Hi guys. After three years of doing stock photography, I am going to share with you
in this video everything that I've learned in that time. This is going to be
a "holding nothing back - sharing it all" including income, rejection reasons,
images that sell, information about agencies and more. And then I'm going to
let you know after three years what my conclusions are and whether or not I
think that doing stock photography is actually worth it. After that I'm going
to share with you your Instagram images from this week. I am blown away once
again by the incredible talent that you guys have and I can't wait to share, so
let's get started.
So what kind of investment does it take on the photographer's part to be part of
the stock photography community? If you already have a camera and you're working
it's really not an investment that way. If you don't have a camera then you need
a camera, and you just need some sort of photo editing software. The really big
investment that I find is required in stock photography is time. So it takes a
lot of time to plan your shoots, to go out to take the photographs, to edit the
photographs, add your keywords, do your descriptions, upload to stock photography
and then wait for your acceptance or rejection of each image. Now I would say
for me, in my experience - even once I got going - So at first it takes a lot more
time because you're learning what you're doing but even after you get going I
would say that it was a lot of work for me to be uploading at least, say, three
images per day. So for me to upload a lot more, say fifteen, sixteen images at one
time, we're talking hours and hours of work. So I would say that that is one
thing that you need to consider if you are thinking about doing stock
photography in any serious sort of way, that it really does take time.
Acceptances and rejections. How does this work with stock photography? In the past,
it was actually really really hard to get images accepted in a stock
photography agency if you weren't a really high quality and knew "exactly
what you were doing" photographer. I'm not saying you shouldn't know what you're
doing. You should but it is much much easier these days to get images accepted
into stock photography agencies. Stock photography agencies want to have the
biggest database of images possible out there for their customers, so it's not
too difficult that way. Rejections, they do still happen and it's actually a good
thing that they happen. So when I have images that are rejected, there's a
rejection reason. So it will tell me why this image has been rejected. You will
learn so much just by going and taking that image that has been rejected and
fixing it for re-upload to the stock photography agencies and that's
something I think is really fantastic about stock photography is that you
learn so much. If you can just get past how much it hurts when you get an image
that you really like rejected (because it does it really does - we all invest in our
images and that makes sense) but once you can move past that part and use the
learning experience and then to see that image accepted or to see your
photography really growing I would say that's one of the most wonderful things
about stock photography and one of the things that I would say is a big big
reason just to do it.
Information about stock photography agencies. Which stock photography
agencies are worth uploading to? When I first started in stock photography, I
uploaded to a good number of agencies - at least 10 of them on a regular basis and
I didn't know at that time which ones were going to be the most lucrative in
terms of getting paid. So after three years I can tell you that there are four
agencies that I use and the other ones I don't upload to anymore. So there's
Shutterstock. Shutterstock will definitely give you the highest number
of sales. Shutterstock has an incredible reach in terms of their ability to
advertise your images and a huge customer base, so Shutterstock I would
say is agency number one. Slightly less sales but more money per sale is Adobe.
Adobe stock is fantastic because it's integrated into the Adobe software which
means higher commissions for you the photographer. Then there's Istock or
Getty Images. The way that they work is that you don't see your sales every
single day or as they happen. At the end of the month you get a report and you
see then exactly how much you made for that month and what images have sold. If
you're an excited stock photographer and you want to see right away, this might be
a little frustrating for you but I would say definitely if you're going to do
this give Istock or Getty Images a try because they do actually get quite a
bit of sales. The other stock agency that I do upload to is Dreamstime and the
reason that I upload to Dreamstime is not because I get a ton of sales from
them but because it's really pretty easy and I will get enough sales that after
quite a bit of time I will get a payout. All of the other agencies that I've
tried I just stopped uploading to them because there weren't
enough sales for me to see ever really having a good payout
and it wasn't worth the effort.
Okay, this is the part that everybody wants to know about - the money. So how
much are commissions? How often do I get paid? How much do I get paid per month
and how much am I getting paid for each Stock agency? And this is a very very
big deal because this is a business. You are investing your time. You're investing
your talent and you are uploading these images for sale and you want to get some
money back for that. In fact it would be nice to get enough money to cover all of
those things and a bonus for you when you are uploading to stock photography.
If you want to be making consistent amounts of money, it is essential and
very, very important that you upload images on a consistent basis. The way
that the search engines work and the way that their advertising in their
marketing works, is that stock agencies, those who submit to them are going to do
best if you upload small amounts of images on
a consistent basis. New images sell better than old. Old images - the old, old
images, can tend to get buried. And there are bestsellers that will just keep
selling but if you're consistently uploading to stock agencies you are
going to see more in your bank account at the end of the day. So different
agencies have different payout thresholds. Shutterstock is $35. If you've
made more than $35 (this is US dollars), at the end of the month they will pay out,
and that's if you have a certain payment method like PayPal, which is what I use.
Other agencies have different amounts. Adobe stock has $50. Istock, Getty Images
has $100. $35 US, that's about $50 Canadian let's say, I will get that from
Shutterstock every single month. Adobe stock is $50. It usually takes (and $50 US)
It usually takes me a month or two to
get that amount. Istock Getty Images - it usually takes me three months to get
that amount so on average from these agencies I am making about $35 per month, US,
and that is pretty consistent now. That is probably because I have stopped
uploading to stock agencies in the last six months. When I was uploading on a
regular basis, as I said before, I was making more money than I am now. Now what
I have is just completely passive income. I'm not doing any work on it. I am not
uploading any more. They just send me the paychecks, which is pretty cool too.
