A huge percentage of all professional imagery licensed is used in one way or another to promote a product or service. But advertisers have recognized that the old ways of promoting are no longer working. They are aggressively searching for new and better ways to reach consumers. Advertisers' decisions dramatically impact future demand for photography, as well as where and how it will be used.
The photo discussed in this article is an almost perfect stock photo. It's not cutting edge; it's not trendy. It's not hip or cool. wshat it is is a photo that will license again and aagain for years....extending its revenue stream long after its production costs have been recouped. This is a photo with a very long tail.
We have done a bad job. A terrible job. If picking a photograph is all about its price and not its quality than we, the photo industry, have made a terrible job at selling our work.
Every time an editor, whether from an ad agency or a magazine decides to use an image because it is cheaper than the others, that means we have all failed to advocate for the real value of photography. We have failed, all of us, Photographers, agents, photo agencies to make the new generation of image buyers see the real value in our images. Thus the current situation.
With all the free information available on the Internet why would or should anyone want to pay for information?
Many consumers believe that writers should give away their work in
order to build a following of customers who will then pay them for some
other product or service they provide. Most would acknowledge that some
effort and expense is required on the part of the creator to produce
good, useful information, but often that is not deemed to be of any
economic value. Photographers tend to supply information on their blogs
as a way of getting customers to hire them for assignment work, for
paid speaking engagements or as a way of selling a book. The other way
to earn revenue is to generate enough traffic to your site that
advertisers will pay to surround your information with ads in hopes
that some or your popularity will rub off on them. Is giving away information the only way?
ZenithOptimedia (Publicis) says that global ad spend for 2009 will be 10.2% lower than 2008, but that in 2010 it is expected to be up 0.9% compared to 2009. Group M (WPP) thinks 2009 spending will only be down about 6.6% from 2008 levels and expects 2010 to be 0.8% above 2009. There is no expectation that ad spending will get back to 2008 levels anytime soon.
Jim Erickson breaks all the stock photography rules and yet is one of the world's most successful sellers of stock images. Pick any strategy that everyone agrees is the key to success in stock, and Erickson is probably doing the opposite.
According to BIA/Kelsey, local advertising spend continues to shift to digital and to decline overall in gross revenue generated.
"We have reset and won't rebound and re-grow," said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on the continued decline of print as an advertising medium during the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival.
Newspaper advertising rates are based on how broadly the ad is used, not whether the publication is characterized as National, Regional or Local. National publications tend to be toward smaller circulations. Based on this theory, ads in National publications will tend to be priced higher than those in Regional or Trade publications. This story provides suggested prices.
This article provides information on how to price stock photo usages for advertising in National, Regional or Local magazines.
Advertising spending on the Internet will increase 26% in 2008, overtaking radio, and is expected to be more than 10% of the market. By 2010, Internet ad spend is predicted to reach $61 billion, slightly ahead of the $60.5 billion magazine ad segment of the market, per ZenithOptimedia.
By 2012, digital advertising is expected to eclipse traditional advertising, according to 52% of respondents to Accenture's 2008 Global Media Survey of more than 100 senior business executives in North America and Europe.