Is it me, or is the competition for engaging evocative nature photography on this site stratospheric; almost ridiculous!?
That is not to say I am entirely intimidated by it, no, mainly I am inspired (and a big thank you to everyone).
This point makes me glad (in some ways) that most here are not aggressive marketers of their work (especially in the area of galleries/prints - where I am targeting). If they were, it seems, the competition would be so severe it would make it much harder to make a living, in an already tough market.
Also, the idea always goes through my head when I am on this site: why does this site not create their own stock agency?
I think, for nature photos and landscape, it would kick some tail out there! The talent here is flat out awesome. In my opinion the "Earth, Sea, Sky" forum consistently produces many of the best landscape images ON THE PLANET! Who needs the "big names" look at the work right there (of course there are some "big names" here as well)!
Makes me wonder why so many awesome images but few people out there marketing as aggressively as they shoot. Yet, like I have said, I am kind of glad.
BTW, in some ways I am not literally asking anyone to answer these questions for me (although please feel free to post your thoughts). I just felt the need to speak my mind about some things that come up every time I come here and am mesmerized by the quality of work consistently displayed.
Keep up the great work everyone!
Mark
Posted by Paul DeCesare on October 27, 2009 at 1:36 PM
Nail on the head. No site has helped inspire me and teach me like the work on this site. The photos, yes, but also the REAL C&C you get when you post an image. I've been whooped before after a mediocre post, and it was the best instruction I could have gotten. I so appreciate that, and the talent and honesty and professionalism here.
As fa as big names, it's rare to NOT have an issue of some major mag that doesn't include an NPN member now! to all you pros, and your patience with us who are still on the road.
Posted by Phillip Noll on October 27, 2009 at 3:29 PM
Makes me wonder why so many awesome images but few people out there marketing as aggressively as they shoot.
Many of the outstanding photographers here have full-time day jobs, families, and other responsibilities. For some of them, photography is a creative outlet and a break from the stress of daily life. Sure, if they invested time and energy in marketing their work they could make some good money at it but for many, turning that stress-relief outlet into a business would just bring about more stress! Kind of a Catch-22 almost. I'm just glad they share their images and techniques here on NPN so we can all learn and improve!
Posted by John Wheatley on October 27, 2009 at 5:19 PM
I must say, that my membership reflects prezackly what Phillip said above. I have a significant body of work that I show to no one but myself. Some of the folks here are camera nuts, some are nature nuts, and most of us are both. I like the idea of sharing with these people.
As to marketing, I would say that, even if the NPN folks never do more than they have, the photographers can certainly help themselves by ensuring that they think through what a harried editor might actually type into Google search that would turn up your image and then ensure that those words or that particular phrase appear either in your title or your description. Do I consider the likelihood high of that producing a sale--no. However, I consider it a possibility that is worth the extra couple of seconds as you post.
Note, that I haven't done this myself every time--but I should.
Now, a little step the NPN folks could take would be to give us a box to enter meta-tags for our photos. Might help.
Yep Phillip, you nailed it I think... Stress Relief!
Want to heap a bunch of stress on yourself? Go out and make a full time living at this!
In some ways, my previous days of driving a school bus during the year, living in an RV, and then taking the entire summer off to park that RV wherever I wanted to leisurely shoot full time (no production demands...) are missed. Not a complaint, but just a simple note of understanding.
I've got what is most certainly a peculiar view on all this. When you think about it long and hard, one of the possible messages is that it takes more than great photography to sell a photo.
The "market" is in a real state of flux right now, and no. I'm not talking about price drops. I'm talking about WHO is marketing successfully, and how clients are finding photos. The much-beloved mantra about shooting lots and placing bazzilions of photos in conventional stock agencies just isn't making a living for many folks. You just can't show and sell enough photos to make a living while giving away 50% or 60% of the income to a stock agency. And I'm curious to know what fraction of photo buyers actually get their photos from traditional stock agencies....
In fact, the most successful stock photographers I know do their own marketing and have their own sites. But it's not a passive activity. The two I know personally are in partnership with their spouses, with the spouse doing the marketing while they do the shooting. And each job is more than full time. Just one heck of a lot of work, moving two steps beyond "labor of love" to near-manic self-discipline. Long hours, careful planning, tight-tight-tight-tight business management, and no new cameras or cars until the old ones are beyond repair.
