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Messages - Jaggy
101
« on: March 22, 2022, 11:59 »
Because they have too many images, and they don't care anymore. It costs money to do realistic reviews. This way they just keep the grinder running, photos in, and we keep trying to get things accepted against the odds of a real review.
Rejection reasons (1)
Focus: The main subject is out of focus or is not in focus due to camera shake, motion blur, overuse of noise reduction, or technical limitations of the equipment used (e.g. autofocus searching, camera sensor quality, etc).
It doesn't matter what anyplace else does or that they accept the same images. SSTK has gone insane. They have a Hal 9000 system doing reviews now.
383,327,819 stock photos, vectors, and illustrations are available royalty-free.
The system is so screwed up that they can't even complete the intake of new images properly.
Agreed. It's become ridiculous. I made a special effort with a couple of recent shots - tripod, cable release, focus stacking - and they still got rejected. Fortunately, Adobe accepted them. In the past, I've generally been able to understand rejections but, recently, anything and everything is getting tossed out. And there is no logic to it. I'm at the point where I'm not sure it's worth uploading to SS any more. More trouble than it's worth.
102
« on: February 24, 2022, 08:03 »
I'm 27% ahead of where I was in 2021 (Jan/Feb) in terms of downloads (maybe more because Feb isn't over yet) and twice as much (108%) in terms of revenue.
In fairness, 2021 Jan/Feb revenue was pretty terrible.
Curious as to what this Ukraine war might do to sales, if anything.
103
« on: February 20, 2022, 16:57 »
Big organizations aren't going to be trolling the internet for 'free'. When they need images or video, they need it timely, they need quality, they need to know it's legal, they need to be able to find what they want quickly and they need to be able to modify as necessary. So they will have a subscription to someone like Shutterstock because that is the most efficient solution. In the grand scheme of things, the cost is peanuts.
104
« on: February 03, 2022, 09:23 »
I wonder how much attention customers really pay to it. Do they care? Maybe they know it's meaningless and are they more concerned with finding the right photo for their needs irrespective of how many times it has been used.
My own best seller sold around 140 times last year but is marked as 'never used'. Yet it continues to sell.
105
« on: January 28, 2022, 10:26 »
Okay, with 3.5 days to go in January, this is where my sales are in comparison to January 2021.
First, January 2021 was my worst month of last year by a long way. So we are starting from a low bar.
Anyway:
Size of portfolio ...... + 18%
Total downloads ..... +57%
Total revenue ..... +136%
RPD ..... +47%
This January (2022), despite the reset to level 1, has been better for revenue than five of the months in 2021.
AS is tracking normally. Slightly behind target but nothing to be alarmed about. RPD at AS is three times that of SS but downloads are almost eight times less. So total SS revenue is about 2.5 times greater than AS revenue. Of course, my portfolio at AS is quite a lot smaller than at SS.
106
« on: January 21, 2022, 11:24 »
Compared to January 2021, I'm ahead on both downloads and revenue. Right now (the 21st), I'm 2 downloads off my January 2021 total and I am ahead on revenue by 37%.
That said, last January was by far my poorest month in 2021. I should also say that this week has been quite slow.
AS is tracking at about the same level as last year.
107
« on: January 06, 2022, 14:56 »
I'm not at level 2 yet but I have double the downloads I had this time last year. Unfortunately, so far I have the same RPD as last January which is $0.19.
Just one sale on Adobe so far for $0.33.
108
« on: January 04, 2022, 21:34 »
I'm just waiting for our Ontario Canada politicians to ban toilet paper as there are no doubt some cancer causing chemicals in the manufacturing process of the paper.
Hope so! I have a couple of toilet roll photos already uploaded and accepted and they have even sold a few times. Would be a good opportunity to sell them a few more times.
109
« on: January 03, 2022, 11:45 »
I may be the anomaly, but the reality for 99% of contributors to SS is that they earn money from being on SS... and 100% of those that aren't on SS, don't earn money from SS.
If you think that there's been some kind of, or will be some kind of, mass exodus of buyers from SS due to a relatively small percentage of contributors leaving (or that lost earnings from SS will automatically be made up elsewhere), then you might be the one who is being naive. Sure, my earnings might dwindle over time... they might at any agency, and that can be reviewed on an ongoing basis, but in the meantime I'm earning money from the time I'm spending uploading, so nothing will come back to bite me. And they're not dwindling now... I made a decent amount more last year then I did the year before.
