sites show how many times a free file was downloaded (yes, I usually vote to have them removed but...)
I can't speak for the majority, but I have a few free files on DT and they don't have anywhere near the downloads of the Istock FIOWs. My most downloaded free file is at around 1500 DLs and the least downloaded is at around 120.
As you said, the quality of the files may have a lot to do with it. I only allowed a few files that didn't sell ANYWHERE to be transferred into the DT free program.
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Thank you for sharing Lisa!
Letīs see what the others have to say.
This could be an interesting indicator about active customer volume, in general.
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Losing customers is one thing. Losing PAYING customers is something else.
But if watching free downloads over the next 3 months shows fewer and fewer downloads, it would add to the data from compete.
I do think the type of file offered makes a big difference, so I really think it is not enough data in itself.
But together with compete, sales threads, etc...just another piece in the mosaic.
And again your own portfolio might still be doing extremely well. I know quite a few exclusives who are celebrating a record year. They did upload a lot of files and have improved the quality of their work.
Reading tealeaves, nothing more.
that is a very interesting statistic - the downloads on FIOTW. I agree that the usefulness of the image makes a difference in the downloads but one could still glean some interesting and telling stats but looking at the overall month-to-month and year-to-year stats on the FIOTW downloads. FIOTW is a "loss leader" designed to bring in traffic and turn them into buying customers. If the overall numbers are dropping that would be an indication of a drop in buyers visiting the site - but of course just one indication and other factors would need to be looked at as well (such as the types of images being offered, the actual sales volumes in relation to the FIOTW downloads, etc). We wouldn't have access to a lot of the data, but one would hope that the marketing staff at IS is looking at all these indicators.
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For the free video of the month I am seeing 11-22 000 downloads. That is quite a huge number of downloads for video.
Again, big difference between the files. But I will be watching those numbers with interest.
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You know, isnt it a fact that when chips are down, the going gets rough, wild speculations, evil rumours starts to appear and all this leaves room for wishfull thinking and wild hopes. We start to indoctrinate ourselves, Oh! it cant be that bad, many are still doing well, etc, etc, videos are selling, this and that.
This time around though, I think we have to face facts, there are just too many signs, pointing in the wrong directions.
Also, I would suggest, its not so much the lack of sales, buyers leaving, etc, one could live with that, but no, its the management or rather the mismanagement of the site that is unacceptable, the blase incomunicado, non caring attitude which have landed them in trouble, still pursuing a stiff upper lip, as if things are totally normal and hurrah Henrietta.
Im sure many here agree, dont care if they sell a million Vettas/ageny, per day, good luck. Its the general attitude, the amateurish and naive approach, trying to justify every single thing going wrong, etc, instead of just saying, sorry, made some errors of judgements here.
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So, Christian, to boil it down: Anything negative is absolutely reliable evidence of the collapse of iS; anything positivie is naive wishful thinking.
I think it's clear that iS is losing market share in its core business of selling cheap photos/graphics but it is not so clear how it is doing with Vetta, agency, video and news. Since all those things are innovations over tha last few years it's not fair to say it is not looking at ways of generating new income streams.
Remember how they deliberately tried to push iStock clients into TS? That only makes sense if they see TS as the marketplace for their original customer base and iS as turning into something else. I currently sell almost three times as many files at TS (well, PP to be strictly accurate) in a month as I do at iS and PP brings in almost two thirds as much cash as straight iS sales.
In cash terms, the combined value of iS and PP has been marginally higher in two of the last three months than my highest pre-PP month (August 09). My iStock only sales numbers are down about 40% from then, but my total sales through the "family" are up more than 50% and are roughly equal to my highest-ever sales tally of November 2006 (of course, dl/file are way below what they were five years back, but so is my % of the total iS collection).
Overall, in the last three months, Getty companies have sold as many of my files as they ever have over any three month period and generated more cash for themselves out of me than in any previous three month period. This is despite my being locked out of the higher-value markets and not participating in new ventures, such as video.
