review very appreciated, thanks!

[CarloM]

Hey everyone, 

 

could you have a look at my portfolio and tell me if there are any obvious mistakes I'm making or how I could improve my images in order to sell more?

 

https://www.alamy.com/contrib-browse.asp?cid={13F2EFA8-F018-4BE9-A30E-EA8E35DE2348}&name=carlo+maggio

 

Thanks a lot for your feedback, looking forward to it!

Best

[Colin Woods]

You have some good images (I like the B&W poplar trees), but one thing I see is that you have a lot of similar images. On the first page there are all those shots of the wisteria flowers. They aren't different enough from each other to merit their place in a tightly edited portfolio. Same with the yellow fish. Just pick the best few and delete the rest. Similars hurt you because they hut your CTR. If you have just two images of, for example, the wisteria flowers and a searcher clicks on one then your CTR for that image was 50%, which will give your portfolio a boost. If you have 20 similars and the same searcher clicks on the same one, then you CTR is way lower. As CTR is a component of your Alamy Rank (which is where in a search your images appear) its best to avoid ways of getting a lower CTR. 

Also I see that the images of Honfleur and the La Cambe war cemetery are very underexposed. Most of the underexposed photos have a bright spot in them, like a sunlit cloud. Is your camera on spot meter? I say this as I have occasionally left my camera on spot meter and the results can look like this (or the opposite where the whole image is wildly overexposed). They are dark to the point of looking like almost black squares as thumbnails, and I can't imagine an editor choosing them over your competition. A good rule is to search Alamy for the same subject and have a look at the competition. Ask yourself honestly "Why would an editor pick mine rather than these". If you can't find a good reason, its probably not worth uploading. 

[Bryan]

Just slow down a bit and concentrate on uploading only your best shots with far more attention to captions and keywording. There appears to be a raft of images captioned Japan. But where in Japan, and what do they show? Not sure what, for example, T6J4M2 is about, nor who would want to buy it. Take a long hard look at the photos that have sold - in the images found threads - and get a feel for the market. Better still, spend some time finding published Alamy shots and post your results in the forum.

[CarloM]

3 hours ago, Colin Woods said:

You have some good images (I like the B&W poplar trees), but one thing I see is that you have a lot of similar images. On the first page there are all those shots of the wisteria flowers. They aren't different enough from each other to merit their place in a tightly edited portfolio. Same with the yellow fish. Just pick the best few and delete the rest. Similars hurt you because they hut your CTR. If you have just two images of, for example, the wisteria flowers and a searcher clicks on one then your CTR for that image was 50%, which will give your portfolio a boost. If you have 20 similars and the same searcher clicks on the same one, then you CTR is way lower. As CTR is a component of your Alamy Rank (which is where in a search your images appear) its best to avoid ways of getting a lower CTR. 

Also I see that the images of Honfleur and the La Cambe war cemetery are very underexposed. Most of the underexposed photos have a bright spot in them, like a sunlit cloud. Is your camera on spot meter? I say this as I have occasionally left my camera on spot meter and the results can look like this (or the opposite where the whole image is wildly overexposed). They are dark to the point of looking like almost black squares as thumbnails, and I can't imagine an editor choosing them over your competition. A good rule is to search Alamy for the same subject and have a look at the competition. Ask yourself honestly "Why would an editor pick mine rather than these". If you can't find a good reason, its probably not worth uploading. 

Hi Collin, many thanks. In effect my CTR is 0.18. 

For me the biggest problem is: Ask myself honestly "Why would an editor pick mine rather than these" because I've sold some underexposed photos or photo that I would have thrown, than I don't know the answer at your question... 😭

[CarloM]

1 hour ago, Bryan said:

Just slow down a bit and concentrate on uploading only your best shots with far more attention to captions and keywording. There appears to be a raft of images captioned Japan. But where in Japan, and what do they show? Not sure what, for example, T6J4M2 is about, nor who would want to buy it. Take a long hard look at the photos that have sold - in the images found threads - and get a feel for the market. Better still, spend some time finding published Alamy shots and post your results in the forum.

 

Hi Brian, many thanks for your suggest. I uploaded photos of Japan 2 days ago, I have to tag them. Normally I insert at least 40 tags, maybe they are too many, I have to make more selection. Sorry for my bad english... 

[Colin Woods]

On 04/05/2019 at 02:33, CarloM said:

Ask myself honestly "Why would an editor pick mine rather than these" because I've sold some underexposed photos or photo that I would have thrown, than I don't know the answer at your question... 

 

This happens to us all, but a tightly edited portfolio remains a better bet.