I joined them in May 2005. I have just over 400 images online and have made 13 sales. All of those sales have been withing the last 4 or 5 months.
Having been here for just 3 months now, I can appreciate how difficult it is for new sites
However, I guess you have to prioritise too. These are my priorities, see whether you agree.
1. Photographers - will make or break any new site. You have to value them above anything else and that means replying promptly to enquiries, keeping an eye and a presence on the forums and making sure images are reviewed as quickly as possible. Be honest and open, in other words, keep people in the picture (pun intended
)
Even if sales are slow (which we know they are), I believe that people understand that, especially if you are open and honest from the outset. It is to be expected given that the site is new and image numbers are relatively low.
2. Building up a decent sized library of good quality images.
3. Keep an active and high profile. It's important to let people know that I'm putting in as much time as I can to make this work. I'm one person at the minute but that's no excuse for slow approval times and responding to enquiries if they are put at the top of the list of priorities.
4. Make the site known to buyers. Now this is the most difficult bit, getting buyers here isn't really a problem but getting buyers to buy is dependent on image numbers, i.e. choice, which in turn means having a large number of images.
5. As you know we have had some sales (more than I expected at this stage in fact) which have been as a result of 'test' advertising. Had we a bigger library then I'm sure there would have been more (choice is a limiting factor).
6. Advertising the site. I have just bought a years worth of advertising at a high traffic web site.
http://www.prosphotos.com. I've been spending a small fortune on googleads and I have made our presence known on many design forums and will continue to remain active in those forums. Advertising will also increase in the coming months.
I'll also be taking advantage of opportunities that come along such as the recent giving away of images cover CD of the December issue of Digital Creative Arts. Unfortunately, nothing much came from that but at the time we only had around 3,000 images online. (choice again). However, it means that our presence became more widely known and that may have a positive effect yet to be seen.
I have to keep reminding myself that it's early days still but be assured that I'm as positive as ever.
7. Site development. I think it's important that ease of use for photographers and buyers. Most of the work on the site has been behind the scenes so far but as we grow, so will the features of the site. recently there has been the 'multi upload' which still needs work but it's better than what we had, the lightbox feature for buyers which is a big bonus because now, buyers can save images that they may buy later. There are a substantial number of images on various lightboxes which is promising.
So it boils down to long hours, high activity and patience. All of which I can provide.
This is a good opportunity to thank everyone for their hard work and patience in supporting yet another new site. So thank you all.
Cheers
John
Ahem..... this only started out telling you how many sales I've had at Scanstock