So while the core photo business of iS, looked at in isolation, seems to be doing horribly (and doing a lot of damage to exclusive photographers in the process) the wider picture may be quite different. As far as Getty's MBAs are concerned, it may all be going according to plan.
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So, Christian, to boil it down: Anything negative is absolutely reliable evidence of the collapse of iS; anything positivie is naive wishful thinking.
I think it's clear that iS is losing market share in its core business of selling cheap photos/graphics but it is not so clear how it is doing with Vetta, agency, video and news. Since all those things are innovations over tha last few years it's not fair to say it is not looking at ways of generating new income streams.
Remember how they deliberately tried to push iStock clients into TS? That only makes sense if they see TS as the marketplace for their original customer base and iS as turning into something else. I currently sell almost three times as many files at TS (well, PP to be strictly accurate) in a month as I do at iS and PP brings in almost two thirds as much cash as straight iS sales.
In cash terms, the combined value of iS and PP has been marginally higher in two of the last three months than my highest pre-PP month (August 09). My iStock only sales numbers are down about 40% from then, but my total sales through the "family" are up more than 50% and are roughly equal to my highest-ever sales tally of November 2006 (of course, dl/file are way below what they were five years back, but so is my % of the total iS collection).
Overall, in the last three months, Getty companies have sold as many of my files as they ever have over any three month period and generated more cash for themselves out of me than in any previous three month period. This is despite my being locked out of the higher-value markets and not participating in new ventures, such as video.
So while the core photo business of iS, looked at in isolation, seems to be doing horribly (and doing a lot of damage to exclusive photographers in the process) the wider picture may be quite different. As far as Getty's MBAs are concerned, it may all be going according to plan.
Hi!
Oh Im sure its going according to their plan, 100%, destruction, non communication and bewilderness, are the hallmarks when Getty slowly defates a company they once took over, no problem, its been like that since 93.
The question is: who wants or need to be a part of all that nonsense?
The aftermath will be: H&F decides to squeeze even a bit more out of everything. A clockwork Orange, you might say.
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i don't get it.
IS is already screwing photographers in any possible nasty way.
why people should give one image away ?
24.000 freeloaders using your RF image ... and being RF they can legally use it FOREVER and ever and for free and without even crediting you.
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As far as Getty's MBAs are concerned, it may all be going according to plan.
You can't possibly believe that can you? You must realise that your PP sales are hugely inflated because most contributors have chosen not to participate and are unlikely to be a reflection of the greater market __ don't you? You'll find out if and when the useless IS programmers finally manage to get their 'PP conveyor belt' to work. Of course that could be a very long time yet. (NB: Funny how SS's 'Bridge to Bigstock' was implemented rapidly and without interruptions elsewhere). According to the independent traffic stat's (that others have provided) TS has just 45K unique visitors against 2M at SS. Your 'analysis' appears to have been entirely constructed as a counter-arguement against Lagereek and is at least as distorted and unrealistic a picture as you accuse him of.
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The aftermath will be: H&F decides to squeeze even a bit more out of everything. A clockwork Orange, you might say.
exactly, after Tony Stone it was game over, and we can all bet Getty has more evil plans in store.
and to those who claim it's unthinkable to ask high prices today look at the sh-it sold in art galleries or at the awful images used in many commercials where they paid 10Ks for a studio shot.
photography is STILL a 100 words, let's not forget it !
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The aftermath will be: H&F decides to squeeze even a bit more out of everything. A clockwork Orange, you might say.
exactly, after Tony Stone it was game over, and we can all bet Getty has more evil plans in store.
and to those who claim it's unthinkable to ask high prices today look at the sh-it sold in art galleries or at the awful images used in many commercials where they paid 10Ks for a studio shot.
photography is STILL a 100 words, let's not forget it !
