My first license of this year was only $32.78, netting me $16.39 - of a photo I licensed on my own last year for $150 (and I kept 100% of that).

On the surface, it seems like it's not much better than the micros, but because it's RM, there is actually a difference between the two. The license alamy sold is for a corporate website and so would only require a regular license - netting me as little as 33 cents on a subscription site to perhaps $7 on DT if not sold as a sub. The license I granted for $150 would require an extended license, netting me $14-28 on one of the micro sites. As the photo is not one that is likely to sell that often - it's a nice travel shot but not of a widely sought-after destination, I'm still way ahead having put it on alamy instead of on the micros.

While alamy's prices have come down drastically since I started there in 2008, at least they give us 50% of what they license photos for instead of 15%, so that's a plus. And there are buyers who specifically search for RM images, knowing they are not widely distributed.

Deciding whether or not to place images there really depends on what type of images you have and whether you do anything else with them.

Just blogged about the survey too - helping to keep my New Year's resolution to start blogging regularly 

http://www.travelstockblog.com/?p=116

I've been with Alamy longer than I've been in microstock and it was hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that for many files I can earn a lot more licensing them for peanuts hundreds of times on the micros than I can even with a few decent sales at Alamy. As prices at Alamy have come down from $150-250 which was what I'd gotten used to - to mostly <$100 per license (and some RM licenses this past year netting me as little as $13.50), I've started putting more images on the micros and have seen a nice jump in income. But for photos that are unusual or that I just really love, I'd still rather see them as RM at Alamy.

If I just uploaded all my work to the micros based on my RPI there I would definitely make more, but it isn't just about making money now, but also about the potential of some photos. Since I also license RM stock on my own directly, I definitely see the need to have two different portfolios. On sites like imagebrief where they'll offer hundreds and even thousands per photo licensed, you can't upload a photo that anyone can license for a few dollars, so there is more to it than simply the RPI.

Scary thought all those drones flying overhead and it's cheap enough that it could happen - what a bonanza for the paparazzi! Sounds like it would be incredibly fun to own. Much cheaper than hiring a helicopter to get a bird's eye view of a location over time I'd think and a tad more subtle if you're trying to swoop in on a celeb wedding 

Nice article - love the lighthouse 

Quote from: wordplanet on January 03, 2014, 14:00

Martha, suggestions on sites to approach for wildlife? I'm with the usual micro suspects and Alamy. Alamy's a better bet but not really a winner for wildlife and nature.

I'm just on a few stock sites. SS, DT, and Veer are the only ones I've had any success with. Haven't tried Alamy or any wildlife-specialty sites.

Mostly, that because I spend about half my time on this. The other half of my time is spent writing fiction. Odd combination? Yeah, I know.

Martha, Thanks for the book recommendation - I checked it out on Amazon & it looks very good - I'm a writer too - lifestyle, corporate communications and PR. Seems like a natural combination to me. 

Thanks Pete too - sounds like everyone recommends the same book - I used to buy a lot of my reference guides for a few bucks off the remainders table at Border's - got some great stuff and all new too, but after they put the local bookstores out of business, Amazon put them out of business. I miss being able to browse the stacks - there seem to be fewer bookstores all the time. Amazon's convenient but it's not the same.

Overall � Up 116%

Microstock � Up 43%
   Shutterstock � Up 15% (Portfolio increased 66.66%)
   Dreamstime � Up 77%  (Portfolio increased 30%)
   iStock � Up 106% (In support of the google drive protest I decreased my portfolio by 2/3rds, but then saw earnings continue to increase significantly so I later added some new files, increasing my portfolio 53% over 2012)
Fotolia, Bigstock � (no new photos added, deleted a bunch from Fotolia)

Percentage of microstock earnings (rounded):
SS - 45%
DT � 35%
iS � 19%
Fotolia, Bigstock � 2%

Traditional Stock � Up 167%
   Alamy � Down 64%, but direct stock licensing way up to bring total up so high

