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3 hours ago, MDM said:

 

Just had a look at your site and I notice you are using Flash galleries. You know that this is very restrictive as Flash won't work on iPhones and iPads (not sure about other phones and tablets) as well as the fact that a lot of people have Flash turned off or not installed for security reasons. For maximium compatiibility it is generally best to use HTML galleries.

Mine also (currently) uses Flash galleries, something I'll be changing when I get a spare day to sort it out - however, it's not truly too much of an issue - my supplier generates a mobile friendly site. If you hit it using a phone or pad, it's automatically picked up and moved to the mobile version.

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14 minutes ago, TeeCee said:

Mine also (currently) uses Flash galleries, something I'll be changing when I get a spare day to sort it out - however, it's not truly too much of an issue - my supplier generates a mobile friendly site. If you hit it using a phone or pad, it's automatically picked up and moved to the mobile version.

 

Yes I actually followed your web link yesterday and noticed that your galleries were Flash as well. As I don't have Flash activated by default, and my version needs updating, I got a browser warning and did not go into your galleries as it would have meant five minutes if messing about updating Flash and then activating it. Also there have been several instances of serious security issues with Flash so a lot of people are suspicious of it now and don't use it. 

 

Ok so I am not a potential client of yours but it illustrates what can happen. I think it can actually matter if you are doing business from your site - you don't want to drive potential clients away. For business one wants to have the most widely compatible technology available as well as having a fast website.

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I am a photoshelter user as well - but I don't use it for sales (I did but I made so few I decided to drop online sales and go in another direction).

 

Am intersted in what the others that use photoshelter think of the lack of development activity the last two years? 
Without a doubt it works very well with just a few things I would change (i.e ability to nest galleries and photos both - in a gallery) but I am surprised at the lack of development, new templates etc over the last two years.....and absolutely nothing on bringing some of the custom abilities of the old system to the "new" templates.

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16 hours ago, MDM said:

 

Yes I actually followed your web link yesterday and noticed that your galleries were Flash as well. As I don't have Flash activated by default, and my version needs updating, I got a browser warning and did not go into your galleries as it would have meant five minutes if messing about updating Flash and then activating it. Also there have been several instances of serious security issues with Flash so a lot of people are suspicious of it now and don't use it. 

 

Ok so I am not a potential client of yours but it illustrates what can happen. I think it can actually matter if you are doing business from your site - you don't want to drive potential clients away. For business one wants to have the most widely compatible technology available as well as having a fast website.

Yup, fully agree, but there's a full days work swapping the galleries over, which I currently can't commit to.
The site works well, designed to get me up the rankings rather than for an impactful index page, and it currently generates a couple of extra jobs a month. My assumption is that most PC's and Macs don't reject flash galleries, and as said, the mobile site picks up the bulk of enquiries these days anyhow.

That said, must find a day to swap it all over to html  galleries...

:)

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On 10/11/2017 at 17:44, geogphotos said:

 

 

I find it frustrating to say the least. It seems to have stood still and only be offering gimmicky sorts of things.

 

Specifically, I find the licensing system out-of-date for the ways stock has changed. It is either the traditional RM price calculator or RF, no simplified RM licensing, and no option to change the wording from RF to something else such as 'Simplified Editorial Use licence' or whatever you might want. No response as yet to an enquiry sent about this last week.

 

I no longer read all the 'How to be a real pro', 'How to pitch for top assignments', 'How to organise your files like a professional, 'Making an impact on image buyers' type of amateur magazine content that they send out. 

 

Sad to say that it has been downhill since Allen M stepped sideways. 

 

They also killed off the community aspect of it and that must have been intentional.

 

Couldn't agree more. I also think the killing off of the forum was intentional as well. 

I worry if they are not successful or developing for a long term successful product they may just close one night like they did with their stock project.

 

Im not aware of any better alternatives right now though.

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I've been considering Photoshelter and Photodeck for my site. Based on what has been said here, it appears that Photoshelter is going in the wrong direction. I'd be interested in knowing what others have to say about this and if anybody has any experience (negative or positive) with Photodeck.