1000
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As far as Getty's MBAs are concerned, it may all be going according to plan.
You can't possibly believe that can you? You must realise that your PP sales are hugely inflated because most contributors have chosen not to participate and are unlikely to be a reflection of the greater market __ don't you? You'll find out if and when the useless IS programmers finally manage to get their 'PP conveyor belt' to work. Of course that could be a very long time yet. (NB: Funny how SS's 'Bridge to Bigstock' was implemented rapidly and without interruptions elsewhere). According to the independent traffic stat's (that others have provided) TS has just 45K unique visitors against 2M at SS. Your 'analysis' appears to have been entirely constructed as a counter-arguement against Lagereek and is at least as distorted and unrealistic a picture as you accuse him of.
Yes, it was a counter-argument to lagereek because it gets boring seeing the same drum being thumped and nothing new being said. However, every single fact in it is correct and represents data people can interpret as they like.
I'm pretty sure that your assertion that "most contributors have chosen not to participate in pp" is false. It may or may not be the case that a considerable proportion of leading independents have chosen not to participate and that may be inflating my figures, but neither you nor I know that, either. We do know that a good proportion of the most vocal were in the boycott but that is a very small number of people.
I'll put up a survey. Let's see what that says.
Meanwhile, I wait with interest to see if (subject to them ever getting things working) my PP figures do take a major hit.
I do find the TS web traffic figures very strange, given my returns. I wonder if it is something to do with how the data are collected.
As for Getty's MBAs, I did say maybe, its what they want , I didn't say I believe it is. From where I am sitting it's hard to imagine that the big-wigs could be happy with the way it's going but as I was trying to point out, that could be because we are seeing only a small part of a very big picture. Maybe they have diverted sales into more profitable (for them) channels rather than losing them outright. It seems unlikely but it's not impossible. And if not, why aren't there signs of frantic efforts to woo back lost customers?
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getty's MBAs are doing their dirty jobs, they're simply hired for it and they shouldn't blamed.
and of course they don't give a sh-it about us and they laugh all their way to the bank, this is happening in ANY creative field by the way, not just photography.
they're greedy professional merchants, what else should you expect from the market leader ?
the problem is .. there's a limit between being in a business and having a win-win situation and getting completely screwed like with Getty, these guys are simply killing the market for photographers as unless paid really well the 15% or 20% of a sale cannot sustain a photographer no matter if RF or RM.
as a direct comparison it's the norm for art galleries to take a 50% cut and they're the ones investing in marketing, advertising, and paying for exibitions and anything else.
now, as yourself what getty or IS are actually doing to promote our products while eating up to 85% of the sales ?
and then now IS is launching a massive and aggressive campaign to fish new affiliates putting the IS banners on their web sites ...pathetic ..and just in time...as they wouldn't do it if biz was going alright, it's obvious their biz is going shite and they're all out in the hope of finding new useful idiots.
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Losing customers is one thing. Losing PAYING customers is something else.
ok but why you're expecting a market leader company to care about us ?
in their eyes we're tens of thousands, one worth the other, easily replaceable by newbies, absolutely expendible.
either we get it or we don't.
let's go back to the beginning : if you're REALLY a skilled photographer you have an agent finding customers for you, and you sell for art galleries or make assignments for the biggest brands billing them 100K as a start !
microstock is the absolute rock bottom of the whole industry, even lower than newbies buying the cheapest Canon Rebel and doing weddings for 500 bucks.
so, we're here ranting that micro agencies s-ucks, well what else is to be expected from the cheapest of the cheapest ?? 1000$ a pop ??
blaming microstock is like blaming Walmart.... same same.
