MicrostockGroup
Agency Based Discussion => Shutterstock.com => Topic started by: blvdone on August 08, 2022, 07:11
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as often as it used to be? That would be the only reason I would turn my portfolio back on there. But I'll keep my video portfolio turned off on Shutterstock because if I turn it back on, I'll have to move a lot of Pond5 exclusive clips back to regular account.
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Definitely not as often as it used to be. At least not for me. While they were pretty common for me last year, (several double digit commissions per month, often in the 20$+ range), I saw a sharp decline in 2022. Speaking for photo, I don't do video.
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Absolutely not as often and not as high return when they come.
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This year I had 800 foto sales so far with and RPD of $0,294...
- 1 sale for $21
- about 25 sales (on demand) in the range $1-$3
- about 750 sales in the range of $0,10-$0,50 (603 sales for $0,10)
Only 15 video sales are not enough to give stable numbers, RPD of $8,62
- Numbers were; $3,12 - $9,38 - $1,53 - $11,85 - $7,43 - $8,85 - $1,25 - $2,36 - $5,09 - $26,85 - $1,40 - $23,58 - $0,80 - $5,85 - $19,98
Sidenote: with the same video portfolio I had only in June on IStock: 28 Video sales for $204,56 (RPD $7,31)
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They still happen, if they didn't, earnings would nosedive.
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This year I had 800 foto sales so far with and RPD of $0,294...
- 1 sale for $21
- about 25 sales (on demand) in the range $1-$3
- about 750 sales in the range of $0,10-$0,50 (603 sales for $0,10)
Only 15 video sales are not enough to give stable numbers, RPD of $8,62
- Numbers were; $3,12 - $9,38 - $1,53 - $11,85 - $7,43 - $8,85 - $1,25 - $2,36 - $5,09 - $26,85 - $1,40 - $23,58 - $0,80 - $5,85 - $19,98
Sidenote: with the same video portfolio I had only in June on IStock: 28 Video sales for $204,56 (RPD $7,31)
RPD of $0,294 is similar to RPD I had in 3 weeks of July I turned my photo portfolio back on. I checked my old earnings on Shutterstock. My RPD for photos was in the $0.75 - $1.10 ish range mostly. RPD of $0,294 is lower than the lowest I get on Adobe Stock photo sales. Not much hope in Shutterstock these days as I suspected.
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i still get non-subs that keep my RPD between .5 & .65 for the last year, actually a bit higher than previous 2 years! overall income down 30% from 2 yrs ago
AS has RPD 20-30% higher but consistently only 30% of SS income over last 3 years
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i still get non-subs that keep my RPD between .5 & .65 for the last year, actually a bit higher than previous 2 years! overall income down 30% from 2 yrs ago
AS has RPD 20-30% higher but consistently only 30% of SS income over last 3 years
Sure thing and fact of the business, one place pays us better RPD, but they don't sell as much in real $$$ as another.
And then there are the others that do neither. iStock at 15% and Alamy now 20%, DT somehow has lost the customer base, but pays fairly, the group of others is growing larger every year.
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i still get non-subs that keep my RPD between .5 & .65 for the last year, actually a bit higher than previous 2 years! overall income down 30% from 2 yrs ago
AS has RPD 20-30% higher but consistently only 30% of SS income over last 3 years
Sure thing and fact of the business, one place pays us better RPD, but they don't sell as much in real $$$ as another.
And then there are the others that do neither. iStock at 15% and Alamy now 20%, DT somehow has lost the customer base, but pays fairly, the group of others is growing larger every year.
Are there ways we can help customers find the agencies that pay producers fairly?
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Absolutely I do. I think I get more than I did "before" but I also have a very large portfolio (closing in on 20k photos). Just had a $120 photo sale a few days ago and June 2022 was my highest month ever.
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just had a $75 sale on SS - an example of why short term reports are statistically invalid - this 1 uncommon sale boosted my monthly RPD from $.60 to $4.40
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Ocassional sale in $20 range, anything above $30, dead. Big drop in ODD sales, at least 50% if not more, 90% of sub sales are in the 0.10-0.20 range. I have about 1500 photos. Earnings drooped, number of sales dropped, there just isn't any excitment anymore, when you get sale, because most are0.10-0.20 subs.
It's like, meh, fu*ck SS.
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I had a $15.47 for one photo DL a few months ago.
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Absolutely I do. I think I get more than I did "before" but I also have a very large portfolio (closing in on 20k photos). Just had a $120 photo sale a few days ago and June 2022 was my highest month ever.
Wow. Nice.
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Ocassional sale in $20 range, anything above $30, dead. Big drop in ODD sales, at least 50% if not more, 90% of sub sales are in the 0.10-0.20 range. I have about 1500 photos. Earnings drooped, number of sales dropped, there just isn't any excitment anymore, when you get sale, because most are0.10-0.20 subs.
It's like, meh, fu*ck SS.
I hear you. Sounds similar to what many contributors are saying.
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I had a $15.47 for one photo DL a few months ago.
You must be a relative newcomer. Did you start after they started the $0.10 subs?
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Two to three times a year I have a big picture sale at SS.
This month I got $70 for a picture.
