Author Topic: just went non-exclusive on istock (Read 32114 times)

cthoman · « **Reply #50 on:** April 25, 2014, 12:33 »

Quote from: gostwyck on April 25, 2014, 12:01

SS are growing their business (and ours).

If they aren't growing our business are we allowed to complain?

MichaelJayFoto · « **Reply #51 on:** April 25, 2014, 13:15 »

Quote from: gostwyck on April 25, 2014, 12:01

I wouldn't however give much credit to IS/Getty for increasing prices. They weren't doing it for us __ it was all for themselves.

I agree with most of your statement but at least with this part I don't. There was a period in time when raising prices and especially the introduction of a higher-priced collection (Vetta) was good for all parties involved: Contributors making more money, agency making more money, clients getting more choice especially from a creative point of view.

It was mainly when the price raises for mediocre content (I'm including mine in that "mediocre" part) and the incompetence in getting their technology working drove customers away when there was the "logical" solution: When we can't raise revenues, there is only one way left to raise profits - by cutting costs.

(and for the record: When I started with microstock in 2007, I already had a higher RPD on iStock as an exclusive than I do have now. So Shutterstock still has quite some way to go if they want to match that eventually)

loop · « **Reply #52 on:** April 25, 2014, 14:53 »

Quote from: gostwyck on April 25, 2014, 12:01

Quote from: MichaelJayFoto on April 25, 2014, 10:10

SS are growing their business (and ours). The growth however isn't coming from subs but mainly from all the higher priced image products that they are selling instead. As Jo Ann has pointed out the subs part of SS is now only about 40% of the total. It seems to me that it is only on SS that RPD is consistently growing (and has been for some years now). Everywhere else it has been moving in the wrong direction __ especially at IS.

Not for exclusives: in fact, RPD has skyrocketed in the last two-three years, going to numbers between 10-20 $ per download. Another thing, quite worse and not less important, is RPI that has gone down (especially now, with the doomed subs).

asiseeit · « **Reply #53 on:** April 25, 2014, 15:32 »

Quote from: loop on April 25, 2014, 14:53

Quote from: MichaelJayFoto on April 25, 2014, 10:10

SS are growing their business (and ours). The growth however isn't coming from subs but mainly from all the higher priced image products that they are selling instead. As Jo Ann has pointed out the subs part of SS is now only about 40% of the total. It seems to me that it is only on SS that RPD is consistently growing (and has been for some years now). Everywhere else it has been moving in the wrong direction __ especially at IS.

Not for exclusives: in fact, RPD has skyrocketed in the last two-three years, going to numbers between 10-20 $ per download.

Agreed. For me, RPD has grown exponentially for 10 years straight.

cthoman · « **Reply #54 on:** April 25, 2014, 15:44 »

Quote from: asiseeit on April 25, 2014, 15:32

Agreed. For me, RPD has grown exponentially for 10 years straight.

It will be interesting to see how subs affect RPD vs overall income for exclusives. Will it add to it or just eat away at high value sales?

asiseeit · « **Reply #55 on:** April 25, 2014, 15:58 »

Quote from: cthoman on April 25, 2014, 15:44

Quote from: asiseeit on April 25, 2014, 15:32
Agreed. For me, RPD has grown exponentially for 10 years straight.

It will be interesting to see how subs affect RPD vs overall income for exclusives. Will it add to it or just eat away at high value sales?

Yes it will be interesting to see. Here are my RPD increases over the last 6 years:
99%
32%
68%
40%
36%
32%

These are just regular sales, not including extended licenses or PP or GI stuff. Since they're reporting subs separately like an additional revenue stream, I don't think many people will pay much attention to RPD or even include subs into their analysis. Any effect on regular credit/cash downloads and sales are what people will pay attention to.

pancaketom · « **Reply #56 on:** April 25, 2014, 16:46 »

Quote from: asiseeit on April 25, 2014, 15:32

Quote from: loop on April 25, 2014, 14:53
Quote from: MichaelJayFoto on April 25, 2014, 10:10

SS are growing their business (and ours). The growth however isn't coming from subs but mainly from all the higher priced image products that they are selling instead. As Jo Ann has pointed out the subs part of SS is now only about 40% of the total. It seems to me that it is only on SS that RPD is consistently growing (and has been for some years now). Everywhere else it has been moving in the wrong direction __ especially at IS.

