Marketing
Paul Banwell, Senior Director, Contributor Relations for Getty Images has just sent contributors the following letter regarding Getty’s directions for the future. This information should be of interest to every stock image producer and distributor regardless of their relationships with Getty Images.
One of the biggest problems with stock photography licensing today is that there is often no clear logic behind why a higher price should be charged for one image and not another. In this article we explore how the industry's marketing strategy might be improved to generate more revenue for creators and distributors, as well as making the image search process more user friendly for customers.
ACSIL has announced the panelists who will be speaking at its ACSIL FOOTAGE EXPO 2016 in New York next week. The event is being held at the historic Prince George Ballroom at 15 East 27th Street, New York City on June 9, 2016. This one-day event is a chance to meet with footage distributors from both Europe and the U.S. and to hear discussions about the latest trends in the stock frootage industry.
In a
previous story we talked about five aspects of the image licensing business where serious modification to standard practices are needed, if the industry is move ahead and grow revenue. In that story I dealt with three of the five: (1) Pricing Floor For Certain Imagery, (2) Simplified Pricing and (3) Better Actionable Data For Contributors That Relates To What’s Selling. In this story we’ll examine the issues of (4) Curation and, (5) a Central Database For Small Collections.
If there is going to be a business of producing and licensing rights to stock photos five or ten years from now, the industry needs a serious re-design. There are at least five areas that need serious modification if the industry is to include anything other than User Generated Content (UGC), or if there is to be revenue growth.
Being represented exclusively by a single agency, or distributor, used to be important if you wanted a chance to license your images for high dollars for advertising or product identity uses. These customers wanted assurance that no one else would be using the same image while their campaign was in progress and they were willing to pay a lot of money for such rights.
The take over of the stock photography business by amateurs and part-timers is not new, but the long range implications are worth considering.
Shutterstock has announced a partnership with
PR Newswire that will provide its customers with access to the Shutterstock 83 million+ image library of licensable photos.
After reading my
previous story investors in stock photo companies as well as image buyers may ask, “Why should we care if professional photographers stop producing stock images?”
Recently, a photographer ask the following questions: Is stock photography a growing industry. I have read some analysis that say it is growing significantly, but others argue that free stock photography and microstock photography are leading photographers to leave the market. What is your opinion on that argument? Should a photographer upload the same pictures to as many other agencies as possible?
I want to call your attention to a couple of comments to my recent story “
Curated Collections: The Future.” It is important to recognize that there are some great images on most of the stock photo sites with tens of millions of images. But as we shove everything that meets certain technical standards onto these sites, it becomes harder and harder to sort through all the mediocre shots and find the few great ones.
Getty Images has contacted Veer contributors to explain what will happen to their imagery as a result of the
sale of Corbis to VCG. Their imagery will not be integrated into the Getty Images collection. Veer contributors may apply to iStock for possible upload of their content there. The memo says:
Many photographers who used to earn hundreds, and even thousands, of dollars for the use of one of their images think Shutterstock, and Microstock in general, are killing the stock photo business. Some Shutterstock contributors are even beginning to ask the same question. A reader recently asked for my analysis of why Shutterstock’s continued addition to its collection of over 700,000 new images a week won’t “drown it’s customers and risk losing its best contributors.”
Getty Images has sent Corbis contributors the following information about the migration of Corbis material to Getty representation. While some questions have been answered there are still a number of issues that are not clear.
The three public companies in the stock photo industry –
Getty Image, Shutterstock and
AdobeStock -- face major challenges that will probably be impossible for them to overcome. Adobe is the possible exception because it can approach the stock image side of its business as a loss-leader that supports the other 98% of its business.
Since publishing “
Next Step For Corbis Photographers” last week, I’ve been contacted by a number of agents interested in talking to Corbis photographers who might be looking for somewhere else to place their work.
I’m getting a lot of requests from Corbis photographers that basically ask, “What should I do now!” Indications are that fewer than 20% of Corbis photographers will be offered Getty contracts. The actual number may be significantly less. Knowing who will and won’t be selected may not happen quickly. This story offers more thoughts on what's likely to happen and offers options for photographers to consider
Increasing numbers of stock photo buyers seem to be deciding that ever larger collections of images are not for them. At least as a first stop. The big question is finding an alternative since most of the better known sites – both microstock and traditional – are racing to add more images.
It may be time for stock shooters to take another look at
Image Brief. It started out as a place where customers would go to list a brief explaining the kind of imagery they needed for their next project.
Both
Adobe and
Shutterstock have recently posted information on tends they have spotted that they think will continue to build in 2016.
Visual Connections returns to Chicago on Thursday, May 5th to stage another networking and education event for art buyers and researchers who need images and footage. The venue will be the conveniently located Ivy Room at Tree Studios.
If you’re a photographer who licenses your work as RM because you believe that’s the way to earn the most money (or a reasonable fee) when your pictures are used, it’s time to take a look at Offset. Many photographers are so opposed to microstock and subscription that they refuse to consider anything connected in any way with Shutterstock. If it is a Shutterstock initiative then it must be bad.
In an effort to make it easier for more people to use Shutterstock imagery the company is partnering with
Optimizely and
Sprinklr. By integrating
Shutterstock’s newest API directly into their platforms, customers of these organizations will be able to easily search, preview, and license from the Shutterstock collection. Contributors will earn a royalty each time an Optimizely or Sprinklr customer licenses one of their images.
Most image creators believe that adding images to online searchable databases will grow downloads and sales. This is particularly true, when one assumes that the new images being added are better than the ones produced earlier because the image creator has improved through experience and has a better understanding of what customers want. However, an examination of the sales by iStock’s leading contributors indicates that adding images is often counter productive in terms of increasing downloads. In fact, contributors who add very few, or remove, images often show the greatest download-per-image in the collection.
If you love Shutterstock, are a Google Chrome user and want Shutterstock to know everywhere you go and everything you do on the Internet, you may want to install the new
Shutterstock Tab just launched today. You can get the tab free of charge by going to the
Chrome webstore.