And if you think my post was 'talking up' SS then... well, that's just strange.
I don't think you are an anomaly and I agree with your post. I don't particularly care about SS, Adobe or any of the others. I use SS because it serves my purpose and when it stops serving that purpose I will move on. The reality is that I still sell more on SS than any other site. I also made more in 2021 than I did in 2020. Not much more - 3.38% - but still more. Adobe did well for me last year too although still not as well as SS. In addition, the absolute number of downloads I got at SS increased last year and at a greater rate than I added to my portfolio. So that suggests that the buyers haven't gone away.
110
« on: January 01, 2022, 10:45 »
2021 compared to 2020.
The good:
Everything Adobe: Downloads +96.67%, Revenue +169.79%, RPD +37.18%
Shutterstock: Downloads +55.72%
The bad: Shutterstock revenue +3.38%
The ugly: Shutterstock RPD -33.61%
111
« on: December 20, 2021, 15:14 »
I don't get fixated on the 10 cents for an image thing. What matters to me is the average RPD over the year.
Unfortunately, this year (2021) I'm looking at a 33% drop in RPD compared to 2020. That is largely due to two factors. The first is that the first four months of the year were terrible for revenue as I fought my way through the levels. The second is the absence of any ELs (2020 I had two) and fewer SODs.
When I look at RPD for May through December, it's at the same level as 2020 and better than 2019.
So, while I have made marginally more revenue this year (+2%) it has taken 52% more downloads to get there.
So my prediction of May 2020 has come true. More downloads to stand still.
You must be still getting a lot of 10 cent sales to even make it worth it to upload, you really need volume now it seems.
Six of my last 20 sales have been at 10 cents. However, you are right. It is all about volume now.
112
« on: December 20, 2021, 14:37 »
I don't get fixated on the 10 cents for an image thing. What matters to me is the average RPD over the year.
Unfortunately, this year (2021) I'm looking at a 33% drop in RPD compared to 2020. That is largely due to two factors. The first is that the first four months of the year were terrible for revenue as I fought my way through the levels. The second is the absence of any ELs (2020 I had two) and fewer SODs.
When I look at RPD for May through December, it's at the same level as 2020 and better than 2019.
So, while I have made marginally more revenue this year (+2%) it has taken 52% more downloads to get there.
So my prediction of May 2020 has come true. More downloads to stand still.
113
« on: December 18, 2021, 13:48 »
I live in a tourist town. On Shutterstock, if you type in the name of my town, you get 22,686 photos. However, when I started to scan the pages and pages of photos, I discovered that there were quite a few things in my town that had been neglected. So I photographed those things and they have sold 168 times in two years.
114
« on: December 18, 2021, 13:38 »
I don't have a problem with having any photo's accepted at SS, as I haven't uploaded to this site since they cut the commission rates last year.
So no rejection at all in over a year.
I would like to delete all my images on SS until they come to their senses but when/if they do how to upload hundreds of images again? That's far too much work. Something needs to be done so that they get the drift that paying 10 cents is just not acceptable.
deleting your images won't make any difference to SS policies, so your choice is to delete for your personal satisfaction or leave your images and make some passive income.
And but don't get hung up on the 10c sales - my SS port this year has had RPD of $.60-.80 each month - just a bit less than AS; actual income from SS is still double that from AS. AS sales haven't changed much over the last 2 years, while SS are down about 30%
I had some really good sales on AS but my average SS sale is down to 0.27 cents per image. I have earned more money with AS this month than with SS. I have not got more than 19 cents for an image this month on SS. Mainly just 10 cents. Occasionally 17 cents and 19 cents.
On SS, my average for 2021 is 36 cents an image. The first four months, when I was fighting my way through the levels, are what killed my RPD. May through December, my average RPD was 46 cents.
115
« on: December 18, 2021, 13:32 »
my SS port this year has had RPD of $.60-.80 each month ...
You create images and videos?
In SS account there is no way to see the downloads and income of pictures and videos separately? Or is there?
I have not found anything in my account.
You can see it on the iphone app when a photo is sold. It shows you how many times it has sold and for how much. You can also see it on the 'view all top performers page' but you may have to scroll through a lot of images to find a specific one.
116
« on: December 16, 2021, 14:41 »
I predict that the market for images and video will continue to be strong but RPD will continue to decline as agencies pursue market share.
That means we will probably have to sell 25% more product to make the same amount of money that we made this year.
117
« on: December 14, 2021, 10:46 »
Shortly before the middle of the month.
