Aren't both of them low? If I could change both I would.

I've had 5 sales at GL this year.   Right now I'm $2 from a payout.

At Alamy, I've had exactly 1 sale all year.   And Alamy's payment threshold is still $175, right?  I might as well close my account because it looks like I'll be dead before I get another payout.

You could always try exercising and eating right. 

SS are growing their business (and ours).

If they aren't growing our business are we allowed to complain? 

Quote from: cthoman on April 23, 2014, 10:53

I'd say some of it is about potential. If I make $.50 RPD at an agency, I have to sell 10 images to make $5, 100 to make $50, 1000 to make $500 and 10,000 to make $5000. But, how many agencies can realistically do that kind of volume at the higher quantities? By contrast, say you make $5 RPD (that's $50, $500, $5000, $50000) or $10 RPD ($100, $1000, $10000, $100000). The potential is much greater to make money.

Not sure about that "potential" thing. Because in the end it does not depend on how much I make from one single sale but also how many customers an agency can attract.

Sure it's easy maths to say I'd rather sell 1,000 licenses at $50 each than 1,000 licenses at $0.50 each. And some agencies just don't get my images because the small customer base does not justify the low prices. But if an agency has a huge client base, it will still make more money than an agency with higher prices but almost no customers.

Don't get me wrong, I believe that some images warrant higher prices, and I struggle to find the right distribution ways for each of my shoots. I love to get those $25 sales on Stocksy or macro.

But simply saying "iStock RPD is down, so it needs to raise royalties" is pointless. I would like to see them go up but from their point of view there is no need to do that as they still get plenty of supply. And apparently rightfully so as other sites with similar or slightly higher RPD don't even make me enough money to make a payout monthly.

I guess it was more of the point that most micro sites seem to sell between 10-100 images a month (at least from my perspective). There are some outliers that sell more (especially SS), but for the most part they fall into those sales volumes (regardless of varying prices).

So if they are going to fall into those sales volumes, shouldn't they be profitable at those volumes for contributors? It's awesome that SS can do insane volumes and it works for their business model, but if nobody else can really replicate that for their contributors should they even try?

Quote from: cthoman on April 22, 2014, 11:49

Quote from: luissantos84 on April 22, 2014, 11:34

Quote from: cthoman on April 22, 2014, 10:32

Quote from: JPSDK on April 22, 2014, 09:56

Gabriela..
The worlds leading microstock agency is shutterstock.
Next comes fotolia, and dreamstimes. the rest are irellevant.
istock will freak you out, and wont sell, so stay away from them.
Focus on shutterstock.

Post your images up here for a critique if you dare, and if you dont dare, you are not the type who can cope with the stress of the microstock world.

This would be terrible advice for me.

SS have feed you before, that is not nice

at this moment there isn't any other microstock agency rewarding us indies, true story!

I still make a good amount at SS, but it is only 15% of my stock income. If I ignored everything else besides SS, FT and DT, I'd miss out on a lot of great opportunities.

I totally agree! if that was what you were referring to I am sorry

Yeah, just talking about me. I'm not sure what to tell other people than try things out and see what works.

Gabriela..
The worlds leading microstock agency is shutterstock.
Next comes fotolia, and dreamstimes. the rest are irellevant.
istock will freak you out, and wont sell, so stay away from them.
Focus on shutterstock.

Post your images up here for a critique if you dare, and if you dont dare, you are not the type who can cope with the stress of the microstock world.

This would be terrible advice for me.

Quote from: wordplanet on April 21, 2014, 17:34

If the poll showed RPI rather than income, it might prove more helpful, but again, given the vast difference in people's portfolios, it's really not so much an accurate representation of what the average microstocker can expect to earn on those sites, but more a way to see which sites do better, for most people.

It's too bad self-hosted and Stocksy don't have enough voters to get them into the poll, but again, you're always comparing apples to oranges, so knowing that an average portfolio earns $xxx a month, while helpful as a way to compare how you stand vis-a-vis the average microstocker on here, won't really help you predict how well you can expect to do on each site.

The benefit to a poll that showed RPI for each site, would be that you can better gauge how your portfolio does compared to the average, but that would be a far more complicated poll and given the low earners, the RPI numbers for some would be 0.000xx - really discouraging!

Add 2nd poll on it's own page, or more all polls to own page.

I always wanted to see the poll without the 50 people minimum.

I'm hearing that people are getting sales at Offset, so it does seem that not every apple photo is created equal. And I think we can see that. A microstock apple photo is certainly not (usually) the same as a $500 apple photo.

This always seems to come up with the $1 versus $100+ dollars. I guess I've always seen it more as $1 versus $20 or $30. I guess some people might want to price higher though. Really, the only fair way to do it is let people set their own prices and let them fail or succeed on their own decisions.

Here's a question (and not a poke at anyone). What establishes picture quality and value? High resolution is easy enough to get with any new camera. Where is the inherent value in an image? Is an isolated apple (again, just an example) done by a pro more valuable than one done by a new shooter if they are (for all intends and purposes) the same image?

Is it scarcity of a popular subject? Concept? Artistic-ness (is that a word?)? Or is it just file size? When is an image actually worth 38 cents or 300 dollars? What is it for you (the forum)?

I'm going with pure saleability. If you can sell them at that price consistently, then they are worth that price. That said, I don't know what the ceiling is on my images because I haven't really tried to push that far.

Illustrators absolutely must upload to Toonvectors! Sales are slowish (but regular and consistent monthly) but at a commission of $14 per sale and 70% you should support this site simply on principle. Upload is a bit unorthodox but once you get it is extremely easy. Toonvectors commissions for me are about 2 times DP and Fotolia and blow the other smaller sites out of the water. This site and Symbio are the two most promising prospects for illustrators in years.

Should I feel guilty that you promote Toon Vectors more than I do? 

Anyway, I'll second it being a good site. What type of images do you sell Kayann?

Just to play devil's advocate, if I was exclusive and my income was 9 times my current indie Istock income, that would be a 71% increase over what I actually made as an indie for March. 

Not sure if that number can be taken as accurate, but either way, I feel kind of queasy thinking about it.

It seems unlikely that you'd get an increase that large. It would be a huge gamble to bet on too.

Quote from: Uncle Pete on April 15, 2014, 09:33

We are powerless as a group, and that's probably what makes most artists angry when they look at the situation. Frustration out of the inability to actually make any significant change in how Microstock is run or how it pays the workers.

I disagree.  As a group we hold all the power.  But, there aren't enough of us disgruntled to the point where we are willing to do something about it.  And if there were I doubt we could get organized and agree to take any significant action.

It's up to each individual to decide if MS is right for them cuz it isn't going to change without us, collectively, forcing that change.

I agree. Most people seem to be fairly happy. I don't get it, but they are.