Search Engine Optimization

PicturEngine Nears Public Launch To Customers

By Jim Pickerell | 1406 Words | Posted 9/14/2016 | Comments
After years of development PicturEngine is about ready to begin promoting its search engine to customers. It has more than 500,000,000 keyword searchable images from 64 stock photo agencies and hundreds—soon to be thousands—of individual photographers.

Agencies – Buyer and Supplier Relationships

By Jim Pickerell | 1321 Words | Posted 9/2/2016 | Comments
Yesterday, I talked about why the business of licensing rights to stock photos - as currently structured - is Designed To Fail unless some major changes are made. Two of the changes needed are: (1) make finding the right image for a project much easier for the buyer, and (2) improving supplier efficiency.

MotionElements Introduces Video & Audio Search Discovery Tools

By Jim Pickerell | 441 Words | Posted 7/12/2016 | Comments
Singapore based, MotionElements has introduced VisualSearch and AudioSearch v2; two improved revolutionary tools that simplifies all creators’ search for that perfect footage or music to use in their projects.

Adobe Stock Adds Premium Collection

By Jim Pickerell | 806 Words | Posted 6/21/2016 | Comments
Adobe has released a host of new features and performance enhancements for its Creative Cloud users. Of greatest interest to stock photographers is the addition of an all-new Premium Collection of over 100,000 high quality stock images. Images will be available for single download purchase and priced between $100 and $500. In addition, there are other key enhancements to Adobe Stock that provide a deeper integration with Creative Cloud apps.

Released: Do You Use It As A Keyword?

By Jim Pickerell | 698 Words | Posted 4/4/2016 | Comments
A photographer recently called to my attention a keywording anomaly that those who want their images found might want to consider. The photographer said that when he prepares for a trip to another country he searches some of the popular photo sites for the country and the keyword “released.”

Pond5 Introduces Improved Search And Membership Plans

By Jim Pickerell | 1410 Words | Posted 2/29/2016 | Comments
Pond5 has improved its systems for searching and finding the right video clip or image. In addition, it has introduced a Membership offering that provides significant saving for customers who pay monthly or annual subscription fees.

How Publications Could Grow Revenue (And Have More To Pay For Photos)

By Jim Pickerell | 862 Words | Posted 10/7/2015 | Comments
As more and more information consumers all over the world turn to the Internet for Information print publications are losing money. They can’t earn enough from Internet advertising to cover their costs. Traditionally, revenue from advertising has covered 50% or more of the total costs of operating a publication.

Picsbuffet: New Strategy For Image Search

By Jim Pickerell | 336 Words | Posted 7/1/2015 | Comments
Picsbuffet (https://picsbuffet.com/#) offers a new method of image search that allows users to easily, visually explore huge sets of images. The images are laid side by side in a “map style” format with similar images close to each other.

Getty Granted “Interested Party” Status In EU’s Investigation Of Google

By Jim Pickerell | 524 Words | Posted 6/24/2015 | Comments
Getty Images has been granted “interested party” status in the European Commission’s investigation into anticompetitive behavior by Google. Getty Images provides specialized image search and shopping services to end users in direct competition with Google.

Surfacing Images For Greater Revenue

By Jim Pickerell | 975 Words | Posted 3/31/2015 | Comments
One of the biggest problems for stock photographers is the percent of their images in major collections that haven’t been shown to any customer for years. I suspect that most of the major distributors aren’t even tracking this figure. If I had to guess I would estimate that as many as half the thumbnails in most online collections have not been viewed by any customer in the last two years.

age fotostock Redesigns Website

By Jim Pickerell | 490 Words | Posted 2/2/2015 | Comments
age fotostock, a stock photography agency based in Spain with offices in Barcelona, Madrid, New York, and Paris, launched a new look on their website this week.

Footage.net Adds Clip Sharing Capabilities

By Jim Pickerell | 240 Words | Posted 10/30/2014 | Comments
Footage.net has added a new clipbin sharing capability to its online stock footage search platform. The newly released feature allows users to share clipbins via email, streamlining the review and evaluation of stock footage screening clips and supporting greater collaboration.

Footage.net Deploys Solr Search Engine

By Jim Pickerell | 315 Words | Posted 10/9/2014 | Comments
Footage.net has adopted Solr search technology to power its online stock footage search and screening platform. The newly deployed search engine allows Footage.net to better manage huge datasets, organize diverse metadata fields, perform a vast number of simultaneous searches and filter search results dynamically. It's also extremely fast, significantly expediting the footage search and discovery process for Footage.net's global user base.