December 1 to 13, 2021 compared to December 1 to 13, 2020
At AS
Downloads: - 7%
Revenues: + 21.8%
For SS
Downloads: - 25.1%
Revenues: + 50.5
AS vs. SS
Downloads AS compared to SS: 76%
Revenues AS compared to SS: 125.2%
For SS, So far, I'm about even on December 2020 in downloads but have already surpassed all of December 2020 in revenue largely thanks to a rather good SOD. For AS, I'm also tracking pretty much at the same level as December 2020. First week of December was terrible but things have picked up a bit this last wek.
118
« on: December 13, 2021, 11:05 »
What if Shutterstock management decided to hold on to a majority of the Contributor payments so that they could have a very large balance of "Cash-at-Hand" for their End-Of-Year Report? 
With these losers it wouldn't surprised me at all. Maybe our $$$ will pay for their Christmas bonuses!
It wouldn't work because the money would still be owed to contributors and that would have to be shown in the accounts.
119
« on: December 12, 2021, 13:05 »
Having read this thread, I thought I would crunch some numbers from my own portfolio on Shutterstock:
Commercial images make up 30.61% of my portfolio.
Commercial images represent 23.07% of total downloads
Commercial images amount to 26.25% of total revenue.
120
« on: December 09, 2021, 18:17 »
Absolutely terrible sales on both Shutterstock and Adobe. I expected December to be poor but thought the fall-off would be in the last third of the month due to the holidays rather than at the beginning.
Anyone else notice a big drop in sales?
121
« on: December 09, 2021, 10:48 »
Yes. I got mine on December 6.
That said, SS seem to have had (still are having?) some system problems which may have slowed things down.
122
« on: December 04, 2021, 09:01 »
I sometimes use it to see if a certain topic is selling well. If it says high or average, you at least know that it is being sold.
Furthermore, we discussed it in detail at Shutterstock forum. Perhaps a customer thinks at similar photos "Let me buy the infrequently sold photo" No idea really.
Also no idea why they switched to this system fairly quickly after the rating numbers (6 to 10).
Hey BugMan  If the data is wrong, and I'll say I don't know how many people have said, they have sold images that show as no sales, how can we learn anything from that?
I like it when I see things like this.
Popularity
High
Usage
Often used
Superstar
Shutterstock customers love this asset!
I suppose I should start collecting data and see what it takes to make...
Popularity
Medium
Usage
Commonly used
Insight
Usage and Popularity show how the Shutterstock community is engaging with this asset.
and finally, the no go:
Popularity
None
Usage
Not used yet
First look
This asset has almost never been seen. Make the first move.
Is anyone collecting the possible Pop/Use/First levels and wording? Or do I need to spend some time digging for useless data?
Great! Another feature that appears to be of little value for use. Thanks folks for your thoughts...
Yeah look what you started?
I suppose the questions are: Do customers actually care about this information? To what extent does the information influence their purchasing decision? My best seller this year (2021) with 125 sales is rated as "Medium" and "Not Used Yet". Would an accurate rating have improved sales?
123
« on: December 03, 2021, 11:07 »
Last month on Shutterstock was my best this year and second best ever for revenue. Downloads were good and RPD was better although not great.
Adobe was okay. Not great but not terrible either.
The end of November was a bit slow and December has started slowly which is disappointing in that, effectively, December is a three week month due to the Christmas and New Year holiday.
Not looking forward to the reset on Shutterstock in January.
124
« on: November 27, 2021, 10:22 »
Same here, and i notice something more... zero sales from US
The 26th was a US holiday. Might explain it.
2 weeks holiday??? no sales in 2 weeks form US.... its really strange.... anybody have any sale from US?
Of my last 20 sales, 11 are from the USA.
125
« on: November 21, 2021, 14:45 »
As we all know, there are different types of photography and different markets for those types. I'm not really an artsy person. I can't draw or paint to save my life, I can't sing and I'm a terrible actor. When I think about photography, I think about those photos that I like to look at and they tend not to be the artsy ones either. I like real life photos thinks such as street scenes and that is what I tend to be drawn to when out and about with my camera. I photograph what I like and what my eye is drawn to.
It seems to work for microstock. My photos sell and, year on year, I sell more of them. I seem to be getting better at it too as the percentage of my portfolio that has sold gets higher too. I know there are others out there who are better photographers than me. But that's okay too. I came to this late in life with no formal education but if I'm progressing then that works for me.
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