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ok but why you're expecting a market leader company to care about us ?
in their eyes we're tens of thousands, one worth the other, easily replaceable by newbies, absolutely expendible.
either we get it or we don't.
let's go back to the beginning : if you're REALLY a skilled photographer you have an agent finding customers for you, and you sell for art galleries or make assignments for the biggest brands billing them 100K as a start !
microstock is the absolute rock bottom of the whole industry, even lower than newbies buying the cheapest Canon Rebel and doing weddings for 500 bucks.
so, we're here ranting that micro agencies s-ucks, well what else is to be expected from the cheapest of the cheapest ?? 1000$ a pop ??
blaming microstock is like blaming Walmart.... same same.
You're absolutely right in everything you say. Microstock is a complete waste of time and is destroying the industry for nice, skilled photographers like you. Do you have any more pearls of wisdom to share please? Get it out of your system now and then maybe you can move on (hopefully in the most literal sense).
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^^ I have said before and I'll say it again. I 100% agree. Everyone else should stop submitting to micro immediately ;)
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As far as Getty's MBAs are concerned, it may all be going according to plan.
You can't possibly believe that can you? You must realise that your PP sales are hugely inflated because most contributors have chosen not to participate and are unlikely to be a reflection of the greater market __ don't you? You'll find out if and when the useless IS programmers finally manage to get their 'PP conveyor belt' to work. Of course that could be a very long time yet. (NB: Funny how SS's 'Bridge to Bigstock' was implemented rapidly and without interruptions elsewhere). According to the independent traffic stat's (that others have provided) TS has just 45K unique visitors against 2M at SS. Your 'analysis' appears to have been entirely constructed as a counter-arguement against Lagereek and is at least as distorted and unrealistic a picture as you accuse him of.
Yes, it was a counter-argument to lagereek because it gets boring seeing the same drum being thumped and nothing new being said. However, every single fact in it is correct and represents data people can interpret as they like.
I'm pretty sure that your assertion that "most contributors have chosen not to participate in pp" is false. It may or may not be the case that a considerable proportion of leading independents have chosen not to participate and that may be inflating my figures, but neither you nor I know that, either. We do know that a good proportion of the most vocal were in the boycott but that is a very small number of people.
I'll put up a survey. Let's see what that says.
Meanwhile, I wait with interest to see if (subject to them ever getting things working) my PP figures do take a major hit.
I do find the TS web traffic figures very strange, given my returns. I wonder if it is something to do with how the data are collected.
As for Getty's MBAs, I did say maybe, its what they want , I didn't say I believe it is. From where I am sitting it's hard to imagine that the big-wigs could be happy with the way it's going but as I was trying to point out, that could be because we are seeing only a small part of a very big picture. Maybe they have diverted sales into more profitable (for them) channels rather than losing them outright. It seems unlikely but it's not impossible. And if not, why aren't there signs of frantic efforts to woo back lost customers?
Yes but with due respect, youre not exactly coming up with anything new yourself, I mean all this speculation, etc, is all very well, who and who havent joined PP, etc, in all fairness, who cares anyway? I couldnt careless if they sold for a billion bucks per day, to be even more blunt, even if I was earning a grand/day, I still would slagg them off.
Antistock, is right, after Tony-Stone and Image-Bank, same pattern, they left them alone for a few years and into a false security, then all of a sudden the sheit came down in hoards, tirds as big as JFK airport.
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..... who and who havent joined PP, etc, in all fairness, who cares anyway? I couldnt careless if they sold for a billion bucks per day, to be even more blunt, even if I was earning a grand/day, I still would slagg them off.
It's not who, it's how many - or, more exactly, what ratio of people who vote. I'm curious. I guess some others are, too, as they are answering the survey.
Meanwhile, more turds are landing on Getty news photographers, according to leaf's latest thread.
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..... who and who havent joined PP, etc, in all fairness, who cares anyway? I couldnt careless if they sold for a billion bucks per day, to be even more blunt, even if I was earning a grand/day, I still would slagg them off.
It's not who, it's how many - or, more exactly, what ratio of people who vote. I'm curious. I guess some others are, too, as they are answering the survey.
