I've been looking at Google from time to time to see how they are indexing my site. This morning I searched for "lonesome bengal cat christmas tree" in Google (not Google images) and my Symbio website image came up as the first result. I logged out of Google and the same happened, but I'm always uncertain how much Google modifies the results based on the person searching.

Could I ask someone to search for that phrase and see if I have really moved to position one? If so, we are doing really well as a group!

Google Images doesn't see this image at all though - is that because Google Images is looking for something very different - ie keywords attached to the actual JPEG - or is it that there is a different cycle for updating that index and we will get there eventually?

What is also interesting about this result is that the word "lonesome" isn't one of my keywords - it is in the title and description, and so our worries about the site search mechanism are just internal worries - Google will search all fields and find our image (probably searching plurals as well). So a buyer will get to our sites to a particular image page. Our main task then is to help the buyer find the best version of the image they are seeking. I think this means we need to work on displaying similars, or sets of similar images, rather than assume our buyer starts from the home page of our site and starts searching for a particular keyword. Hope that makes sense!

Steve

50% of zero is.....

Steve

PS - seriously, I'm adding more images and will give them a fair trial!

Thanks all for the useful advice! Makes sense!

focus keyword

I see this in the SEO program - I thought it was used to judge the SEO worthiness of the page - is it used for something external that helps the placement of the page?

Steve

I mentioned this in a different thread, but I keep a detailed record of images on each site and earnings from that site - by month and by year in my annual review.

Of course, this depends on the type of portfolio, but you will see how much I earn from each of them on my blog.

Steve

Nope - doesn't work for me!

Sorry

Steve

Hi Steve,  I found a slight problem with your captcha login

Yes, I did see that myself in my testing. It is because the login page is actually a single page that scrolls down if you want to register and then my captcha get put half way down that larger page.

I may have to change to something else!

Steve

I decided to try a different sort of captcha - a picture based one called Confident Captcha. It show 8 images and you have to click on the photo that matches the word. You need to register on their site to get the various api codes, but it all seems very easy and secure.

Anyone who wants to see what it looks like can try to register on my site and you will see the way it works

steve

site focused on macros and still life photography

Nice designed site. Have you got a clearer description of what sort of images you are looking for. I notice that some of the images of coins, for example, don't fit a traditional definition of macro (although I guess they are still life!)

Do you make any sales at present or is this just getting under way.

Finally, I notice the 50 image a week limit. For any contributor with an existing portfolio, it would be much better to allow a one-off FTP upload. I don't mind if you then look at 50 a week, but forcing the contributor to keep track of which image has been uploaded, and remember to go back next week with more is a bit of an annoyance!

Steve

I am also wondering how I am going to handle editorial images...... any suggestions anyone?

I'm going to make a prominent statement in my description, in the same way as I am saying "Model release available" or "No model release" if it is a part of a body like this one:
http://www.backyardstockphotos.com/image/caribbean-written-in-sand-girls-legs-sexy/

At the end of the day, editorial is the same as no model or property releases available and we need to clearly state Editorial use only: No model or property releases available at the start of our description.

Steve

$100 a month!!!

I agree - a great set of images. I can't say about Stocksy (not had a response to my request to join yet), but I take a lot of travel and landscape images and I'm very open about how much I earn from the portfolio of 5000 images on the various stock sites on my blog. I submit to about 20, including Alamy, and have built the earnings up to $2000 a month from my portfolio. I am sure you could do well with yours!

Steve

Edit: And of course you could join our growing group of networked artist sites using the Symbiostock theme on Wordpress. My site is in the signature page below and there are tons of posts about it in the forum!

You may think this is nitpicking, but I modified the sentence structure a little bit and this is how I put it in my About page. I have a section on the home page that simply says that my site is a member of the Symbiostock network and links to the about page so that people see it up front but I don't clutter the landing page, and they get the details separately.

Feel free to use this approach or modify as you see fit to align with your own sites:

 Home Page:  Backyard Stock Photos is a member of the Symbiostock Network. For more details please see �About Backyard Stock Photos� above

About Page: Backyard Stock Photos is a member of the Symbiostock Network. Symbiostock is not a stock agency, we are a group of independent photographers, illustrators and artists licensing royalty-free and rights managed images from our own sites. To make it easier for you, our customer, to find the right image we are also linked to each other.  This means if you do a search for  �tree� you will get a page where firstly my tree images appear and then those of my network members. If you use Categories to start your search you will only find the images on my site. The network members I am linked to may link back to me or may link to other members so you can click on one of their images and do another search to bring up different results.  Of course, my ambition is to have the pictures you desire here but if I do not I can offer an alternative where you can purchase direct from the artist.

Steve

I looked at one of your elephant images from the category search, and I noticed that at least that one didn't have "elephants" in the keywords. If I search for "elephant" they all come up

Steve