Author Topic: Perfect solution for selling on your own website (Read 26159 times)

elvinstar · « **Reply #25 on:** November 05, 2012, 10:44 »

Search is DEFINITELY one of the items at the top of our priority list. As a buyer (and also a submitter), I've experienced the pain of bad search myself.

cascoly · « **Reply #26 on:** November 05, 2012, 18:30 »

rather than re-invent the wheel, itvwould help to take a good look at the opensource GALLERY to see what might already be available.

the sticking point though will still be SEO - how will this new site be able to outperform or even just compete with agencies that already have staff devoted to SEO?

i've rarely found any of my images in my smugmug portfolio in google searches, but quite often find my images on the first search page with links to the major stock agencies. (my smugmug images all have the same tags that are given to the agencies)

elvinstar · « **Reply #27 on:** November 05, 2012, 21:53 »

I guess a question that needs to be asked is how people plan to use this software.

Do you plan to rely on Google searches, or will you be directing potential buyers to your site?

THP Creative · « **Reply #28 on:** November 06, 2012, 02:08 »

Mostly Google searches for me, therefore SEO is hugely important.

Also, I personally would a prefer a reasonable one-off cost to buy the software (after a free trial to test it out) rather than a subscription model.

If you can make this happen, I would seriously be interested, but all the elements need to be there. Thanks for even contemplating it - it's a huge job!

RacePhoto · « **Reply #29 on:** November 06, 2012, 03:06 »

Quote from: chromaco on November 04, 2012, 20:37

Since we are throwing out ideas...I would like to see some sort of "parent site" that ties all of the individual sites together. Perhaps with a search option like "search this site" or "search entire network". I would even be ok with being a part of one large site but having my own "store" so to speak. Kind of like a mall. Lots of individual stores in one place.

Pretty much an interesting way to drive traffic to everyone and let the photos/illustrations speak for themselves. Sure we are competing with each other and at the same time, working in a co-operative fashion would bring more buyers and views to all of us.

Ultimately a photostore where artists could link their stores together to create a bigger library. Yes that's the idea.

I think there are good suggestions for the rest of the features, watermark, re-size. (offer size by price handled by the software) Direct payment by PayPal, Google, or others that provide that service to us. Download set after payment is confirmed and stays active for 48 hours or some selectable fair time for the buyer to download.

But if I had to pick one, I'd like the site to have a "Circle" of friends which allows everyone to promote the other collections. I'm not sure that a search of all sites would be functional because it would need to download and index some constantly changing galleries from everyone, over and over. Links and descriptions to all member sites would be more workable.

mattdixon · « **Reply #30 on:** November 06, 2012, 04:49 »

Quote from: elvinstar on November 05, 2012, 21:53

I guess a question that needs to be asked is how people plan to use this software.

Do you plan to rely on Google searches, or will you be directing potential buyers to your site?

Both are essential, one will drive the other, you want a positive cycle. Without showing up in Google you are pretty much invisible.

elvinstar · « **Reply #31 on:** November 06, 2012, 06:38 »

How would you guys rate your existing solution regarding getting your images found by Google: Excellent, Fair, or Poor?

cascoly · « **Reply #32 on:** November 06, 2012, 18:49 »

Quote from: elvinstar on November 06, 2012, 06:38

How would you guys rate your existing solution regarding getting your images found by Google: Excellent, Fair, or Poor?

first, are you referring to our own sites or our images as represented by agencies?

either way, it's difficult to really know, since it's hard to know what 'found by google' means. a ggogle search requires specific keywords and that can vary tremendously. unfortunately, most agencies dont tell us how our sold images were found. Dreamstime is one of tghe ones that does, and here are some results I found for some recent sales. these were all done by first using the google images area:

image stock currency nicaragua   -- 1st picture
stock photo currency nicaragua -- 1st picture
stock picture currency nicaragua -- 1st picture

image currency nicaragua   no results
photo currency nicaragua   no results
picture currency nicaragua   no results

or
fall rockies    1st page
stock fall rockies   1st row + 2 others
stock photo fall rockies   1st row + 8 others

in all cases these were images on stock agencies, not my site.

i did a more extensive look at this earlier:
http://cascoly.hubpages.com/hub/How-to-use-Google-increase-HubPages-traffic-and-microstock-sales

elvinstar · « **Reply #33 on:** November 06, 2012, 19:29 »

Quote

first, are you referring to our own sites or our images as represented by agencies?