Meanwhile, more turds are landing on Getty news photographers, according to leaf's latest thread.
Correct, you spell it turds, not tirds. Thats what I meant, TURDS! ;D
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Thanks for the embedded links, they didn't catch my attention in the other thread.
This chart matches what I'm seeing at ShutterStock, explosive growth, couldn't have happened to a better company. I love watching IStock's demise!!!!!
+1 for me :). Thanks for adding the images it surely got my attention too. Very nice site this is to check websites growth, didn't know of it.
It's been a year since I joined iStock (been about 3 year in microstock), and after 20 images and Flash file upload I stopped uploading there. Seeing that it's getting less and less share of the market I think I am happy I didn't waste or don't go on wasting time over they ALL TOO TIME CONSUMING upload system. That's a major turn-off for me, being non-exclusive I keyword and description for ALL the other site, but for iStock I need to manually correct everything... Even tho the apparent ''good money'' in iStock was attractive, it's getting less and less interesting to upload there.
For me, if Shutterstock keeps growing and iStock falls I'll be a happy camper (that an individual comment, but I know for a lot of Exclusive photographer there it must be stressful to see their major source of income degrade slowly). Overall I wish best for iStock, for the sake of the contributors there, but those graphs speaks from themselves.
Losing 1 million... 1 MILLION out of 1.5 unique visitors... 66% of a business... This means something. Wouldn't want to be in their shoes.
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If you bill clients 100k you probably also have running costs for studio and team of 30k a month. And do you really believe selling Art through galeries Is the way to go in the year 2011??
If you don't know how to make good money with stock, then all it says that you personally don't understand how to be successful in the genre. Just like there are wedding photographers who charge 5000 usd and others who will never find anyone who will pay more than 500 usd.
Stock photography and working with stock agencies is a highly specialized subject matter. It isn't for everyone.
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http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=159 (http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=159)
looking back, interesting read.....
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[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=159[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=159[/url])
looking back, interesting read.....
Oh dear <takes out onion>. It makes me want to touch my monitor just to feel the warmth of his sincerity. Funny though, he didn't seem to mention the $50M he'd just stuffed into his back-bin. Must have forgot.
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[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=159[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=159[/url])
looking back, interesting read.....
Oh dear <takes out onion>. It makes me want to touch my monitor just to feel the warmth of his sincerity. Funny though, he didn't seem to mention the $50M he'd just stuffed into his back-bin. Must have forgot.
No need to be quite so cynical. I'm sure it was a genuinely emotional moment for him: if you've ever sold something you've created, you'll know that.
It is interesting to see how all the promises and reassurances have come to naught. Which probably had a lot to do with why Mr Livingstone subsequently absconded.
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No need to be quite so cynical. I'm sure it was a genuinely emotional moment for him: if you've ever sold something you've created, you'll know that.
Emotional? no sh*t! I have also never sold anything for $50 mil, I assumed that was him in the photo cross dressing in pink and jumping for joy.
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[url]http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=159[/url] ([url]http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=159[/url])
looking back, interesting read.....
I have no idea what his options were when Bruce made that decision but I wonder if he regrets it now or not. The easy answer is he had his share of 50 million reasons not to regret it. However, seeing what is happening to Istock now has to sting. Very few people have ever created a business that created a fundamental change in a market, and I bet its tough to see your business go from being an innovator to, potentially, a regressive business model.
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Because istock is a pay as you go site with high prices, SS is a subscription site with much lower prices. So even with less traffic, istock still makes more money.
SS is not just 'a subscription site' and hasn't been for some time. OD and EL sales have been growing strongly for the last couple of years and now make up nearly 50% of my total earnings at SS.
I checked my own stats after reading this and found that more than one third of my revenue on ss comes from non-subscription downloads. I've put a very simple poll on my blog. Hope u guys can take part.