We have a funny relationship with stock. Sure we are stumbled upon for the occasional stock sale out of the blue. But 90% of our stock sales are purely "inside track" deals. We sell our services as photographers and take specific photos on contract, and stock sales are made to "fill out" or complete a client's project. We might be hired to photograph facilities and lifestyles for a lodge, then they buy our stock photos to complete the assembly of their "image" for clients.
We might be hired to photograph a gee-whiz piece of industrial gear, and the company buys some of our stock for their logo or prints for their boardroom walls. And the examples go on. The point is, those clients NEVER went near a conventional stock source to fill their needs. And their stock needs were always part of some larger project. And being plugged into that larger project is our entry into the stock sales. We don't go out of our way to sell stock, doing all the conventional stock marketing routines. We do market the heck out of our photographic services and realize only about 20% of our total income from subsequent stock sales. Heck, we even get hired now and then by stock agencies to take photos they can't get from their files or fleet of photographers. Go figure! We're certainly interested in marketing our stock more effectively, but so far our time is better invested in other things, both in terms of income and stock sales.
Does our stock photography measure up to the best here? HECK NO!!!! But our sales don't come from sites or stock agencies. They come from first being recognized as photographers that can get a job done on time, on budget, and on site. Once you're "known" to a client as a reliable source for photos, they'll come back to you for future stock sales, sometimes years after the first project.
And meanwhile, not another photographer or stock agency in the world ever hears about the sale opportunity or gets a chance to sell their better photography.
Time for a new marketing model for stock? Sure works for us.
Posted by Kent Staubus on November 1, 2009 at 11:46 PM
Ten years ago I made enough money from selling through a regional stock agency that it paid for my camera gear. Now, I just don't see any money in it at all. I think setting up something like that would be a waste of time.
If you're talking to me Mark, "stock" when conducted as a self-driven enterprise in local markets is almost entirely overlooked by most photographers. Playing with the big boys in the stock agencies has all the glamor, but can't match local sales for income. Small local sales will easily add up to more than what you'll make joining the anonymous ranks of an agency. Between our assorted photo services and local stock sales we're pulling a living out of a town with population under 15,000.
And even as a sideline, our stock sales top those of the vast majority of photographers I know personally who are listing with agencies. Your local businesses need photos too, but never go to the stock agencies to get them. When arrayed against their amateur photography, your good quality stock of local landmarks and topics will stand out with local clients, even if it remains anonymous at an agency.
Again makes me wonder why most don't market as agressively as the shoot? Money coming in from doing what we do often gives us freedom to do it even more.
Now you've nailed it down to the core question Mark! Shipping files off to a stock agency is surrogate marketing at best.
Lots of folks don't have the confidence or ambition or desire to do it themselves. But if they put 10% of the effort into marketing that they put into shooting and 1% of the money they put into camera gear, they'd be selling lots of photos I think.
Thanks Hank. I am walking into a market (self marketing) and wondering where everyone is? I see all these "super talents" on the forums, and sometimes they market on the forums to get publicity for their photo tours or online calendars or whatever but why don't they take their work to the world? I think it is an awesome service (and privilege) to others to share the things we have seen and captured and I think it is a good idea to go outside the virtual forum world and get these things into peoples homes.
Posted by John Williams on November 30, 2009 at 9:50 AM
Discussion
12 repliesIs it me, or is the competition for engaging evocative nature photography on this site stratospheric; almost ridiculous!?
That is not to say I am entirely intimidated by it, no, mainly I am inspired (and a big thank you to everyone).
This point makes me glad (in some ways) that most here are not aggressive marketers of their work (especially in the area of galleries/prints - where I am targeting). If they were, it seems, the competition would be so severe it would make it much harder to make a living, in an already tough market.
Also, the idea always goes through my head when I am on this site: why does this site not create their own stock agency?
I think, for nature photos and landscape, it would kick some tail out there! The talent here is flat out awesome. In my opinion the "Earth, Sea, Sky" forum consistently produces many of the best landscape images ON THE PLANET! Who needs the "big names" look at the work right there (of course there are some "big names" here as well)!
