To Watermark Or Not

Have you checked that out? I started adding watermarks to a few today. I am still not sure how it will effect sales, I suppose I will find out!

Keep in mind - Images are not always posted by the individual. Galleries do not have a personal stake in the art so are most likely choose no watermark.

I tracked that for about 10 days one time and posted the results in one of the watermark threads on a daily bases.

It turned out 68% or something like that were no watermarks, 32% with.

I did not check every single image of course. I checked ever morning when I logged on and then once or twice through out the day.

"Galleries do not have a personal stake in the art so are most likely choose no watermark."

Really? No personal stake? They damn well do if they want to keep those artists as clients.

I would never even think of putting up an image from one of my artist without the watermark if they wanted one. But I don't have one artist that I rep that uses watermarks. They know it hinders sales.

The artist is the one that determines if watermarks are going to be used or not, not the gallery owner.

I do rep or have for most of the major publishing houses. Images we use to sell their work on the net are supplied to us by the publisher. In most cases we can not alter it. Very few of them have watermarks and then only if the artist demands it.

The big, bad gallery owner is not making that decision. He has nothing to do with it.

I don't use the watermark feature on the FAA but I do put a watermark on images I upload to social media sites. The mark is just across the bottom and includes my web site address, at least this way anyone seeing my image will have a direct route back to my site.
The mark could easily be cropped off if anyone want to pinch the image, but then I think any watermark can be erased without too much trouble, and the shared images are relatively small (800 * 600px) or thereabouts

Thanks for the little test.
For me it is a no brainer. Trying to sell art with a watermark is like going to a job interview with a big zit on your nose. It's certainly not going to help make sales and it is distracting.
I think most people just know this intuitively. Plus the fact that in 8 years of having watermarks on my work, I have had many make comments about the mark and some just assume it is sold with that on. Once I have to stop and explain the watermark, I have pretty much already lost the sale. Making a sale depends strongly on the first impression.

For most, using a watermark is a trade off between a slight loss of sales and a slight increase in infringements. Since minor infringements don't seem to cost me anything I go with the more sales since money is important to me. Also I think it insulting to the viewers senses to watermark It is also a bit of a dare and a minor challenge to designers who like to screen grab

It is ironic that my most troublesome image infringements were on images that were watermarked by having my name in large bold type. They just take out my name and put their message over it.

I let my viewers browse and enjoy without distractions or even thinking about what will print and what won't.
There is a POD similar to FAA that does not even offer watermarks.

The ease of removing the watermark is besides the point. Those people will always find away.

Legitimate shares need to have some kind of linkage back to the source otherwise its useless.

....

Galleries - Think National Geographic, Getty - the galleries with 10s of thousands of images on the site. What percentage do they represent and how does that effect any sampling?

First off anybody who thinks the watermark will print is clueless. The watermark is no diff than having proof on a print from a portrait studio. Currently I have no watermark but may go back to using them when I discovered you can save the image to a cell phone an print a perfectly fine print up to 11 x 14. The watermark is a good detourant to prevent this. Lose a sale it is not going to bother me because how will you ever know this?

"First off anybody who thinks the watermark will print is clueless."

95% of the people that buy art prints are clueless about something regarding art. Does that meany you don't want to sell to them?

The argument is as old as the first litho that came off the first printing press.

When you insist that someone has to prove watermarks hinder sales to you, it can't done. You can't prove a negative.

When you get a few hundred calls, emails and people walking in with printed promotional materials, asking if the watermark will show on the item, you have to know that there is at least a half dozen or more people that didn't bother to ask.

Some of them don't ask because they don't want to be called clueless for asking.

I used to have a huge conference table in the middle of one of my galleries. It had all of the catalogs of the major publishing houses. Thousands and thousands and thousands of images. Some with and some without watermarks. People used to sit at that table for hours looking for just the right image. I can't tell you how many of them asked if they ordered the print, would the watermark show up. Some of them that asked were decorators. Ya, I know, clueless, but I found that clueless money spent just as well as just plain old money. lol

Some things you have to leave to and believe in the people that do research on these sort of things, the human behaviorist. I know in surveying people, like political (or product) surveys they do not sample the entire voting block to get a very accurate picture of what people are thinking.