We are referring to images on your own sites. Most hosting packages have fairly detailed stats packages included that will show you where your traffic is coming from. You could also install Google Analytics for free if you need more data from your existing solution.

mattdixon · « **Reply #34 on:** November 08, 2012, 10:57 »

How about setting up a blog of the progress?
Collectively we can could help with ideas along the development stage.
If you guys are serious I would happily invest via kickstarter to get it moving.

djpadavona · « **Reply #35 on:** November 08, 2012, 11:54 »

Quote from: elvinstar on November 06, 2012, 06:38

How would you guys rate your existing solution regarding getting your images found by Google: Excellent, Fair, or Poor?

Out of the box, KTools isn't optimal for SEO. Lots of underscores and characters in the names of images, galleries, etc. You'll need to do some re-writing to improve the SEO. But don't sweat it. If you are relevant, the KTools naming system will do just fine for you.

Getting found by Google is easy. Getting ranked highly is not, but I think that is what you were referring to. I don't think SEO helps as much as the SEO community would lead you to believe. If someone tells you that you need an SEO Expert, assume they are selling SEO services.

Getting your images ranked highly has nothing to do with Photoshelter, KTools, or whatever path you decide to go down. You need to prove to Google that you are highly relevant. Which seems impossible, because how do you become relevant if Google doesn't put you on Page 1?

I look at setting up the store as maybe 1/1000 of the work toward getting yourself recognized. The other 999/1000 is everything else you do to get people's attention.

elvinstar · « **Reply #36 on:** November 13, 2012, 12:28 »

Quote

Getting found by Google is easy. Getting ranked highly is not, but I think that is what you were referring to. I don't think SEO helps as much as the SEO community would lead you to believe. If someone tells you that you need an SEO Expert, assume they are selling SEO services.

Getting your images ranked highly has nothing to do with Photoshelter, KTools, or whatever path you decide to go down. You need to prove to Google that you are highly relevant. Which seems impossible, because how do you become relevant if Google doesn't put you on Page 1?

I look at setting up the store as maybe 1/1000 of the work toward getting yourself recognized. The other 999/1000 is everything else you do to get people's attention.

I've been debating with myself as to whether or not I should post something very similar to what you just said. Thanks for making the decision for me! I don't know if people truly understand just what SEO means. Having links on other website that lead to YOUR website is vitally important in the SEO world, and that's nothing that we can influence.

We're firming up the list of first-launch features and will post here once it's finalized.

Thanks everyone for the input!

elvinstar · « **Reply #37 on:** January 29, 2013, 13:33 »

I just wanted to give you guys an update of where we are in the development process.

So far we have completed the following:

Uploading images (including IPTC recognition)
Primary photo color recognition and listing
Individual photo or .zip archive upload
Portfolio display

Next up:

Payment integration/content delivery
Search functions

We're plugging away!

Jeffrey · « **Reply #38 on:** February 05, 2013, 11:07 »

I will be watching this one too, aside from the other similar project in the other thread...

http://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/selling-rf-images-is-really-not-that-hard-php-developers-wanted/

Microbius · « **Reply #39 on:** February 05, 2013, 11:19 »

Quote from: Jeffrey on February 05, 2013, 11:07

I will be watching this one too, aside from the other similar project in the other thread...

http://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/selling-rf-images-is-really-not-that-hard-php-developers-wanted/

Honestly the other thread is a lot more interesting, that offers something really new in the cross linking of sites to create a larger network. Another KTools or similar is not all that interesting to me.

elvinstar · « **Reply #40 on:** February 05, 2013, 13:11 »

Quote from: Microbius on February 05, 2013, 11:19

Honestly the other thread is a lot more interesting, that offers something really new in the cross linking of sites to create a larger network. Another KTools or similar is not all that interesting to me.

We ARE planning to offer cross-linking of the individual sites. It was first mentioned in this thread on November 4th.

Microbius · « **Reply #41 on:** February 05, 2013, 14:40 »

Apologies, missed mattdixon's post about that and your response earlier in the thread.

Is that something you plan to offer at the outset or some time down the line? I think that is the exciting thing about the recent threads re. new ways to sell. In any case I am primarily an illustrator so wouldn't be on board at the start.

elvinstar · « **Reply #42 on:** February 05, 2013, 17:17 »

No apologies necessary! While we want to get a product to market as quickly as possible, we also want to be sure that the feature-set is robust enough to be useful right out of the gate.