Not for exclusives: in fact, RPD has skyrocketed in the last two-three years, going to numbers between 10-20 $ per download.

Agreed. For me, RPD has grown exponentially for 10 years straight.

I don't think that word means what you think it means.

asiseeit · « **Reply #57 on:** April 25, 2014, 16:54 »

Quote from: pancaketom on April 25, 2014, 16:46

Quote from: asiseeit on April 25, 2014, 15:32
Quote from: loop on April 25, 2014, 14:53
Quote from: MichaelJayFoto on April 25, 2014, 10:10

SS are growing their business (and ours). The growth however isn't coming from subs but mainly from all the higher priced image products that they are selling instead. As Jo Ann has pointed out the subs part of SS is now only about 40% of the total. It seems to me that it is only on SS that RPD is consistently growing (and has been for some years now). Everywhere else it has been moving in the wrong direction __ especially at IS.

Not for exclusives: in fact, RPD has skyrocketed in the last two-three years, going to numbers between 10-20 $ per download.

Agreed. For me, RPD has grown exponentially for 10 years straight.

I don't think that word means what you think it means.

ha ha

made me look it up. According to webster's definition 3 it fits.
"characterized by or being an extremely rapid increase (as in size or extent)"
... but I know what you mean

ShadySue · « **Reply #58 on:** April 25, 2014, 16:59 »

Quote from: cthoman on April 25, 2014, 15:44

Quote from: asiseeit on April 25, 2014, 15:32
Agreed. For me, RPD has grown exponentially for 10 years straight.

It will be interesting to see how subs affect RPD vs overall income for exclusives. Will it add to it or just eat away at high value sales?

Almost certainly the latter, as they are actively trying to switch existing buyers.

gostwyck · « **Reply #59 on:** April 25, 2014, 17:11 »

Quote from: asiseeit on April 25, 2014, 15:58

Quote from: cthoman on April 25, 2014, 15:44
Quote from: asiseeit on April 25, 2014, 15:32
Agreed. For me, RPD has grown exponentially for 10 years straight.

It will be interesting to see how subs affect RPD vs overall income for exclusives. Will it add to it or just eat away at high value sales?

Yes it will be interesting to see. Here are my RPD increases over the last 6 years:
99%
32%
68%
40%
36%
32%

These are just regular sales, not including extended licenses or PP or GI stuff. Since they're reporting subs separately like an additional revenue stream, I don't think many people will pay much attention to RPD or even include subs into their analysis. Any effect on regular credit/cash downloads and sales are what people will pay attention to.

What order are those numbers in? Is 99% the latest year or the first year you started? Please specify which numbers relate to which year.

asiseeit · « **Reply #60 on:** April 25, 2014, 17:15 »

Quote from: gostwyck on April 25, 2014, 17:11

Quote from: asiseeit on April 25, 2014, 15:58
Quote from: cthoman on April 25, 2014, 15:44
Quote from: asiseeit on April 25, 2014, 15:32
Agreed. For me, RPD has grown exponentially for 10 years straight.

It will be interesting to see how subs affect RPD vs overall income for exclusives. Will it add to it or just eat away at high value sales?

Yes it will be interesting to see. Here are my RPD increases over the last 6 years:
99%
32%
68%
40%
36%
32%

These are just regular sales, not including extended licenses or PP or GI stuff. Since they're reporting subs separately like an additional revenue stream, I don't think many people will pay much attention to RPD or even include subs into their analysis. Any effect on regular credit/cash downloads and sales are what people will pay attention to.

What order are those numbers in? Is 99% the latest year or the first year you started? Please specify which numbers relate to which year.

2008 99%
2009 32%
2010 68%
2011 40%
2012 36%
2013 32%

kayann · « **Reply #61 on:** April 26, 2014, 05:38 »

Quote from: BoBoBolinski on April 20, 2014, 12:30

I hope you will keep us updated as to your experience. I think there would be quite a few people interested.