Now this is where, this is where I want to say something that I am quite
passionate about and it's one of the reasons why I've stopped doing stock
photography. Even though you can be making some money from your images, I
would say that from the amount of time and talent and investment that you as a
photographer have put into creating your images, I think, this is just my opinion
but I think that a 25 cent commission or 33 cent commission or even
when you get a big sale and you get $5 or $50 ($50 by the way, is the highest
commission I've ever gotten on one photo and that was once, twice, maybe a couple
of times) so the amount of time and effort and talent that you put into it I
would say that photographers are being robbed of their images and I know that
sounds really really strong but that is how I feel. I feel that, you know
everything - all of the education and the time and the talent that you are putting
into your stock photos - I would say that you are worth more than a small
commission so I have not been doing stock photography for the money because
honestly it's pocket change. It's just little bits of money that come in. For
the amount of work that you put in, it's a very small amount of money. I
think that you as a photographer are so valuable and that you are producing
something that is so valuable to the companies that use your work. I have seen
my work on huge companies, like big companies in very big places, and they're
using my images for their advertising and they're getting a great benefit from
it and I've gotten 33 cents. So just something to think about and if you have
another opinion I would love to hear it. Just put it below. And you might ask me,
why then have I done stock photography three years? And I will explain that the
benefits of doing stock photography have to do with what I've mentioned earlier
and that is the learning process. So as you create different images, you're
constantly thinking about what you can do that will sell, what images look good,
what makes an image look good, what makes and image sell, what makes a high quality
image for a business that... You know, you're just, you're constantly learning.
So my photography skills have increased many many times over since doing stock
photography and I really appreciate that and I also really enjoy learning, so that
is one reason why I have done stock photography. Another reason why I've done
stock photography is the satisfaction of it and I'm not talking about the money
because I already addressed that. With the satisfaction of seeing my work in a
publication or on TV or in a magazine or you know, whatever. Something like that is
incredibly satisfying. It's different than your family member
telling you, "Hey, that's a good picture" or your mom, you know, because she has to.
When you see it out there being used by a big company for something, they value
your work. It's extremely satisfying and it gives you a lot of confidence, so for
that reason I do recommend stock photography and it's fun.
So what are some ideas and tips if you do want to do stock photography?Somebody
asked me if you could only choose one lens, which would it be? For me, my go-to
stock photography lens is just a plain 50mm lens. It's perfect. In terms
of tracking your sales, I use an app called Microstockr. Okay I think it's a
funny name but Microstockr, so it's microstock with an "R" on the end and you
can find it in the App Store. I'm not sure if you can find it on Google Play
but it is great. It is a cheap, cheap app and what you can do is you just open the
app, you have all of your agencies that you're signed up for listed and it'll
show you your sales for each one. You don't have to go and log into each site
to find out how many sales you've made and how much you've made each day. It's
great. Another person asked me about using either your real name or a trade
name for..., or just like a user name for your account. On stock agencies I would
suggest if you can, to use your real name and that's because it gives you
recognition as a photographer. I have had images used, say, like on a textbook or in
a location where the company that purchases it does actually credit the
photographer and it's really nice to see my name Rachel Lerch, beside the image
instead of, you know, some username that I've just kind of thrown out there.
Another person asked about stock video. I have not done any stock video, so that's
not something I'm going to be covering in this video. Creating best-selling
images. Definitely best-selling images are those that have a concept or are
something that you can easily apply to a theme. So Christmas images, holiday images,
Easter images, anything like that - something that represents a holiday. And
it could just be, say, some eggs in a basket or it could be a Christmas ribbon.
Those images are going to sell well. By concepts I mean
something that might represent something, like energy or excitement or anything.
Pretty much any concept you can think of - if you can make an image that
illustrates that, and usually the simpler the better. A nice, simple, clean image is
going to be a good seller.
So is stock photography worth it? I am NOT doing stock photography anymore.
That's not to say that there aren't reasons to do it, things like I told you
about - learning and about the satisfaction and all of those things - and
if... You know what? If you just want, you have the time and you want to upload
your images and you don't mind getting smaller paychecks from them, hey. Why not?
I still enjoy getting the paychecks that I do get every month. They're not huge
paychecks but hey, that's okay. I'll still take them. Is it worth it for
me? It's not worth it at this time because it takes a large time investment
and I don't have that right now and I have other things that I'd like to put
my time into and enjoy - the vlogs that I go out on, the the times when you
guys join me on workshops, all of that stuff is just it's a preference for me. I
really, really enjoy that stuff and so I'm not doing stock photography anymore.
Now on to exciting things - your Instagram images. They are fantastic. You blow me
away with your talent. The images this week are just... and last
week's the collection, is so fantastic. You need to check them out. Go on
Instagram and search for #heyrachellerch and see these images and
then add your own because I'm going to, next Sunday, put some more images that
you have posted on my video. Now there were so many, I could not - I could
not pick just one, so this week's image that I'm going to post for you is
posted by Jarle. Amazing sunset. I love this image and what do I love about it? I
love the mood. It is a monochrome image but it's all deep golden yellow, orange
and it's just... there's just something about the image that when you look at it
just makes you feel. Just feel. I love the colours. I love the composition. I love
everything about it. Congratulations Jarle. That is a fantastic, fantastic
image.
Now just exciting I want to let you know that I am planning a two-day photography
workshop in Niagara Falls. So it's going to include some exciting stuff.
It's going to be coming up soon so I'm going to go down there and visit. I'm going
to record for you - give you an idea of where we're going to be going. The
workshop for now is tentatively planned for the beginning of June and I hope
that some of you can make it out. We're going to have a fantastic time. Thanks so
much for watching. If you have any questions about stock photography, about
the hashtag on Instagram, about anything that you want to ask me, please post it
below. Thanks again for coming along and I'll talk to you soon. Bye guys.