Quote from: Irina Anosova on November 25, 2016, 07:39
Don't expect Shutterstock would eliminate ALL those accounts. This is their money finally and many spammy titles allow those images pop up in higher Google search positions than the same images uploaded to Fotolia or Depositphotos for example (Am I right that huge spam title problem is Shutterstock only?) It's a balancing between being modern and responsible and losing total income.

Google ignores keyword stuffing for at least 10-15 years. Moreover, google penalizes it. So, SS loses money with it.

The whole thing is about a few bigheads in the board want to see a bigger number in image count... I'm sure that they have no idea, what this company does, like in almost every big companies...

I had 9 sales so far today of my last batch submitted yesterday.
Before, for the last months, I usually didn't sold anything new.

Quote from: cthoman on March 02, 2016, 22:36
If I ever get a sale there, then it might pass FT. 

I've just got my first sale...
Compared to several hundred monthly sales on SS and FT.

I've started uploading to Alamy a few months ago.
Many stated here that sales will start very slowly, but they will be regular. So, I keep uploading.

Maybe, this feature can improve the performance of not well-keyworded images...

Quote from: sweetgirll on January 07, 2016, 15:01
they want in sets of 50?  Are you asking a price for each set, or for each image in the set....

Did you approach  them, or they approached you?

-I approached them.
-They want sets of 50 images.

I know these two factors decrease the price.
I'm asking for a per image price, but I have no idea what is a correct price.

Quote from: w7lwi on January 07, 2016, 02:24
Do you get any royalty payments when they sell an image or is your original sale price all you will see?

Only the original.

Quote from: Zeus on January 06, 2016, 22:23
What do you mean by sell?

I give them right to sell those images forever on their stock site.
This is non-exclusive, so I can still sell them on ShutterStock, Fotolia, etc...

I'm negotiating about selling non-exlusive (I'll keep selling them) resale rights for some of my vector images to a small, but pretty old stock vector company. They like to buy them in sets of 50 vectors.
They are mostly simple images, like these:
http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-228932677/stock-vector-blue-penrose-triangle-technology-company-symbol-design-set.html
http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-210234994/stock-vector-lavender-twirl-pattern-background-vector-version.html


For how much should I sell them?
I'm thinking about $2-$5 per image.

What's your opinions?

I've been thinking of making videos for a few days.
I just don't know if I have enough space for them on my computer...

Hi!
I've started to make stock vectors 2 years ago, and I joined ShutterStock on January 2014. I've made about 4000 vectors until now.

I already had the necessary skills 5-6 years earlier, but I simply didn't know about this industry. I sometimes wonder, how much money I'd make 5-6 years earlier with the same portfolio.
Am I right, that contributor numbers grown much-much higher rate than customer numbers since then?

So, the whole game is for me is about time-management:
-I have a good idea, and I can make 1 image in 2 days --> no,no!
-I have a mediocre idea, and I can make 50 images in that niche in 1 day --> go!

(I'm not able to make those top-seller type images.)

So, I usually make larger batches of one type of vector:
http://www.shutterstock.com/g/davidzydd/sets

I have a very special method of making vectors, I don't use Illustrator. (except converting to eps)

Congratulations! 

I've reached this in August this year.

The funny thing is that the change  from $0.33 to $0.36 comes immediately, you don't have to wait even to the end of day.

I've just tried to upload to GraphicRiver. They rejected all 15 vectors.
(I have 4000 vectors on ShutterStock.)

This rejection reason is very informative:
"Unfortunately your submission Multicolor Page Corner Star Design Template isn't ready for GraphicRiver and cannot be resubmitted as it did not meet our minimum requirements for quality and/or Envato Market policies. In order for submissions to be considered for sale they must be of high aesthetic and technical quality, unique to our library and cannot be in violation of Envato's policies."

Quote from: VB inc on November 03, 2015, 21:51
Before, when the libraries weren't so big, your high quality, highly commercial images would gain sales almost right away and rise to the top fairly quickly.

I wish I had started this whole stock-thing 5-6 years ago... 
(I've just started in 2014 January)

Quote from: jamiehooper on November 03, 2015, 19:19

Total Sales on SS: 9
Total Sales on FT:  331

The same for me: One of best selling image at Fotolia (126 sales) never sold on ShutteStock.
I think, it had luck with a relative popular keyword(s) on Fotolia, but at ShutterStock, it's buried among the many thousands of similar images.

It's not the exact thing what you are looking for, but it could be very helpful for searching keywords with good potential:
http://www.microstockgroup.com/microstock-services/stockkeyword-com-new-free-online-keyword-tool/

Pond5 have passed DreamsTime in the poll results on the right.
Looks interesting, I've just registered there.

Quote from: Julied83 on September 29, 2015, 13:17
The uploading process is ridiculos, I got error every time, I spend 15 minutes trying to upload a best seller vector ! This is so stupid. is it faster by ftp ?

I've just registered to GraphicRiver and uploaded a few vectors with by ftp via StockSumbitter. It was only a few minutes, compared to the very complicated normal submitting.
Let's see what happens...

