How do you Rate Alamy?

[geogphotos]

Companies regularly ask for this sort of information.

 

As we know Alamy has a commitment to its contributors. They repeatedly say so in their submissions to Companies House.

 

On a scale of 0-10 how satisfied are you as an Alamy contributor?

 

0 - what am I doing here, I hate it

10- Amazing, wonderful, I love it

 

My score is 3

 

Yours?

[Ed Rooney]

 

Hmm. I'm gonna have to ponder this some. If you want me, I'll be in the bar.

[Betty LaRue]

Maybe from an 8 about 7-8 years ago, down to a 3 or 4. It dropped a fair bit before the exclusive thing and the percentage change. A lot of that was because of the mistake made when we were asked to do those modifications that were never implemented. I spent a lot of time doing those, (what did they call them? Annotations?) then undoing them. Then when AIM was implemented, I spent several months going through my entire 5000 plus images straightening out the mess it caused to my KWs. That took a lot of the shine off and made me feel like someone was snapping fingers to get me to jump through the hoop. I jumped, but no treat.

Then the % change. I’ve lost 80% of my motivation.

When I think of how much time I spent implementing something we were asked to do, or correcting things not caused by me, I could easily have had 1000 more images in my port than I have presently.

Back when I got $300 for a schoolbook usage and I received 60% of the license, now that was motivation.

 

[John Mitchell]

Hmmm...tough question. Hope the bars stay open late in Liverpool. 🍺

 

At one time, probably 8, even 9, but now I'd say 4-5 overall. Before the recent 20% drop and "Platinum pie in the sky" bombshells fell out of the blue, I would have been more generous. That said, compared to the other big agency options out there, Alamy ranks the highest (for me anyway) of the disappointing bunch. 

 

 

Edited November 13, 2021 by John Mitchell

[Michael Ventura]

I would still rate Alamy with a high score, maybe a rate of 8 or 9.  But I give the stock photo industry a 1 or 2.  The recent  drop in the commission rate really stings on top of falling fees.  The state of the industry is not the fault of Alamy, in fact I feel they have done a lot try to slow the sinking fees but it is difficult to compete free or near free.  It is hard to get excited to shoot stock but still love art of photography.  As John just wrote, Alamy is still the best option, but that, unfortunately, isn’t exactly saying a lot these days.

Edited November 14, 2021 by Michael Ventura

[John Mitchell]

1 hour ago, Michael Ventura said:

I would still rate Alamy with a high score, maybe a rate of 8 or 9.  But I give the stock photo industry a 1 or 2.  The resent drop in the commission rate really stings on top of falling fees.  The state of the industry is not the fault of Alamy, in fact I feel they have done a lot try to slow the sinking fees but it is difficult to compete free or near free.  It is hard to get excited to shoot stock but still love art of photography.  As John just wrote, Alamy is still the best option, but that, unfortunately, isn’t exactly saying a lot these days.

 

You have a generous and understanding nature, Michael, which is a good thing in this often unkind world.

 

However, the definitive answer/rating will be given when Edo gets back from the bar. 😜

[Marianne]

After a string of $ sales this month, it's not a good time to ask me. On the other hand, this year has been my best for revenue here since 2017, even with the commission cut, so I haven't lost all hope, but diminishing returns make it hard to garner much enthusiasm for any stock site. 

 

 

[Michael Ventura]

19 minutes ago, John Mitchell said:

 

You have a generous and understanding nature, Michael, which is a good thing in this often unkind world.

 

However, the definitive answer/rating will be given when Edo gets back from the bar. 😜

This is true 

[Radim]

My rating is in the bottom half and unfortunately I have to say that I do not see anything to suggest any improvement.
I invested a lot of work and time to Alymy.
Everything is getting worse.
Prices are falling, sales numbers are not rising, confidence in fair relations is gone.
No light at the end of the tunnel.
This year, the Alamy will be profitable by reducing our commission, but next year they will have to find some profit again that will not miss us again. '
This industry is collapsing

Edited November 14, 2021 by Radim

[spiegel]

From a purely economic point of view, Alamy is mediocre. For me it is now on rank 4 out of 8 agencies that get my pictures. However, I can see an increase every year (even after the nasty changes), so there is still hope that Alamy will eventually be able to compete financially with the big MS agencies. So for this I give only 2 points.   
But man does not live by bread alone. In many other points, which I do not want to list all now, I like Alamy very much. There are not many agencies that respond so quickly and friendly to mails. So, for that it is an 8 from me. 
However, at the end of the day, when the blade is stuck in my teeth, these 8 points do not really help me...

