sales

[debramillet]

Hi everyone, I joined in January of this year and have put appr 80 pictures a month on, small port true, but I have not had a single sale here where I have sales at other places, no problem. Is it normal to go 11 months and never have a sale here, I cant imagine it is but wondering how long it took for others to have a sale

[JohnB]

They certainly look like the sort of images that would sell.  I would say you should expect  a couple of sales per month for that number of saleable  pictures.  Obviously you have not had all that number of images forthe full eleven months and you do need to take into account that it can take  a few months for a sale to go through - often even longer for books.

 

Maybe you need to do some work on keywording. For example you have a load of images labelled: "cars on display at the syracuse nationals in syracuse, new york". I'm thinking you need to be rather more precise with your keywording - what are the cars?

[losdemas]

It can potentially take a long time, yes, depending on many factors.  If you do a search of the forum, you will find this covered in other places, but waiting a year for a first sale is far from unusual and a portfolio of 717 images is, as you say, still small amongst more than 41.5M others.

 

The trick is to getting your images seen and zoomed.  Uploading small and often is good (guarantees you results under the 'New' button) as is ensuring that your keywords are working well (you have to keep a regular eye on your search results in AlamyMeasures 2.1).  If your images are being zoomed, then your CTR will gradually rise, which will in turn lift you up in the search results and get you seen more often.  Sales, when they come, (and I'm sure that your collection will result in sales), will also lift your CTR.  A broad variety of subject matter helps, as does having people in images (something lacking in my own portfolio!)

 

Best of luck!

[Mirco Vacca]

Hello everyone,

 

I have almost 5.000 images online for 3 months and also 0 sales. I was also thinking if this could be normal or not. I know some of you dont like microstock but i have on some sites half the amount like i have on Alamy but get far more revenue. I am not even talking about the site with 4900 images. My plan is to test out Alamy if it will fit me. 

 

Sometimes i assume it is because i have most images made in Poland or because it needs more time until it starts to run. I can not go out from that i have bad images since my photography are doing very well at other agencies. I am positive person so i will keep on going.

[Chrissie]

'Rural village in autumn' no clues as to which country or even continent. 'Courthouse' with your only visible keyword as 'courthouse' You are missing out a huge amount of information - especially Location that would help a picture buyer. I would be passing over many of your pictures purely because of the keywording I'm afraid.

[NYCat]

Definitely work on your keywording. Your images have to be SEEN before they can sell. Accurate and complete keywording can make all the difference. Take a look at the captions and keywords that more successful photographers are using. Getty shows the keywords on their images so you can get a good idea there. Just one missed opportunity I noticed. Your "scary creature" doesn't have Halloween in the caption or essential keywords.

 

Paulette

[David Kilpatrick]

At risk of being shot at, your colour management does not seem to suit Alamy's display standards - I'm seeing very yellowish, soft images with turquoise-blue skies. Pumpkin farm shot for example has pumpkins which would not pass the supermarket colour grading test of being a deep rich orange colour. This is my reaction to your overall portfolio screen. Some other portals colour manage thumbs differently and your images may look better on them. Also, people don't see your screen, they see your images mixed with others.

 

There is a neutrality and distance to your images which works against you even when the subject is right for sales. Get close to the pumpkins. Scarecrow in field - no, it's actually a picture of a fence, which happens to have a scarecrow featuring in a small way beyond it. That pic needed you over the fence, a 24mm or wider (85° plus) lens on the camera, and scarecrow occupying 30-50% of the image in such a way that the thumbnail view instantly said 'scarecrow!'. I'd say think simpler, think bolder, think closer and try to find a more aggressive processing formula with a stronger neutral colour balance.

 

And the keywords and captions - as others have said. They also need to 'get closer' and be more assertive. You'll probably make sales but what I see is very laid back and neutral in all respects. I don't get much sense of excitement from the images or involvement and research from the captions/keys.

[Chrissie]

I would also suggest appropriately capitalising and punctuating your captions. I've no proof that this helps sales but it looks a lot more professional and that should inspire a bit more confidence in your image.

[Doc]

Hi Debramillet!

 

At first glance your images look bright colourful and punchy and they look like they should sell. 

 

You absolutely must look much more closely at your keywords as others have said, for many reasons I think. 

 

Ask yourself when looking to keyword an image (or in fact, when putting the image up for sale in the first place); "What would someone use this image for?"

 

Images with no information about their location are very much less likely to sell for editorial purposes, always put his information in, at least town/city, state/county and country

 

The keywords in the esskeys space are the most highly weighted for searches, yet you often have only one or two words in the essential keywords. 