This will greatly increase my august RPD.
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Occasionally, yes.
These two, for example, are from the last days of July:
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Are there ways we can help customers find the agencies that pay producers fairly?
Buyers will go where there's good content for a low price. Of course low RPD sites get more sales as long we keep giving them our best work. They can undercut the better paying sites for the exact same content. The only way we can get buyers to the better paying sites is to stop giving low RPD sites your content (or at least your best or newest content). Prices have long since dropped past what buyers are prepared to pay. The price drops are all agencies competing for the same pool of customers with each other now. It’s entirely under our control.
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...The only way we can get buyers to the better paying sites is to stop giving low RPD sites your content (or at least your best or newest content). Prices have long since dropped past what buyers are prepared to pay. The price drops are all agencies competing for the same pool of customers with each other now. It’s entirely under our control.
how is it under our control? past boycotts have had no effect on agency sales, and buyers likely never even know they happened. a few among thousands of artists aren't going to cause buyers to move, esp'ly buyers with subscriptions
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...The only way we can get buyers to the better paying sites is to stop giving low RPD sites your content (or at least your best or newest content). Prices have long since dropped past what buyers are prepared to pay. The price drops are all agencies competing for the same pool of customers with each other now. It’s entirely under our control.
how is it under our control? past boycotts have had no effect on agency sales, and buyers likely never even know they happened. a few among thousands of artists aren't going to cause buyers to move, esp'ly buyers with subscriptions
"Our" as in all contributors.
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So far this month...
Enhanced x 2 - $20 + £26
SOD x 3 - 2x $32 1x £18
Video 1 - $18
That said, there have been a lot of $0.10 sales with below average daily totals.
Edit... another $33 SOD today.
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I don't offer videos, so I can only say something about the larger revenue for images. I'll define those as more than $20.
In 2022, the highest so far was $78.39.
What's striking in 2022 is that I've only had one Enhanced so far, but I don't include it in my stats because it was $19.25, below my $20 definition. Compared to the same period in 2021, I am down 53% in higher SODs and Enhanced.
In 2021 (Jan 01-Aug 11), there were 6 Enhanced above $20. The highest SODs were each just below $80 (several).
There used to be an average of 12-15 Enhanced during the same period for me. I wonder if the need for Enhanced has declined so much, or if buyers are just not licensing correctly lately.
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I wonder if the need for Enhanced has declined so much, or if buyers are just not licensing correctly lately.
Fair point. Who's actually checking whether the use of an image is correctly licensed?
We don't know who licensed it and we don't know how and when it is being used.
Sure, we can use google alerts and do reverse image searches, but that only reveals a a part of the possible usage of our content.
Anyhow, I'm not doing any of that, except for the occasional search engine stuff to see where my images ended up.
Hundreds of sales per month are impossible to track. And even if we discover misuse of a license, are the agencies willing to chase the buyer?
On the other hand, I see a decline of bigger commissions across all agencies.
Only iStock/Getty and Shutterstock deliver bigger two digit commissions on a stretching every now and then.
I had exactly one bigger $$ sale on AS this year (yet, they still deliver a rather fair RPD).
Ages since I've seen a +2$ sale on Dreamstime, and even longer on other agencies.
I can hardly imagine the demand for enhanced licenses decreased. Another explanation could be that licensing conditions improved in favor of the buyer. Get more usage options for the same price. Or there's a growing amount of misuse by the buyer. Deliberately or unknowingly.
Licensing conditions are anything but my field of expertise, maybe someone else can tell us more about how the conditions "evolved" over the years.
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It's not so easy to see in the statistics, but I think on average I have about one image sale out of 100 larger than 20$.
And I think it's about the same as before, but the average amount is lower now. And my total number of sales is also lower.
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Shutterstock Video sales 2022:
Total sales(videos) - 491
$150+ - 1 sale
$125+ - 2 sales
$100+ - 7 sales
$75+ - 8 sales
$50+ - 5 sales
$0.25 - 26 sales
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I had a $15.47 for one photo DL a few months ago.
You must be a relative newcomer. Did you start after they started the $0.10 subs?
What does being a newcomer matter? I get nothing but 10c subs and I'm from after the 10c started.
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Shutterstock Video sales 2022:
Total sales(videos) - 491
$150+ - 1 sale
$125+ - 2 sales
$100+ - 7 sales
$75+ - 8 sales
$50+ - 5 sales
$0.25 - 26 sales
What about other 400+ video sales prices? How many are below $10 and $5?
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I had a $15.47 for one photo DL a few months ago.
You must be a relative newcomer. Did you start after they started the $0.10 subs?
What does being a newcomer matter? I get nothing but 10c subs and I'm from after the 10c started.
I was just asking/guessing because the poster only had one $15 DL in a few months. Stop being upset about anything.
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Shutterstock Video sales 2022:
Total sales(videos) - 491
$150+ - 1 sale
$125+ - 2 sales
$100+ - 7 sales
$75+ - 8 sales
$50+ - 5 sales
$0.25 - 26 sales
What about other 400+ video sales prices? How many are below $10 and $5?
Below 5$ - 236 sales
Below 10$ - 52 sales
and the total avg is around $13.
