There are plenty of free sites around, think of flickr alone, where you can display your pictures, cost nothing. Another is wordpress where you can blog as well. All you need is a few pictures to show quality and style, To put up hundreds of pictures is just confusing. Search on free photo storage.
You can also make completely your own site, many places offer free web hosting. Keep it simple, stay far away from rubbish as Flash based complex sites. People want to see the pictures, not the site and skill of the site designer or computer programmer.
http://www.free-webhosts.com/power-search.php
http://www.absolutely-free-hosting.com/
Just search for free web hosting. Here is one http://www.robingee.v2hd.com/ hosted at http://www.v2hd.com/
You have to make your own site and upload it, but it is not a difficult thing to learn, I think Microsoft Word can be used, windows explorer for uploading, and there are plenty of free tools. Search on HTML editors and try until you find something you like. Talk to others
Then we have sites as
http://www.photographersdirect.com Where buyers can advertise their needs. Excellent.When you put up your pictures, make sure you put your name, company or logo visible in one corner, and your contact details like email. Make the picture reasonably low resolution and about the size of a screen saver, 1,000 pixel wide. Then you hope that 100 million people will "steal" it and use as screen savers. Ooops, now you have 100 million free commercials all over the world. They would never have paid for it anyway if you tries to sell it, so what does it matter.
Then you keep writing to chosen buyers and offer your services, not only photos, and join blogs and commentaries to draw attention to what you have to sell. I think it is called guerrilla marketing. Don't put it up as advertisements, most people don't like that, but just "my way" of doing it, so to say.
Then you can write free photo manuals, articles, and free camera manuals, how to photograph, your own experiences, how I took this picture, and so on, sales material the clients want, and that has value to them. Remember, it is usually not the person who signs the check that looks for the picture, so if an assistant find a how-to manual for photography, he/she is likely to take a look at your photos too, and you have attention.
Just a few ideas.
On 09-Jan-2012 8:42 AM, Terri Keller wrote:
Rolf,
Your analogy is very insightful. I too thought that by displaying my photos on Smugmug that everyone would be able to see my work. They seem to look, they seem to like....but no one has bought anything. My year with Smugmug is just about over. I will take into consideration your suggestions and see how it works from there. I've always wanted to have my own website. Do you have any suggestions for a website illiterate? Where do I start without it costing me a fortune or a college degree in computer science?
On Tue, Jan 3, 2012 at 10:15 PM, RK <rolf.krohna@gmail.com> wrote:
Just a few ideas, and I am not claiming to be right or any expert or guru.
To make money on photography is not about photography at all, but a matter of having the goods someone want to buy, and then sell it to them, get it under their nose.
There are heaps of sites you can exhibit your photos on. Look especially for sites that specialize in one genre, like travel, hospital, medical, location, etc, what ever.
When I went to your site http://www.shaunramsay.com/ and it confused me, it is heavily tilted towards selling SmugMug, not your photos. Just my opinion, but much better to open your own site than pouring photos into a general site where everything disappears into a gigantic barrel of everything. Most buyers are either subscribed to one o a few sites, as media and papers, or use search engines like Google to find what they want. The right key words are crucial. Find sites that have active sales and ongoing activities. Not just storing your photos for a fee.
Suggest you focus a bit more. Most pictures are of the kind where there are billions of free photos available on the web. The guard in front of The Forbidden City for instance.
Name the files with the keywords and your email, watermark the photo discreetly in one corner with your logo and eventually your email, and don't upload the originals. Biggest size should be the same as for a screen saver. A lot of people will download the photo of that reason, and every PC using it will be a free commercial for your photography.
To get into the stock photo market today is difficult, too many in there and too much free of charge available. Try to combine your photography with some activity that bring your name forward and yourself noticed, things like having your photos on mouse pads, T-shirts, etc. Cover events and news, even if it does not pay well, or not at all.
Put meta data in. Your name and email. Now I can only see that you use a Canon EOS 5D Mark II and took the picture at 2011:06:08 12:57:44 and a few other things. (The Neuschwanstein photo) Metaeditor is a good free program, just a bit convoluted to get started with. (http://www.kiwiczech.net/)
Many people will download photo and use them on private blogs and personal pages. Great. Make sure the credit you, because they will never pay for it anyway, and every "stolen" such photo is a free sales commercial.
Just a few thoughts.
On 01-Jan-2012 6:19 AM, ramsayshaun115 wrote:Hi everyone,
I've been in business for about a year and a half and am looking to take the plunge into stock selling, though I don't have experience with it.
My website is www.shaunramsay.com. I'm also on flickr at www.flickr.com/photos/shaunramsay. If anyone has suggestions about stock companies that are accepting new photographers, I would be interested to know and appreciate any tips and advice.
Thanks and Happy New Year!
Shaun
--
TerriBe sure to check out my website! http://pixbytlk.smugmug.com/and remember:Life is short! Bend the rules, forgive quickly, kiss slowly, love truly,
laugh uncontrollably, & NEVER regret anything that made your smile!
0 comments:
Post a Comment