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Messages - Shelma1
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2051
« on: November 14, 2014, 13:19 »
Interesting read. I noticed the picture of photographer in the article was holding his camera incorrectly. He's not off to a good start! 
I'd be interested in a similar article about illustration. As an illustrator, I have very little equipment needs. I can draw a stadium filled with interesting people and not need a model or property release. Nor would I need to pay any of them for posing. We really have it different than photographerseasier in most cases. Quantity is tough, however. I've been averaging 45 images uploaded weekly. It's been grueling. 100 would be an interesting challenge.
I agree...much less of an upfront investment for us. All you need is a laptop and Illustrator...or just paper, a pen and a scanner if you draw by hand and sell jpgs. You don't need up-to-date software because you save everything down to a lower version anyway. Also, there are fewer of us, so less competition, and as you've pointed out, only so many images you can generate in a day. So I suspect we have a higher average earning per image. And we can live and work anywhere.
2052
« on: November 13, 2014, 19:28 »
Shutterstock said no??? How about trying Offset?
2053
« on: November 11, 2014, 20:05 »
My average earnings/DL on iS is now 30% lower than on SS. They're heading in opposite directions.
2054
« on: November 08, 2014, 16:50 »
I use the free Symbiostock theme. Very happy with it. Starting to get sales more regularly now. My site: http://vector999.com
2055
« on: November 05, 2014, 13:10 »
Yes, a couple of my old files now show up as new. Not that it helps...terrible sales there.
2056
« on: November 02, 2014, 10:59 »
I guess there soon will be a point when this move from credit to subs is going to be over and then it will show how iStock will build up on their new offer which obviously is meant to mirror Shutterstock's offer.
Only then we will be able to judge if the new system is going to help iStock get back to a growth path or if they lose the race against Shutterstock after all.
I think they've already lost. There was a time just a few months ago when SS brought me 3x as much income as iS, but since the introduction of subs it's been shiftingthis month it's 5 to 1. And I was making an effort to upload the same things to both sites so my portfolio would grow by the same number of images in both places. (The number in my SS port is misleading because they count jpgs and vectors as separate images, so many of my images are counted twice.) It seems iS subs just convinced some previous credit buyers to switch to subs, which resulted in a big income drop. And then the new pricing changes at iS drove more buyers over to Shutter. If only they would both grow...that would be great.
2057
« on: October 29, 2014, 10:00 »
I don't know whether this approach will help or not. But it seems to be an iStock problem rather than a title/description problem. When I search "boy dog beach" I get some DT and Getty images up pretty high in the results, but I gave up looking for iStock results.
The question is, who's going to use a different title/description for iStock uploads vs. uploads everywhere else? It just adds another layer of * complexity to their already complex * upload process. I guess it might help exclusives, if it works.
My Symbiostock images usually appear fairly high in google search, alone with my Shutterstock images. But I use the same title/description/keywords everywhere.
("t i m e - s u c k i n g" is a no-no? Weird.)
I guess we'll see.
2058
« on: October 27, 2014, 14:53 »
I'd like to keep this thread about how to opt out.  Go to your Contributor page. Under My Account, select My Profile ( https://us.fotolia.com/Member/Modify). Select Contributor Parameters ( https://us.fotolia.com/Member/Modify/Contributor). Find Sell my files on DPC and click Modify. And, from another contributor: "Then check that where you ticked actually says, "do not share on DPC". It's one of those sneaky buttons that if you press it again it will revert to share." after clicking Modify you need to "Save parameters" at the bottom of the page. Otherwise the changes will not stick.
2059
« on: October 27, 2014, 10:02 »
I have mostly vectors there, and my credit earnings have dipped slightly. I'm getting more downloads (or at least, they've evened out a bit), but my vectors now bring in half the amount of money. PP and subs don't seem to be affected. So overall my income there has dropped a little. On the other hand, it's risen at SS and DTmore than enough to cover the loss at iS.
