Shutterstock continues to be my best seller.

So far this year, I've sold 3.5 times more images on SS than on AS and made 3.25 times more revenue.

That said, I've stopped uploading to AS because approval takes months and is extremely inconsistent. 99% of my uploads to SS are approved in less than 48 hours.

Quote from: Brasilnut on June 29, 2023, 07:05

I interviewed Doug Jensen, veteran stock footage contributor, with a portfolio of 9,187.

Question: In terms of sales volumes and revenue, have you experienced a decrease in the past two years since our last interview?

Answer: "If you define �sales volume� as being the total number of clips that are sold, then that number has remained fairly consistent since we last spoke.  Unfortunately, my revenue, which is ultimately the metric that matters most, has dropped by more than 50% during that same time period.  I attribute this to two things:   First, Shutterstock made a lot of changes to their commission structure that have hurt contributors.  And second, Shutterstock is really pushing customers towards a subscription-based sales model which results in overall lower pricing per clip �  thus lower revenue for the contributors who created those clips.

Here�s how I see it:  If a customer pays an agency $50, does it really matter to the agency whether that $50 covers a single download or a hundred downloads?  $50 is $50 of income to the agency no matter how you slice it.  But the agency didn�t put any effort whatsoever into shooting, editing, uploading, or creating the metadata, so they don�t really care whether that $50 covers one download or a hundred downloads.  It�s still $50 of income (minus the commission) to their bottom line.   But to the average contributor, it is devastating because we only get a very small slice of that $50 if the customer is downloading multiple files.  The way the subscription model works, the more clips a customer downloads, the less money any individual contributor will get for their slice of the pie.  The bottom line is that when you have agencies that are offering customers unlimited 4K and HD downloads for as little as $50 per month, who do you think loses?  The contributor."

Link to full interview:

https://brutallyhonestmicrostock.com/2023/06/28/interview-with-doug-jensen-stock-footage-expert-fresh-insight-after-2-years/

"That dude used to attack me when I criticized Shutterstock on Shutterstock's contributor forum.  Now he's suffering the same fate as everybody else huh."...  I had completely forgotten about Shutterstock's forum.  That certainly went away fast after they lowered our commissions.

Quote from: zeljkok on October 31, 2024, 19:58

For me SS has outperformed AS several months this year, incl. October  despite FireFly bonus and Extended License on AS.

Dismissing SS is premature IMHO.  But to each their own.

i'm seeing this too.  for months (maybe a year) adobe was about 5x shutterstock but starting around may ss starting catching up.  oct is the first month where ss beat as (by about 50%).  i, like many others, was prepared to dismiss them after months of minuscule sales but now that they are competitive i think you're right.

I think SS changed the search algorithm for pictures/videos again from 1st of November, I was checking a lot in the last months where my files where located in the pages and for the last 3-4 months they prioritize the new files which jumped my sales a lot, over 100 assets on daily basis, now I see they went back to the most downloaded assets back on the front pages, I already see an impact, curios if anybody else saw any impact in volume of sales for the 1st of November compared with the last months.