Quote from: KB on September 08, 2010, 04:40

Quote from: asiseeit on September 08, 2010, 04:20
Non-exclusives will definitely be hurt by this. But with a 1-5% drop on just one their selling avenues.

This sounds less harsh than it really is. For non-exclusives, they will be seeing as much as a 20% (oops! 25%) drop in commissions.  

I recently (sadly) became an iStock photo exclusive, but I can now look forward to seeing a 16% cut in my commissions in 2011.  

I realize it is much more than an effective 5% drop in money, but for non-exclusives iStock makes up a smaller percent of their money. A 20% drop in part of one's income is much less than a 20% drop in all of one's income. So for example, if iStock makes up 25% of your income, only 25% of your income is privy to the 20% drop. And also to be honest, those that don't sell 2000 credits (about 40 dls a month if I figured it right) in a year are either just beginning or not really contributing much stock right? So most serious non-Exs will be in the 16%-18% range right? My only point really is that curiously, middle-of-the-road (Gold or low Diamond) exclusives look to be hurt quite a bit unless the facts change this week. A strange move to hurt many exclusives so much.

Non-exclusives will definitely be hurt by this. But with a 1-5% drop on just one their selling avenues. Middle of the road exclusives though seem to be hurt the most. Many are saying they'll be dropping 5%. Thankfully mine is staying the same, but that 1.4million mark seems next to impossible.
On the other hand, I as well think we will hear a second announcement later this week with a compromise of some kind. Probably a lowering of the targets for next year or some kind of 1-year royalty lock-in rate.

Went exclusive about a year and half ago and have no regrets. For me it was about the time and the money. I tried non-ex for about 10 months and my iStock earnings never dipped below 70% of the total. Others have had different results of course. Time: I realized I'd much rather spend that extra 30% of my time (uploading, keywording, and categorizing the other sites) actually shooting and planning. So for me it was a no brainer.

I think I had around 800 or so images.

Thanks for all the info guys, I went ahead and forked over the $75 so I'm sure I'll see you there.
Thanks,
Steve

Hey Tyler, do you think the UGCX event is worth going to for someone who is already fairly successful in Microstock? I know almost nothing about the event and was curious.

Wow, I just found this thread and I'm very interested. I won't get into NY until Wednesday so I could only make it to the last one on the 21st. Please let me know if there's room for it.
Thanks!

nope.

One more exclusive survey filled out...

o

oops.

Pixvue works 99% of the time with istock, except the description never comes through (as stated above).

Except for Istock, I already upload to 7 sites using ftp with one click. It would be nice to have that for istock though. Looks like a pretty good program, but I don't think I'm comfortable with them having all my passwords stored on their server. I'm not sure why they do that too because I don't think it's necessary.

I'm using a free service right now that allows up to about 300 photos. When I pass that I'm planning on using http://www.jungledisk.com/. It looks like one of the best prices around for what we do. 

Looks like December will be my best month yet, about 10% over last month. Although, I am anticipating a slowdown with the holidays ahead....

Has anyone found that submitting a free image every once in a while has boosted portfolio exposure and earnings? I haven't tried that yet.

I agree with SX, it's up to 10% for me this month so far.

Yep, I pretty much have just a Big 2 for now as well - IS and SS. DT and StockXpert are starting to come on, but until I get a payout every month I question whether they're worth it. 

Yes, business is only if you want to process CCs, and use some of the other advanced tools - ebay....

The basic personal account has a monthly receiving and withdrawal limit of $500. If you provide 2 forms of identification (Verify the account) the amount changes to unlimited I think. I was able to receive and transfer more than $500 this month. I think the forms of identification include a social security number, bank account number, and something else. And there are no extra fees.

It seems like it would be difficult to tell unless you were able to change a photo from non-exclusive to exclusive and then see if sales went up, and how much.

Has anyone had a better experience selling your individual photos on an exclusive basis? I know DT and FT allow photos to be sold this way, but I haven't tried it yet. I'm just not sure it is beneficial enough to restrict a photo to only one stock site. Especially since SS and IS account for 80% of my sales. Any thoughts?

Does anyone know if the list is in the printed version of PDN?

Friday was down just a bit, but it was more noticable compared to my huge Thursday sales.