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Shutterstock Video sales 2022:
Total sales(videos) - 491
$150+ - 1 sale
$125+ - 2 sales
$100+ - 7 sales
$75+ - 8 sales
$50+ - 5 sales
$0.25 - 26 sales
What about other 400+ video sales prices? How many are below $10 and $5?
Below 5$ - 236 sales
Below 10$ - 52 sales
and the total avg is around $13.
Thank you for the detailed number. 60% of video sales now are cheap subs and the average sale price for all video sales is only $13? That's horrible. Unlike Adobe Stock's video sub, Shutterstock's video subs are for 4k clips as well. I sell most of my 4k clips for $199 on Pond5. So, I'll get about $120 on my exclusive account and $80 on my non-exclusive account. I don't miss selling my videos on Shutterstock. I don't think I'm losing any revenue because I don't sell videos on Shutterstock now. Some big buyers know my portfolio. If they have a choice, they'll take advantage of Shutterstock video sub. Historically, average video sale price on Shutterstock was in $25-30 range before video subs began. In 2019, it was constantly over $30 per video sale. I just checked my earnings reports in the past.
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Shutterstock Video sales 2022:
Total sales(videos) - 491
$150+ - 1 sale
$125+ - 2 sales
$100+ - 7 sales
$75+ - 8 sales
$50+ - 5 sales
$0.25 - 26 sales
What about other 400+ video sales prices? How many are below $10 and $5?
Below 5$ - 236 sales
Below 10$ - 52 sales
and the total avg is around $13.
Thank you for the detailed number. 60% of video sales now are cheap subs and the average sale price for all video sales is only $13? That's horrible. Unlike Adobe Stock's video sub, Shutterstock's video subs are for 4k clips as well. I sell most of my 4k clips for $199 on Pond5. So, I'll get about $120 on my exclusive account and $80 on my non-exclusive account. I don't miss selling my videos on Shutterstock. I don't think I'm losing any revenue because I don't sell videos on Shutterstock now. Some big buyers know my portfolio. If they have a choice, they'll take advantage of Shutterstock video sub. Historically, average video sale price on Shutterstock was in $25-30 range before video subs began. In 2019, it was constantly over $30 per video sale. I just checked my earnings reports in the past.
Pond5 is not performing well for me, Just earned $500 in 2022 with 21 sales, which is less than my single month earnings on Shutterstock.
I prefer 60-70 sales a month with an avg of $13, instead of 2-3 sales month with an avg of $25.
My last 2 sales on Pond5 ( GPP slaes) were $1.92 & $1.12
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Shutterstock Video sales 2022:
Total sales(videos) - 491
$150+ - 1 sale
$125+ - 2 sales
$100+ - 7 sales
$75+ - 8 sales
$50+ - 5 sales
$0.25 - 26 sales
What about other 400+ video sales prices? How many are below $10 and $5?
Below 5$ - 236 sales
Below 10$ - 52 sales
and the total avg is around $13.
Thank you for the detailed number. 60% of video sales now are cheap subs and the average sale price for all video sales is only $13? That's horrible. Unlike Adobe Stock's video sub, Shutterstock's video subs are for 4k clips as well. I sell most of my 4k clips for $199 on Pond5. So, I'll get about $120 on my exclusive account and $80 on my non-exclusive account. I don't miss selling my videos on Shutterstock. I don't think I'm losing any revenue because I don't sell videos on Shutterstock now. Some big buyers know my portfolio. If they have a choice, they'll take advantage of Shutterstock video sub. Historically, average video sale price on Shutterstock was in $25-30 range before video subs began. In 2019, it was constantly over $30 per video sale. I just checked my earnings reports in the past.
Pond5 is not performing well for me, Just earned $500 in 2022 with 21 sales, which is less than my single month earnings on Shutterstock.
I prefer 60-70 sales a month with an avg of $13, instead of 2-3 sales month with an avg of $25.
My last 2 sales on Pond5 ( GPP slaes) were $1.92 & $1.12
Those GPP were Pond5 clips on Adobe Stock sold via video sub. That was horrible.
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In July I got one 25 dollars photo sale (oldtimer car) and that was my all-time best on SS. With my rather small port of 800 images, I usually have around 40 sales per month, and it is all about those few bigger sales that make the month, usually 3-5 sales in 2-3 dollars range. Compared with previous years, I see little difference, but my port is small, so those data are not that relevant.
I have been shooting in the area around very big football stadium yesterday, and at some point I stopped, and started collecting empty plastic bottles left in front of the stadium by drunk football fans, in order to return them to the grocery store for money. They were 15 cents each, and in total I made 6 euros in about an hour. My gf sometimes makes fun of me when sees a plastic bottle in the trash and she says: look! download! It is sad :)
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Occasional high-priced sales made today:
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Occasional high-priced sales made today:
Wow. Nice!!! You can retire now.
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In July I got one 25 dollars photo sale (oldtimer car) and that was my all-time best on SS. With my rather small port of 800 images, I usually have around 40 sales per month, and it is all about those few bigger sales that make the month, usually 3-5 sales in 2-3 dollars range. Compared with previous years, I see little difference, but my port is small, so those data are not that relevant.