Makes me wonder why so many awesome images but few people out there marketing as aggressively as they shoot. Yet, like I have said, I am kind of glad.
BTW, in some ways I am not literally asking anyone to answer these questions for me (although please feel free to post your thoughts). I just felt the need to speak my mind about some things that come up every time I come here and am mesmerized by the quality of work consistently displayed.
Keep up the great work everyone!
Mark
As fa as big names, it's rare to NOT have an issue of some major mag that doesn't include an NPN member now!
As to marketing, I would say that, even if the NPN folks never do more than they have, the photographers can certainly help themselves by ensuring that they think through what a harried editor might actually type into Google search that would turn up your image and then ensure that those words or that particular phrase appear either in your title or your description. Do I consider the likelihood high of that producing a sale--no. However, I consider it a possibility that is worth the extra couple of seconds as you post.
Note, that I haven't done this myself every time--but I should.
Now, a little step the NPN folks could take would be to give us a box to enter meta-tags for our photos. Might help.
Want to heap a bunch of stress on yourself? Go out and make a full time living at this!
In some ways, my previous days of driving a school bus during the year, living in an RV, and then taking the entire summer off to park that RV wherever I wanted to leisurely shoot full time (no production demands...) are missed. Not a complaint, but just a simple note of understanding.
The "market" is in a real state of flux right now, and no. I'm not talking about price drops. I'm talking about WHO is marketing successfully, and how clients are finding photos. The much-beloved mantra about shooting lots and placing bazzilions of photos in conventional stock agencies just isn't making a living for many folks. You just can't show and sell enough photos to make a living while giving away 50% or 60% of the income to a stock agency. And I'm curious to know what fraction of photo buyers actually get their photos from traditional stock agencies....
In fact, the most successful stock photographers I know do their own marketing and have their own sites. But it's not a passive activity. The two I know personally are in partnership with their spouses, with the spouse doing the marketing while they do the shooting. And each job is more than full time. Just one heck of a lot of work, moving two steps beyond "labor of love" to near-manic self-discipline. Long hours, careful planning, tight-tight-tight-tight business management, and no new cameras or cars until the old ones are beyond repair.
We have a funny relationship with stock. Sure we are stumbled upon for the occasional stock sale out of the blue. But 90% of our stock sales are purely "inside track" deals. We sell our services as photographers and take specific photos on contract, and stock sales are made to "fill out" or complete a client's project. We might be hired to photograph facilities and lifestyles for a lodge, then they buy our stock photos to complete the assembly of their "image" for clients.
We might be hired to photograph a gee-whiz piece of industrial gear, and the company buys some of our stock for their logo or prints for their boardroom walls. And the examples go on. The point is, those clients NEVER went near a conventional stock source to fill their needs. And their stock needs were always part of some larger project. And being plugged into that larger project is our entry into the stock sales. We don't go out of our way to sell stock, doing all the conventional stock marketing routines. We do market the heck out of our photographic services and realize only about 20% of our total income from subsequent stock sales. Heck, we even get hired now and then by stock agencies to take photos they can't get from their files or fleet of photographers. Go figure! We're certainly interested in marketing our stock more effectively, but so far our time is better invested in other things, both in terms of income and stock sales.
Does our stock photography measure up to the best here? HECK NO!!!! But our sales don't come from sites or stock agencies. They come from first being recognized as photographers that can get a job done on time, on budget, and on site. Once you're "known" to a client as a reliable source for photos, they'll come back to you for future stock sales, sometimes years after the first project.
And meanwhile, not another photographer or stock agency in the world ever hears about the sale opportunity or gets a chance to sell their better photography.
Time for a new marketing model for stock? Sure works for us.
Kent in SD
And even as a sideline, our stock sales top those of the vast majority of photographers I know personally who are listing with agencies. Your local businesses need photos too, but never go to the stock agencies to get them. When arrayed against their amateur photography, your good quality stock of local landmarks and topics will stand out with local clients, even if it remains anonymous at an agency.
Lots of folks don't have the confidence or ambition or desire to do it themselves. But if they put 10% of the effort into marketing that they put into shooting and 1% of the money they put into camera gear, they'd be selling lots of photos I think.