2060
« on: October 25, 2014, 11:51 »
No, she's not complaining about the wrong keywords, but the boxes she has to click to the left and the phrases (disambiguation). Whatever Getty changed about their search in the past year is slowing her down.
2061
« on: October 25, 2014, 10:51 »
iS/Getty need to fix their weird search terms problem. The art director I'm working with has been complaining about it all week. She hates whatever they've done to "improve" the search there. She says it's harder to find what she needs. I see her going back every day and trying to figure out what phrases she needs to input to find what she's looking for. Which annoys me, because the longer it takes her to find images the less time she has to brainstorm with me.
2062
« on: October 22, 2014, 11:20 »
Does anyone have any feedback on the usefulness of Google Adwords to the promote the site? It is worth the investment?
Thanks!
www.millionstock.com
It seems to be somewhat successful for me; I had several purchases last week. But at this point I'm still spending more than I make. I do advertise on Facebook as well (but spend much less there).
2063
« on: October 21, 2014, 15:17 »
I wish! It was kind of shocking to realize how slow my connection is at home.
2064
« on: October 21, 2014, 14:12 »
I'm on a super fast connection at work (we buy a lot of images). 3 seconds for iStock, 1 for the same search on SS. 2 on Getty, which is where we buy.
2065
« on: October 21, 2014, 11:56 »
I think they should sit down and talk to a bunch of the clients who are defecting and ask them what they can do to make things right. Stop tossing pasta at the wall to see what sticks, to put it very nicely. I hate to see them collapse, but honestly all it means for me, as an indie, is that those sales move elsewhere. SS earnings are now up 32% for me over this time last year.
2066
« on: October 21, 2014, 11:24 »
I don't know...if any of my advertising clients saw sales plunge like iS has, they'd be reversing course pretty quickly. (The most famous example being "new Coke." That product lasted about a nanosecond.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Coke
2067
« on: October 21, 2014, 10:18 »
Sure...a website, twitter, a Facebook page, google adwords, Linkedin.
2068
« on: October 19, 2014, 12:01 »
Well, with the majority of people reporting lower income, it looks like iStock's shot itself in the foot again.
There is obviously too little evidence here and over much too short a period to draw any sensible conclusion about the numbers. From here.
IMO iStock now has a long window, probably even years, in which to demonstrate growth vs today. Because growth (specifically subscriber numbers growth) is measured against previous quarters and not against all time highs. Investors (and probably ultimately markets) are most interested in growth and the potential for growth.
If growth, by whatever measure, is the only thing that matters then I think that starting on the back foot may end up being to their advantage. Especially compared with other companies which may have less room to increase the number of subscribers at a time when markets are looking so very uncertain.
October is a good month for stock, historically. Yet sales and earnings are down this month at iStock. That means they're down even more, really, because they should have gone up. As they did at their main competitor. My sales there are up about 25% over this time last year. Growth is happening, just not at iStock.
2069
« on: October 19, 2014, 06:36 »
Well, with the majority of people reporting lower income, it looks like iStock's shot itself in the foot again.
October is on track to be slightly lower than September for me, so i'm guessing the second half of September people were using up their credits. But sales are picking up pretty nicely on SS. Maybe that's where former iS customers are buying now.
2070
« on: October 13, 2014, 16:06 »
Dallas, the only thing that counts is whether u make money there . if u do, what others say is not important. also, if everyone hates fotolia...means less ppl submit their work to them. if that means u earn more there, who cares?
In virtual world of anonimity on forums- yes, you are right. But, in real world, in your town, in your neighborhood, among your friends and people you live with - do you really live this way? Not caring about anybody, just going for money?
I know you don't. It's just that these internet world made us tell stupidities.
I'm not going to give up income just because my neighbor says it would br good for him. And I'm not anonymous. I would tell you the same thing to your face.