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I use Piwigo on my purchased webspace that I have for my dog collars site.  Haven't worked on it for awhile, that will come over the winter when I don't have any shows for a couple of months.  You can add a Paypal extension for people to buy prints or whatever you want to sell.   I did use Zenfolio for awhile, but for someone with a small port like me, the costs just can't be justified.

 

I find Piwigo offers me what I want without any cost as I am paying for the space anyway and can have as many domains as I wish on it.  don't have a separate domain for the photography, but probably will come the new year.  Don't mind spending $15 a year for the domain renewal.  Lots of different themes.

 

Jill

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  • 1 month later...

Just to update....

 

Finally decided on Smugmug, relatively easy to use, useful tutorials, links to the Lab I already use and not too pricey.

www.geoffshoults.com  is it if anyone fancies a look. 

Feel free to critique it

 

thanks for the previous advice

 

Geoff

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On 10/12/2017 at 20:28, Rubens Alarcon said:

I've been considering Photoshelter and Photodeck for my site. Based on what has been said here, it appears that Photoshelter is going in the wrong direction. I'd be interested in knowing what others have to say about this and if anybody has any experience (negative or positive) with Photodeck.

I've been quite happy with PhotoShelter for 10 years. Besides being a backup, the tools for display and delivery help me serve old customers. 

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26 minutes ago, geoff s said:

Just to update....

 

Finally decided on Smugmug, relatively easy to use, useful tutorials, links to the Lab I already use and not too pricey.

www.geoffshoults.com  is it if anyone fancies a look. 

Feel free to critique it

 

thanks for the previous advice

 

Geoff

 

Can you make a profit selling on Smugmug at about £112 + tax per year?

 

Assume you use Loxley to print for you?

 

Allan

 

 

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23 minutes ago, Allan Bell said:

 

Can you make a profit selling on Smugmug at about £112 + tax per year?

 

Assume you use Loxley to print for you?

 

Allan

 

 

Well, that's the question and there's only one way to find out I suppose. It will succeed or fail on my efforts to market it and the quality of the stuff on it.

I am aware that it's on the scale of a small fish in a big pond, possibly plankton in a big pond. Compared to a new piece of equipment it's a small outlay.

It was £84 + vat by the way - I got a 'special introductory offer' for the first year. 

Yes, Loxley .

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16 hours ago, geoff s said:

 

Well, that's the question and there's only one way to find out I suppose. It will succeed or fail on my efforts to market it and the quality of the stuff on it.

I am aware that it's on the scale of a small fish in a big pond, possibly plankton in a big pond. Compared to a new piece of equipment it's a small outlay.

It was £84 + vat by the way - I got a 'special introductory offer' for the first year. 

Yes, Loxley .

 

Thank you Geoff.

 

Allan

 

 

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13 hours ago, Phil Robinson said:

I use Wix - it's free, easy to design and I like the results

https://pjrfoto.com

 

I don't sell direct from there, but you can link to you images on Alamy and I think if you pay for a premium membership (i.e. paid membership) you can do that too.

 

I don't mind paying a small amount, under £150/year, for a decent website which allows me to sell commercially and links to a process lab to produce the product people may want.

 

Allan

 

 

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The support has also been excellent from Smugmug.

I'm fairly hopeless with anything techy but questions have been answered quickly - often within a minute - and

the live 'webinar' that I watched the other day was very helpful too.

Geoff

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Re. Smugmug fees and printing - yes not cheap but I tend to tag on a small margin when clients order prints from their (password protected) galleries. Loxley are  also at the upper end of pricing, but I've never had any complaints from clients, their fulfilment is good so I feel it's worth linking to them for prints, rather than having to do my own printing or organising via another third party and risking issues. Smugmug also regularly have booths at i.e. the Photography Show, so it's nice to go and have a chat to them, they're usually happy to explain new features and help with doing own coding if one wants to do that. Agree on customer service, they've saved me from lengthy re-uploading several times when I had accidentally pressed that fat delete button on galleries.  But I'm sure there are also plenty of other, similar providers, particularly in the US.