Percentage of traditional stock earnings:
Alamy 11%
Direct Licensing 89%

Since my portfolio is still quite small (~700 on Alamy and just under 200 on SS & DT; far fewer on the other micros), 2014 goal is to triple it in size and find more RM and direct licensing options. I know the kind of growth I've seen the last two years will be harder to sustain once my portfolio becomes larger, but given my results from a very small portfolio (For the first time reached payout from at least one micro site (often from at least two) every month but February), and from direct licensing, I'm hopeful I can see some decent supplemental income going forward. I�m determined to significantly increase my portfolio next year across all sites and to continue to seek out avenues where I can license my work directly. I made more from direct licenses (of stock photos � I also do editorial assignments which I don�t count as it obviously isn�t stock) than from all other sources. Also hoping to find other outlets for my RM work.

Also saw an increase of 123% on FAA but put a lot of effort into marketing there and don't feel the time justified the results, so while I plan to increase my portfolio there, I don't plan to spend as much time on social media, etc as I did this year. Saw some results from social media but saw more improvement from simply increasing my uploads. I think traditional query letters to publishers who may have an interest in my RM stock will be a more productive use of my marketing efforts this year.

Applied to Deposit Photos and Image Brief in December and just got into both so will see what 2014 brings on those two.

Interesting question. I went through and counted up my US images - US travel, US editorial, and nature images that are site specific. That came to 34% of my portfolio but they account for 65% of my all time sales at shutterstock.
I did not count isolated objects and other still life photos that could have been shot anywhere unless they were of iconic American things, nor did I count abstract backgrounds, since, though many of these were shot in the US, again they could be anywhere.
Since this is the time of year for analyzing sales and deciding what to shoot in 2014, I also went through my payment history and discovered that 51% of my sales come from US sources and 49% from non-US sources, so clearly customers outside the US are purchasing US source images - I've found a lot of my US images - travel and editorial - on South American and European web sites and I often have sales from every single continent showing up on my map at SS. Though my image with the highest number of sales is an abstract background, my highest grossing image there is a US travel image.
Most of my European images (I've only been to North America and Europe) are with traditional agencies or are only available through my own site, but I checked out those stats too. They make up just 3% of my portfolio and account for 0.6% of my sales - with such tiny numbers I don't think the stats are significant, though the percentages are about the same for European images on DT, a European site.
I've sold a lot of US travel photos on Alamy too - many to European clients - in the UK, Italy and Russia.

Glad you have healthy kids - the best gift we all can get - Like Lisa, I too have a Christmastime child - she turns 21 today! and having her home from college for the holidays is always my favorite gift. This year in addition to baking cookies together I taught her how to make a pie crust and we just spent a lot of time hanging out and having fun. She got me a thermos that looks like a zoom lens complete with a tripod collar for a handle and even an "N" for Nikon.

I also got an email right before Christmas from The Museum of the City of New York telling me one of my photos is going to be in a show there this week which was exciting! Here's the link to the show. http://www.mcny.org/event/rising-waters-20

And I got a beautiful pair of cowboy boots.  All in all a very lovely Christmas! Hope it was good for all of you who celebrate and wishing you all a Happy New Year too!

I think Scott's answer makes sense IMHO as  they need to carefully walk the line between contributor transparency and protecting the confidential nature of the deals they make since they would not want another site to try to undercut their deal by offering more favorable terms - quite likely at contributor's expense.

It would be helpful of course to know how exactly much we're getting per download since that's the bottom line, but that wasn't the question asked. Scott, can you tell us that please?

Congrats Matt and hope you and everyone else had a Merry Christmas!

I think a question about POD sites would be good as well - it's not exactly stock but it is an online outlet for many here and it would be interesting to see how those sales stack up against actual stock.
I'd also like to see some numbers for Alamy if they aren't already part of the survey that way.
Thanks!

Haven't had a problem when adding Latin/scientific names in my titles. They often show up as misspelled but I just hit the "Upload" button again & they go through. No trouble on the review end with them rejecting images for non-English titles - maybe you got a new reviewer? Can sympathize with your frustration.