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Those of us with good ratings who have supplied alamy with regular shots over the past ten years or so are now finding with 90million images to compete.

 

Half of which at least Alamy should throw away in the garbage, honestly speaking!

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I started deleting my poorer images and now find that they are being zoomed as much as my top psuedos (which admittedly is not much).

The new search engine is bringing the junk to the fore for me.

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Four sales spread over seven days for the beginning of March is a positive change from my usual pattern of weeks of nothing, followed by small clumps - frequently as the clock ticks towards midnight on the last day of the month. If I'm going to get sales then I'd rather have regular ones, because those barren weeks can knock your confidence somewhat.

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Ok, I like how things changed, really - sales coming day by day. Just like I could be right that something stuck in reports in last few weeks and reactivated now. Keep it going Alamy! 

Btw. I'm out of partners because of PU case so even more nice surprise to see that movement in sales :)

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When things are slow I attempt to cheer myself up by searching for the usage of my more popular shots using Google.

 

In the past I would generally find a few newspaper sales this way. However this time only one image tested positive, presumably due to the end of the DM deal. Realistically, those DM sales were only marginally worth having, but now they are gone, or much reduced, I need a different source of encouragement!

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Joseph, to be good at this you must be Polish (they say so) or at least visit Poland! ;)

 

Lol Arletta - as the daughter of Polish parents (but born in the UK) I am wholeheartedly with you!  I have noticed that Poles do seem to be very good photographers, especially in my main field of landscapes! 

 

Well that's good to hear! (I'm half Polish).

 

Slow month here for me.  Went from record level zooms last month to hardly any this month.  But I know such fluctuations happen, and for me it often just depends on if customers happen to be searching for the subjects I cover.  I've spotted a few unreported sales as well.

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Having a decent year, but certainly notice that as a non-UK and non-European photographer 75% of my sold images over the past year have been of people doing something, 20% of specific businesses and the last 5% a little more generic.

 

Actually sold a wildlife pic this year, a first!  And today had my first double sale day.

 

Unless you are an exceptional wildlife and landscape photographer (and I still think for landscape stuff buyers head for micro) you really have to have images that have people doing things to get regular sales, especially being here in Canada.

 

I don't have many travel images ( a few from my trip to Kenya and Tanzania, have not sold a one but that's probably cause they aren't that great  :) ). 

 

I have decent placement.  On most searches of images of which I have keywords, I usually have an image on page 1, which is all I can ask.  The rest is up to me.

 

Jill

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By the end of March last year I had double the amount of sales I have now. In March 2016 alone I had eight sales at this point and so far this year I have none. Will it get any better or indeed is it worth carrying on? :(

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By the end of March last year I had double the amount of sales I have now. In March 2016 alone I had eight sales at this point and so far this year I have none. Will it get any better or indeed is it worth carrying on? :(

 

As MariaJ said, sales fluctuate. I guess that, the larger your portfolio, and the greater the range of subject matter, there may be fewer dead periods. 

 

I find that my zooms are all over the place, one month approaching 3 figures, the next low 20s etc.  It's not at all predictable.

 

After investing all of the energy and time in building up a collection of over 4000 images, I would be loath to abandon ship. 

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Marb, a lot of your images are available on microstock sites and can easily be found and bought there. Why should buyer go to Alamy where they are likely to be paying a lot more for them? You might get the occasional sale from a buyer who cares not to shop around, but Alamy is better suited to content which is unique to them and their particular approach to stock imagery. You are in the UK and you are an experienced stock photographer, you seem well placed to capitalise on that, but simply duplicating your microstock portfolio is not likely to bring great results.

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Point taken Joseph and thanks for the tip. Do you really think it is better to sell my UK work here ?

 

You won't sell in the quantity you may be used to in microstock, but you are far more likely to sell occasionally for a decent sum which makes microstock look silly. Alamy is an agency which now has photographers around the world, but it still has its focus in UK editorial. My last three months here have been very poor, but I don't regret giving up shooting microstock photographs and I would not go back to it.