Using the same bases of understanding human nature that they apply to those surveys, common sense would tell you that for every one "clueless" person out there that thinks the watermark may show up, that is going represent a dozen? two dozen? a hundred? or more that think that but do not ask.

In response to Bonfire. Clueless people have money and buy art. Also as a middle class American with a college degree I tend to associate with a lot of other middles class Americans with college degrees. Many ask me if they print with the watermarks or assume they do. I also count them in with the "clueless".

Many people have their own watermarks on their prints on this site, even though they won't print them. It's a legitimate question. If we had no inspections FAA would be sending out prints every day with business names and Web addresses. In this day where the average 30 something grew up with the brand name of their clothes in bold all across the front, why would they just assume the watermark is removed?

But the main reason I don't use them is watermarks are a visual distraction. And I am selling visually here. (and quite successfully i might add). So who's clueless?
Edit. Floyd beat me to it.

I am not trying to convince people to use watermarks nor am I trying to convince people not to use them.

I am trying to give people a no nonsense way to see for themselves if they have an affect on sales or not.

The big galleries could skew that number but it won't be that much as they don't have many images in the top sellers. They sell a lot of images by virtue of the fact that they have a LOT of images but not many individual images in that gallery of 30 thousand plus images do that well individually. Thus it may not skew as much. Of the four gorilla sellers I compete with and am aware of one uses watermarks. Getty does not btw and that can be something to think about in and of itself. Getty is primarily a licenser of images so they of all the galleries have a stake in people infringing upon them yet none of their 43K images on here have watermarks. Again, make of that what you will.

Another thing that will skew this is best sellers will by their nature sell more often than images at large. That will actually skew the other way. In theory a best seller with a watermark will have a better chance of selling with it than the general pool at large.

Now, it is simply a fact that some potential clients think that watermarks print. Call them clueless if you want but even if that is true, I am more than happy to take money from them. The fact is they are not clueless, they simply don't know. Yes, people that buy stock art generally do know but this is art. John and Jane Q may never have even thought about ordering an image online so how in the world would they know they don't print? They are most certainly not clueless.

Do I have some 11x14s printed without my authorization? I am sure I do. Would those people have paid my $70 markup for a 14 inch print had there been a watermark? Not likely. So, yes I have some unauthorized prints and it doesn't cost me a dime. Now if just 10% of my customers that buy 36 inch prints from me didn't because of the watermark, THAT would be a quantifiable loss of 2K per year. So, in summery, yes some people "steal" an 11x14 but I sell more large prints. Seems like a win to me.

Again, I really don't care if you do or do not use a watermark. I do not and you now have a way to genuinely compare the difference in sales.

How many who do not use the watermark keep the high rez option on for buyers to see the details?

JC, any excuse is good enough when someone doesn't want to do something...In this particular case, for those who aren't marketing and selling, blaming the watermark is a great excuse.

Then there is hard money argument.

As soon as you offer up your first image for sale and hope to turn selling your art into a business or even a serious hobby, you have to start making hard money decisions.

Yes, as it stands right not, an image good enough to print a half decent small print can be easily lifted. But that is not a loss. That guy was not ever going to buy that image from you. Therefore you have not lost anything. You still have the original file. You have been wronged, what the guy did not right. No one is condoning this behavior. But you have not suffered a hard money loss.

When you put a watermark on a image, you are going to hinder sales. No one is saying it will prevent all sales or even half of them, but it will hinder sales to some degree. Those sales are hard money loses. That is money that can be spent on paying your overhead or taking you wife out to dinner or roll in a cigar and smoke it if you chose.

What I see is too many artist taking the "well I'll show them" approach. That is a decision made based on emotion.

The hard money decision you have to make is are you willing to lose real hard money to defend against a loss that has no effect on your bottom line. This is not an artistic decision, it is a business decision.

Yup...

Thinking that you are not selling because of the watermark when the real issue might be image quality, boring work or not marketing is the real clueless.

...

Personally I'm not so greedy. I'd rather lose a few sales. To me, unauthorized use of my work causes me more pain than a few lost sales.

Edward I prefer to use the term hungry rather than greedy.

