Editorials
Micro-stock facts and figures from Fotolia
Few trends in the stock photo industry made as much of a bang in 2006 as the ascendancy of the micro-stock business model. Where only a handful of stock photo insiders knew much about micro-stock twelve months ago, Getty's purchase of iStockphoto early in the year forced everyone to sit up and pay attention. Jupiter Images CEO Alan Meckler, who recognized the importance of micro-stock sooner than most, solidified Jupiter's position in the micro-stock sector in 2006 by acquiring 90% of HAAP Media, owner of stockxchange.com and stockxpert.com. The topic of micro-stock also generated considerable commentary, both positive and negative, from all corners of the stock photo and professional photography blogosphere, including this publication. So, with great interest, we consider the following facts and figures relayed in Fotolia's end-of-the-year newsletter to its community of photographers and image users.
According to the newsletter, as of December 22, 2006:
Fotolia has now completed just one year of operation.
It has 1.9MM images on-line.
Its community of registered users exceeds 200,000 members.
Over 40,000 artists have contributed images to the site.
It added branches in Brazil, Japan and Portugal to already existing offices in France, Germany, the UK, Spain, Italy and the US.
50% of the images on the site have sold more than once.
70% of the buyers are return customers.
An image is sold every eight seconds on the site.
10,000 images are sold on the site every day.
The statistics offered by Fotolia depict an enviable state of affairs for any start-up business. The extraordinary growth-rate of the micro-stock business, reported by all the major players in this still relatively small sector, appears to have remained steady throughout the year.
Several deductions we can make from the Fotolia information:
a) If Fotolia's average fee per download matches that of iStock, or $1.62, then their 10,000 downloads per day generate daily revenue of $16,200 and annual revenue of $5.9MM.
b) If 40,000 contributors have supplied 1.9MM images, that's an average of 48 images per contributor.
c) If Fotolia pays an average of 50% to its contributors (as stated in their presentation at the PACA International Conference in Key West,) at the current download run-rate that's $2.95MM per year shared among 40,000 artists for an average of $73.91 per contributor per year.
These figures bear out the notion that most contributors to micro-stock aren't in it for the money which makes it hard for professional photographer groups to take them seriously. The fact that these contributors compete (consciously or unwittingly) with professionals who are decidedly in it for the money makes it hard for those same professional photographer groups to dismiss or ignore them. How serious a threat micro-stock will prove to professional stock photographers, especially those primarily engaged in RF, and to the RF business in general, will become clearer in 2007.
We look forward to Fotolia's newsletter for next December.
Web: www.fotolia.com
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Related Stories:
Getty offers iStockphoto contributors a contract and raises prices (December 5, 2006)
2007 predictions for the stock photography industry (November 27, 2006)
Editorial: Scary math – A closer look at Micro-Stock numbers (November 14, 2006)
Jupiter ups stake in micro payment stock photography sites (November 8, 2006)
The future of a traditional stock agency is in its own hands (October 24, 2006)
Editorial: Micro payment agencies - A force for good or evil? (July 17, 2006)
Microstock and the rise of the crowd (June 5, 2006)
Editorial: The evolution of the stock photo industry (January 12, 2006)
Posted in: Editorials, Stock Photo Companies
Comments(4)
post a comment »Dittmar Frohmann, December 29, 2006 [#]
hi chris,
just a short note. unfortunately your fotolia calculations are highly speculative - probably as much as our newsletter, that mainly objects to use realistic numbers from 1 til 12 thus representing the 12 months of the year. it is a promotional tool after all. still this site is known for its informative and professional content so i wanted to put this right.
please be assured that the reality is much, much brighter than the one drawn up in your calculation model. also do bear in mind that out of those 40,000 artists some are inactive, some take less than $73, and the lion share of the earnings is taken by those professional photographers who are clever and flexible enough to turn to microstock. this discussion has been going on for quite a time but neither micro stock nor rm are dead yet. and looking at my german figures i would always bet on micro.
happy new year to you and all the ati-readers (micro and rm)
dittmar frohmann
fotolia germany
Bryan Zmijewski, December 29, 2006 [#]
Howdy Dittmar- sorry we didn’t get a chance to meet at PACA!
I just want to understand what you meant by “probably as much as our newsletter, that mainly objects to use realistic numbers from 1 til 12 thus representing the 12 months of the year. it is a promotional tool after all.”
I think something got mixed up in the translation. I’m trying to understand what this means. Thanks!
Dittmar Frohmann, December 31, 2006 [#]
hi bryan,
you are right. the sentence should have been broken down in three. i am not a native english speaker and we just love building long complicated sentences in germany. so please apologise the confusion. what i meant to say was that:
a. the figures are realistic
b. the figures are suppposed to be promotional, entertaining, attention grabbing etc. since the newsletter is a piece of self promotion.
c. the objective was to use the numbers 1 til 12. so might as well have written that i have 1 laptop, 2 screens, 3 pencils, 4 stamps etc.
using sales oriented items instead seemed more appropriate for a newsletter though.
i prefer to base an indeep discussion of the success of microstock in general and of fotolia in particular on a company report rather than an advert. so come on guys - ease up and let’s rather face a successful 2007.
happy new year
dittmar
Dan Heller, February 14, 2007 [#]
In your analysis, you assume an equal distribution of sales of images, and an equal distribution of those images to contributors.
Statisticians in economic circles usually assume an 80/20 distribution, as empirical evidence has always born out when actual data is available for analysis. therefore, to assume that contributors are getting $74/year is unlikely
A more realistic picture would be represented if you assume that 80% of the revenue is going to 20% of the images, and the owners of those images are probably represented by 20% of the contributors.
In other words, it’s more likely the case that 20% of the 1.9MM images are making 80% of the revenue, which translates to 380K images are earning $2.3M. that brings up the avg revenue per “important” image to $6.2 each. If we also assume that such images are provided 20% of the 40,000 contributors (8000), then this would mean that if each of these contributors earned $6.2 for each image in their contribution of 47.5 images each, they would be earning close to $300/year.
clearly and pittance, which also makes the prospects worse for the more massive 80% of the other guys! Not that any of this diminishes your bottom-line assumption in any way, but it is important to do good economic analysis.
This will be a topic of an up-and-coming blog entry of my own…
dan