Hi all,
Are you also experiencing extremely low revenue on Shutterstock?
My revenue is down 5-6 fold. It's a disaster.
Review times also became catastrophic. I am uploading vectors and I have to wait around 24-36 hours for my files to get reviewed.
So, despite my regular uploads, my revenue is going down each day.
How are your Shutterstock portfolios doing?

edit

Great.

More exciting news. The last thing that still provided decent return is gone. I used to upload my videos to Adobe first, see which ones would get traction and only then upload the low earners to SS. Now this is pointless.

Spend a pile of cash for very expensive 3d software and a powerful enough PC, spending hours and sometimes days modeling, texturing, lighting... Then rendering which also takes awhile, then editing, then keywording...
Good effort, here's a buck...

This. +1

My sales are good.
Better than 2021.

Hmmm, I only have a small portfolio there - as with all other agencies. Less than 1500 files.

But that I sometimes have to wait over 4 months until the images go through the review, there is only at 123rf. And this only happens there when I write to the contributor support. With all other agencies, the review process is just as fast as it is with all contributors, even if I upload very rarely and very little.

And - without wanting to seem arrogant - my income with 123rf, although it is much less than before, is still several times higher than $10 a month.

So I can't understand this policy of 123rf. Mass alone cannot be the criterion for the speed of the review.

I guess you vectors are more complex or more stock-friendly than mine.
As for reviewing speed, I've read somewhere on this forum about prioritizing batches, but I can't find that thread now. I don't remember the agency in question.
BTW I have 5 files pending on 123RF for quite some time. I have submitted hundreds of vectors and batches always go through, but those singles get stuck for weeks.
Sometimes, while I'm still submitting, they accept a few dozens from that batch. Hence - prioritizing large batches.
In a way it makes sense. Reviewers pick larger batches from the queue, because they want to make more money, if they are paid by number of reviewed images.
If you submit one image every day, in one month you will have 30 submissions, one file per submission. Reviewers just won't bother to accept 30 micro tasks over one task with a large batch. When you contact support, they check your submissions and mark them as urgent. Maybe they pay more money (cents) for urgent reviews, or maybe they create one bigger batch from your separate submissions, and then reviewers check your files.
Anyways, this is way too much writing on this subject.

Quote from: smcbuki on February 17, 2022, 10:59

This is not my experience with 123RF. They are very professional. They review times are more than acceptable (sometimes quicker than SS). Their support is great.
It can take months to accept images only if you don't submit often or if you submit just few images.

Taking months to accept images is hardly what I would call "professional" or an "acceptable" review time.   
How many or often you submit images shouldn't play a role.



 I created an account with them about a year ago, submitted some images, half a year later they were still not reviewed, so I  deleted the site from my bookmarks and wrote that chapter off. That's anything but professional and not an agency I want to work with.

You should have contacted their support. They would push your pending images.
How many images you submit at a time definitely plays a role, almost everywhere. The larger your batch, the sooner your images get accepted.

Hello
Is it worth uploading vectors to 123RF ?
Or this is just a waste of time ?

I have 5500 vectors on 123RF.
I make 5-10 USD per month. I still upload there, because it's really easy, considering my workflow.
So, you decide. If you have thousands of vectors on 12-15 small agencies and you get 10 USD per month from each of them, then you can make 150+ USD per month, or 1800 USD per year. That is a nice addition to "big agencies money" - SS, AS, iS, P5...  But, of course, uploading to 20 agencies takes a lot of time.
If you automate and/or optimize your workflow... maybe...

I'm no expert, and I;ve never used Fuji, but it looks perfectly respectable and no reason it wouldn't be suitable for stock... I mean APS-C, Full 4K recording, 200Mbps, 240fps option... will do the job and it's a pretty decent price. I'd prefer 10-bit 4:2:2 output and F-Log, but you're unlikely to get that for less than $1000.

I can have it for 850EUR in my country and since I mostly use vintage manual lenses, I'd only need an adaptor (EF-X).
But...
I've just downloaded out of camera 240 fps sample and I'm very disappointed.
There's a MONSTER moir on everything. It's unusable for stock, as I see it. Actually, I'm not sure if this is moir or 720p (or even lower resolution) scaled up to 1080p. Maybe it's 720p with moir. Maybe if I do some heavy processing, maybe then it woud be useful for stock.
Anyways, it looks just like 1080p 240fps on my phone.
Again, if someone has one, please tell me your impressions.

Should I create image/video sets? Is it going to increase my sales/visibility/ranking, or is it only good for "viewing my content�s performance and staying organized".
What's your experience? Do you have sets?

Thank you all for constructive replies.
I didn't mean to start a fire here.

https://support.submit.shutterstock.com/s/article/Can-I-open-a-second-account

Thank you for you answer.
Actually, I was going to create that second account for my wife. We are together in stock illustration and we use one (my) account right now.
What I'm trying to ask is...
Do you think that if I mix content (adding photo and video to my illustration/vector portfolio) it may hurt my search rankings and sales?

Ok, so I've checked my port on AS...
Same visibility with and without VPN (chose multiple locations all over the world). My search rankings are identical from all locations.
I'm located in Eastern Europe. Where are you from?
I guess it doesn't affect all regions?

Quote from: smcbuki on January 22, 2021, 02:05

I am using Adobe Illustrator and I always edit file info of my vectors. Shutterstock and 123RF pull all metadata, but Adobe Stock pulls out just a title and then he just suggests keywords.
How can I resolve this?
It's not really big trouble for me to copy/paste keywords from SS or 123, but I'm thinking of adding more agencies (Alamy, Dreamstime, Vectorstock...) and I understand things get more complicated if you don't use metadata.

I checked on this for you and confirmed that you need to embed your keywords in a jpg file add it to a .zip folder with the vector for your submission to have the system read the keywords. Otherwise, copy/paste as you noted or a CSV file will be your best alternative.

-Mat

Thanks. I'll give it a try, again. I'm probably mistaking somewhere.