 

Image D332XF is a case in point - this is a great image I think, apart from the fact that it is probably cropped too closely, which absolutely screams "America" at me, Yet in the caption you have spelled diner incorrectly, (remember the caption words also contribute to the searches), and the esskeys are just "car retro". A search on alamy for "america diner car" shows it up on p2, but if you had them all in the esskeys it would have been placed higher, and it does not figure in any searches for "american diner ...." because american is not in your keywords at all despite the fact that american diner plus other additional words like 1950 and 1950s have all been used as search terms by buyers in the past year

 

Incidentally you have the same image on as RF ( DBA64P ) but you have no property releases so it should be removed. 

 

Another example is image D2G2EY- a photograph of a pinto horse on a lunge (or longe) line, but no indication as to where this is. Also your only esskey word is "Pinto". If a search is done on alamy with the word Pinto there are over 5,700 images, some of pinto horses, some of pinto beans, some of actresses with that name.  GOK where your image comes in that search but if you search for "pinto horse" (again, a search which has been done within the past year), your image comes up on p3 of 12 pages. Imagine where it could come if you put "horse" in the esskeys?

 

Bottom line - your images will not sell if they are not seen, and they will not be seen unless you keyword them better.

 

Have tried to make this constructive and hope you see it as such!

 

Regards and good luck

 

Kumar

[Nick Jenkins]

It's been said before and doubtless will be said again, but in the context of selling/marketing stock (especially in such a MASSIVE reservoir)  it is the quality and accuracy of the keywords that will guide the buyer to your work, irrespective of how good it is. 

nj

[Angler]

As others have said good accurate keywording is essential to buyers seeing your images. Your images are saleable but your keywording is poor, very few of your images have a location or even country e.g. america, US, USA.

Make your captions a readable descriptive sentence.

 

The Constant Angler

[debramillet]

Thank you everyone for your advice, especially Doc and David Kilpatrick, and Micro I hope things pick up for you too soon . I have much work to do to try to turn this around , thanks again all!

[Hawgshooter]

Debra,

 

It took about 6 months for my library to build a decent CTR and climb up the ranks before they were getting page 1 averages in searches. As others have stated, keywording is essential. My first sale, and this was back in July 2008, was for $125. And then four months later I had two sales licensed to the same buyer for a total of $1,600. I was ecstatic! I haven't had a sale that big ever since, but I've had several large sales over the years. Get your keywording down and you should start climbing the ranks. Good luck!

 

Marc

[Ed Rooney]

Debra, I'm going to have to squeeze off another shot . . . not at David but at your key wording, which is frankly appalling and useless. You, or someone close to you, seem to be interested in classic cars. You need to say more than "car." You need to list the make, the model, the year, and the color . . . details. I see many attractive buildings in your collection with no information as to what they are or where they are . . . I don't even see USA. Your images are very nice, but your key wording? That will sink your ship. 

 

http://www.alamy.com/search/Imageresults.aspx?CreativeOn=1&adv=1&ag=0&all=1&creative=&et=0x000000000000000000000&vp=0&loc=0&qt=classic%20cars&qn=&lic=6&lic=1&archive=1&dtfr=&dtto=&hc=&selectdate=&size=0xFF&aqt=&epqt=&oqt=&nqt=&gtype=0

 

By clicking on the number of images under a forum member's name you can see their collection and the top part of their keywords. 

[debramillet]

_{Thanks Marc and Ed, Im used to trying to make everything generic as always thought that would increase sales but now see I have to do the opposite and be more precise. On a side note I don't know why my last post is underlined, new to the forums, Thanks again}

[MMiller]

IMHO I'd be a little cautious with proprietary material, such as the Disney characters. Not sure what restrictions you set on those photos, if any, but without releases, I believe at least setting them to exclusively "editorial" is a wise course of action. And that's assuming the photos were taken in a public setting, not on private property, No expert on the matter, of course, but for my own photo collection,  I simply don't publish any of my Disney character photos or anything I photographed at Disney. There may be legalities I don't know of when if comes to publishing (ie uploading to websites) such photos, but simply as a matter of caution, Disney photos, baseball games, anything that may be proprietary (especially in the big corporate sense), I carefully avoid.

[debramillet]

thank you NMiller, they were in a store window , not really something I would generally shoot, but they're marked as not having a property release so I think its okay. Best wishes

[debramillet]

Being new to the Alamy boards I just wanted to add I apologize for the title, I should have been more specific