Just how much of a subscription site is Shutterstock? (http://www.microstockposts.com/just-how-much-of-a-subscription-site-is-shutterstock/)
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I checked my own stats after reading this and found that more than one third of my revenue on ss comes from non-subscription downloads. I've put a very simple poll on my blog. Hope u guys can take part.
Just how much of a subscription site is Shutterstock? ([url]http://www.microstockposts.com/just-how-much-of-a-subscription-site-is-shutterstock/[/url])
I just voted. I was surprised to learn that a whopping 69% of my SS money comes from non-subscription sales. I think the subs still account for a large majority of my total downloads there, but the increase on OD sales and the massive increase in ELs has helped swell the dollar totals.
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I just voted. I was surprised to learn that a whopping 69% of my SS money comes from non-subscription sales. I think the subs still account for a large majority of my total downloads there, but the increase on OD sales and the massive increase in ELs has helped swell the dollar totals.
This is why I don't get people's rosy outlook on SS. They haven't really seemed to have grown much in the last 4 years. They just swapped out subscription sales for On Demand sales. Income is up (that's good), but the number of downloads is about half of what it was in 2007 (even though my portfolio is 2 to 3 times bigger). It seems like they sacrificed their subs sales for the more lucrative On Demand. I can't complain about that, but it seems more like a "switch-a-roo" than growth. Now, they are introducing single sales, so I'm going to predict another 4 years of imaginary growth. ;)
I always kind of felt the same about iStock too. Were they really growing or just increasing prices at a rate that seemed like growth?
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Out of curiosity, I went back to check download counts at Shutterstock. In November, 2005 I had 268 DLs. November, 2006 saw 425, a 58% increase. November, 2007 saw a 20% drop to 344. 2008 was up 28% to 442. 2009 grew another 9% to 485. 2010 was up 10% to 537. Last month grew 26% more to 679.
And those are just the downloads, not the revenues from those downloads. Downloads grew by 153% in six years; income grew 615%. That's due to increases in subscription royalties, as well as extended licenses and other non-subscription offerings.
I didn't do a month-to-month comparison for every month, but I suspect the results would be equally impressive. In any event, I've seen growth of both kinds.
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In any event, I've seen growth of both kinds.
Same here. Substaniatial growth too of late.
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In any event, I've seen growth of both kinds.
Same here. Substaniatial growth too of late.
I am seeing year to year growth in DL's at SS. Not as dramatic as Disorderly mentioned, but downloads alone at SS were up 15% from Nov 2010, for me. This compares to drops in downloads at the other 3 major sites, for me: IS -52%, DT -22%, FT -27%.
So from my perspective, SS is the only big 4 site showing both download and income growth.
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Out of curiosity, I went back to check download counts at Shutterstock. In November, 2005 I had 268 DLs. November, 2006 saw 425, a 58% increase. November, 2007 saw a 20% drop to 344. 2008 was up 28% to 442. 2009 grew another 9% to 485. 2010 was up 10% to 537. Last month grew 26% more to 679.
And those are just the downloads, not the revenues from those downloads. Downloads grew by 153% in six years; income grew 615%. That's due to increases in subscription royalties, as well as extended licenses and other non-subscription offerings.
I didn't do a month-to-month comparison for every month, but I suspect the results would be equally impressive. In any event, I've seen growth of both kinds.
Do all your months look like that? I have months that look like that through the years, but I also have months that look the exact opposite. My November's are pretty consistent from 2007-2011. '07 - 1029, '08 - 971, '09 -1244, '10 - 1126, '11 - 1008. It just seems like the range of downloads hasn't changed that much for me. Every month has been somewhere between 800-1500 for the last 4 years. Granted, income is way up from 2007, so, like I said, I can't complain. But, it makes me think.
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I like to think SS's growth is due to great strategic planning. As more and more images are added to the site, it's only logical that contributors would see their earnings decrease through dilution of their portfolios and increased competition. How can SS combat that and keep contributors happy at the same? By not doing what IS does when they release new programs too soon. SS rolls out new programs slowly, the latest being the single purchase option for buyers.