Well my first update about my going non-exclusive experience is that two weeks ago I clicked on the istock link to cancel exclusivity. For 10 days it was counting down. I checked it every day or two. Suddenly at the beginning of this week it is gone and there is no indication that I put in for exclusivity at all. I sent in the contributor form to tell them about the problem but of course I have not heard from them. If my past experiences are any indication I will get an email back in two or three weeks.

kayann · « **Reply #62 on:** April 26, 2014, 05:50 »

Quote from: Jo Ann Snover on April 22, 2014, 09:35

Quote from: wds on April 22, 2014, 07:58
Lisa and Dirk,

But in the cases of Dreamstime and Shutterstock. Can you place links to these lightboxes as part of an image caption?

No - no HTML or UBB allowed in captions.

This was one of my favorite things about istock. Since I create for such a niche audience, I think it really helped to be able to have the image link to a lightbox. Example - If you are looking at an illustration of a woman softball player and the one you found is not quite what you wanted here is a link to my other similiar vectors.

Now of course istock is forcing these links so far down the page and they put such a large gap of white space above them, I doubt that most customers even seen them. It may be as Michael has said here that istock did not have a good mechanism of their own so they gave contributor's more control. That is okay by me. When I first began with istock in 2005, I thought they did so much to allow contributors to market themselves. Now they seem to be working hard to bury contributors or get them to leave.

kayann · « **Reply #63 on:** April 26, 2014, 06:17 »

Quote from: SNP on April 25, 2014, 09:36

Quote from: MichaelJayFoto on April 25, 2014, 01:55
Quote from: SNP on April 24, 2014, 14:22
By reputable I mean: established, selling licenses, communicating with contributors, working with contributors openly and honestly, in a supportive manner.

Yes, I would support that definition of reputable. And I am not convinced that I know a microstock agency that would fit that description.

microstock isn't the be-all and end-all either. important to branch out, get into mid and macro....and other avenues of photography. I love ImageBrief as a sales opportunity, it is one of the models out there that I think is clever and apropos for the market today.

but giving credit where it's due, Shutterstock impress the heck out of me in terms of treating serious contributors well. if only the amount per download wasn't such pittance, but the volume is nice. would love to combine my iStock sales best years with Shutterstock the company. I hope they'll develop more of the non-sub license sales, and I like Offset.

pre-Getty this was istock. They did everything to attract good contributors. Going forward I think it will be agencies trying to cull out contributors. I see both sides of this issue, but I am not a photographer. I started at istock as a buyer. I created business presentations for a corporation and it was so annoying to page through image after image of the same thing. That is where the friend system was great. I would friend Yuri and Sean, etc. just because I could rely on them. If I needed to create a quick presentation I went to my friend list first.

When I started illustrating for istock my approach was to upload illustrations they did not have many of. As all of you know this means less sales. I thought it would be good to fill out their catalogue and bring in a new type of customers. It was a nice second income for me, but what I have learned about business today is this thinking is to nuanced for them. They want big money numbers and you don't really need to think any deeper than that.

kayann · « **Reply #64 on:** April 26, 2014, 06:26 »

Quote from: MichaelJayFoto on April 25, 2014, 13:15

Quote from: gostwyck on April 25, 2014, 12:01
I wouldn't however give much credit to IS/Getty for increasing prices. They weren't doing it for us __ it was all for themselves.

I agree with most of your statement but at least with this part I don't. There was a period in time when raising prices and especially the introduction of a higher-priced collection (Vetta) was good for all parties involved: Contributors making more money, agency making more money, clients getting more choice especially from a creative point of view.

It was mainly when the price raises for mediocre content (I'm including mine in that "mediocre" part) and the incompetence in getting their technology working drove customers away when there was the "logical" solution: When we can't raise revenues, there is only one way left to raise profits - by cutting costs.

(and for the record: When I started with microstock in 2007, I already had a higher RPD on iStock as an exclusive than I do have now. So Shutterstock still has quite some way to go if they want to match that eventually)

As a buyer for years Michael, to me, has hit on the exact problem. istock's site got impossible to use. It just slowed to a crawl and became in-usable. At the same time they have a site that is just infuriating to use they raise prices not just a little but a lot. I am sure I am not the only buyer that went looking for other options.