Of course we'll continue to add features after the initial launch and make the product SUPER easy to update.

You made a good suggestion about having "networks" that could band together so you wouldn't have to worry about quality. That gave us something else to think of and I'm not sure we want to release the option to link individual sites without your suggested feature.

So thanks for a great idea and one more thing to put on our "to-do" list!

brmonico · « **Reply #43 on:** February 05, 2013, 20:39 »

Quote from: Pixart on November 04, 2012, 11:54

- Ability to sell physical goods.
- Ability to charge local taxes (I need to calculate 1 or 2 taxes depending on postal code or none for out-of-country)
- Auto renumbering/renaming system. I gave my shots sequential numbers, but went and put the model's name in it too... 1523-JakeSmith-Hockey. Mistake!
- Ability to set a blanket price series, but to be able to change it for special or exclusive content.
- Instant download - no waiting for an e-mail with a link that they can pass to all their friends.
- Collections/packages - I imagine if we can upload a zip we can make our own collection
- Repositionable watermark

You really get what you pay for. I've been looking at some Wordpress and Woocommerce photo stores but they don't auto watermark or auto resize. The more I look into the work I would have to put into it (or pay to have put into it), the better K-tools looks.

Well you are talking about Ktools version i have.......word by word.....and still does much more.

elvinstar · « **Reply #44 on:** February 05, 2013, 21:20 »

Quote from: brmonico on February 05, 2013, 20:39

Well you are talking about Ktools version i have.......word by word.....and still does much more.

I'm not sure that I understand what you mean. Are you saying that Ktools does all of that and more?

shiyali · « **Reply #45 on:** February 05, 2013, 21:29 »

Quote from: djpadavona on November 08, 2012, 11:54

Quote from: elvinstar on November 06, 2012, 06:38
How would you guys rate your existing solution regarding getting your images found by Google: Excellent, Fair, or Poor?

Out of the box, KTools isn't optimal for SEO. Lots of underscores and characters in the names of images, galleries, etc. You'll need to do some re-writing to improve the SEO. But don't sweat it. If you are relevant, the KTools naming system will do just fine for you.

Getting found by Google is easy. Getting ranked highly is not, but I think that is what you were referring to. I don't think SEO helps as much as the SEO community would lead you to believe. If someone tells you that you need an SEO Expert, assume they are selling SEO services.

Getting your images ranked highly has nothing to do with Photoshelter, KTools, or whatever path you decide to go down. You need to prove to Google that you are highly relevant. Which seems impossible, because how do you become relevant if Google doesn't put you on Page 1?

I look at setting up the store as maybe 1/1000 of the work toward getting yourself recognized. The other 999/1000 is everything else you do to get people's attention.

Wise words. There are several pretty good options available for setting up your own store. Getting people in there is the challenge.

gbalex · « **Reply #46 on:** February 05, 2013, 21:55 »

The features on Yuri's site would be worth a look.

peopleimages.com

brmonico · « **Reply #47 on:** February 06, 2013, 03:23 »

Quote from: elvinstar on February 05, 2013, 21:20

Quote from: brmonico on February 05, 2013, 20:39
Well you are talking about Ktools version i have.......word by word.....and still does much more.

I'm not sure that I understand what you mean. Are you saying that Ktools does all of that and more?

Yes, this last version do it all , in a easy way.... and if understand php and html , or are able to develop the program you have a extremely good work base to start.

elvinstar · « **Reply #48 on:** February 06, 2013, 09:50 »

Thanks for the reply. We're building a solution that people who don't know any programming can use. We want you to be able to focus on creating, not spending a lot of time tweaking your website.

Jeffrey · « **Reply #49 on:** February 06, 2013, 20:44 »

Can you give us an idea of how much would it cost? Just price range, maybe below 100$, below 50$, below 20$?

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Author Topic: Perfect solution for selling on your own website (Read 26159 times)

elvinstar

cascoly

elvinstar

THP Creative

RacePhoto

mattdixon

elvinstar

cascoly

elvinstar

mattdixon

djpadavona

elvinstar

elvinstar

Jeffrey

Microbius

elvinstar

Microbius

elvinstar

brmonico

elvinstar

shiyali

gbalex

brmonico

elvinstar

Jeffrey

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