MicrostockGroup
Agency Based Discussion => VideoBlocks => Topic started by: KimsCreativeHub on March 29, 2019, 22:19
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Hi i was wondering how to leave videoblocks with my balance of $24.50
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I was just going to post to see if anyone is leaving SB. I think I am going to close my account there. My 3-4 sales a month has gone to zero a month once they made the "good news" announcement.
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I was just going to post to see if anyone is leaving SB. I think I am going to close my account there. My 3-4 sales a month has gone to zero a month once they made the "good news" announcement.
Yes and it would have been nice if the “cash out min” was changed from $25 to $24
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I was just going to post to see if anyone is leaving SB. I think I am going to close my account there. My 3-4 sales a month has gone to zero a month once they made the "good news" announcement.
The same with me :-(
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I was stuck on $24.50 for 7 months - I asked for my money - after two longgggggg emails staying how wonderful the company is, they suddenly paid last month -
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What has happened to them? They have gone from quite reliable to very pathetic. I've sent them emails about how useless they've become and they always reply with the same stock standard BS.
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What has happened to them? They have gone from quite reliable to very pathetic. I've sent them emails about how useless they've become and they always reply with the same stock standard BS.
They now have ample clips in their wholly owned collection to fill most of their needs. That was the plan all along, to ultimately phase out the paid collection so they get more subscribers that do not have to pay more doe for clips once they lay out the cash for the subscriber model. I think many here pointed that out early on and questioned VBs long term intent. Those hypothesis came true and sure enough VB cut commissions and could now care less about the contributors who helped make them successful.
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Thanks all for the responses :)
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This year a total disaster. Not worth it anymore.
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What has happened to them? They have gone from quite reliable to very pathetic. I've sent them emails about how useless they've become and they always reply with the same stock standard BS.
They now have ample clips in their wholly owned collection to fill most of their needs. That was the plan all along, to ultimately phase out the paid collection so they get more subscribers that do not have to pay more doe for clips once they lay out the cash for the subscriber model. I think many here pointed that out early on and questioned VBs long term intent. Those hypothesis came true and sure enough VB cut commissions and could now care less about the contributors who helped make them successful.
And when the next one comes along like DP did before VB and pulls the same game, people will run to join. Then we can watch as they get the materials and content and pull the rug out from under their promises. I'm happy for the people who made money off VB early on, I'm also happy I never joined, because I'd be leaving now. :)
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I used to get a few sales each month.
But now nothing this year.
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What has happened to them? They have gone from quite reliable to very pathetic. I've sent them emails about how useless they've become and they always reply with the same stock standard BS.
They now have ample clips in their wholly owned collection to fill most of their needs. That was the plan all along, to ultimately phase out the paid collection so they get more subscribers that do not have to pay more doe for clips once they lay out the cash for the subscriber model. I think many here pointed that out early on and questioned VBs long term intent. Those hypothesis came true and sure enough VB cut commissions and could now care less about the contributors who helped make them successful.
I just looked back at what I said about them in 2015 "I've stayed away from VB. If they become successful they force other sites to lower prices and then what happens if they decide to take 50% royalty or if they stop licensing videos and only promote their free offerings. I'm going to say away and most likely this year go exclusively with Pond5"
I didn't go exclusive with P5 since then but I did put more work on there than anywhere else. It should have been obvious to everyone what VB's plan was all along.
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Hi i was wondering how to leave videoblocks with my balance of $24.50
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Did April do it for you?
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Hi i was wondering how to leave videoblocks with my balance of $24.50
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Did April do it for you?
No, i did tske my file s off so I could be exclusive w pond five.
I did. Hear someone say it takes long
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Nobody bite on the Partner Program / revenue share thing?
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Craffed shutter made a very good video about Storyblocks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyeQmy3BV70&t=2s (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyeQmy3BV70&t=2s)
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What has happened to them? They have gone from quite reliable to very pathetic. I've sent them emails about how useless they've become and they always reply with the same stock standard BS.
They now have ample clips in their wholly owned collection to fill most of their needs. That was the plan all along, to ultimately phase out the paid collection so they get more subscribers that do not have to pay more doe for clips once they lay out the cash for the subscriber model. I think many here pointed that out early on and questioned VBs long term intent. Those hypothesis came true and sure enough VB cut commissions and could now care less about the contributors who helped make them successful.
I just looked back at what I said about them in 2015 "I've stayed away from VB. If they become successful they force other sites to lower prices and then what happens if they decide to take 50% royalty or if they stop licensing videos and only promote their free offerings. I'm going to say away and most likely this year go exclusively with Pond5"
I didn't go exclusive with P5 since then but I did put more work on there than anywhere else. It should have been obvious to everyone what VB's plan was all along.
Yep. I recall you saying that.
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My next prediction is that within a year they'll get rid of the marketplace altogether.
