Microstock Diaries

Thanks to everybody who submitted questions for the Ask a Microstock Superstar competition. There were some very smart questions indeed. The winners have all been contacted and those attending Photoplus 2008 will shortly receive their Gold Pass and Microstock Superstars session ticket directly from PDN.

The winning questions:

Dan Richardson: If you had to start over again, knowing what you know now, and with the Microstock sites available now, which ones would you start with and why?

Matthew Botos: What aspects of microstock photographer do you find most personally satisfying?

Karen Keczmerski: Should photographers consider using an alias like “Yuri Arcurs”?

Ann Parry: Would you advise dedicated stock contributors to go microstock, macrostock or both?

Special Mentions:

Matt Antonino who can’t make the conference: What is the biggest mistake you have made?

Jim Pickerell who already has his ticket: See list of 15 submitted questions

The Real Prize

How often do you get to speak personally to three superstars of your profession? In this seminar, three of the world’s top microstock contributors will share their success stories and answer questions from the audience (and me!). The winners of this competition now have free tickets, but the real prize is being there to learn from the masters.

Tickets are on sale now for the expo and this seminar via the PhotoPlus Expo website. I’ll be available to chat after the seminar, so if you’re there come and introduce yourself to me. I look forward to meeting as many fellow microstock enthusiasts as possible.

Wow! Record earnings this month. Three new agency records and total earnings were 20% above the previous record and up 25% on last month. The jump was primarily due to an unusually high quantity of extended license sales: iStockphoto (2), Dreamstime (1), Fotolia (1) and StockXpert (2).

August marks the end of the microstock summer slowdown so all microstock contributors are looking forward to rising earnings until December.

Here’s my microstock earnings report for August:

Observations:

• The three agencies which earned new record highs selling my portfolio were iStockphoto (broke the record set exactly two years ago!), StockXpert (my first two extended license sales in the same month) and Crestock (second consecutive record earnings month and more than doubled).
• Shutterstock’s OnDemand system worked well netting me six sales and 8% of my total earnings.

News roundup for August 2008. No major breakthroughs, but plenty of forward momentum.

StockXpert turned photos.com inside out to keep StockXpert contributors happy with the connection.

Traditional stock photo agency ImageSource gave a second chance to their bottom 5% of “non-sellers, out of date and out of fashion material” by making them available via Fotolia’s Infinite Collection.

Fotolia joined the ranks of corporate-friendly microstock agencies with the launch of their corporate accounts services which complement their new subscription offerings. They also passed the 4 million images milestone.

Dreamstime reached out to the Czech and Slovak markets by partnering with Imagio.cz.

The microstock editorial market expanded with BigStockPhoto announcing they will soon accept editorial photos.

Shutterstock responded to the rest of the market adopting their business model with a smart adjustment which lets them compete for credit-based buyers while simultaneously raising contributor earnings. They also got a new logo:

Many people criticize the microstock business and specific microstock agencies when the real reason for their discontent is that microstock just isn’t suitable for them. It’s obviously working for some people, so let’s look at some of the situations where microstock isn’t suitable and some of the alternatives that may be more appropriate.

You’re an “Artist”

Almost all successful stock photographers, microstock or traditional, are also business people. They look at what the market wants and create accordingly. This means conducting their own research or buying it, and following market trends or trying to predict them.

If your passion is shooting landscapes, abstracts, fine art or other less commercially popular subjects, you can expect to work harder than others in the microstock market. All successful stock photographers have an element of art to what they do, but they’re not all “Artists” with the inverted commas.

Still, there are many “Artists” who are also successful stock photographers, but they’re the exception. If you’re an “Artist” and want to make stock photography work for you, you need to adjust your expectations accordingly.

You Can’t Handle Rejection

Rejection in the microstock market is unavoidable. Even the top contributors get images rejected. The list of technical requirements is long and every submission must meet them all and at the same time be commercially appealing. Add to that the fact that reviewers often have less experience and knowledge in the stock photo industry than the contributing photographer and frequent inconsistencies in rejections across various agencies, and it can get frustrating.

If you can’t disconnect from your photos enough to accept the rejections, learn what you can and just move on, then you can expect contributing in the microstock market to be frustrating.

You Can’t Get Past the Commission Rates

Microstock commission rates are very low! They can get as low as 18 cents. Looking at it this way it’s hard to see why anyone would sell photos in the microstock market. A photo which you carefully crafted using all your skill, talent, experience and expensive equipment sells for only 18 cents commission!

Successful microstockers look past this perspective. They see the income in terms of time rather than individual sales. Photos obviously sell many times and continue to sell each day, hopefully for years. If you can’t get past the individual commission rates and see the bigger picture then you won’t enjoy selling photos in the microstock market.

You’re Already a Professional Photographer

Many professional photographers working in areas other than stock see microstock as an open opportunity to leverage their skills and equipment to generate a side income. If hobbyists can earn a few hundred dollars a month, surely a professional can do even better.

The fact is that microstock, and stock photography in general, has different requirements than other areas of photography and many professional photographers experience difficulties getting started in microstock. However, some professional photographers thrive in the microstock market. The difference seems to be in the investment of time and energy to understand stock photography and the microstock business. If you look at microstock as any easy-entry and lucrative sideline, microstock may not be for you.

So What are the Alternatives?

If microstock isn’t for you, there’s no shortage of alternative outlets to sell your photos. Here’s some suggestions:

Alamy - an established agency which accepts submissions from the public. Prices are at traditional levels (except the Novel Use scheme) and they offer both Royalty Free and Rights Managed licenses.