As a contributor, I loved the higher prices. I may not have had many views but I got paid more per piece so the lower views did not matter. It you have 2 views and get one download for $7.50 it is way better than 50 views and 7 downloads at .30 cents.

blamb · « **Reply #65 on:** April 26, 2014, 22:28 »

Quote from: kayann on April 26, 2014, 05:38

two weeks ago I clicked on the istock link to cancel exclusivity. For 10 days it was counting down. I checked it every day or two. Suddenly at the beginning of this week it is gone and there is no indication that I put in for exclusivity at all.

I had a similar experience. With 7 days to go I received an email saying 'congrats on becoming an istock exclusive!' I sent out some messages and received confirmation that I was still scheduled but then my exclusivity disappeared, a week early. Maybe there's a bug.

elvinstar · « **Reply #66 on:** April 26, 2014, 23:04 »

Quote from: blamb on April 26, 2014, 22:28

Maybe there's a bug.

There are no such things as bugs, only features.

kayann · « **Reply #67 on:** April 27, 2014, 04:53 »

Quote from: blamb on April 26, 2014, 22:28

Quote from: kayann on April 26, 2014, 05:38
two weeks ago I clicked on the istock link to cancel exclusivity. For 10 days it was counting down. I checked it every day or two. Suddenly at the beginning of this week it is gone and there is no indication that I put in for exclusivity at all.

I had a similar experience. With 7 days to go I received an email saying 'congrats on becoming an istock exclusive!' I sent out some messages and received confirmation that I was still scheduled but then my exclusivity disappeared, a week early. Maybe there's a bug.

how could you tell that your exclusivity disappeared? Or are you saying your exclusivity countdown dissappeared?

kayann · « **Reply #68 on:** April 27, 2014, 06:32 »

I am just trying to make sure I understand, shutterstock removes pieces that have not sold after a certain length of time? For instance, if I upload an illustration of a wheelchair race if one only gets sold twice a year say, it will be remove for lack of sales?

kayann · « **Reply #69 on:** April 27, 2014, 07:43 »

Quote from: chromaco on April 16, 2014, 11:19

Illustrators absolutely must upload to Toonvectors! Sales are slowish (but regular and consistent monthly) but at a commission of $14 per sale and 70% you should support this site simply on principle. Upload is a bit unorthodox but once you get it is extremely easy. Toonvectors commissions for me are about 2 times DP and Fotolia and blow the other smaller sites out of the water. This site and Symbio are the two most promising prospects for illustrators in years.

Are there other vector sites you would recommend?

Shelma1 · « **Reply #70 on:** April 27, 2014, 08:41 »

Quote from: kayann on April 27, 2014, 06:32

I am just trying to make sure I understand, shutterstock removes pieces that have not sold after a certain length of time? For instance, if I upload an illustration of a wheelchair race if one only gets sold twice a year say, it will be remove for lack of sales?

I don't think Shutterstock does. But I think Dreamstime does.

luissantos84 · « **Reply #71 on:** April 27, 2014, 09:23 »

Quote from: Shelma1 on April 27, 2014, 08:41

Quote from: kayann on April 27, 2014, 06:32
I am just trying to make sure I understand, shutterstock removes pieces that have not sold after a certain length of time? For instance, if I upload an illustration of a wheelchair race if one only gets sold twice a year say, it will be remove for lack of sales?

I don't think Shutterstock does. But I think Dreamstime does.

yep, after 4 years, quite sick of their daily emails

chromaco · « **Reply #72 on:** April 27, 2014, 10:12 »

Quote from: kayann on April 27, 2014, 07:43

Quote from: chromaco on April 16, 2014, 11:19
Illustrators absolutely must upload to Toonvectors! Sales are slowish (but regular and consistent monthly) but at a commission of $14 per sale and 70% you should support this site simply on principle. Upload is a bit unorthodox but once you get it is extremely easy. Toonvectors commissions for me are about 2 times DP and Fotolia and blow the other smaller sites out of the water. This site and Symbio are the two most promising prospects for illustrators in years.

Are there other vector sites you would recommend?