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I used to get a few sales each month.
But now nothing this year.
My sales dropped from a peak of $1500-2000 a month there to about 2 a month now. Really not worth continuing there.
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I suppose you haven't considered that pushing them to raise marketplace prices by over 60% caused the potential buyers to look elsewhere?
The typical VB customers are not bigger budget advertisers that go to Pond5 and Shutterstock mainly. They are small subscription users that sometimes could stretch their budget to one or two $49 clips. Even that was probably out of reach for most.
And then you probably got quite a few buyers shopping around for the cheapest price, and now there is no reason for them to buy from VB instead of P5 or Shutterstock, where you get 40% or 30%. :)
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I suppose you haven't considered that pushing them to raise marketplace prices by over 60% caused the potential buyers to look elsewhere?
The typical VB customers are not bigger budget advertisers that go to Pond5 and Shutterstock mainly. They are small subscription users that sometimes could stretch their budget to one or two $49 clips. Even that was probably out of reach for most.
And then you probably got quite a few buyers shopping around for the cheapest price, and now there is no reason for them to buy from VB instead of P5 or Shutterstock, where you get 40% or 30%. :)
Are you sure they didn't raise their marketplace prices so that the subscriptions would be more attractive? When I look at their marketplace clips they all link to free files when you click on them, all the similars are subscription files. How do you know what their typical customer is? They list ABC, NBC, the History Channel, MTv, Travel Channel etc... as clients. Those aren't small companies with tiny budgets. VB sells at $79 the same as SS.
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Are you sure they didn't raise their marketplace prices so that the subscriptions would be more attractive?
None of us can be sure of anything, since we don't work there. But subscriptions have always been their main product. They raised the prices because of pressure from content creators. They were set on continuing with $49, a price people thought was perfectly reasonable before.
They list ABC, NBC, the History Channel, MTv, Travel Channel etc... as clients.
Everyone lists their famous clients in the spotlight. So do I, and even if I have sold licenses to McDonald's and Nike, they are not my typical customer.
VB sells at $79 the same as SS.
Yes, which was the entire point of my previous post. As nearly all VB contributors are reporting near $0 sales since the price change, something happened. And if anything, VB would only be more inclined to want to sell marketplace content now that they get 50%.
Buyers have no reason to shop at VB now since the Shutterstock library is both better and bigger, at the same price.
But a buyer that needs 20 marketplace quality clips would have saved $600 with the old VB prices, which can be significant for small to medium sized businesses.
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Are you sure they didn't raise their marketplace prices so that the subscriptions would be more attractive?
None of us can be sure of anything, since we don't work there. But subscriptions have always been their main product. They raised the prices because of pressure from content creators. They were set on continuing with $49, a price people thought was perfectly reasonable before.
They list ABC, NBC, the History Channel, MTv, Travel Channel etc... as clients.
Everyone lists their famous clients in the spotlight. So do I, and even if I have sold licenses to McDonald's and Nike, they are not my typical customer.
VB sells at $79 the same as SS.
Yes, which was the entire point of my previous post. As nearly all VB contributors are reporting near $0 sales since the price change, something happened. And if anything, VB would only be more inclined to want to sell marketplace content now that they get 50%.
Buyers have no reason to shop at VB now since the Shutterstock library is both better and bigger, at the same price.
But a buyer that needs 20 marketplace quality clips would have saved $600 with the old VB prices, which can be significant for small to medium sized businesses.
Are they also pushing the subscription sharing model because of contributors desire for that? I remember people saying only bloggers use SS not serious buyers with money. Getting 100% is better than getting 50% so I'm not sure they want to push marketplace content, if they did they would make it easy to see that content and put it in the similars space but they don't, they also wouldn't be trying to get contributors to sign up for the subscription sharing program either.
Also when you do a search there the marketplace clips are hidden by default, only membership files are shown. When you click show all you get a pop up warning about them and then in the generic search I did only 1 out of the first 60 clips was a marketplace clip.
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WOW - Despite Videoblocks efforts not to sell my clips (now appearing at end of search). I JUST HAD A SALE! . . . first one this year.
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Are they also pushing the subscription sharing model because of contributors desire for that? I remember people saying only bloggers use SS not serious buyers with money. Getting 100% is better than getting 50% so I'm not sure they want to push marketplace content, if they did they would make it easy to see that content and put it in the similars space but they don't, they also wouldn't be trying to get contributors to sign up for the subscription sharing program either.
Also when you do a search there the marketplace clips are hidden by default, only membership files are shown. When you click show all you get a pop up warning about them and then in the generic search I did only 1 out of the first 60 clips was a marketplace clip.
You don't seem to be following the reasoning here... We're not discussing promotion of the subscriptions, they have ALWAYS had that as their main product.
