May earnings

A record month for earnings which for the first time were above the $ 300 and closing down on the $ 400 mark....
4 BME on the big 6. 123RF performed very well this month due to two EL and the new price structure. SS came back to the first position with a record month in sales helped by the 32% increase in commission.
FT came down very hard but was better at the end of the month. It can explained by the fact the search engine was scrambled..... Apparently FT is also implementing a subscription package but at $ 0.23 it will be the lowest price in the industry, not good... So far it only possible to opt-out exclusives pictures, even worse.... That is what I did first.
BME at IS as well where the subscription package started the 26th but apparently sales were not credited yet.
SXP gave me the highest $ per regular dl's with $ 1.82 helping by some $ 5 sales (I still opt-out for sub there).
Regarding midstock one sale to rport at Zymmetrical for $ 19.6.

Microstock one by one

• SS (+72%). BME. Excellent month and with global performance coming back up again to the level it was last December. More than 400 pictures sold this month. performance 43 %

• 123RF (+559%). BME. Record month due to 2 EL at $ 36.5 each few days apart.$ per download of $ 3.4 the highest this month.
  

• IS (+21%) A good month at IS with a average of $ 0.87/dl this month and a global performance of 28 %.
  

• FT (-64%) Earnings clearly down this month and only number 4 this month.... $ 1.5 /dl
  

• SXP (+96%) BME. SXP continues its progression with an average of $ 1.82/dl (subscriptions opt-out). Global performance 11 %.
  

• DT (+9%). Stable compared to last month. Average return of $ 0.77/dl and global performance of 4 %.

Low earners (less than 2 % of earnings)
BSP (no sales this month) CSP ($ 0.75...) , SCP ( $1.5), CT ($ 1.5....), LO ( $ 0.4) RIP

* Big 6 rankings

$: SS>123RF>IS>FT>SXP>DT
Performance: SS>IS>123RF>SXP>FT>DT
$/DL: 123RF>SXP>FT>IS>DT

Detailed earnings Figures in USD. Note: 100 % global performance is defined by a portfolio with an average of sales of $ 1 per picture.

123RF review

I started submitting to 123RF in July 2007 along with other agencies. I don't have any link with 123RF (except the referral link at the end :) ) I just wanted to give a fair review of this agency and talk a bit about my experience so far.

Even if sales started very slowly at first, 123RF has been growing at its own pace very consistently as I uploaded regularly every month between 40 and 50 pictures. At this date I am seasoned contributor with a bit more than 500 pictures online. I had 2 payouts (took me 8 months for the first, only 2 months for the second). For the past two months 123RF was my 5th and 3rd site in term of earnings.

I tried to put a list of things I like about 123RF which is actually surprisingly long !

• Consistent and fast reviews (typically 24 to 48 hours)
• Nice and quick web interface with very low downtime
• Easy uploads , no categories and disambiguation needed
• One of the highest acceptance in microstock (at least for me about 80-90%)
• Movable watermark
• 50 % commission
• Possibility to mark as favorites 5 % of your pictures, giving them more exposure during the search
• Automatic Paypal payment after $ 50 reached
• Balanced credit and subscription models in term of sales
• Highest exclusive license commission in all microstock agencies (up to $ 36.50).
• Very fast on line support (used it once)

What I don't like ? Well not many things so far except the donated images I tried it several times which did not increase significantly my sales. However I noticed that fave your best pictures really increase picture exposure and sales. I advice to rotate pictures in the faved section from time to time.

On the graph below I plotted my earning since the start. Please noted that this month is exceptionally high since I sold two extended licenses in a row :)

Is 123RF the little agency that grows and grows ? Time will tell but they have been pretty innovative so far and active in marketing their products. They unveiled recently a new label called EVO, limited so far to some cherry picked contributors. With this, 123RF expands its products to the midstock market.

If you are already submitting to microstock and looking to increase your earnings with a agency with some potential I definitely recommend 123RF. You will need to put at least 200 pictures online to see some earnings though.
And if this post has been useful to you and I convinced you to register you can use my referral link below, you will be my first :) Thanks !

Update on Shutterstock

I wanted to give an update on my progress on Shutterstock : 4 months have passed since my previous post so what happened ?


Stats

• I got a raise from 0.25 to 0.30 then $ 0.33 per download
  
• Best day with 34 downloads in December 2007
• Only 8 pictures so far have made more than $ 10 each (a bit less than 3 % of my portfolio)
  
• At this day 2200 pictures were sold including 2 extended licenses (for $ 20 each)
• Portfolio is now close to 300 pictures
  

• Despite regular uploads, sales are not linear anymore with the size of my portfolio since last December
• The performance of my portfolio decreased steadily from 53 % last January to less than 30 % last month
• SS was my number earner for 8 consecutive months and only second last month after FT
• The raise in March did not change anything :( so I am looking forward to raise this month....
  

It will be interesting to see how much SS are willing to give to their contributors for the raise and how the subscription program that IS will implement later this month will impact on my SS and IS sales. Will SS be number one again next month ? We will see...
Update graphs are below

Despite the pessimist tone of this post, it is still worth to join Shutterstock. If you want to join here is my referral link Submit Photos to Shutterstock and make $$$!
Thanks !

April Earnings

This is now my 10th consecutive earnings report and the best so far closing down on the $ 300 mark. For the first time, SS lost his number one spot over FT. All the other sites are performing as usual no surprise there. I got my first sale (11.97 euros) at Panthermedia with a very small portfolio which is encouraging.

The surprise this month in microstock was LO announcing that they will close down the 15th of May due to a lack of funding. Got one payout there and have so far $ 3.40 on the piggy which will probably get lost.... Other agencies are following this path and it looks like that on the long term, micro will evolve to midstock.
Next month should see an increase in earnings: SS will announce and implement its raise for its contributors in the first two weeks of May, I hope it will be something like $0.40.... IS will implement subscription at the end of the month (26th) and finally 123RF implements its new credit prices today the 2nd of May.
Go back to stats now with microstock one by one

Microstock one by one

• FT (+74%). BME. My best earner this month for the time since I started contributed to SS last August. A exceptional month at FT with good sales volume and a record of $ 2.57 per download due to an extended sale ($ 26, picture was exclusive to FT). Global performance of 14 %.

• SS (- 5%). Despite uploading new pictures, earnings do not increase like they did before , it is hard enough to maintain them.... Hopefully with the raise coming and more uploads it will possible to make $ 100 a month on SS. Global performance down to 29 %, an all time low.

• IS (+72%) A good month at IS with a average of $ 0.72/dl this month and a global performance of 27 % just behind SS...

• DT (+28 %). Not far from a BME this month. Average return of $ 0.85/dl and global performance of 4 %.

• 123RF (+31%) A dip in sales compared to last month but 123RF is pretty stable otherwise. Hopefully earnings will go up this month when the new credit prices will kick in this month. Performance of 3 % and average of $ 0.72/dl.

• SXP (+8%) BME. SXP continues its slow progression with an average of $ 1.44/dl (subscriptions opt-out). Global performance 6 %. 200 + portfolio this month.
  

Low earners (less than 2 % of earnings)
BSP, LO (RIP), SCP, CT (a slight improvement in sales this month). No sales at CSP for 2 months in a row (next to go down ??).

• Big 6 rankings

$: FT>SS>IS>DT>123RF>SXP

Performance: SS>IS>FT>SXP>DT>123RF

$/DL: FT>SXP>IS>123RF>DT>SS

Detailed earnings Figures in USD. Note: 100 % global performance is defined by a portfolio with an average of sales of $ 1 per picture.