Ask Steve a Question
One thing I tried many months ago was to open up the website to questions and I then tried to combine similar questions and answer them in a concise post. So this might be a time to try that again!
You can ask a question in the comments below, or send me a message through the contact form. Your question can be anonymous if you like. I’ll wait a while and then start to create some answering posts.
So, if you have a burning question on your mind, ask away!
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Mostly I get 10 cents per sale on Shutterstock, yet on very rare occasions it’s a large amount like $50 or $75 for one sale. How does Shutterstock calculate those variances?
There are two main reasons for high price sales – one is that the buyer needs a wider set of uses than are permitted in the standard license that SS offers – an enhanced license that allows them to use the image with a much larger print run, or on a product that they are going to sell. So you see your percentage of those higher priced licenses. The other time you see them is when a customer has a deal with Shutterstock that provides them with a higher level of support, for instance and that support results in higher sale prices. These are often known as “single” sales and can be anything from a few dollars to over $100 or more. One of the reasons that Alamy gets away with charging higher prices is that they offer much more support to their customers and the buyers are willing to pay for that. We get our share of the resultant higher price.
Well, that explains the mystery. Thank you, Steve!
I have a funny conspiracy theory about DT agency and wanted to ask if you have noticed something like this. So last month I reached my first ever payout there. At fist I had lot of sales( at least everyday). And the closer I got to Payout( 100) the gaps between sales widened. Almost week no sale, then sold one pic. Again week with nothing, then 1-2 pic sale. So on. So I finally cashed my first payout and NOW I again have even multiple sales per day :D. Have you notices something like this?
I haven’t noticed that and I would be surprised if Dreamstime have gone to the trouble to program that into their systems. I think it is just the random nature of sales to be honest. There used to be a theory that Shutterstock capped the earnings of contributors in some way and I think this could be an urban legend similar to that one. My Dreamstime results are up and down – sometimes I earn $30 in the month, more recently closer to $100, but that is because I have one file that has started to sell well over there – it doesn’t sell anything like as well on other agencies, so I just go with the flow!
Hi Steve, Im curious to know how to price for image licensing on FAA?
This is how I currently have my prices set: Fine Art America print pricing for 2019. I’m tempted to reduce the margin to almost zero and see if that makes any difference to sales. Would be an interesting experiment!
Steve
How many images are in your portfolio?
I usually publish this each month in my earnings report. Around 15000
Hi Steve, do you play the “clickfest game” of follow, likes and comment on Society6 and Fine Art America? Is it worth it? Best,
Juan
No – I did try to get a group together to “like” each others photos on FAA, but it didn’t really last very long and although I think it might have been beneficial, it is too hard to keep going. So I don’t do anything on either site these days.
Steve
I appreciate you taking the time to answer my question. Your point of view is always interesting and enlightening. My question is how you go about setting up photos where you are the model. For example, ” temperature taken in a mall setting (with nice haircut)”. Did a second person take the photo? If you took the photo yourself, how were you able to set up the camera and get the focus correctly?
I almost always set up and take the picture myself. I normally have a lightstand with no light at the place where I am going to stand, and I focus on that. I can then stand at that spot and perhaps lower the stand a bit so it isn’t in the picture. Most of the time I can then get the photo in focus. Not all of them work, but most do. With this one with the thermometer, I stood by my lightstand and my wife’s arm held the thermometer. In one of the green screen articles I think I had a wider view of the studio with my focus lightstand.
Steve
Hi Steve. Forgive me if you’ve posted an article on this already but I’d be interested to know how you organise your images on your computer and how you know which you’ve uploaded to to what site? There seems to be a multitude of ways that this can be done. I’m not a Lightroom user but have Capture One on my PC.
Thank you in anticipation.
Andy
Hi Andy
I think this is the latest one I wrote about workflow: https://backyardsilver.com/my-current-workflow/. However, Lightroom and its keywords is a big part of this – I am not sure that Capture One has the same functionality there. I’m also a heavy user of Stock Submitter, which does the actual upload and submission process and now (a recent function) does record what happens to the files to at least some of the agencies in terms of accepted etc. However, I have never really tried to capture the status of individual images on each site – I don’t know what the benefit of that would be and it is a lot of work. I rarely upload a different file if one is rejected for some reason. So in working out your own process (and in particular the records you keep), bear in mind the actual use case you have in mind for the information.
Thanks Steve – I’ll look at the link you posted.
‘However, I have never really tried to capture the status of individual images on each site – I don’t know what the benefit of that would be and it is a lot of work.’ Not really sure I understand what you mean – maybe I’m being a bit dim!! 🙂
I simply know that I have uploaded a certain image to the stock agencies (ie to all of them) and I don’t track whether each agency accepts or rejects that image. I believe that some people try to do that, but I have never seen the value in that level of detailed tracking
I see! Thanks for your input and time Steve. Hope you and your family have a lovely Christmas.
Steve,
I was at level 4 at Shutterstock before the reset at the end of 2020, and was paid 10 cents for almost every image that was downloaded. Since the reset, like everyone else I’m at level 1. I still get paid 10 cents for almost all images. Is there really a difference in the pay scale?
I tried to explain my understanding of the way the different download types (Subs, ODs etc.) would be impacted back in June: https://backyardsilver.com/shutterstock-what-to-do-next/
Basically, what you are seeing is that many buyers of your images are ones that have the largest subscription packs and so it doesnt make a difference if they give you 35% of the sale price or 25% of that price – it is still less than 10c and so they round it up to 10c. The difference for me last year was that the larger sales prices – on the ODs, SoDs and EDs we got a bigger share of the price and that could certainly add up for a large sale. Subs were a mix of 10c and higher ones in the teens and twenty cent range – at the moment they are mainly 10c as you are seeing.
Steve