Curation

By Jim Pickerell | 645 Words | Posted 6/25/2014 | Comments
Customers are becoming increasingly unhappy with being asked to search through tons of images and still not finding what they want. In many cases it is not that great images are unavailable, it is just that they are buried under tons of less desirable images. Curation is the answer.

Search and Compare Major Microstock Sites

By Jim Pickerell | 749 Words | Posted 4/29/2014 | Comments
Buyers looking for microstock images want to know which of the many available sources offers the best licensing models, terms and price. Now with the beta version of http://www.microstock.photos customers can simultaneously check the offerings of 9 or the most popular microstock sites and see who offers the best deal. This search tool is free to use.

Should Old Images Be Culled From Archives?

By Jim Pickerell | 1142 Words | Posted 1/23/2014 | Comments
Recently on the Linkedin Stock Photography blog Valerie Henschel asked, “When do you cull older non-selling images from your archive?” It is certainly something to think about. If customers are forced to go through a lot of outdated, mediocre or totally irrelevant images in order to find something that really fits their needs – and hopefully the best of that subject matter available in the collection – they are likely to give up and go elsewhere. As the choices of almost any photographic subject expand exponentially, this is becoming a bigger and bigger problem for buyers.

“Usage Rights” Image Filters On Google And Bing

By Jim Pickerell | 889 Words | Posted 1/16/2014 | Comments
Google has just made it much easier for searchers to find images they can legally use for FREE – even for commercial uses. Bing introduced this feature last July. Go to Google. Use the images search feature and search for any subject. Click on “Search Tools” and under that click on “Usage Rights.” The default search is “not filtered by license,” but the searcher can change that to any one of the following:

CEPIC Image Registry

By Jim Pickerell | 1624 Words | Posted 6/20/2013 | Comments
Motivated by the European Union’s challenge to develop a technological system that would make it easier for European citizens to gain access to cultural resources CEPIC has developed the CEPIC Image Registry (CIR) that will allows simultaneous visual or text search across thousands of image databases. Read more about how will work and how it may change the image licensing business.

Should Web Developers Use Stock Or Original Photography?

By Jim Pickerell | 128 Words | Posted 6/19/2013 | Comments
Recently, Google engineer Matt Cutts was asked if stock photos on a web page have a negative effect on ranking compared to the use of original photography?  In a new Google Webmaster help video he said,  “To the best of my knowledge it doesn’t really make a difference whether it’s a stock photo versus an original photo,"

Alamy Launches New Look Website

By Jim Pickerell | 401 Words | Posted 3/26/2013 | Comments
Alamy’s new website is the latest step in the company’s efforts to improve the online experience for creative and editorial customers. The company has taken a phased approach to the site re-design and is initially launching with a new homepage, search results, image pop-up and lightbox tool.

Flickr As A Marketing Tool

By Jim Pickerell | 1152 Words | Posted 3/30/2012 | Comments
Most professional photographers believe Flickr is a site they should avoid because someone might steal their pictures. They think of it as a place where amateurs put the pictures they want to share with family and friends. Todd Klassy is using it very effectively to market his images in his part-time photographic business.

SuperStock Launches Value-Priced Image Collection

By Jim Pickerell | 260 Words | Posted 9/28/2011 | Comments
SuperStock, a leading stock photography agency specializing in Contemporary, Travel, Fine Art, and Vintage imagery, has launched SuperFusion, a new collection of value-priced royalty-free images gathered from around the world.  The collection features images from top professional photographers including microstock stars Yuri Arcurs, Ron Chapple, and Andres Rodriguez.

Corbis Updates Search Engine

By Jim Pickerell | 2341 Words | Posted 9/21/2011 | Comments
If you haven’t visited the Corbis web site for a while it may be time to take another look. In 2010 Corbis decided that it was time to update the search technology they had been using since 1995. The project involved a series of architectural changes with two primary aims – improving performance (speed of delivery) and relevancy of the search results delivered. This story discusses some of the changes and modifications.

Masterfile Introduced Timesaving Image Search Tools

By Jim Pickerell | 176 Words | Posted 8/23/2011 | Comments
Masterfile has upgraded its website with a suite of timesaving tools for creative professionals. "The new Masterfile.com is a game changer. It makes the task of sifting through millions of images an enjoyable, rewarding and ultimately creative experience," says Steve Pigeon, President.

Do You Love To Keyword?

By Jim Pickerell | 270 Words | Posted 7/28/2011 | Comments
In the digital world everyone loves to work for free. Particularly when it is an opportunity to help someone else earn money as a result of their efforts. With that in mind Magnum Photos is looking for volunteers to help them tag their online archive. If you’re interested sign up here.