A little jump on FT, but with these small numbers (100-150 sales/month), I don't know whether it means anything or not...

Quote from: PZF on October 29, 2015, 19:58
Hmmm......this looks like it should be good but it all seems rather complicated. I looked up 'cat' but can't begin to understand the significance of the numbers.  Maybe you can explain?
average ID top10:    171 057 228
average ID top100:    156 319 257
newest  ID top10:    302 691 488 (10.pos)
newest  ID top100:    302 691 488 (10.pos)

ID-s are growing linearly, small ID means old picture, big ID means new picture:
200 000 000 --> submitted approx. 2014.06.20
300 000 000 --> submitted approx. 2015.07.15
(My first image was submitted to ShutterStock on 2014.01.09, it has an ID of 170 490 818 - it was never bought  )

average ID top 100 means that the average submit time of the top 100 images was 2 years ago.
newest  ID top100 that the newest image in the top 100 is about 3 months old

So, if the newest ID is below 200 000 000, it means that it's pretty hard to get a new image into the top 100.

The site use computes a formula - called "low competition factor". The bigger is this number, the easier to get into top 100 for that keyword.

Alone, this number tells nothing, but compare with the numbers of other keywords to find out, which keywords has lower competition.
Here are few examples of "low competition factor":
cat: 134.56
kitten: 429.60
kiwi bird: 66704.75  (much less buyers search for this word, than for cat)
linx: 1560526.74 (it's a misspelled version of lynx - lynx we'll be online on today's update)
background: 0.84   (it's almost impossible to get into top 100)

estimated sale factor can be more important


The other usage of the site is to get keywords for your image. Little downward in the section called:
Top related keywords for CAT (images, popular search)
You can find the most important relevant keywords in order of importance. For example:
KEYWORD    IMPORTANCE    NUMBER    IMPORTANCE/NUMBER
cat    9472    97    97.65
cute    4126    75    55.01
pet    3772    79    47.75
kitten    3596    68    52.88
animal    3213    76    42.28
white    2884    46    62.70
isolated    2162    47    46.00
vector    2033    23    88.39
mammal    1828    41    44.59
dog    1752    19    92.21
kitty    1743    49    35.57
feline    1717    56    30.66
portrait    1652    39    42.36
black    1625    29    56.03
fur    1513    35    43.23
background    1410    41    34.39
breed    1198    24    49.92
paw    1157    25    46.28
domestic    1058    68    15.56
young    1047    42    24.93
love    1038    21    49.43
funny    985    37    26.62
adorable    937    38    24.66

Add them except of the few irrevelant, then click on "kitten", for example.
Then add new keywords like: baby, small, sweet, etc...

Quote from: Rinderart on September 04, 2015, 22:58

Quote from: Sean Locke Photography on September 03, 2015, 11:44
Don't forget this guy.  He's added even more!
http://www.shutterstock.com/portfolio/search.mhtml?gallery_landing=1&gallery_id=1256674&page=1&safesearch=1&sort_method=newest

Just added 400 new ones since 2 days ago.

He's very high surely...
I think marijuana fans browse his portfolio for hours!

I've noticed this large preview a few days ago...
I usually make my vector images very fast, so it's not a huge problem for me if somebody downloads a few of them without paying. But I know, there are many of contributors who put large amount of time into their works.
(The images I've put the most work into are never purchased...)

Am I right, that now previews are not as large as a few days ago?

I've made a website that analyze keywords that ShutterStock customers potentially use in their searches:
http://www.stockkeyword.com/

FEATURES:
-This is a free online tool.
-It analyzes ShutterStock search results, as it's the biggest microstock site. These keyword trends are mostly similar on other stock sites.
-More than 3000 keywords already analyzed. Currently I add few hundred new keywords daily.
-The site provides data for the first 100 search results for every keyword.
-all images/photos/illustrations/vectors  and  popular/relevant searches
-The data shows competition factors and potential sale opportunities for each keyword.
-Each keyword page also shows the most important related keywords for every keyword. This way, it's easy to find the best keywords for your images.
-You can find new keyword ideas, that have great "estimated sale factor" and/or big "low competition factor".
-You can view all the keywords of the top 50 images on one page - it also helps proper keywording.
-Average and newest ID shows whether it's possible to get a new image into the first page for a given keyword, or it's reserved for ancient images. (low ID means old image)
-Related keywords are clickable, the site is easy-to-use.

If You're interested in a given keyword(s), reply to this post, and I'll add it/them in a few days!

SS is back to normal now.

Quote from: stockastic link=topic=25731.msg434757#msg434757
All I can think of is that they're loading up on this sort of content now - and very likely doing it internally, or on contract - and, once they have enough, will announce a more sophisticate search tool for buyers.  You might be able to see just single image of "marker guy" and then search specifically for the same image with different text.  Or the same text on a different background.

It would be a very interesting feature!

I'll register to it.
But I'm not sure if I'll upload. It storngly depends on the time factor...