John Mitchell Posted February 14, 2015 Author Share Posted February 14, 2015 I'm probably missing something vital here but what advantage is there to a potential buying to 'zoom' on an image now that the 'mouse over' gives a large image anyway? John Well if nothing else, they can read the description and location info. Pearl Yes, I imagine that it shows they are curious enough to want to know more. Visual impact can be secondary for editorial buyers looking for specific subjects. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vpics Posted February 14, 2015 Share Posted February 14, 2015 January was great in terms of zooms. February zooms are down to normal levels, but sales from zoomed images in January are now trickling through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bryan Posted February 15, 2015 Share Posted February 15, 2015 Zooms not rolling in abundance for me, 3 sales and 15 zooms since start of Feb. A zoom a day keeps despair at bay. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Gaffen Posted February 15, 2015 Share Posted February 15, 2015 Sales so far this month zero, zooms thin on the ground CRT not too hot as you would expect. Hope for better in the second half of the month! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sultanpepa Posted February 17, 2015 Share Posted February 17, 2015 Still not looking good regarding sales. Boo hoo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colin Woods Posted February 17, 2015 Share Posted February 17, 2015 Zooms continue to be amazing for me, 12 today. Sales, though, are terrible. December was poor, Jan slightly better and Feb so bad it's a bit surreal, as if I have dropped from 13k to 3k images. I'm hoping the buyers will start to ooh and aah over my pictures and start buying. Colin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stokie Posted February 17, 2015 Share Posted February 17, 2015 January 21 zooms and 4 sales February 19 zooms and 1 sale (so far) John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Posted February 17, 2015 Share Posted February 17, 2015 Not a hot month for anything really. Kumar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Martin P Wilson Posted February 17, 2015 Share Posted February 17, 2015 A dire month even for views. January looked to be recovering from Thanksgiving/Christmas/Re-rank downturn. But last week or so every day seems to be a weekend day I am planning a new strategy for Alamy and other work.I start a major new documentary project on Thursday - will probably run for at least a year. Will it make money? Maybe not, but I will enjoy the process and meeting lots of new people; there could be spin-off opportunities as well. I made a commitment last week in front of 50+ people so I am rather on the hook, I have to stick with it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Craig Yates Posted February 17, 2015 Share Posted February 17, 2015 Still no sales yet.However most of last month's sale's dropped in after the 17th so there is time yet. Zooms healthy so looking forward to future sales hopefully. Regards Craig Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mrggt Posted February 18, 2015 Share Posted February 18, 2015 Not had a zoom for well over 2 months ?? could be 4 months will have to check, does seem a little strange, 3 sales this year (well two of those were last year just recorded for this year) wish I could get more zooms Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jill Morgan Posted February 19, 2015 Share Posted February 19, 2015 Not had a zoom for well over 2 months ?? could be 4 months will have to check, does seem a little strange, 3 sales this year (well two of those were last year just recorded for this year) wish I could get more zooms I think you need to relook at your keywords. I looked at a set that all had the same Caption beginning with: Countryside around Dunsop Bridge. This one: Image DWG00k is an image of what appears to be daffodils yet nowhere in your keywords are the words daffodil or flower. You can have a set of keywords for a group of images that were taken at the same place, but then you need to caption individually as well as add the individual keywords that are specific to each image. You will get a lot more zooms that way. Jill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lynn Palmer Posted February 22, 2015 Share Posted February 22, 2015 Dead,dead, dead...views aren't notably up or down but zooms have plummeted since mid November and are zilch this month. Sales are following suit. I have hundreds of images to process and over a hundred awaiting keywording but can't work up the energy to do any of it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spacecadet Posted February 22, 2015 Share Posted February 22, 2015 Not had a zoom for well over 2 months ?? could be 4 months will have to check, does seem a little strange, 3 sales this year (well two of those were last year just recorded for this year) wish I could get more zooms I think you need to relook at your keywords. I looked at a set that all had the same Caption beginning with: Countryside around Dunsop Bridge. This one: Image DWG00k is an image of what appears to be daffodils yet nowhere in your keywords are the words daffodil or flower. You can have a set of keywords for a group of images that were taken at the same place, but then you need to caption individually as well as add the individual keywords that are specific to each image. You will get a lot more zooms that way. Jill You also appear to have a lot of similars,which reduces your effective port size and damages your CTR because you get too many views. Do you need 9 pictures of a dead badger? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niels Quist Posted February 22, 2015 Share Posted February 22, 2015 You also appear to have a lot of similars. --- Do you need 9 pictures of a dead badger? Perhaps mrggt needed to be quite sure it was quite dead? But I agree with Mark... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reimar Posted February 22, 2015 Share Posted February 22, 2015 I'm probably missing something vital here but what advantage is there to a potential buying to 'zoom' on an image now that the 'mouse over' gives a large image anyway? John As Pearl mentioned - more info. Plus, if you want a bigger picture, clicking the zoomed image gives a much bigger preview than the rollover. I suspect buyers have figured this out - but only use it when really interested. