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Messages - cthoman
Pages: 1 ... 64 65 66 67 68 [69] 70 71 72 73 74 ... 145
1701
« on: November 09, 2012, 11:51 »
twop.com is "Television without pity".
I thought it was an onamonapia when Batman punches people. The site looks OK. The design doesn't seem all that user friendly. I haven't read through the terms, so I can't really comment on those. I didn't see any illustrations either.
1702
« on: November 08, 2012, 13:04 »
Yes, that is the issue I ran into Sean.
There have been 2 upgrades to Version 3 of Photostore since I purchased it, including the Smarty update. But I have put so much work into customization that I cannot upgrade, or everything will be wiped out. I don't know that there is any way around this issue.
It's also the reason I chose not to purchase Version 4. V4 does a lot of functions that I wanted, and it just looks a lot better. But I can't tell you how many hours went into the customization of 3.8.8 and I'm not going back to Step 1.
I have the same issue. I'll probably just continue to make tweaks to 3 at this point. If I was to start over from step 1, then it would have to be really enticing. So far, I don't see that in version 4.
1703
« on: November 05, 2012, 18:02 »
Sorry Jens but thats BS and you know it. The fraud rate in the payment industry is about 1%. There is always some risk when selling online. And who says the chargebacks where fraud? What if the image was not used or someone made a mistake and purchased the wrong image? Maybe the image was not up to standards?
I don't think digital files should be refunded. It's kind of like open software boxes. They don't allow returns on those either. I don't allow refunds at my own site. I would definitely make exceptions for certain circumstances (like double purchases or upgrading to an extended license). But, for the most part, the nature of the format prevents it from being returned. Credit card fraud is a trickier matter. You can try to put up walls to prevent and flag known suspicious behavior, but some of these crooks can be very determined. I had talked with a site owner about it, and the way they described some of these perpetrators of cc fraud was scary.
1704
« on: November 05, 2012, 10:04 »
It would probably have to be significantly better than my current KTools store. Otherwise it wouldn't be worth the effort to switch, fix links, change workflow, etc.
Which features would you like to see added? What needs improvement?
The more information that you guys provide, the better the final product will be.
I'd say search would probably be the next thing that needs tackling on my site. Probably some decent cross-selling or up-selling features too. A software package that was upgradeable would have been nice too. I've basically been abandoned by the Ktools folks. At this point though, a custom solution might be my next platform. Either that or just continue to keep making tweaks to what I already have. It really depends on how the site continues to grow.
1705
« on: November 04, 2012, 10:36 »
It would probably have to be significantly better than my current KTools store. Otherwise it wouldn't be worth the effort to switch, fix links, change workflow, etc.
1706
« on: November 03, 2012, 14:20 »
Total submitted not every time you take a photo i.e. include rejections.
For one thing an image will not a be rejected by every site.
I submit the same content to every site and keep track of total uploads/ portfolio size using Canstock's stats just because it is easy to see the breakdown on their stats page.
It would make no sense to omit what they happen to reject when other sites have accepted the same images.
Not subtracting images you choose to delete from a site is another obvious one for me, for any calculation their being on a site and not selling is the same as them being deleted. The only reason to not take them into account would be to massage your ego with a high RPI, very nice if you are doing this for fun, but useless if you want to evaluate how your business is going and whether you are producing salable images.
I think that is the big difference here. I don't submit the same images to every site. I never really have, and I only submit my new images to to a few sites. So, it never really made sense to keep track of how my whole portfolio was performing on sites that I never submitted my whole portfolio to.
1707
« on: November 02, 2012, 14:15 »
By "prepackaged" are you talking about the $10 package that Anita mentioned?
Did it work well ... without modification?>
Nope, Ktools.
1708
« on: November 02, 2012, 13:56 »
It would take some time, but if I had the knowledge, I would definitely build a custom solution. I don't, so spending the money on a prepackaged solution was the best option. It paid for itself pretty quickly though.
1709
« on: November 01, 2012, 14:36 »
On a side note, did your SS earnings not clear out at the end of the month? Don't they usually start at zero to begin a new month?
1710
« on: November 01, 2012, 14:02 »
7th BME. Up slightly from September, but down from August (which is weird to say). With only two months left, this should end up being a BYE (best year ever).
1711
« on: October 31, 2012, 15:22 »
So you mean I need to calculate based on submitted images, not active images?
Does anyone else except you do that?
I don't (I do only accepted images), but I'm not overly concerned about my time put in and my acceptance rate is pretty high (so it probably wouldn't be much different anyway). I could see that being useful if you feel you are just spinning your wheels or trying to track particular batches of images. That's too robotic for me though. I like the cluster shot approach. 
1712
« on: October 30, 2012, 14:04 »
The point is, knowing this number helps you project where you should be in a month or a year. You can plan your way to success, or you can hope to get there with blind ignorance and a dash of luck. I know which way has worked for me.
I keep track of it and find it useful for long term forecasting, but, in the end, it is mostly a leap of faith with a dash of luck.