I have been shooting in the area around very big football stadium yesterday, and at some point I stopped, and started collecting empty plastic bottles left in front of the stadium by drunk football fans, in order to return them to the grocery store for money. They were 15 cents each, and in total I made 6 euros in about an hour. My gf sometimes makes fun of me when sees a plastic bottle in the trash and she says: look! download! It is sad :)
Makes you think doesn't it? We get paid about the same as we could make, by walking around and picking up bottles and cans with a deposit on them. Used to be old men in the local park, with bikes that had big baskets. They would pick cans for the Aluminum. Now with state mandated deposits in many places, the ride in the park could be even more profitable?
Maybe I'll take up a new hobby... 🤑
Lets see, I'd make more, for less time working and less money invested and the money is not taxable income. Wow, this looks hot. ;)
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My average return per download has been dropping steadily for the past 4 years.
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My gf sometimes makes fun of me when sees a plastic bottle in the trash and she says: look! download! It is sad :)
Look! Download! :D
Never looked at it that way, but it's quite confrontational, isn't it? How to lose the respect from your girlfriend? Shoot microstock.
I bought airplane tickets to Berlin earlier this year with my microstock money and told my partner about it.
She thinks I'm banking big on my photography.
I don't dare to tell her that a lot of that money is made by selling images below a dollar.
No dead bedroom for me!
Speaking of Berlin: I saw homeless people collecting cans and bottles too. One of them was feeding those bottles and cans to a machine in the supermarket.
I looked at the display and it said 74 euro's. And he still had one big plastic trash bag to feed.
Hard truth: he made more that day by collecting trash from the streets than I did with my Microstock sales.
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I used to get some nice ELs/SODs (best was $80 - usually in the $20+ range) but since turning my portfolio back on in May after the 10 cent fiasco, the best I've seen is a piddling $7.50 SOD. So not even an occasional high priced sale in over three months.
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In July I got one 25 dollars photo sale (oldtimer car) and that was my all-time best on SS. With my rather small port of 800 images, I usually have around 40 sales per month, and it is all about those few bigger sales that make the month, usually 3-5 sales in 2-3 dollars range. Compared with previous years, I see little difference, but my port is small, so those data are not that relevant.
I have been shooting in the area around very big football stadium yesterday, and at some point I stopped, and started collecting empty plastic bottles left in front of the stadium by drunk football fans, in order to return them to the grocery store for money. They were 15 cents each, and in total I made 6 euros in about an hour. My gf sometimes makes fun of me when sees a plastic bottle in the trash and she says: look! download! It is sad :)
Makes you think doesn't it? We get paid about the same as we could make, by walking around and picking up bottles and cans with a deposit on them. Used to be old men in the local park, with bikes that had big baskets. They would pick cans for the Aluminum. Now with state mandated deposits in many places, the ride in the park could be even more profitable?
Maybe I'll take up a new hobby... 🤑
plus you'd get your 10K daily steps!
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as often as it used to be?
I had the last large (20+) image sale last December. I did not have them every month, but still with some regularity.
Since then, nothing, not even when I take into account that sales in January yield less money because of the reset of the level.
Now I am back at level 3, but what does it help when almost all sales are 10 cent or slightly above. This month the largest sales was 50 cents so far. No other sales with more than 14 cents. It was never this extreme before. The number of downloads is ok. They just yield less and less money.
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"Do you still have occasional high price photo or video sales on Shutterstock?"
No
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Turned my photo port back on yesterday and just got a $2.29 on demand sale!!! I can get a slice of plain pizza with nothing extra on it maybe!! Because of that 1 on demand sale, my RPD just jumped from 10 cents ish to respectable 32 cents!!! Shutterstock rocks!! Easy money. Get rich quick!!
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Occasional high-priced sale made today:
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Occasional high-priced sale made today:
Nice, congrats!
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High priced sales pretty much had stopped for me before the 10 cent scheme started. I went from a few a month (with a few 0 months per year) to a few a year, to maybe none the year before they screwed us. That was one of the main reasons I was mostly ok with turning off my port. Also the average RPD drop from ~75 cents to about ~25 cents and the overall income dropping more than 50%.
Before I turned off my port I looked back at some of the good years. Wow, no wonder it was fun and exciting looking at stats back then and all that with a port that was half the size or smaller.
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High priced sales pretty much had stopped for me before the 10 cent scheme started. I went from a few a month (with a few 0 months per year) to a few a year, to maybe none the year before they screwed us. That was one of the main reasons I was mostly ok with turning off my port. Also the average RPD drop from ~75 cents to about ~25 cents and the overall income dropping more than 50%.
Before I turned off my port I looked back at some of the good years. Wow, no wonder it was fun and exciting looking at stats back then and all that with a port that was half the size or smaller.
Yeah, good ol' days.
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Occasional high-priced sale made today:
Is it for video or photo?
You have some talent for sure.
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Occasional high-priced sale made today:
Nice! Congrats!
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None this month but last month was great - several in the $20 range and one for $80+ and these are just pictures no video
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Occasional high-priced sale made today:
Is it for video or photo?
You have some talent for sure.