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jill Morgan Posted February 22, 2015 Share Posted February 22, 2015 I'm sure many buyers are throwing their images into lightboxes. Especially when surfing through a few thousand images on one search. I know I would. Jill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Mitchell Posted February 24, 2015 Author Share Posted February 24, 2015 Zooms have cooled down since my original post. Still only one sale to report, though, with only five days to go in Feb. Bummer. Last-minute shoppers welcome. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MariaJ Posted February 24, 2015 Share Posted February 24, 2015 I'm sure many buyers are throwing their images into lightboxes. Especially when surfing through a few thousand images on one search. I know I would. Jill Do images moved into lightboxes count towards our rankings, or just zooms? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bryan Posted February 24, 2015 Share Posted February 24, 2015 After a promising start, the month has died for me, although still a few days to go.The nature of the business is changing, it just seems just a short while ago when Alamy boasted 30 million images, but now it's up tp 55 million, almost double. When I look for Alamy images within the papers it's not unusual to find 3 or 4 agencies offering the same shots, so maybe some of the growth of the library has been due to mergers or sharing deals or sub-letting of the stock. I guess that this is the way to survive, and a dead Alamy wouldn't be too useful to any of us.I also feel that the cheapo web usage of images, while helping to feed the beast, is downgrading photography. A national newspaper of my close acquaintance, and whose web pages I frequent, recently ran a story on a particular topic that used numerous images, many from Alamy. I quickly discovered that most of the selections were of the most recent additions to the stock, used irrespective of their visual appeal I'm not sure if this was due to idleness, or a need to be sure that the pictures were up to date, or a mixture of the two. Looking through the Alamy collection there were plenty of superior (to my eye) shots available.The business is in continual ferment, nothing is constant, but making money is becoming increasingly difficult. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Martin P Wilson Posted February 24, 2015 Share Posted February 24, 2015 ... Alamy. I quickly discovered that most of the selections were of the most recent additions to the stock, used irrespective of their visual appeal I'm not sure if this was due to idleness, or a need to be sure that the pictures were up to date, or a mixture of the two. Looking through the Alamy collection there were plenty of superior (to my eye) shots available. The business is in continual ferment, nothing is constant, but making money is becoming increasingly difficult. I have suspected for a while that to keep views up you need to constantly feed the beast. I slowed down submitting in October and practically stopped after the November re-rank and I am now running at about third of the views I was getting in September. As Bryan says and my experience suggests picture researchers may be focussing on the latest material, understandable if you consider the number and (subjective) quality of images returned from a search on the full database. But it means you can't take a break or you will fall off the ranking radar. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedSnapper Posted February 24, 2015 Share Posted February 24, 2015 "picture researchers may be focussing on the latest material" Not sure i agree With the exception of LiveNews sales, 137 of the 144 licences since the start of the year have been from images with Alamy codes starting with A-D....ie, not my recent material km Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sultanpepa Posted February 24, 2015 Share Posted February 24, 2015 Zooms have cooled down since my original post. Still only one sale to report, though, with only five days to go in Feb. Bummer. Last-minute shoppers welcome. Zooms are pretty good but sales volume and revenue are declining since September. Not promising 'cause it's money in the bank that counts! Cheers, Philippe I've seen a steady stream of zooms throughout the month. More than I've ever had in fact and whereas that may bare fruit in the months to come I'm quite despondent that I've had no reported sales so far this month. It's looking like my first blank month in quite some time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bryan Posted February 24, 2015 Share Posted February 24, 2015 "picture researchers may be focussing on the latest material" Not sure i agree Not sure I agree too, more discerning users employ picture editors and they will search out the best images for their purpose and I regularly see A coded Alamy photos being used. The point that I was making was that, at the bottom end of the market, quality doesn't see to be so important, we are competing with the likes of Google street view, and it's convenience and price that seem to be the primary considerations, although date taken might also be a factor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Martin P Wilson Posted February 24, 2015 Share Posted February 24, 2015 "picture researchers may be focussing on the latest material" Not sure i agree Not sure I agree too, more discerning users employ picture editors and they will search out the best images for their purpose and I regularly see A coded Alamy photos being used. The point that I was making was that, at the bottom end of the market, quality doesn't see to be so important, we are competing with the likes of Google street view, and it's convenience and price that seem to be the primary considerations, although date taken might also be a factor. I certainly hope you and Keith are right. I misinterpreted what you were saying but I note Phillipe has seen a similar downturn since September (perhaps not as large though and we have to use different measures ). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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