 

I split my time between here and video stock work which I, perforce, place with microstock agencies (except the one where I, and I think you, started out all those years ago). If i could afford the specialist video equipment and gain more professional expertise I would even try to move away from microstock agencies for my video clips.

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Two sales for me this month, this one being the best for a long time at $140

 

Country: Worldwide
Usage: Editorial
Media: Television (editorial)
Print run: Unlimited transmissions
Placement: Use within body of show
Start: 08 March 2017
Duration: In perpetuity All media

 

Liam.

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Numbers so far a little below average but am also seeing several duplicate sales so I suspect there will be some refunds coming - anyone else noticing this? End of financial year effect??

 

Kumar (The Doc one)

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Numbers so far a little below average but am also seeing several duplicate sales so I suspect there will be some refunds coming - anyone else noticing this? End of financial year effect??

 

Kumar (The Doc one)

 

For me numbers a bit higher than average due to one $250 sale.

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Point taken Joseph and thanks for the tip. Do you really think it is better to sell my UK work here ?

 

 

You won't sell in the quantity you may be used to in microstock, but you are far more likely to sell occasionally for a decent sum which makes microstock look silly. Alamy is an agency which now has photographers around the world, but it still has its focus in UK editorial. My last three months here have been very poor, but I don't regret giving up shooting microstock photographs and I would not go back to it.

 

I split my time between here and video stock work which I, perforce, place with microstock agencies (except the one where I, and I think you, started out all those years ago). If i could afford the specialist video equipment and gain more professional expertise I would even try to move away from microstock agencies for my video clips.

Having said that I sold an image here in a national online paper article and got little more than I would at microstock. The same image has earned me far more over time at microstock so there is a lot to be said for microstock.

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Having said that I sold an image here in a national online paper article and got little more than I would at microstock. The same image has earned me far more over time at microstock so there is a lot to be said for microstock.

 

 

A lot to be said, but nothing good!  :P

 

UK newspaper licenses are low because you're in the UK newspaper scheme, which you are able to opt out of. From what I know of microstock (I've never submitted to microstock so only know what I've read), you still get more from Alamy with UK newspaper scheme licenses. It isn't great though, I know, but like I said you can still opt out if you want to.

 

Geoff.

If I add up my total earned by microstock and Alamy, microstock wins hands down despite the small sales.added together they help pay bills.

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Point taken Joseph and thanks for the tip. Do you really think it is better to sell my UK work here ?

 

You won't sell in the quantity you may be used to in microstock, but you are far more likely to sell occasionally for a decent sum which makes microstock look silly. Alamy is an agency which now has photographers around the world, but it still has its focus in UK editorial. My last three months here have been very poor, but I don't regret giving up shooting microstock photographs and I would not go back to it.

 

I split my time between here and video stock work which I, perforce, place with microstock agencies (except the one where I, and I think you, started out all those years ago). If i could afford the specialist video equipment and gain more professional expertise I would even try to move away from microstock agencies for my video clips.

Having said that I sold an image here in a national online paper article and got little more than I would at microstock. The same image has earned me far more over time at microstock so there is a lot to be said for microstock.

 

 

What you earned here for that single national newspaper sale is likely to to be about as low as you you will get here - the prices for newspaper editorial have been dragged down over the years as the microstock sites got into editorial as well as commercial imagery and, it has to be said, as a natural result of print newspapers struggling to make a profit in the online age where consumers expect everything to be free. Your fee for that sale might be small, but at least at Alamy there is always the possibility of a decently priced sale.

 

This is not a land flowing with milk and honey, it seems to have dried up somewhat. However, I do know that in one single sale here a couple of years ago I made more than in the entire year on microstock.  I was already convinced even before them that I needed to forswear microstock, if I was not to be part of the pressures dragging prices here on a downward spiral and that sale simply reinforced that conviction.

 

Whether or not you chose to invest time and effort here is a decision you need to make for yourself. All I would do at this point is take you back to our original discussion and suggest that at least you avoid shooting yourself in the foot by using your valuable time putting images on Alamy which are already available very cheaply in other places.

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