Only subscribers got the marketplace clips for $49, so naturally, only if they didn't find what they needed in the unlimited section, they would go to the marketplace clips. Now, when they cost $79 anyway, the subscription isn't worth as much, and they can go to Pond5 and find cheaper $25 clips, or a better library (including the clips they may find at VB, since they're all spread out) of $79 clips at Shutterstock/Pond5/Adobe.
Non-subscribers who shopped around for price before the change, needing more than 6-7 clips got a great deal by subscribing and getting thousands of free clips + the same clips they wanted for $49. That is not the case anymore. Now they just get a mediocre unlimited library with no other benefits.
Therefore, very few marketplace sales.
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Are they also pushing the subscription sharing model because of contributors desire for that? I remember people saying only bloggers use SS not serious buyers with money. Getting 100% is better than getting 50% so I'm not sure they want to push marketplace content, if they did they would make it easy to see that content and put it in the similars space but they don't, they also wouldn't be trying to get contributors to sign up for the subscription sharing program either.
Also when you do a search there the marketplace clips are hidden by default, only membership files are shown. When you click show all you get a pop up warning about them and then in the generic search I did only 1 out of the first 60 clips was a marketplace clip.
You don't seem to be following the reasoning here... We're not discussing promotion of the subscriptions, they have ALWAYS had that as their main product.
Only subscribers got the marketplace clips for $49, so naturally, only if they didn't find what they needed in the unlimited section, they would go to the marketplace clips. Now, when they cost $79 anyway, the subscription isn't worth as much, and they can go to Pond5 and find cheaper $25 clips, or a better library (including the clips they may find at VB, since they're all spread out) of $79 clips at Shutterstock/Pond5/Adobe.
Non-subscribers who shopped around for price before the change, needing more than 6-7 clips got a great deal by subscribing and getting thousands of free clips + the same clips they wanted for $49. That is not the case anymore. Now they just get a mediocre unlimited library with no other benefits.
Therefore, very few marketplace sales.
My point is that they probably wanted that. At some point, when they had enough content, they were going to get rid of the marketplace which I think they are setting up right now. The marketplace content was just used to get people to buy subscriptions. Raising prices makes their content more attractive. If it doesn't sell then they can argue you should join the subscription sharing program.
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I talked to VB. Only 2 video sales in 2019. Drastic fall-off! I stopped uploading fresh content and will wait another 3 months (if something changes) before I close the account.
Sad story :( they were one of my favorites
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What has happened to them? They have gone from quite reliable to very pathetic. I've sent them emails about how useless they've become and they always reply with the same stock standard BS.
They now have ample clips in their wholly owned collection to fill most of their needs. That was the plan all along, to ultimately phase out the paid collection so they get more subscribers that do not have to pay more doe for clips once they lay out the cash for the subscriber model. I think many here pointed that out early on and questioned VBs long term intent. Those hypothesis came true and sure enough VB cut commissions and could now care less about the contributors who helped make them successful.
I just looked back at what I said about them in 2015 "I've stayed away from VB. If they become successful they force other sites to lower prices and then what happens if they decide to take 50% royalty or if they stop licensing videos and only promote their free offerings. I'm going to say away and most likely this year go exclusively with Pond5"
I didn't go exclusive with P5 since then but I did put more work on there than anywhere else. It should have been obvious to everyone what VB's plan was all along.
Still I don't regret those 3 good years of high commission (100%) sales before things went upside down.
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My average monthly sales at VB...
2016: $218
2017: $271
2018: $203
2019: $33
Ah well... it was nice while it lasted!
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I just saw the video about story blocks.. what scumbags and what a great informative video!
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I just saw the video about story blocks.. what scumbags and what a great informative video!
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Going to give it a watch.
Edit: Weeeee I am almost done deleting 1500 videos manually. Then, POOF! Account closed after.
Edit: Done deleting 1500 clips. Sent a email to close my account entirely.
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Would anyone know how much the average sale is for this new subscription program that Storyblocks have implemented? I can't find any information about such details. Ive only just recently joined SB myself so I missed out on the so-called good old days. If these new commissions are going to be painfully low, I'm going to have to remove my small port and head elsewhere. I regret not joining earlier when the goings were good.
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VB made it clear that their focus is on subscription-based content. If you're not willing to put your material in this type of program, you might as well not even put content on VB.
That said, there is a market for subscriptions. There are customers that ONLY "shop" on subscription-based agencies. These are the customers that will never buy a "one-off" clip for $79. And most of VB's customer base are of this type.
And that's why their marketplace sales have tanked.
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The subscription model will be the end of stock...you pay a month or year fee and you can download all the library...does it make sense?? If you want your clips to sale elsewhere stay away from it...
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... I second that... have tried and I ran away asap... think twice, because return is not worth of risk, to offer your files almost for nothing...