I have only uploaded a handful of images the past two years, so it's easy to tell when sales are starting to decline or are on the increase. Whenever I see a decline pattern emerging, SS responds with a new buyer option or contributor incentive. My downloads have been stable three years in a row now with small increases each year, and my earnings continue to grow at an increasingly accelerated rate. I'm not making that happen by uploading content, so it has to be something right that SS is doing.
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I graphed my monthly download counts from February, 2005 through last month. My numbers bounce around quite a bit, so I replaced each monthly count with an average of that month and the previous eleven. That reduces the bounces and eliminate seasonal effects, since each point represents an average of of twelve consecutive months. From the graph I see that I reached an average of 400 DLs/month in August, 2006, rising to a little over 500/month in November, 2009. Things fell off to 450/month in November, 2010 but climbed back to an average of 550/month in November, 2010.
So what does that mean? I've been uploading steadily, and my downloads have been stable or increasing a little. My revenues have been increasing more quickly, with each download averaging .53 over the past year. They were .20 when I started.
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... As more and more images are added to the site, it's only logical that contributors would see their earnings decrease through dilution of their portfolios and increased competition...
This may be true, I have seen several people say that lately, and I cannot recall anyone arguing against it. But there might be another side.
If I made picture frames and Wal-Mart offered to sell them, should I say, "I don't want to sell at Wal-Mart, they have too many products." Or if I want to sell my watch, should I decide not to sell it on ebay because ebay has too many watches for sale? Buyers tend to go where the selection is best.
Surely many of the SS PPD/non-subs sales these days are to buyers who are jumping ship from iStock, and to what ship are they likely to jump? The one with the most images? Hence our great increase in PPD sales at SS. Maybe the more images it offers, the better we will all do. Maybe there is no such thing as a downside to dilution.
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... As more and more images are added to the site, it's only logical that contributors would see their earnings decrease through dilution of their portfolios and increased competition...
This may be true, I have seen several people say that lately, and I cannot recall anyone arguing against it. But there might be another side.
If I made picture frames and Wal-Mart offered to sell them, should I say, "I don't want to sell at Wal-Mart, they have too many products." Or if I want to sell my watch, should I decide not to sell it on ebay because ebay has too many watches for sale? Buyers tend to go where the selection is best.
Surely many of the SS PPD/non-subs sales these days are to buyers who are jumping ship from iStock, and to what ship are they likely to jump? The one with the most images? Hence our great increase in PPD sales at SS. Maybe the more images it offers, the better we will all do. Maybe there is no such thing as a downside to dilution.
(emphasis mine above in bold) In that case, everyone should advocate Alamy surely...more images than anyone, fair commission and charity donations too?
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In that case, everyone should advocate Alamy surely
Their images aren't at the same price-point as microstock. Don't forget that some of the people buying microstock just plain can't afford more.
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So from my perspective, SS is the only big 4 site showing both download and income growth.
and from another perspective the whole microstock industry is declining year after year.
judging from the numbers we're reading here to stay afloat a photographer should double or triple
his portfolio every 12-18 months.
agencies on the other hands will still make a sh-itload of money for a long time unless they kill each other with underpricing,
subs, and rock bottom promotions.
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In that case, everyone should advocate Alamy surely
Their images aren't at the same price-point as microstock. Don't forget that some of the people buying microstock just plain can't afford more.
... and, ironically, those who can buy in bulk and get huge discounts. (But to be fair, they have the most negotiating clout with Alamy too.)
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I like to think SS's growth is due to great strategic planning. As more and more images are added to the site, it's only logical that contributors would see their earnings decrease through dilution of their portfolios and increased competition. How can SS combat that and keep contributors happy at the same?
photographers have no voice on these matters.
SS is not a "boutique stock agency" where they proudly enlist their famous and expensive photographers with Bio and a form to hire them on assignment.
