Why You Should Always Get Paid Up Front

Have you ever had a client buy something from you and then not pay? If you have not then you are very lucky.

I got a call a two years ago from a small ‘one-person’ calendar publishing company who had seen my work around and needed some pictures for next years calendar.  We talked briefly about what he needed and he threw out some names of other photographers he had worked with, names I knew.

I sent him thumbnails and he picked two shots for the calendar and we settled on price.

I next sent him the two high resolution versions by ftp and followed two days later with an invoice.

A year and a half later I FINALLY got paid. Was I stupid by trusting a total stranger? Yep! These situations make me want to quit trusting the client and instead ask them to trust me. So I’ve changed my strategy, demanding as much as I can to get paid up front and here is how I handle it now. … Continue Reading

Selling Images Online Has More Than Monetary Drawbacks

When the internet emerged the stock photo industry was one of the first large industries to embrace the technology and its advantage sales and distribution of digital imagery.

Photographers benefited as well from the global reach an online stock agency could have and that equaled more sales.

The best known and most widely discussed drawback to online sales was the emergence of the one price model based on resolution size over the value of the images usage. It was widely believed that photographers might make less per sale but earn more sales. But there are other drawbacks as well.

10 years ago I tired of ‘pulling’ photo requests and all the labor that went into that task.

Book and calendar submissions felt more like giant photo contests so when my stock agent said they were building a website and heading to online image sales I saw it as a wonderful opportunity.

More reach across the globe, more sales, more income, and less office work for me!  But like everything, there is always a downside.

… Continue Reading

10 Tips on Selling At Art Fairs

by Drake Fleege

I have been considering selling prints at art fairs, and am wondering if making both a financial and time commitment to this venue would provide a good income stream.

The one variable that is most difficult to quantify is the potential sales that might be generated from each show.

Though my research is still a work-in-progress, I am having difficulty finding a justifiable first year return on the initial investment.

Here is my market research thus far. … Continue Reading

What Would You Charge For This Photo Usage?

Editors Note: One of the most challenging tasks for photographers is determining what to charge. I received this email from a reader asking for help in determining just what to charge for a specific use. I offered my advice and then suggested we post this to see how other photographers would handle this and what they would quote for the usage. We plan to post these requests as they come in, so if you have suggestions please mention them in a Comment. If you need help determining a price, please email us and we’ll open it to the readers to offer advice. And all names; photographer and client will be withheld and remain confidential!

Hello Charlie,

I couldn’t think of anyone else to turn to on this that didn’t have an affiliation with them and I need a professional opinion. I have been approached by XXXXXXXXXX to use two of my images in one of their up-coming books. They want to use my images for photo credit (no money). I don’t normally give away images and was hoping to get some professional feedback… Any thoughts?

John Doe (photographer) … Continue Reading

5 Reasons Your Photography Isn’t Selling

For those in the business of licensing their stock photography, times are challenging if not difficult. The market for stock imagery is competitive and saturated and making sales is difficult.

More photographers than ever are in the business sharing the same dream to succeed at their passion. And with the job market in the ditch even more shooters are entering the business looking to make any money to offset their job loss.

The poor market, lousy economy, and competition may not be the only reasons your work may not be selling. As co-founder of online agency, Fogstock, I have looked at countless images submitted by photographers for consideration and we see a mix of the same old places as well as some new and unique imagery.

Here are 5 reasons photography doesn’t sell and some thoughts on what to do about it. … Continue Reading

Not Sure What to Charge? Ask The Client For Their Budget

A client wants to use one of your photos and requests a price or they have asked to bid an assignment. This can be a difficult position to be in a tight and competitive market.

You may be wondering “what is a fair price?”

The struggle over what to charge comes from not wanting to charge too much and lose the sale but also not wanting to charge too little and later regret it.

A good approach is to find out what the clients budget is. This can save you time and make this tough process easier.

Having the client disclose their budget also allows you to decide if it is enough to license the image or in the case of an assignment, it tells you if you can afford to take on the assignment at that price. … Continue Reading

The Role of Negotiations

by Drake Fleege

It’s a great day – the photo buyer has made contact to license your image.  To facilitate this transaction it is necessary to ask a few questions.  The generic questions are of importance.  These include: the image selected, intended utilization, (cover, inside, image size), publication, distribution, and frequency of use.  These questions are easily handled with most photo licensing calculators.  If this is all that is needed, the image can be licensed and sale made, assuming the calculator returned a figure within the licensee’s budget.  The transaction becomes essentially a commodity purchase, regardless of the price of the license fee or the quality of the image. … Continue Reading

Rights Managed Licensing and Negotiations

by Drake Fleege

In my previous life, before fulltime photography, I was selling large two-way radio communication systems for Motorola.   In addition to marketing our solutions, solving problems,  building relationships,  and ultimately selling the systems, a key part was negotiations.   To me, this was the most fun, as it required learning the customer’s needs and offer solutions that would satisfy those requirements.

Early on I learned that money (i.e. cost) was not the largest concern, though it was the one item most often mentioned.   I also learned (through many training sessions and experience) that a successful negotiations should have many points for discussion.  It is through negotiating different items that offers and counteroffers can occur, trust can be established, and a win-win solution can be obtained.  If there is only one item on the negotiations table, such as price, the result will never be a win-win situation.  There can only be one winner and one loser.  Unfortunately that’s not negotiations but rather a zero-sum game.  All or nothing. … Continue Reading

Is This The Future for Licensing To Text Books?

I teach an online class about the business of nature photography and last winter I had a student in the course that I just received an email from the other day regarding a stock usage that was proposed to him.

The student was contacting me for my opinion on a potential stock sale of an old image he had taken in the 80’s. He had been contacted by a text book company who had found his blog and the picture of the Yellowstone fire aftermath in the late 80’s. (Thanks to excellent keywording.)

They wanted to license the picture and said the target print run would be 1,000,000 text books, which I think is the planned print run before a total re-edit of the book. They offered $1200.00 for the use for a 4×6 inside use.

Now my pricing guide suggests a 1 million print run would be around $1000.00 and is probably the rate I would have quoted, but things have changed since this book was published in 2007. In this economy with plummeting prices, what can you really expect to get? Is the ‘normal’ rate a little lower or a lot lower?  … Continue Reading

Sean Bagshaw Pulls Off A Bank Job

Editors Note: The markets are tough these days and making large multi-image Rights Managed sales in the face of a formidable Microstock market is no easy task. When we hear about it we want to feature it so when we caught wind of Southern Oregon photographer Sean Bagshaw’s large project with a bank, we asked Sean if he would share the story behind the project and how he handled the details.

Hi Sean. Congratulations on such a large project with a local bank in your area. It looks like they used a lot of imagery from your files. How did they find you?

Thanks Charlie!  In this case they were already familiar with my work and looked me up.  I am fortunate to be one of very few photographers doing the kind of work I do in my small corner of Southern Oregon. The combination of specializing in imagery from my local area and being very active in keeping my images in the public eye through my website, social media, blog, galleries, exhibits, news articles and so on has created a situation in which many local businesses are already familiar with my photography. When it comes time for them to find images for a project they often seek me out.  It takes a lot of ground work to be in that position but it is nice when the calls come in. … Continue Reading