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

[Ed Rooney]

8 hours ago, Michael Ventura said:

I would still rate Alamy with a high score, maybe a rate of 8 or 9.  But I give the stock photo industry a 1 or 2.  The recent  drop in the commission rate really stings on top of falling fees.  The state of the industry is not the fault of Alamy, in fact I feel they have done a lot try to slow the sinking fees but it is difficult to compete free or near free.  It is hard to get excited to shoot stock but still love art of photography.  As John just wrote, Alamy is still the best option, but that, unfortunately, isn’t exactly saying a lot these days.

 

These are my thoughts exactly. And on a personal level, when I lost my home on Mulberry Street, Alamy did not collect their 50% for the next 10 months. Actions count more than intentions or theory. Of course, Ian, our OP here, was incredibly helpful too. 

 

Now where did I put that pint? Oh, I drank it. 

[Phil Crean]

8 hours ago, Michael Ventura said:

I would still rate Alamy with a high score, maybe a rate of 8 or 9.  But I give the stock photo industry a 1 or 2.  The recent  drop in the commission rate really stings on top of falling fees.  The state of the industry is not the fault of Alamy, in fact I feel they have done a lot try to slow the sinking fees but it is difficult to compete free or near free.  It is hard to get excited to shoot stock but still love art of photography.  As John just wrote, Alamy is still the best option, but that, unfortunately, isn’t exactly saying a lot these days.

That would be ok if they hadn't dropped our commission after promising it would not change....

Low end of a 5 from me.

Phil

[Bryan]

It has to be viewed from the perspective of the stock market as a whole.

 

Since the take over I've been selling more images, but for lower prices and then there is the commission issue.  My gross income peaked in 2017, and despite adding more photos, it has dropped every year since.  Factor in the 60 to now 40 % share and you have a personal business venture  in terminal  decline. Fortunately I don't depend upon this income stream to stay afloat, but I guess others do. 

 

Judging Alamy, I can't say, as I've only a minor dabble in POD to compare it with and that is barely covering the costs. 

 

My dealings with Alamy admin staff have been positive, but having made sales and then being kicked out of Live News hurt.

 

In the past I've encouraged family members and friends to get involved, but those days are long gone, don't waste your time.

Edited November 14, 2021 by Bryan

[NYCat]

10 hours ago, Michael Ventura said:

I would still rate Alamy with a high score, maybe a rate of 8 or 9.  But I give the stock photo industry a 1 or 2.  The recent  drop in the commission rate really stings on top of falling fees.  The state of the industry is not the fault of Alamy, in fact I feel they have done a lot try to slow the sinking fees but it is difficult to compete free or near free.  It is hard to get excited to shoot stock but still love art of photography.  As John just wrote, Alamy is still the best option, but that, unfortunately, isn’t exactly saying a lot these days.

 

This pretty much sums it up for me, too. I also have lost enthusiasm since ending my wildlife trips. Then deciding I'd better delete my zoo photos since everything seems to be "for personal us only" these days. Animals have always motivated me and I haven't found the same interest in photographing other things. Not Alamy's fault.

 

Paulette

[meanderingemu]

Currently i rate them F for Frustrating.  The fees and commission is an impact of the market, and if everything else was supportive to contributors i could understand to historical support to the Agency.  But recent interactions with the back end have been less than stellar. 

 

I look at the thread of Alamy's refunds and rebilling to take advantage of the contract change, which appears to still have not been taken care, and cringe.  Claims that certain negative impact only had 20 occurrences, half of which affected regular forum posters seemed odd. 

 

From my side  i had the following less than stellar interactions just in last 6 weeks

 

-submitting an unbilled usage 3 months 3 weeks after use as per guidelines (first why to these happen), and  being told, "this is a distributor, when cannot accept the submission now, please resubmit in 5 days".  I shouldn't even have to do this, Alamy should be the one making sure they pay in first place, and now i have to reprocess again!

-asking for access to Reportage instead of using Live News for more regional events which News desk doesn't have clients for and being told: "Submit as stock, fail QC a few times, then we give you access".  

-continual lack of explanation and input of the sudden increase in Affiliate charges, and what the value of the approach is.

 

 

 

I didn't experienced the old days of when everyone seems to rate them 8-9, but even over the last 3 years, my rating would have dropped. 

 

Probably a 5, because they still have access to some client base i wouldn't have elsewhere, but i wish they would make it simpler for us to work with them. 