Nobody's asked you, or anyone, to give up income only because it's good for them. We've boycotted DPC because it's good for everyone. You included.
2071
« on: October 12, 2014, 08:17 »
Really? You don't think 25% less competition from your fellow photographers would affect your downloads? (Am I remembering correctly that that's how many files were removed during the boycott?)
2072
« on: October 12, 2014, 07:53 »
To be perfectly honest, I get a better return for my sales at FT / DPC than I do at IS where we are getting raped on both pricing and commission but I suggest the decline there is more to do with the ineptness of the folks in control than any external factors. SS are holding up, DT is coming back nicely after a few bad months mostly due to good RPD and the only place I see a downturn is 123. There is a sense of running faster to stay in the same place generally that can be totally explained by the vast increase in supply over the last while.
Well, yes, you're getting a better return at FT/DPC...because your fellow artists boycotted, which pressured them into offering higher commissions to hold onto the content. Just sayin'.
2073
« on: October 12, 2014, 05:40 »
Well, all negativity and bias aside, I'd like to know some hard facts:
1) Does DPC butcher sales on other sites?
2) Is DPC garnering enough sales to make it worthwile?
3) Will DPC actually destroy the market as we know it with a race to the bottom?
I'm not opted in, but as for question 1: I'm not seeing any decline in sales on other sites since the existence of DPC, and even if there would be a decline, it's hard to tell if it's because of
DPC.
Therefore, I think the answer to question 3 is 'no'.
That leaves question 2 unanswered. Perhaps opted-in contributors could shine some light on this?
You can't know whether the answer to #3 is no, because as you pointed out yourself, it's hard to tell. But there has been a lot of complaining over the past few months about declining sales, especially at SS and iS. If files are selling at DPC, they are NOT selling elsewhere. So DPC has to have some negative effect on sales at other sites...we just can't tell how much of an effect is due to that and not to an influx of new content or other factors.
2074
« on: October 09, 2014, 13:55 »
i stopped this silly poll long ago. whats the point when they cap off earnings at $2500? my exclusive earnings are much more than that. the accuracy of this poll is not accurate at all simply because of the cap in earnings that are able to be reported. also of note, if stocksy is so hot why are they still at nothing? i think you can only judge the accuracy of this poll if we actually had real earnings able to be added ie: $5300 and also by how many people actually used the poll.
I also stopped doing the poll for the same reason. I don't think I've answered in a year or so. If we are allowed to enter higher numbers I might start again. Right now a nonexclusive can enter earnings of tens of thousands per month but exclusives can only enter $2,500.
I also agree. As a non exclusive I make more than that on Shutterstock alone. And I'm certainly not wildly successful in microstock.
(But you see how it might not change the poll results much. )
not true, if you max out at SS with close to 6K images and get a fraction of that on IS with a fraction of the images, it skews the poll by inflating one while deflating the other proportionately based on actual images at either site.
I'm just saying that raising the maximum will affect more people than just iS exclusives. And there are reasons I have a smaller port at iS, the biggest being the difference in the upload process at each site. I'd love to see iS simplify theirs. I think it holds them back to some extent.
2075
« on: October 09, 2014, 13:03 »
i stopped this silly poll long ago. whats the point when they cap off earnings at $2500? my exclusive earnings are much more than that. the accuracy of this poll is not accurate at all simply because of the cap in earnings that are able to be reported. also of note, if stocksy is so hot why are they still at nothing? i think you can only judge the accuracy of this poll if we actually had real earnings able to be added ie: $5300 and also by how many people actually used the poll.
I also stopped doing the poll for the same reason. I don't think I've answered in a year or so. If we are allowed to enter higher numbers I might start again. Right now a nonexclusive can enter earnings of tens of thousands per month but exclusives can only enter $2,500.
I also agree. As a non exclusive I make more than that on Shutterstock alone. And I'm certainly not wildly successful in microstock. (But you see how it might not change the poll results much. )
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