SS and micros in general are the absolute rock bottom, if a newspaper buys your image you don't even get credited.
i'm reading a lot of stats here and in other sites .. all the indicators are pointing downwards for the whole industry and despite IS downfall is compensated by SS rise how long it's gonna take before it becomes finally unsustainable ?
if new images aren't getting sold multiple times the whole reason to go RF ceases to exist, it's a broken business plan, at least for photographers as the agencies instead are pretty happy about it, they love it ! you work hard, they sell for peanuts and get a 70-80% cut.
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I like to think SS's growth is due to great strategic planning. As more and more images are added to the site, it's only logical that contributors would see their earnings decrease through dilution of their portfolios and increased competition. How can SS combat that and keep contributors happy at the same?
photographers have no voice on these matters.
SS is not a "boutique stock agency" where they proudly enlist their famous and expensive photographers with Bio and a form to hire them on assignment.
SS and micros in general are the absolute rock bottom, if a newspaper buys your image you don't even get credited.
i'm reading a lot of stats here and in other sites .. all the indicators are pointing downwards for the whole industry and despite IS downfall is compensated by SS rise how long it's gonna take before it becomes finally unsustainable ?
if new images aren't getting sold multiple times the whole reason to go RF ceases to exist, it's a broken business plan, at least for photographers as the agencies instead are pretty happy about it, they love it ! you work hard, they sell for peanuts and get a 70-80% cut.
true! the entire world and universe, is unsustainable. I simply love that word, I even keep quoting this to my wife, the farm, horses, all the dogs, etc, the cars, its all unsustainable.
The one and only thing which is sustainable its the Micro world, nothing sustains like sustainabillity. ;D, its cheapo, thats why.
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...i'm reading a lot of stats here and in other sites .. all the indicators are pointing downwards for the whole industry and despite IS downfall is compensated by SS rise how long it's gonna take before it becomes finally unsustainable?...
I know the "unsustainable" term came into fashion in this business last year when the istock execs started throwing it around, but personally I have yet to see any evidence that microstock as a whole is headed that way. for istock exclusives, sure, I'd say that unsustainable is a good way to put it. I don't see how anyone continues to make a living in a few years by remaining exclusive to istock. But outside of that, I think it's a whole different landscape, one that isn't even dependent on SS or any of the agencies that we've come to know as the staples of he microstock business. Sure things are good at SS. I'm coming off a BME there, beating my previous best month by a few hundred dollars. If that momentum keeps up, I'm happy. If not, I'm also involved in a few agencies that show some serious promise. I think the whole Envato marketplace is blowing up. Just a few days into December, I'm already more than halfway to my November earnings total at Graphic River. iClipart is a new one for me, but it's looking good so far.
My point is that while things may at times become shaky at a few agencies, there are always other agencies picking up the slack. So despite istock pooping the proverbial bed this year, and Fotolia not far behind, my overall earnings are up. And it's sustainable because I'm working on diversifying my portfolio and spreading it around to lots of good agencies and some promising upstart agencies. I'm not doing the same old work I used to do repeatedly, and I'm trying new things. And I'm getting that new work in front of as many people as possible. And to me, it looks to be sustainable.
If your plan is to stick with one failing agency and try to remain sustainable with the same old work, then sure I can see how that seems to be a failing strategy and your outlook on the business seems grim. But like it has always been in the stock business, if you're willing to try new things, explore other options, keep things moving, and changing up your work and how you distribute it, I think there is still plenty of reason to remain optimistic about the future of this business and keeping your income sustainable. Maybe even more than sustainable if you make the right moves.
The business itself is sustainable on it's own. Buyers love microstock, they love the price point, the buying options, etc. Microstock as a business isn't going away. Whether it's sustainable for contributors on an individual basis is a whole other story, one that I think is entirely up to you and how you approach your work, your distribution, etc.