Video, and ... nope, no talent:
https://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/how-much-has-your-best-selling-image-made-you/msg578844/#msg578844 (https://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/how-much-has-your-best-selling-image-made-you/msg578844/#msg578844)
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Occasional high-priced sale made today:
Is it for video or photo?
You have some talent for sure.
Video, and ... nope, no talent:
https://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/how-much-has-your-best-selling-image-made-you/msg578844/#msg578844 (https://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/how-much-has-your-best-selling-image-made-you/msg578844/#msg578844)
OK, you insist on having no talent, but nobody believes you!!! lol
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Occasional high-priced sale made today:
Is it for video or photo?
You have some talent for sure.
Video, and ... nope, no talent:
https://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/how-much-has-your-best-selling-image-made-you/msg578844/#msg578844 (https://www.microstockgroup.com/general-stock-discussion/how-much-has-your-best-selling-image-made-you/msg578844/#msg578844)
OK, you insist on having no talent, but nobody believes you!!! lol
I do. Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
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I do. Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
Exactly! Work and acquired knowledge (through work) is the answer.
I am not blessed with talent, I'm no artist, I'm an engineer. Everything I do in this field comes from research, analysis and self-learning, not from luck, not from talent.
I have "Zero Talent". :P
Btw, here is another sale that qualifies for "occasional high-priced sale", that just happened today on SS:
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I do. Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
Exactly! Work and acquired knowledge (through work) is the answer.
I am not blessed with talent, I'm no artist, I'm an engineer. Everything I do in this field comes from research, analysis and self-learning, not from luck, not from talent.
I have "Zero Talent". :P
Btw, here is another sale that qualifies for "occasional high-priced sale", that just happened today on SS:
Now I am getting depressed with your high sales. Go away! :)
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I do. Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
Exactly! Work and acquired knowledge (through work) is the answer.
I am not blessed with talent, I'm no artist, I'm an engineer. Everything I do in this field comes from research, analysis and self-learning, not from luck, not from talent.
I have "Zero Talent". :P
Btw, here is another sale that qualifies for "occasional high-priced sale", that just happened today on SS:
Now I am getting depressed with your high sales. Go away! :)
Can't speak in Zero Talent's name but I think what he's trying to say: anyone can do it if you really want to.
At least, that's what I get out of it.
Rule of thumb is that it takes 10.000 hours of proper practice and education to master a certain discipline.
I know there are exceptions and certain factors in a discipline that require other characteristics (e.g. physical) too, but 10.000 hours of proper practice will really beat out a lot, if not most, of more talented competition. Hard work often goes hand in hand with consistency, reliability and adaptability while talent without hard work is strongly dependent on the right conditions, luck in other words, to thrive.
Whether it's worth it to dedicate all that time to microstock is another question of course and for most of us the answer will be hell no. On the other hand, you really don't need that 10.000 hours for microstock. Most of us already know how to handle a camera and getting a decent looking shots out of it. If you are willing to invest time in reverse engineering success stories, you can probably go a long way in microstock. So we can all create our micro success stories and decide for our own how far we want to go with that. Find the right balance between liking what you do, invest some time in things you don't necessarily like but need to grow, and the returns (which can be financially or emotionally, pleasure) you get out of it.
So far my philosophical meandering take on the topic.
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I do. Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
Exactly! Work and acquired knowledge (through work) is the answer.
I am not blessed with talent, I'm no artist, I'm an engineer. Everything I do in this field comes from research, analysis and self-learning, not from luck, not from talent.
I have "Zero Talent". :P
Btw, here is another sale that qualifies for "occasional high-priced sale", that just happened today on SS:
I'm the one who really has Zero Talent!!! Zero talent and zero sales. Your portfolio looks great!!
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Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
From my personal experience, with microstock, sheer luck beats talent and hard work. Might not have been the case when the selection of images was more limited, but now with millions of images for competition, it's mostly a matter of luck to have the right image at the right time displayed somewhere.
This one sold for around $100:
https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380 (https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380)
I still have some images where I put lots of work into where I seem to have been able to produce something that is in high demand and the images sold hundreds of times. But even "hundreds of times" can, in worse case scenario, still mean like $50 only. For me it's rarely the images that are in high demand and sell in large quantities that bring in the money. It's the ocassional high amount sales that make the difference between a good month and a bad month on Shutterstock and these, at least for me, are often really random. I really can't attribute having earned $100 from a very random photo of a very random industrial dumpster, that took me literally 3 seconds to take, 0 seconds to post-process and under 10 seconds to keyword to "hard work" or "talent". Anyone who follows the minimum image quality standards of Shutterstock could have made, uploaded and sold an image like this. All it needed was luck.
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Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
From my personal experience, with microstock, sheer luck beats talent and hard work. Might not have been the case when the selection of images was more limited, but now with millions of images for competition, it's mostly a matter of luck to have the right image at the right time displayed somewhere.
