Author Topic: Why is this selling so well at FT? (Read 7230 times)

madelaide · « **on:** June 27, 2007, 19:31 »

This one and its sister image have always been popular at FT (for my standards).

I'm a bit surprised however that it sold 5 times in 6 days. Maybe somehow it's being favoured in the search engine (with the problems people have reported), but do you see any other reason that could explain its popularity?

Regards,
Adelaide

PS: The new watermark is so boring and uncreative!

fintastique · « **Reply #1 on:** June 28, 2007, 13:46 »

Coz its a bright and cheerful illustration

If you do an "illustration" search AT ft for "sun" it is very prominant and very relevant on the first page 27 DLs and 2302 views.

What we should really be asking if you do a search for "sun" ordered by relevance you will see eight shots of one brunette model with a nose stud (a nice series) on the very first page of 40 images and "sun" is not even in their keywords, what the *#@*!

Great search engine!
I personally think the new watermark is useless and would take about 5 minutes to clone out on some illustrations. I have the same problem with a lot of my illustrations which tend to feature large sections of solid colour. I am going to start using more colour gradients and detail.

Did anyone manage to upload and keyword recently?

Whiz · « **Reply #2 on:** June 28, 2007, 14:47 »

I agree, the watermark is worthless. I thought it was simply a temporary watermark or something.

madelaide · « **Reply #3 on:** June 28, 2007, 18:58 »

Quote from: fintastique on June 28, 2007, 13:46

Great search engine!

It's funny that their engine seems to be good enough to give me good sales (and a quite impressive sales/view ratio), but it's also not quite good.

I don't think the search problem is in V2 only - maybe it was only amplified. When they started FT in portuguese, I did some searches in the Brazilian site and the results were awful - images that had nothing to do with the keywords I had typed. They tweaked something and it worked better, but still quite poorly. I thought it was only the translation, maybe it was the tool itself (I don't think I ever checked how good or bad their search tool was).

I uploaded one image through the website form, the description appeared in the title and there is no description field (was there no desc filed before?). Other than that, it worked well, but it is still in queue.

On the good side, I sold 5 images today - one was the sun again...

Regards,
Adelaide

madelaide · « **Reply #4 on:** July 03, 2007, 16:11 »

Just for the records: this image represents 11 of my last 20 dlds, 5 of my last 6!!

I'm considering making it exclusive to FT - it is possible, isn't it? I'm only unsure about this being only a momentary thing caused by the search tool problem, giving it a position in searches it would never normally have.

Regards,
Adelaide

ianhlnd · « **Reply #5 on:** July 12, 2007, 21:40 »

Mad, where has it been selling? I find that a lot of americana type stuff I have doesn't sell, but industrial stuff sells in germany. I think they have very targeted markets and you have to know what's used in those markets, and what would go good there. Apparently that "happy sun" strikes a cord somewhere. I would think Japan or China.

pauloresende · « **Reply #6 on:** July 13, 2007, 03:25 »

I´m Portuguese but in my keyword i always put them in English. Now Fidelia don´t let me put my keywords in English and i don´t sell nothing since V2, and don´t have any visitors. Something is very wrong with Fidelia.

madelaide · « **Reply #7 on:** July 13, 2007, 13:56 »

ianhlnd,

The sun image sells well at FT. It always had, but since the new system it has been selling more. Not that I mind, I'm just curious.

Paulo,

If you use the US or UK Fotolia sites, you can upload in English. I'm Brazilian and it works for me. When I use www.fotolia.com I am sent to the Brazilian site, but when I click on the US link at the bottom, I am sent to the US site where I signed up.

Regards,
Adelaide

Pixart · « **Reply #8 on:** July 13, 2007, 14:42 »

It's quite a useful image I suspect. Actually today I had to double check and ad in the paper if it was yours, there was a local Toyota sale and it used a similar (but with sunglasses) - having their "Sunshine Sale".

madelaide · « **Reply #9 on:** July 13, 2007, 19:41 »

Pixart,

Are you sure it wasn't an edited version of mine? That would have been so exciting! Only once I saw the use of my images!

Anyway, that is a good idea for a new version of it. I must think of other variations as well...

Regards,
Adelaide

Pixart · « **Reply #10 on:** July 13, 2007, 21:19 »

Nope, I'm positive. Yours is much nicer

. For sure, try slapping some sunglasses on the same image and submit another version. The sunglasses they used didn't have legs, just the black frame. Their glasses could have used some white spots / reflected light? - unless it didn't come across so well on newsprint.