wiskerke

Thank you! Insightful answers! Probably for the OP too. Except maybe the one about the multiple sellers ;-). I agree about the 20% thing. Alamy themselves have repeatedly warned against the eggs=1 basket thing. However in my case almost all the other outlets have gone the way of the dodo already. wim

I may have asked you before, but are the same images selling here as on the micros? Are the same images selling on every micro, or are there clear differences? Do you have many multiple sellers here and/or on the micros? Like 5x; 10x; 20x? or are they mostly 1x or 2x? I'm aware the answers may well be in your book or blog, but I'm not behind my home desktop machine right now. We probably all have noticed that you have a blog and a book about how to succeed as a stock photographer, does that bring in any serious money compared to the income from stock photography itself? Parts of the answers may well answer parts of the OP's questions. wim edit: typo

You did spot the link? Sorry no IM here anymore. wim

And well deserved it is! wim

Really good image, pity the layout person didn't like books. And a pity it's still not clickable in any way. Nor is the Info button. No links. This way the contributor doesn't really profit from it or at least it's pretty hard. wim

Whoever knows what is working now must be keeping that to him/herself. Just submit your best etc etc. may well be the only remedy left. And even then. The sky has not fallen yet though. Or isn't that what is happening to your emoticon? wim

You have some similars; some news items that have just one or two keepers; some really dark images that really need some pp. My count is that you have around 140 images that are keepers for now for at most 85 subjects or situations. The problem with inferior images is that the system may not see them as inferior images and place them higher up (because you have no zooms or sales) on a page that a client is seeing, while a perfectly good image is buried on page 3 or 13. I have checked some of your images for a likely keyword and my impression is that you have still a quite good rank. So I would not worry there. But I would certainly have a look at the competition and honestly pick a the single image from a page 1 (for a keyword from your Pseudonym Summary) that you would choose. And why. All this may belong in a different thread you started. wim edit: For instance check Bath Christmas Market for competition. Or Trowbridge for what happens with inferior images popping up high. Or Trowbridge Memorial where your best image is placed last - no problem here with only 42 images.

Processing error can also mean the file itself. A recurring one is JPG set to something other than Baseline (standard) in Photoshop or any other program. Both Baseline Optimized and Progressive give errors. But sometimes the first one slips through somehow. Photoshop and I assume LR remembers it's last setting. wim

Which is why checking AoA is the first thing to do. That will filter out several possibilities: no views recorded on Alamy as a whole; none of your keywords were searched for; other people also having small ports; ports with few images suitable for the season or other unknowns. My own port is pretty small but with lots of variation. Partly because I'm easily diverted, partly because that's what used to work on Alamy. No views can mean 3 things, again they have to be checked against AoA: Clients are not searching for the things you have images of. Or clients are searching for those things, but are using different keywords. Or your images appear too low in the results for clients to see them. Again easily checked by using AoA. So maybe you have images with very strong competition in an already saturated field. The other thing is that you have in fact far fewer images than the 395 underneath your pseudonym & avatar to the left. You could try to copy all your keywords in one list and filter it for duplicates and see how many keywords you're left with. Here's an online tool for that. That would make searching on AoA easier. wim

You could check against AoA for the same dates. Try one day at a time and see if any of the keywords/phrases match yours. If so, look at the amount of images the client has seen. Now click on the keyword to see if any of yours show up and if so, where. Now compare the images on the first page with yours. Should yours be on that first page? Some years ago in a different thread I wrote down these truisms on Alamy (but there are more): No views; no zooms; no sales: this is not your sport. Many views; no zooms; no sales: You're doing something seriously wrong. Maybe just keywording. Probably more than that. Style? Technique? Many views; some zooms; no sales: also something wrong, could be technique or style. Many views; many zooms; no or few sales: definitely style or technique. Many views: some zooms; many sales: you're a perfect match for Alamy. Too many views however will lower your ranking on the page: go shoot popular subjects that return less than 5 pages of images; cut back on keywords. I should add that this pertained to Alamy alone. Different outlets; different markets and different outcomes. wim

Which is here on Alamy: The National Trust Photolibrary (45,687) They seem to have come on board and have stopped when we were at the F's. That may indicate two things: things are going so well here for them that they don't need to add newer images. Or things go not that well, so why bother. But because it's free money, why not stay in. wim

Sure. I'm all for giving the client the choice. There's another option, let's call it the nuclear option: guaranteed lowest price in case of a non-exclusive RF image. wim

Like exclusives get 60% and non-exclusives (meaning images on the micros) 30%. I would be all for it. 25% even better. wim

Worldwide book 1p inside Gettysburg the Eternal Flame. $$ almost $$$ wim

There's a pretty famous image by Herb Ritts that's the *inspiration* for the octopus on the head photo. And after that it becomes a meme. Welcome to the interwebs. And there's the octopus in manga of course. Ask your Japanese intern. Maybe not. Just go to Wikipedia. Oh and Insadco is the agency where Yuri Accurs started. He still has some images here through them. Agency images do not go through QC. wim