Quote from: pixel8 on March 02, 2015, 16:08

I have a few questions about selling direct. I know many don't think you should bother, but if I do bother maybe you can help me understand how this works.

Licensing for example, how would you go about that, simply copy what a big site is doing?

How do you police that license agreement or do you just hope they are honest?

When you do sell a photo, are you allowing them to download a jpg file at a set resolution or is there some other file type etc?

I've noticed that when I have a large format sell of a photo it could bring in upwards of $120 for my cut so that would mean about almost $400 for the the overall sale before the agency takes out their cut yet I have seen contributors on here say they would only charge $59 or something like that, that seems pretty low for pricing don't you think?

Which brings me to this question, if these various top four micro sites are selling millions of photos every day how do they enforce the licensing agreements that are being made? I don't even thing the US Gov could keep up with that!

For licensing, some website platforms already have RF and RM systems similar to big sites. Photodeck and Photoshelter are two popular options. You can use their templates or create your own.

For policing, not easy, but Google reverse image search does a pretty good job of finding images in use.

For resolution, depends on license type. RF is usually based on offering size options. RM is normally full size but priced on usage. I only do JPEG.

For pricing, depends on your work. If you have unique enough work that buyers will pay a higher price for then yes why charge $59? I just quoted someone $400 and they had no problem with that price. And yes, 100% of $400 is better than 20% of micro pricing. Charge whatever buyers are willing to pay.

For enforcement, they usually don't enforce infringement that I'm aware of. The RF license is so unrestricted that it's almost impossible to tell if an image is a legit customer or a thief. A designer could have used your image for 15 different websites because the license allowed them to. Plus, very few agencies let us know who the customers are anyway. But with RM it's usually for a very specific use for a single customer. And since it's your site you know who the customer is. So let's say you have a new image and so far have only sold one RM license to one company. But when you do a Google image reverse search you find your client plus 15 other companies using the image. You know those 15 other companies didn't license your image and you can pursue them as you feel appropriate. I only offer RM on my site. And you would need to somehow track each customer and their licenses like with Contact Management software.

Like Sweetgirl mentioned, you need to promote yourself. And you need to understand SEO so you have optimized IPTC content. No marketing/promotion + poor content = no traffic and no sales.

My suggestion is you need to commit to your own website as a mission and strategy. If you're less than committed, stick with agencies.

Yep I hear ya, lucky for me I have years of SEO experience so that part is covered. It's the License part that is complicated. I plan on using PayPal for my commerce side of things. I was planning on RF but I guess I could offer both RF and RM right? I also don't really know what is a reasonable price for photos as all I ever see is my cut from the stock sites.

I license RM stock directly - in fact I just got a box full of products with my photos on them from a client today, but  I wouldn't remove my photos from the various stock agencies since many buyers don't look beyond the agencies.

You could license RM images and still stay with IS so you don't lose your base.

I license photos via people finding them on my site, but I license the most by sending out queries to publishers who license stock and getting on their photo request lists - it's a lot more work than licensing via an agency. Though you don't need the volume of microstock, you still need a lot of volume licensing RM to make it worthwhile, at micro price points I can't imagine you could get the volume - even Yuri couldn't do it on his own.

Good luck!

What about Yuris Site peopleimages.com ? That site is not making it?

So you looked at your history correct? I just looked at mine and at first I added up wrong with my calculator so I typed into an excel spread sheet and added it that way and it was all correct. However that's not to say that they didn't mess up on yours, I'm just saying double check your numbers.

I personally hope Google goes belly up, they are a Mega Monopoly, worse than Walmart killing off small online businesses with their death grip, play by their rules or get banned, the little guy can hardly compete with their rules and advertising trap. They are becoming like Buy in Large on Wally! They have their hands in everything from automotive to the new space race.

Fear the day they buyout and run the leading micro stock site I am sure that day is coming!

I live in the USA so Alamy does  not issue a 1099, so what do you do for this when it comes to filing  taxes?

Thanks

How can you tell if they went to Google, is Google only showing up at the 2.00 mark?

Is it too late to Opt out of the Dreamstime Google deal?

Thanks!

Quote from: pixel8 on February 24, 2015, 14:39

So on Canva all sales are $1 and the royalty is 35% so .35 cent to the contributor every time which would mean that no matter how large or small an image would go for.35 cent? So as where on Alamy I might make $200 for an image at its largest size on Canva I make .35 cent?

Yes, but the usage is restricted to their online design program.

Why would that be good? If someone makes a flyer for example they print it off and go to Kinkos, or if they make an album cover they then take the design to a printing place, I guess I don't understand how having the image restricted to their online design program is any different then purchasing an image and doing something with it on your own computer as a graphic designer?

I typically only upload to BS my rejects form SS. BS always seems to take my rejects which is interesting seeing how its owned by SS. I have always wanted to upload my entire Portfolio to BS but haven't since they are owned by SS. My fear is that then all my sales would start coming from BS for a lot less pay.

Ive been back and forth on this since hearing about it however there are a few things to take into consideration. For instance in DT rules for image use on the web for anyone buying an image not just Google, they are allowed 10,000 uses and that can be on lets say a clients website for those who put together webpages for others, and then to take it a step further the person or business who has the website made for them which now has your image is also going to make money from using that image. In fact in just about all instances anyone purchasing a RF image is then making money from the image in some way or another either by placing it on a product or using it with a service they provide. So is Google any different in this regard?

As far as ads go, most people trying to sell something will first use their own images and then look for an image if they can't come up with their own. And thats if they choose to use an image with their ad in the first place!

On top of all of that one can only assume that there are only so many businesses that would be trying to sell a certain product that would require your image and thats if they even choose your image assuming that there will most like be more than one picture to choose from for any given category.

What are your thoughts on this?

Is it too late to opt out?

ok here is the answer to my own question

"The details of the program that we can share with you at this time are that Google has selected a large number of images from our collection for use in display ads: Google will be able to use pre-selected Dreamstime RF images only for ads, and in limited sizes to accommodate ads. During the beta period, images will not be available in a template library. These images will be used under the Royalty Free license in a beta for the next 12 months, and contributors will receive royalties soon. The royalties for the first 12 months will be based on our all-at-once subscriptions � i.e., $2.00 (non exclusive) and $2.20 (exclusive) per image.

As we do with other initiatives, Dreamstime supports the volume discounts and we expect to at least double our regular royalty rate. The volume discount also reflects the use case, since these images will be used in limited-sized ads and not in more prominent uses."