 

 

 

[Tony ALS]

Interesting to read different points of view. I follow the diminishing (seems to me) number of contributors to the forums since the recent changes which I wasn't happy about either, but with limited choices it seems to me Alamy are still worth my small efforts compared to what else is offered as a reward with other agencies so I guess I would give them a 5, partly because of the swift responses I have received from Alamy to my emailed questions.

It was, however, a double negative for me with both eyesight problems and the cut in reward from Alamy coming at the same time. Now having recovered vision to acceptable levels again I will get around to keywording the near 600 images waiting to be completed but feel no sense of urgency to do so with deflated expectations about the potential rewards.

I spent some time adding to the "Have you found any images..." threads before my eye decided to get infected as nobody seemed to be tracking the BBC at the time I first started looking. Having just trawled through the BBC website I was disappointed to find that The Beeb has gone for "G" almost exclusively for images. I couldn't find one single image from the last 24 hours attributed to Alamy whereas only a few months ago I used to find several a day.

Is this a sign of cheapest is best as far as the BBC are concerned? Not great but I guess licence payers would be happy.

 

[Joseph Clemson]

I have to put my score in the context of my experience of the microstock agencies I started with and have long since departed, and those I still work with for my video portfolio. . Almost universally, with one possible exception if I'm being generous, the microstock agencies have treated their contributors abominally as the years progressed. By comparison Alamy has been a shining star. Since the advent of PA that star has seriously dimmed but they still outrank the other options. Even so, I can't bring myself to give Alamy more than 5 at the moment.

[Michael Ventura]

I may have been too generous with my rating, but yes, I have always been a glass-half-full kind of guy.  The one that always nags at me is with the recent commission change, was it done  in desperation to literally staying alive as a business or was it because they could, knowing that they would lose a relatively small portion of their contributors.  Perhaps a combination of both.  No answer to this is good however. 

[sb photos]

I'll quote Janice Nicholls from long ago, I'll give it 5. Additionally, will put in more effort next year and then realistically review end of year 2022.

Edited November 14, 2021 by sb photos

[Steve F]

You should rate Alamy compared to the competition. They're not immune from the downward pressures on pricing.

 

But the new owners didn't make friends by benchmarking the commission to be more in line with the competition either....

[meanderingemu]

48 minutes ago, Michael Ventura said:

in desperation to literally staying alive as a business or was it because they could,  

 

 

If their survival depended on cutting the commission for 7% of the images, number provided by Alamy and referred to as " not a commercially significant element to our overall offering ",  i would be afraid of the viability of the current model.  

[Radim]

The viability of the contributors ended as an old mare somewhere in the slaughterhouse
The viability of the corporate machinery will become apparent as early as next year. I don't believe it will be something that will please me.

[Sultanpepa]

1 hour ago, sb photos said:

I'll quote Janice Nicholls from long ago, I'll give it 5. Additionally, will put in more effort next year and then realistically review end of year 2022.

 

"I'll give it five" was indeed a long time ago. 🙂

[Chuck Nacke]

I would give Alamy a 7 out of 10.  A few years ago it would have been over 9.

The photo agency/ library business has been more than difficult during the

last ten years and I do believe that Alamy and the people at Alamy have been

doing the best that they can.

 

I also believe that my rating of 7 vs 9 is due mostly to changes in the Photo Agency/Library

business.

 

After 43 years in the Photo Agency business, I have heard or read the same complaints 

over and over (I have even made a few of them myself.)

 

As I have written on this forum more than once:  "I would not contribute to Alamy if I did

not trust Alamy to represent my images."

 

The above is just my own opinion.

 

Chuck

[geogphotos]

3 hours ago, Steve F said:

You should rate Alamy compared to the competition. They're not immune from the downward pressures on pricing.

 

But the new owners didn't make friends by benchmarking the commission to be more in line with the competition either....

 

 

 

The last time I mentioned the existence of competitors I received a warning and a brief forum ban. 

 

I am rating Alamy now with what it once was. 

 

Others can rate Alamy using any criteria that they want. No rules.

 

Edit - Just to add I rate the Alamy staff that I deal with in Contributor Services as 10/10

Edited November 14, 2021 by geogphotos

[Mr Standfast]

For

Helpful customer relations. 

They've survived recessions and a pandemic, indicates a well run company, which gives an indicator of behind the scenes operation. (Imo)

Recent months show they're finding a wider market for my snaps.

My earnings have increased, hear on year...just.

 

 

Against.

The market, sigh...

Very trusting customer self reporting regime.

Reliance on the forum to do their problem solving. Don't they appreciate we have important things to talk about!

Slow to fix the issue of the over charged commission refunds.

Punitive level for platinum membership and my 40%

 

Sorry can't put a number on that lot.

 

🦔