Articles by Jim Pickerell
Marketers are often told that the images they use in their marketing materials should be “unique” – whenever possible unique to their own business. In theory, that is one reason why so many experts claim that stock images are bad.
But, is that true? Do most image user follow this advice?
Shutterstock, has announced the expansion of its leadership team with three hires over the last six months. David Petts as Chief Revenue Officer, Lou Weiss joins the company as Chief Marketing Officer and Lisa Nadler, who joined the company in 2017, as Chief Human Resources Officer.
I have been looking at some of the Visual Trends 2018 reports. I hope they are helping customers because I don’t think they are doing much for image creators. Take
Getty’s trend report which evidently came out of the UK office. They say, “our Creative team analyzed 1 billion searches and 400 million imagery downloads on GettyImages.com, studied advertising trends, and examined pop culture shifts to predict three defining visual trends of 2018.
Over 60 years ago I decided that because I enjoyed taking pictures I wanted to pursue photography as a way of earning my living. I’ve had a great career, but as a profession things have changed dramatically. For anyone starting out today it is much more difficult to get a foothold – and much less likely that you will ever earn reasonable money – taking pictures for a living.
After six years of connecting advertising agencies and brands with image creators ImageBrief has announced that they are closing down their marketing services. Effective March 1, 2018 when photographers who have subscribed to the service login the only page available to them is the one where they may download information about their licenses. No other website pages are operational. No new “Briefs” will be offered.
A Shutterstock investor asked me recently, “What can Shutterstock do to grow revenue?” He went on, “worldwide, the number of customers willing to actually pay for the images they use seems to be flat, not growing. Shutterstock
cut prices In 2017. Downloads were up less than 2% compared to 2016. Meanwhile, they added enough new images to grow their collection by 46% in 2017 compared to 2016. Art directors say the size of the collection is making it harder, not easier, for them to search and find what they need. AI doesn’t seem to be solving the search problem."
Visual China Group (VCG) announced on Monday, February 26th that it has acquired 100% of 500PX, INC. (
500px) shares through its wholly-owned subsidiary, VCG Hong Kong LTD.
500px is one of the leading online visual creative communities in the world, founded in 2009 and based in Toronto, Canada. With more than 13 million professional and hobbyist photographers from over 195 countries and regions, the 500px community has produced over 120 million unique images diversity and creative trend. 500px is renowned globally for its community, image licensing, and custom photography.
The numbers
Shutterstock put out yesterday got me thinking. Is it really possible for the average price per download to steadily rise in a year when they have introduced new 10 and 50 image packs at lower costs to the customers? Do the download figures really mean the customers are using more of every category of imagery?
Depositphotos, a global stock photography, stock footage and editing tools provider, has launched the
Focused Collection, a marketplace of more than 400,000 premium images by selected artists which have previously never been available on stock photography platforms. The company partnered with 500px, Image Source Premium, Westend61, StockFood, MintImages and other major agencies to bring to life this collection of rare and authentic images, aiming to serve the needs of editors, websites, advertising agencies and corporate clients.
Shutterstock has reported Q4 2017 revenue of $151.8 million up $21.7 million, or 16.6% on a constant currency basis, compared to $130.2 million in Q4 2016. The revenue was also up $10.7& million from Q3 2017. Revenue per download averaged $3.33 per image, an 11% increase over Q4 2016. About 27% of revenue, or roughly $150.4 million, was paid out in royalties to contributors.