PhotoShelter - a new agency who are doing many things right. Sales are still slow and uploading is a lot of work, but they allow you to set your price (minimum $50) and you choose your license.

Inmagine - accepts submissions from the public through its IRIS system. You can choose both a price tier and a license type.

Cutcaster - a new agency supporting prices that run the full range. You choose the price and can receive pricing feedback based on how well your image performs.

Shutterpoint - a pay-to-play agency that allows you to set your own prices from $20 up.

FeaturePics - a microstock agency that lets you set your prices above microstock levels. They also enable Rights Managed sales.

I’ve always been a fan of Paul Melcher’s blog. He draws on his vast industry experience and knowledge to create the insights and opinions he provides via his blog, and he doesn’t hold back. Those posts that aren’t over my head usually leave me laughing or shaking my head in disbelief, but I always learn something and get a fresh perspective. After confessing this to Paul he shared that he has experienced the occasional head shaking after reading some of my blog posts too.

Paul’s strong opinions shine through in Zymmetrical, the agency he has created with business partner Keith Tuomi. Zymmetrical sets itself apart from other agencies in many ways, each designed to position the agency for the future of the market as it evolves “into what we expect today in modern society; unionized, equal-opportunity workplaces” says Keith.

“The real winner in the business will be the one that can balance the need for the content creators to earn a living, and the clients to get good value”, which Keith asserts Zymmetrical can achieve by “bring[ing] the buyers attention to the way we do business with the Artists [contributors]“. He continues, “These days, many people don’t like to knowingly buy things like clothing from sweatshop factories, because they don’t support the working conditions…”.

Zymmetrical has branded this contributor-friendly campaign as “Fair Trade” and backs it up by paying a high 70% contributor royalty rate and enabling contributors to price their content between $3 and $100. Content is referred to throughout the site as “Art” and contributors as “Artists”.

The agency has taken some criticism for their Fair Trade marketing and will be breaking new ground if they can achieve meaningful success with such a high commission rate, but founders Paul and Keith remain confident they can achieve their mission: to bring the best legal content without killing the artist.

Details

Cool Features

• In addition to photos, vectors and video footage, Zymmetrical also supports buying and selling of Royalty Free fonts
• Zymmetrical is well internationalized with local languages, local domain names, and plans for locally located servers
• All IPTC data is shown enabling buyers to see the camera model, shutter speed and all other available information if contributors leave it in
• Buyers can search for images with particular colors and copyspace availability, not dissimilar to facilities at iStockphoto
• The website allows contributors to customize a modular profile page with profile elements similar to those available at other agencies. I was impressed to be able to import and display my own blog feed in my profile page

It’s All About Strategy

Zymmetrical are not going to be among the top earning agencies for contributors any time soon, nor is that their intention. All agencies entering the market at this time have to battle to build their portfolio and customer base simultaneously. This is particularly difficult when both buyers and contributors already get what they need from established agencies.

Some new agencies attempt to build a portfolio and customer base with a big budget. Zymmetrical, however, have “long-term operational and marketing budgets significantly lower than what a casual observer might expect”, so their success is largely dependent upon having a superior strategy.

The race to build sales is actually less important to Keith than enhancing the Zymmetrical customer experience. When explaining why his referral program doesn’t include referred contributors Keith writes, “We’re not playing for a high score yet, in Artist count or file count. At this point I’d rather be able to provide full service for fewer people then half-service for more.”

Low Budgets Have Their Costs

Zymmetrical are building their system slowly and with a limited budget, which comes across on their website. After more than two years online there are still some major shortcomings in their system: contributors must ‘request’ payouts via the PayPal website; FTP uploads are moved into the review queue manually; buyers cannot filter or order search results based on price; and, the site’s functionality and navigation are very clunky. The site’s design is also less polished and less modern than many of their competitors and there are numerous inconsistencies in the site’s information.

The upside of a low budget operation is that changes and fixes can be implemented more quickly, in theory. While the bugs I submitted still haven’t been resolved, I have seen forum conversations where bugs were fixed in real time during the conversation. Additionally, the lower development costs means Zymmetrical are already profitable.

Collaboration and Evolution

Keith and Paul are frequent visitors to the Microstock Group forum responding to questions and complaints respectfully and with a refreshing dose of personality. They’re intent on listening to the community and building their business in collaboration with their suppliers and customers. While they have a clearly defined strategy, they recognize that their business model will always need to evolve in line with changes in the market.

Analysis

The Zymmetrical strategy is designed to be what’s required of a successful stock agency once the market has matured to the equal opportunity state that Keith describes. He’s primary concern in positioning Zymmetrical for the market of tomorrow where the current microstock model will not be viable.

I remain unconvinced that the current microstock business model is killing contributors or is otherwise “unsustainable”. I’m also skeptical that buyers will - in any meaningful quantity - choose a stock photo agency on the basis of the contributor commission alone. That being said, I’ve read enough of Paul Melcher’s blog to know his understanding of the market is superior to mine, so I’ll watch closely for the opportunity to learn something else from the Zymmetrical strategy.

As for contributing to Zymmetrical, they’re clearly not in a position to provide a timely return on investment for uploading an entire portfolio. Everything about the agency is designed for a future that hasn’t yet arrived. While many contributors are reporting sales, it appears that contributing to Zymmetrical is an investment in the future and/or a gesture of support for the Zymmetrical political stand.

Take a look at Zymmetrical here.