Back in the Seventies and Eighties I founded and ran several Fleet Street photo agencies specialising in stock images of celebrities from pop stars to politicians. These were syndicated to the National and International press and Television. These days I am active in the Microstock world and this blog charts my journey as well as, hopefully, providing inspiration and ideas to others. Image buyers should also find this blog useful with links to my portfolios and regular updates on new uploads. Unless otherwise stated all images are my copyright and may not be reproduced or copied. Comments are very welcome but will be reviewed before publication. Enjoy your visit. Regards, David.

Wednesday 22 November 2017

October Sales Updates:

Placa de Catalunya, Barcelona
October saw no sales at Alamy so they drop right off the list this month. It seems to be that it takes time to build regular sales there so I would expect them to jump on and off my rankings for some time to come. With a portfolio there now just passing the two thousand mark I am continuing to upload my back catalogue (as well as new images) and gradually building a presence.

With Alamy absent that, of course, leaves Shutterstock in top place and a good solid month of sales there. Shutterstock have recently caused some excitement by introducing a new submission editing page. I've only used it a few times but after spending thirty minutes trying to submit my first upload I found things got better once I grasped how the page works and I'm sure it will soon be totally familiar.

Redbubble made a strong second place with two sticker sales and a good print sale. As I approach the second anniversary of my last FineArt America sale I can only wonder at the big difference in performance from these two POD sites.

Istock came in third place with 35 downloads. Not as good as some recent months but subscription sales
Fountain in the Placa de Catalunya, Barcelona
are still averaging well above the old 28 cent flat rate payment.

In fourth place were Dreamstime with 5 downloads. A higher paying credit sale (above $5) and several of the $2 sub sales improved things here a bit.

Bigstock made fifth place with 9 downloads. A variety of sales but I'm still seeing a trend to local Hastings and area images - as I have noted many times before.

Sixth place saw 123rf with 7 downloads. I'm still languishing down at level 1 there and I'll need to see a lot more sales than that to have a hope of returning to level 2.

Catalonian Parliament building in Barcelona
Canstock made an infrequent appearance in seventh place with 2 downloads.

Fotolia brought up the rear in eighth place with just a single download (editorial submissions -please!).

Recent shooting and uploading has concentrated on my last minute trip to Barcelona following the declaration of independence there. Though only a two day trip I managed to get a number of key Barcelona images including, of course, the Catalonian parliament building. Hopefully, these will see some sales as fresh elections approach there. It was a brief but fun introduction to an exciting City and I will certainly be returning for a longer stay in the future. Regards, David.


2 comments:

Parafull Photo said...

Mr. Fowler, I am following your ShootingStock blog and as I can see you are currently making stronger presence on Alamy with your vintage BW images. I have two questions: 1. Were some of your vintage BW images on Alamy downloaded more than once? 2. Do you think it is good idea to upload vintage BW images (the ones that have historical significance) to Alamy only and not elsewhere so to have better chances for making sales?

David Fowler said...

Thanks for your comment. So far none of my archive images have been downloaded more than once on Alamy but I see no reason why they wouldn't be in the future. Your second question is much harder to answer and has to be a personal judgement.In my case, because Alamy only allowed the Royalty Free (RF) option for Editorial from earlier this year, my archive images were already available across microstock sites and I just see Alamy as another outlet for those.If I was starting now would I restrict those images to just Alamy? Probaly not - Alamy has a huge library of archive images and mine are just a few among them. Search Margaret Thatcher (for example) on Alamy and you will get numerous results. Try it on any of the microstock sites and you will get very few which is why Margaret Thatcher is one of my top selling images. My advise would be to do searches and see what is already available for a specific archive image and then make a decision.Kind regards, David.