This one sold for around $100:
https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380 (https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380)
I still have some images where I put lots of work into where I seem to have been able to produce something that is in high demand and the images sold hundreds of times. But even "hundreds of times" can, in worse case scenario, still mean like $50 only. For me it's rarely the images that are in high demand and sell in large quantities that bring in the money. It's the ocassional high amount sales that make the difference between a good month and a bad month on Shutterstock and these, at least for me, are often really random. I really can't attribute having earned $100 from a very random photo of a very random industrial dumpster, that took me literally 3 seconds to take, 0 seconds to post-process and under 10 seconds to keyword to "hard work" or "talent". Anyone who follows the minimum image quality standards of Shutterstock could have made, uploaded and sold an image like this. All it needed was luck.
That's a beautiful photo!!! Nobody shoots a dumpster like that!!
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Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
From my personal experience, with microstock, sheer luck beats talent and hard work. Might not have been the case when the selection of images was more limited, but now with millions of images for competition, it's mostly a matter of luck to have the right image at the right time displayed somewhere.
This one sold for around $100:
https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380 (https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380)
I still have some images where I put lots of work into where I seem to have been able to produce something that is in high demand and the images sold hundreds of times. But even "hundreds of times" can, in worse case scenario, still mean like $50 only. For me it's rarely the images that are in high demand and sell in large quantities that bring in the money. It's the ocassional high amount sales that make the difference between a good month and a bad month on Shutterstock and these, at least for me, are often really random. I really can't attribute having earned $100 from a very random photo of a very random industrial dumpster, that took me literally 3 seconds to take, 0 seconds to post-process and under 10 seconds to keyword to "hard work" or "talent". Anyone who follows the minimum image quality standards of Shutterstock could have made, uploaded and sold an image like this. All it needed was luck.
I agree with you, luck is probably quite a big factor in the game nowadays.
But don't you think that hard work increases your chances in having that luck?
Hard work can be producing a lot of content, which increases your chances on having more occasional big sales of rather random shots like you had, or having an unintentional best-seller of a rather generic subject.
Hard work can be producing higher quality images, which also increases your chances of getting images actually sold on a very regular basis.
Or hard work can be analyzing the market trends and gaps in the database and start shooting that.
Or combining all of that together.
Whether the hard work is worth the returns is of course a completely different story :)
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Received for one of my videos.
First time such a high amount of money.
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Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
From my personal experience, with microstock, sheer luck beats talent and hard work. Might not have been the case when the selection of images was more limited, but now with millions of images for competition, it's mostly a matter of luck to have the right image at the right time displayed somewhere.
This one sold for around $100:
https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380 (https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380)
I still have some images where I put lots of work into where I seem to have been able to produce something that is in high demand and the images sold hundreds of times. But even "hundreds of times" can, in worse case scenario, still mean like $50 only. For me it's rarely the images that are in high demand and sell in large quantities that bring in the money. It's the ocassional high amount sales that make the difference between a good month and a bad month on Shutterstock and these, at least for me, are often really random. I really can't attribute having earned $100 from a very random photo of a very random industrial dumpster, that took me literally 3 seconds to take, 0 seconds to post-process and under 10 seconds to keyword to "hard work" or "talent". Anyone who follows the minimum image quality standards of Shutterstock could have made, uploaded and sold an image like this. All it needed was luck.
I agree with you, luck is probably quite a big factor in the game nowadays.
But don't you think that hard work increases your chances in having that luck?
Hard work can be producing a lot of content, which increases your chances on having more occasional big sales of rather random shots like you had, or having an unintentional best-seller of a rather generic subject.
Hard work can be producing higher quality images, which also increases your chances of getting images actually sold on a very regular basis.
Or hard work can be analyzing the market trends and gaps in the database and start shooting that.
Or combining all of that together.
Whether the hard work is worth the returns is of course a completely different story :)
Yes, of course hard work, and also talent, plays a role. I don't doubt that. As said, there are images where I invested a large amount of work and time and some of them sell regularly - And across all agencies, counting together the sum, of course they also bring in a decent amount of money over time. But when I just sell my "regular" sellers within a month, my income is my "regular" income as well. Because of the time and effort I put into my photos that "regular" income might be much better than someone else's income, who just snaps a few photos without any real effort. But it's the big sales that make a difference between my average "regular" monthly earnings and a really great month. These big sales have a much bigger impact on my earnings and these are almost always really random photos that do not sell regularly at all, that's why I attribute them to the luck factor.
I am not sure I am getting across what I am trying to say so well. I am convinced that spending time and effort, not only into taking photos and videos, but also into doing research to determine what could sell well and also talent pays off and plays a role in microstock and helps you have a decent income.
But this is a thread about high price photo and video sales and, at least for me, very specifically these sales rarely seem to be the ones connected to effort and work, but more to luck.
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But this is a thread about high price photo and video sales and, at least for me, very specifically these sales rarely seem to be the ones connected to effort and work, but more to luck.
It's not about luck, it's about probabilities.
Luck means that everyone has the same probability to score high-priced sales, like in a lottery.
But obviously, some ports are experiencing high-priced sales more frequently than others.
Improving one's probability to score high-priced sales is not necessarily done through luck or talent (= luck at birth), but rather through research, analysis, learning, and work. ;)
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Hard work beats talent (if talent doesn't work hard)
From my personal experience, with microstock, sheer luck beats talent and hard work. Might not have been the case when the selection of images was more limited, but now with millions of images for competition, it's mostly a matter of luck to have the right image at the right time displayed somewhere.