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I have had my own website for over 25 years. Way before you could buy 'of the peg' site templates. Bought my domain name, got some webspace, free at that time when you bought internet connection and an e mail account. There were no web design programmes so had to learn basic HTML and write it myself. Now I update and amend with Dreamweaver, taught myself the basics, but my (very) basic HTML skills are still useful from time to time if I want to tweak things. I don't sell from my site or POD sites as folks who want my work, (not stock), don't want an inkjet print but a proper chromogenic print or an archivally processed silver gelatin print if B&W. My site is just information and shows a range of my projects and publications and my prints sell through the galleries and dealers that handle my work. A website is useful to point people to and as a guide to your work. If I was starting now I would probably 'buy in' from one of the template providers or hire someone but I quite enjoy fiddling with my site from time to time.

 

Pete Davis

http://www.pete-davis-photography.com

http://peteslandscape.blogspot.co.uk/

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Ah, time flies. I was counting back incorrectly because i mis-dated the time that Documentary Photography moved to Caerleon which was all set up with Macs then. They were well up on that then. You are right, but it was certainly very early on so 1993 might be right. I know I did  a basic html course as there wasn't anything else at the time. So it's 23/24 years anyway.

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I had my first website in 1998 as well.  Self taught myself HTML and took orders over phone or they mailed them in.

 

Finally got X-Cart in 2001, taught myself a little PHP so I could edit pages.  Now run an Opencart site and it's great software.  This is for my dog and horse business.  For the images, I use Piwigo.

 

Jill

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Another SmugMug / Loxley user here. Been with them a few years and the customer service from both is very good. The only things I don't like are that 1) if you want galleries listed with different prices you have to pay for the top SmugMug subscription which pushes the price up a fair bit if your sales are limited and 2) the Loxley products that you and customers can order through SmugMug is a limited subset of what Loxley offer direct. For example, customers can't order 'traditional' framed prints whereas there is more variety in what they order from the more modern range e.g Art Boards, Acrylics that sort of thing.

 

For that second reason I'm considering cutting the ordering link and reducing my subscription level and asking customers to contact me direct for their requirements. I would then order direct from Loxley for delivery to them. Slows the process down and introduces extra stages but I just wonder how many sales I lose because people can't see (via SmugMug) the product they're after.

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2 hours ago, Gary Clarke said:

Another SmugMug / Loxley user here. Been with them a few years and the customer service from both is very good. The only things I don't like are that 1) if you want galleries listed with different prices you have to pay for the top SmugMug subscription which pushes the price up a fair bit if your sales are limited and 2) the Loxley products that you and customers can order through SmugMug is a limited subset of what Loxley offer direct. For example, customers can't order 'traditional' framed prints whereas there is more variety in what they order from the more modern range e.g Art Boards, Acrylics that sort of thing.

 

For that second reason I'm considering cutting the ordering link and reducing my subscription level and asking customers to contact me direct for their requirements. I would then order direct from Loxley for delivery to them. Slows the process down and introduces extra stages but I just wonder how many sales I lose because people can't see (via SmugMug) the product they're after.

 

Agree re products - their US American printers have a greater variety also, in terms of "novelty" type print products, mugs, mouse pads, that sort of thing. I guess they could add a second printing company to choose from if they wanted to, to fulfil those type of products if Loxley won't. Haven't needed this enough to suggest so far, but wonder if more customers contact them about it, they might consider it. But then again customers can of course do this themselves, too (if they have paid for image files)

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Yes I was a bit disappointed to see that they don't offer greetings cards via Loxley ( and Loxley do offer them). I would think that would be one of the more popular items.

I intend to contact them about it so, yes, a bit of lobbying may hopefully work.

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1 hour ago, geoff s said:

Yes I was a bit disappointed to see that they don't offer greetings cards via Loxley ( and Loxley do offer them). I would think that would be one of the more popular items.

I intend to contact them about it so, yes, a bit of lobbying may hopefully work.

 

Please let me know when you have been successful with your lobbying.:)

 

Allan

 

 

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