I've learned that my results and recommendations are so far from the norm that most people will violently disagree with me. Ill just say this... SS is only 12% of my earnings and IS is less than 2%. There are other options but you need to test them all, track your results and upload accordingly. May not work for you but I personally am not to worried about 1 single agency doing something to dramatically affect my earnings.

kayann · « **Reply #73 on:** April 29, 2014, 10:27 »

Quote from: chromaco on April 27, 2014, 10:12

Quote from: kayann on April 27, 2014, 07:43
Quote from: chromaco on April 16, 2014, 11:19
Illustrators absolutely must upload to Toonvectors! Sales are slowish (but regular and consistent monthly) but at a commission of $14 per sale and 70% you should support this site simply on principle. Upload is a bit unorthodox but once you get it is extremely easy. Toonvectors commissions for me are about 2 times DP and Fotolia and blow the other smaller sites out of the water. This site and Symbio are the two most promising prospects for illustrators in years.

Are there other vector sites you would recommend?
I've learned that my results and recommendations are so far from the norm that most people will violently disagree with me. Ill just say this... SS is only 12% of my earnings and IS is less than 2%. There are other options but you need to test them all, track your results and upload accordingly. May not work for you but I personally am not to worried about 1 single agency doing something to dramatically affect my earnings.

you can't text what you don't know about

chromaco · « **Reply #74 on:** April 29, 2014, 11:13 »

This is what I mean.
I like Canstock and 123 because they sell really well for me. Istock isn't all that good for me but mostly because I have chosen not to deal with them. FT is worthless and I really like GL.
Self hosted and a couple of sites that don't even earn a rating are my preferred uploads. But you seem to be genuinely interested so here is my upload priority list.

Self hosted - (5 sites)
Clipartof - (closed to new contributors)
Toonvectors - (70% commission on $20 vectors)
GLStock (52% on $14.00 vectors)
Pond 5 (I don't actually upload here yet but intend to when I start uploading to micros again)

Cutcaster
Stockfresh
Stockami
Featurepics
Yay
(I like the RPD even though the sales are slow- the way I look at it is if they are stealing sales from the sub sites great...I get paid better. These site combine for Christmas money at the end of the year)

Shutterstock
Canstock
123
Dreamstime
(I really, really dislike subs because I see them as killing my future sales. These sites now only get the images I have tracked as not great or non sellers on my preferred sites.It is also much more likely that my images will be stolen/shared on free sites because of the low price.)

Sites I probably won't upload to again
Bigstock (I liked these guys until they introduced the subs)
IS (Hundreds of reasons)
FT (Sales just never justified liking these guys)
DP (RPD is just to low for the volume)
Graphic River (Prices are too low-even though they do have decent volume)
Veer (Just a strange site with weird sales patterns)

Sites that will never get anymore of my images
Crestock (I can live without the four $.25 sales I get a month)
Vectorstock (Price is way to low)
Isignstock (No sales details and an arbitrary commission at the end of the month)

I want to be selling my images 20 years from now and my images take a while to produce. I will never have 10,000 images so I feel like I need to protect the ones I do have. I now look for a RPD of at least $7.00. I won't remove images that I have already uploaded but my new stuff goes to my preferred sites first. This is working for me because my income continues to rise and I don't lose sleep at night hoping that Shutterstock doesn't change their commission structure.
Note: I spend a lot of time doing things that most people would consider insane. It probably takes me around 10 minutes per image to prepare and upload an image to the first site and about 3 minutes for every site after that. I spend a massive amount of time on keywording, image naming, and content descriptions. Finally, I would guess that about 70% of my income comes directly from Google Image searches. I would argue that anyone who says that you can't sell images without a huge marketing budget is simply wrong. I'm tempted to start a co-op of illustrators based on what I've learned and the symbiostock foundation but I'm not sure enough people would be willing to invest the money and more importantly the time it would take to make it work.

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Author Topic: just went non-exclusive on istock (Read 32114 times)

cthoman

MichaelJayFoto

loop

asiseeit

cthoman

asiseeit

pancaketom

asiseeit

ShadySue

gostwyck

asiseeit

kayann

kayann

kayann

kayann

blamb

elvinstar

kayann

kayann

kayann

Shelma1

luissantos84

chromaco

kayann

chromaco

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