In web advertising what produces the best results still photos or videos? You may be surprised. This story outlines some of the things that are happening that will change the way customers choose their images and some of the things you can do to increase sales.
In March it was reported by Moody’s and Standard & Poors that the
gross revenue for Getty Images in calendar 2011 was $945 million. This
figure, and how the various lines of business break out, provide some interesting insights into the state of the stock
photography business.
The stock photography industry has to face the challenge of becoming relevant in an economy that has no patience for inadequate business models. Today the vast majority of photographs are used without any contact with the traditional photo industry, which has completely lost control of production and distribution. But the industry continues stubbornly to apply old rules to this new landscape. It does not see, or purposely wants to ignore, that their model does not fit current needs and thus is chasing customers away.
Evolveimages.com has introduced a new simplified licensing model for Rights Managed (RM) Images that they call EvoRights. EvoRights focuses on four primary price drivers: use type (commercial or editorial), intended media (print, digital or both), duration and geographic distribution and allows customers to determine the usage fee in as little as three clicks.
An Australian company called
ImageBrief, has developed a way for buyers to submit briefs directly to photographers for the images they need. This cuts out the stock agency middle men, and eliminates the need for buyers to wade through massive online databases of images.
iStockphoto has launched a simple and intuitive
plugin for several programs in the new Adobe® Creative Suite® 6 (CS6). The FREE plugin enables designers to search and directly download images within the programs without interrupting their workflow. A one-click comp replace feature automatically exchanges comp images with purchased images, perfectly resized and positioned within the working page layout or design.
As of the end of April PacaSearch had 169,352,194 searchable images on
www.pacasearch.com. That is a lot of images. And the number is constantly growing. But, the number is not what makes searching on this site unique. What’s amazing is the fact that all the images are easily available for licensing because trademark, copyright and release issues have been addressed and sales models have been created.
The U.S. Copyright Office is proposing to increase the registration fee for filing an online application from $35 to $65, and the fee for using a paper application from $65 to $100. They are requesting a fee increase because in 2011 fee receipts only covered 59.5% of the cost of providing the service. The rest comes out of the taxpayers pockets.
Alamy has announced the expansion of its
100% Royalties project, designed to give young photographers experience of a professional stock photography agency. Launched in a number of universities in the UK and USA in 2011 the project has proved a real success. In fact, it has been such a success that it is being extended into a second year.
RM photographers Take Note!! With the launch of
PeopleImages.com Yuri Arcurs has taken away your last best argument for why professional art directors and graphic designers should go to traditional RM sites to license the images they need.