This one sold for around $100:
https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380 (https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/orange-industrial-transportable-dumpster-container-1668704380)
I still have some images where I put lots of work into where I seem to have been able to produce something that is in high demand and the images sold hundreds of times. But even "hundreds of times" can, in worse case scenario, still mean like $50 only. For me it's rarely the images that are in high demand and sell in large quantities that bring in the money. It's the ocassional high amount sales that make the difference between a good month and a bad month on Shutterstock and these, at least for me, are often really random. I really can't attribute having earned $100 from a very random photo of a very random industrial dumpster, that took me literally 3 seconds to take, 0 seconds to post-process and under 10 seconds to keyword to "hard work" or "talent". Anyone who follows the minimum image quality standards of Shutterstock could have made, uploaded and sold an image like this. All it needed was luck.
I agree with you, luck is probably quite a big factor in the game nowadays.
But don't you think that hard work increases your chances in having that luck?
Hard work can be producing a lot of content, which increases your chances on having more occasional big sales of rather random shots like you had, or having an unintentional best-seller of a rather generic subject.
Hard work can be producing higher quality images, which also increases your chances of getting images actually sold on a very regular basis.
Or hard work can be analyzing the market trends and gaps in the database and start shooting that.
Or combining all of that together.
Whether the hard work is worth the returns is of course a completely different story :)
Yes, of course hard work, and also talent, plays a role. I don't doubt that. As said, there are images where I invested a large amount of work and time and some of them sell regularly - And across all agencies, counting together the sum, of course they also bring in a decent amount of money over time. But when I just sell my "regular" sellers within a month, my income is my "regular" income as well. Because of the time and effort I put into my photos that "regular" income might be much better than someone else's income, who just snaps a few photos without any real effort. But it's the big sales that make a difference between my average "regular" monthly earnings and a really great month. These big sales have a much bigger impact on my earnings and these are almost always really random photos that do not sell regularly at all, that's why I attribute them to the luck factor.
I am not sure I am getting across what I am trying to say so well. I am convinced that spending time and effort, not only into taking photos and videos, but also into doing research to determine what could sell well and also talent pays off and plays a role in microstock and helps you have a decent income.
But this is a thread about high price photo and video sales and, at least for me, very specifically these sales rarely seem to be the ones connected to effort and work, but more to luck.
Yes, clear Firn. My post was indeed a more general remark regarding Microstock, not specifically aimed at fishing for high commissions.
So thanks for bringing it back on topic.
If I'm not mistaken, a discussion regarding which kind of images and subjects generally generate higher commissions took place in the past.
Can't find it after a quick and dirty search, maybe someone else remembers better than I do.
Anyhow, I don't think there was a clear conclusion regarding which kind of images have a higher chance to get better commissions.
So you might be right: it's a matter of luck and then only way to have a higher chance to win the lottery is obtaining more tickets.
I do have the gut feeling that my illustrative editorial images are a bit more subject to generating higher RPD's.
But also way lower in volume, and nothing that comes close to double figure commissions.
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proving one's probability to score high-priced sales is not necessarily done through luck or talent (= luck at birth), but rather through research, analysis, learning, and work. ;)
Million dollar question: which parameters trigger a higher probability? ;)
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There's no way to measure "Talent". So, I say people with the most sales have the most talent. In that regard, I have almost Zero Talent because I have almost zero sales.
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Million dollar question: which parameters trigger a higher probability? ;)
Too easy to answer "the right mix" of all 😁
That is probably true...
By the way, great congrats to Zero Talent, who seems having found the right recipe 👍👍👍
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Million dollar question: which parameters trigger a higher probability? ;)
Too easy to answer "the right mix" of all 😁
That is probably true...
By the way, great congrats to Zero Talent, who seems having found the right recipe 👍👍👍
Sorry for quoting myself... But I would like to add something: a good old question...
Quality or quantity?
I mean, and this is direct question to Zero Talent: could you let us know how many of your works gain high price sales? Percent on all your uploads? That's would be really interesting for me, as I can't find an answer for myself, after years of microstock...
I had several good high price sales, both for images and clips, but sincerely never understand how much the upload quantity count.
Better one great image, or ten middle value images, in your experience?
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I had a $53 sale in July and an $84 sale in August but isn't so very odd that
when I get these higher value sales the overall sales value remains stuck at around $130 a month and never higher ::)
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...
I had several good high price sales, both for images and clips, but sincerely never understand how much the upload quantity count.
Better one great image, or ten middle value images, in your experience?
i go by volume, since i can never predict what will be the best seller (and i doubt any agency can either!)
s
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I had a $15.47 for one photo DL a few months ago.
You must be a relative newcomer. Did you start after they started the $0.10 subs?
What does being a newcomer matter? I get nothing but 10c subs and I'm from after the 10c started.
I was just asking/guessing because the poster only had one $15 DL in a few months. Stop being upset about anything.
Who's upset? I just asked what being a newcomer had to do with $15.47 DL. I'm new and I don't get anything that good, most are 10c.
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I had another "occasional" big sale, yesterday.