1713
« on: October 29, 2012, 16:37 »
Sorry for another post right away, but here is something I should ask you guys.
Jon is working on a relevance system for the search this will prioritize the results to where "men" would show top of the list, and things like "women" will show later in the list. Unless you do an exact search then it would have to be a 100% match (men = men, nothing else).
That sounds reasonable. Would you get results for "men" and "man" first or just "men"?
1714
« on: October 29, 2012, 14:38 »
The price slider (and it should be called a dot pattern chooser; what amazon.com and many other sites offer has $$ in it) isn't really a help here. His second complaint was that older things had their price jacked up. The sticking point I believe is that there is too much ordinary dreck at high prices. All the spin doctoring about more expensive content is undermined because there's a ton of run-of-the-mill stuff at much higher prices.
If it was only the good or expensive stuff - your shoot on an airplane would be a good example of the type of work that costs more to produce and needs to have a higher price point - I think there'd be a lot less fussing. It just isn't visually or logically clear to buyers why various things have the price tag they do.
As a friend of mine said, complaining about a poorly thought through plan: "I like money" isn't a strategy 
As someone that works quickly and with low production costs, I don't really think work should be penalized because someone else thinks it was easy to do. Frankly, I never really understood why it wasn't all priced the same. You are buying a license to use the image (not quality, size, production costs, etc.).
1715
« on: October 29, 2012, 13:00 »
I kind of have to side with iStock on this one. I thought their push for higher prices in the regular collection was good for the industry in general. I can't really defend the agency collection stuff though.
I understand everyone has a budget and micro is supposed to be cheap, but I think some of the expectation for low cost/high quality images has gotten a little out of control. Especially as quality and contributors have improved. Getting images for a buck or two should probably vanish and make way for a more profitable pricing scheme.
1716
« on: October 26, 2012, 14:02 »
I do appreciate your effort but find the numbers quite discouraging.
At least I'm not "average." 
Yeah, it's kind of shocking how fast $120 million becomes 85 bucks.
1717
« on: October 26, 2012, 11:27 »
I have 300 photo in SS and can receive roughtly 45 USD per month.HOw about this performance? Good or not good? Really curious about this result.
If you divide out the money and images evenly between all the contributors at SS, the average contributor should have about 550 images and make about $85 a month (if I did my math right). So, you seem on track for that. That said, you have to assume that a majority of contributors at SS aren't very active (because there are some people that make a lot more than that). My guess would be that there are only about 10K active contributors, so the average moves to about 2000 images and about $300 a month. Oddly enough, you are right on target for that too. Obviously, you can make more than that, but I'm not sure if you can expect it.
1718
« on: October 26, 2012, 10:38 »
Hey, I opened my site a year before Yuri opened his. I should be making more money than he does!
Me too. What's the deal? Maybe, I need a "Yuri approved" sticker on the front page.
1719
« on: October 25, 2012, 09:39 »
I said both, but I don't buy very often. I'm mostly just a contributor, and even that is waning at most sites. Is there a neither option?
1720
« on: October 24, 2012, 13:50 »
Justin, I already wrote about Ktools. Do I need to write again, or will my first e-mail suffice?
I'm not sure if I'm one of those four either. I wrote them an email asking about Ktools, but learned they weren't supporting illustrations in their initial launch.
1721
« on: October 24, 2012, 09:27 »
I always have to go over these a couple of times, but is this what they changed?
1. 6 months instead of 2 years.
2. Level 0 are now 25% instead of 20%.
3. Some sort of 24 hour introductory pricing for new buyers.
1722
« on: October 22, 2012, 19:09 »
I guess hosting your own site doesn't make as much as through the big 4 libraries but wondered what the trend is...
Is it growing? Yes. It's growing. Definitely not as fast as I would like. Are buyers happy to buy direct?It doesn't seem to be a barrier. Most buyers just want the right image when they find it. Is it a viable percentage of your overall income?It's been a nice part of my income, but it is nowhere near where it could be.
1723
« on: October 22, 2012, 14:10 »
As far as I understand it, if you don't have your own site PictureEngine directs to the site that had the image first. Based on this information I have been staggering my uploading with priority going to the sites that pay the best rpd. Sites with sub sales get my images last (even though that may only be 30 days later). If PictureEngine really does take off they will be directing my images to the best paying sites (for me). If it doesn't take off, at least these sites have a bit of a head start on SEO. Either way it doesn't do me much harm (and possibly has a large benefit) to upload to my preferred sites first.
I got the impression you could still pay and promote your portfolio on a particular agency, but it's been a while since I looked it over. I kind of lost interest when they said they weren't launching (when or if they launch) with illustrations.
1724
« on: October 22, 2012, 12:41 »
oops
1725
« on: October 22, 2012, 12:40 »
NOW is the time to JOIN, and LEAVE your AGENCY!!!
I've already left several agencies, so I'm definitely not against leaving places if I think I'm not getting the best deal or best representation at. That said, I have a few sites that I'm really happy with, so I don't mind paying them for the hard work they do. It's hard to find equitable partners in this business, so I have no desire to cast off the ones that do their job well.
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