Microstock: what bothers me
Posted by mattantonino | Posted in Agencies, Challenges, Earnings, Goals, Microstock World, N2M, Results, Sponsors, Tricks, business, education, models, photography, workflow | Posted on 16-02-2009
6
Most bloggers in microstock are very polite, respectful and friendly to everyone.?? I try to be the same but there are some times and some issues that push my buttons and I think it’s appropriate to respond to issues that come up.? I would like to say that I will talk to, help and work with any agency that wants to listen.? On the other hand, I don’t feel bad for the agencies that get upset by criticism and don’t change.
(Short version: I’m going to bust some chops.? Don’t like it, fix it.)
- Categories – I would love to know the stats on images bought through categories vs. keywords.? Are these seriously necessary?
- Shutterstock refusing to update the photographer side of the site (views, easy image management, etc).
- Banning & removing contributors for having differing opinions on how things should work.
- Fotolia flat out changing the rules mid-stream without telling anyone ALL THE TIME.
- Flat sales in a down economy – this is when we should be picking up new business partners for life.
- 123RF‘s negative review wording “bad this” “poor that” “Snapshot” – ack!
- Editorial captioning rules that are ridiculous – and this includes almost every site that allows editorial images.
- Some sites show off work on their main page that has blown highlights, poor lighting, and looks awful.? It wouldn’t be accepted if you submitted it today – don’t show it off!
- Submission processes that take too long: IStock, Fotolia and several smaller sites – I’m talking to you.? This is a time-oriented business.? Make it FAST for us.
- Small sites that promise to do things different and get no sales.? Ever.? That’s not different.? That’s the same if you’re a small site.? Here’s a hint: photographers + images + sales = more of all of the above.? Thousands of images with no buyers, thousands of buyers with few images – neither works.? Stop trying to do it overnight and BUILD your site.
- Inconsistency.? I subbed 50 to a site and 45 were rejected.? I resubmitted in anger the same exact 45 with *no* changes and 43 were accepted.? Please. Fix. This.
- Make things easy – how many times do I have to repeat this on the list for stock sites to get it?? Not just submissions – make getting our money easy, make resubbing for missing model releases easy, make updating an image data easy. (thank you Bigstock for nailing this!)
- If I submitted an image 3 years ago and I have better PS skills now, allow me to replace the image with a better upload without losing all my stats, views, etc.
- Sites without FTP annoy me.
- Great looking/usable sites without views/sales/revenue – what IS that?? You have the site right.? Just sell.? If you can’t sell, close the business.? This business is ALL sales.
- Get rid of images 4+ years old with no sales.
Okay I’m done for now.? Please feel free to comment, wish me luck in my next career…(laughing), etc.? Someone has to say it.
Related posts:
- Away we go! Hi & welcome back! NiltoMil is officially off and running...
- Directing my energy Let me quote myself. I am not going to stick...
How about Dreamstime’s 150 hours for submittal review? Everyone else does it in a couple of days.
It’s a numbers game, so I’d like to see batch processing for many image editing features.
Crestock’s arrogance in expecting Getty standards for microstock payouts.
I feel your pain on a lot of this and as the owner of a site that caters to photographers as well as buyers of images and vectors, we are always trying to listen and act on the feedback we get. A few points,
I understand your frustration when you say something like this, “Shutterstock refusing to update the photographer side of the site (views, easy image management, etc).” However then you say something like this, “Small sites that promise to do things different and get no sales. Ever. That?s not different. That?s the same if you?re a small site. Here?s a hint: photographers + images + sales = more of all of the above. Thousands of images with no buyers, thousands of buyers with few images – neither works. Stop trying to do it overnight and BUILD your site.”
I think you hit the nail on the head with these two points and they go together in a lot of ways. It really highlights that chicken vs. the egg problem and when do you focus on your sellers needs vs your buyers needs. Such a tough balancing act and one I would love to solve.
“Sites without FTP annoy me. ” Still don’t get why one site in particular never got this. Must have been by design. I would add that sites without FTP annoy me but sites with the ability to parse out IPTC data during an FTP are immediately defined as useless.
I could go on for a bit more but have to get back to work. Interesting feedback and I am thinking along the lines that you are. Keep up the good work. John
I just read this one. This post is more up my road. Great observations, you really know the agencies inside out.
I sooo agree that this would be a Win-Win-Win for client, agency, contributor:
“If I submitted an image 3 years ago and I have better PS skills now, allow me to replace the image with a better upload without losing all my stats, views, etc.”
(SXP has this “submit improved version” feature)