I must admit that this month, the "occasional" big sales were more frequent than just "occasional".
August is now the best month of the year, for me.
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Great! :)
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I had occasional high price sales yesterday too. No, I'm not bragging. 2 on demand photo sales that's nearly 30x most photo sales.
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My RPD is pushing toward $0.40 now. Nice!!
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I had occasional high price sales yesterday too. No, I'm not bragging. 2 on demand photo sales that's nearly 30x most photo sales.
4 nice photo sales that just kicked-in today, making those 10c subs look like background noise.
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I had occasional high price sales yesterday too. No, I'm not bragging. 2 on demand photo sales that's nearly 30x most photo sales.
4 nice photo sales that just kicked-in today, making those 10c subs look like background noise.
That's nice!! What the size of your portfolio? I have about 7,000 photos and videos are turned off.
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I had occasional high price sales yesterday too. No, I'm not bragging. 2 on demand photo sales that's nearly 30x most photo sales.
4 nice photo sales that just kicked-in today, making those 10c subs look like background noise.
That's nice!! What the size of your portfolio? I have about 7,000 photos and videos are turned off.
1500+ photos and 300+ videos
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I had occasional high price sales yesterday too. No, I'm not bragging. 2 on demand photo sales that's nearly 30x most photo sales.
4 nice photo sales that just kicked-in today, making those 10c subs look like background noise.
That's nice!! What the size of your portfolio? I have about 7,000 photos and videos are turned off.
1500+ photos and 300+ videos
Wow. You must have very high quality contents!!! My stuff is mostly crap.
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..... My stuff is mostly crap.
I think that explains your 10 cent problem ;)
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..... My stuff is mostly crap.
I think that explains your 10 cent problem ;)
Yup.
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I still have some big sales, 2 or 3 per month between $50 and $90
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Occasional high price video sale...
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Occasional high price video sale...
Cool man! That probably made your day :)
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Don't give up! Occasional sales are back... 'tis video...
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Not really. I don't do video, but over this year from January, after 2000 uploads, I have 2 over $30: $37.50 and $73.40
For me SS is well behind Alamy and Adobe for income.
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Don't give up! Occasional sales are back... 'tis video...
I also got this one a few days ago.
This amount is very unusual for an editorial clip.
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i do only video and i can say ss despite subs sales has higher rpd thatn adobe...at ss i often have premium sales that goes from 50$ to 300$ (my earning) while on adobe i have few rugular sales and a lot of subs sales at 2/5 $ since subs came in...i think adobe with the new free collection will be the agency that will skew the
market in 2023...
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I had a 57$ image sale last week, which soothes the otherwise not so very good October at Shutterstock.
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Not very many high sales for me this year on Shutterstock, the best was a photo for 37.50 back in January, with a few more enhanced photos ranging from $9 to $17.56.
Up to the end of Sept, I have a total of 715 sales for the year for $402. I have nearly doubled that amount on Adobe and iStock is a little behind Shutterstock.
I also have Dreamstime, DepositPhotos, Alamy and Pond5 but they are even further behind.
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No.
35% of nothing = nothing!
Either the buyers are no longer licensing correctly or the need for special licences has declined sharply.
This is also true for Adobe Stock. The number of extended licences there is also going down and down. But there, the RPD is still OK - in contrast to shutterstock.
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Had a $65.16 image sale today. Rare for me but I'll take it.
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Adobe Stock just continues to decline for me despite continued uploading (as the trend line shows). Shutterstock is running at 537% better that Adobe in this current month.
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Shutterstock is running at 537% better that Adobe in this current month.
Is this comparison for downloads or earnings? I also have more downloads at Shutterstock this month (and most, if not all months, for that matter), however, the earnings are better at Adobe.
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Shutterstock is running at 537% better that Adobe in this current month.
Is this comparison for downloads or earnings? I also have more downloads at Shutterstock this month (and most, if not all months, for that matter), however, the earnings are better at Adobe.
Earnings.
ETA it's changed since. Now it's only 499%. ;D
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Adobe Stock just continues to decline for me despite continued uploading (as the trend line shows). Shutterstock is running at 537% better that Adobe in this current month.
Interesting, for me, SS has showed a slow long term decline, while AS has showed a slow long term increase in $$. AS now earns more overall than SS for me....and that is with SS allowing a greater range of editorial.
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Interesting, for me, SS has showed a slow long term decline, while AS has showed a slow long term increase in $$. AS now earns more overall than SS for me....and that is with SS allowing a greater range of editorial.
Same experience here
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Shutterstock is running at 537% better that Adobe in this current month.
But is your portfolio the same size at both sites? Often people have a smaller portfolio at Adobe because they don't take editorials.
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In October, Adobe Stock is currently at 226% over shutterstock in terms of revenue. And it's been an average month so far.
Shutterstock is missing the big licensing revenue this month as well. That's the problem. There are fewer and fewer SODs and Enhanced. Not even level 6 would change anything.
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In October, SS is 10.9% better than AS and only 14.4% of the earnings originate from subs.
Below is my monthly SS vs AS earnings graph, since 2014.
Only 4 times AS managed to do better than SS.