Well you have to consider the lost sales when people don't know anything about the free floating image. The watermarked image says two thing - 1. Its available for sale (if you know what FAA is) 2. Where to find it

I believe its possible in general to have fewer sales with watermarks than without although I've not seen any definitive proof of that specific to my images. In other words, how many potential buyers liked one of my images but bought from another artist because that other artist did not have a watermark and I did?

I don't like having the Fine Art America watermark on my images. They are my images not FAA's and there is no traceability back to me. Its a lousy choice but the only option I currently have if I want a watermark.

I do not have a choice on image size - I'd rather have a smaller one than the larger one FAA displays.

FAA appears to have a wide open policy in terms of allowing anyone access to the site and the images including scraper sites and not so nice bots or from places that have more of a reputation for hacking, scraping and scamming than they do for buying.

That is why I no longer promote my FAA or AW pages directly. I have my own website (with links to my AW site) and I promote that instead. I use smaller images on my personal website with my site URL and copyright text on them. I block out most of the useless bots, scrapers, hackers, scammers and spammers when I discover them in my stats.

Since I have my own website, I view FAA (or any POD site) primarily as an order fulfillment resource and not a personal website.

Dave Gordon
http://dgportfolio.net

@Edward: Disagree. People that steal image have a billion of them to chose form. They are not looking to pay for anything. Knowing it is for sale is meaningless to them. Of course that assumes the leave the watermark on also.

But even if that is true that is not going to offset the sales you are going to lose.

That is also like saying I lost the US Open this year. Fact is I can not lose what I never owned or had a chance to win to begin with.

However, my wife and I did win the couples Thanksgiving tournament yesterday at the club. It is good to have a wife that is a 15 handicapper!! That's two in a row for me so the US Open many not be totally out of the question! (Dreamer!)

You can always put on your own large watermark like Anne Geddes.

Unlike many of us, Anne's watermark helps her sell. People want the known name.....

That is not so true with the non-world-famous JC Findley

On everything we use to publish, and still do on somethings, we put an identifying line on the bottom of the print.

Something like this:

Lone Cypress by Barbara Snyder - Published by S&S Enterprises, Santa Maria, CA., www.FASGallery email Floyd@FrameHouseGallery.con. Protected by Copyright 2104.

We use 6 point type so it is very small. We also do it very close to the bottom so it is covered by and mat or frame.

But FAA does not want that I am told. I think it has to do with FAA promoting FAA and not direct sales that take them out of the process. Smart move on their part, assuming that is what it is.

Anne Geddes

I don't see that as a watermark as much as I do a digital signature. I do that also. I think everyone should sign their work.

My thoughts:

Watermarks take away from the beauty of the image. All that time spent on framing or cropping or lights and shadows, then spoil the whole thing with a watermark and expect the viewer to see around it... to totally see the work as if it were not there. An artist is able to do that, but can others?

If you are selling on your personal web site, why promote FAA?

Also, and I see that I am almost alone on this thinking, why talk about returns by placing it up on the header where you see it almost before you see the artwork:

"Every purchase includes a money-back guarantee." Why instill that negative thought? I would rather use that TV ad: "You'll love my work--I guarantee it!" if you want to put something there.

at the very basics of it - watermarks are confusing. fine art america, australia etc - pixels, your own name brand---all say FAA on it. or at least, last i checked. and because it doesn't have your name on it, it makes it hard to find. if it had a more custom logo with name and title of the image (where it could be adjusted if you changed the name). they would at least be more functional. i find them ugly. while some people sell them with them there and they do sell with them attached. we will never know if they didn't buy it because they didn't like the watermark or it blocked something, or they had a hard time imagining what it would look like on their wall, or if they thought it would be a part of the final print.

nothing is quite as icky as seeing a large water mark on a jet black background. its like when a movie usher blinds you with a flash light in the middle of the movie. it creates a distraction and doesn't really protect you too much. it may stop some of it though.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

"Now, it is simply a fact that some potential clients think that watermarks print."

If you really believe it, then it would be a good idea for FAA to include a notice below each picture or on the front page that the watermarks are not printed on any order.
Simple and effective! Much better than the voodoo speculation about the watermarks scaring potential buyers.

Thanks JC. In my case, I started off without watermarks, but then I decided to start adding them. I've read the suggestions on why you should not use them. I do understand that it may affect sales, however, I also hear about all the artwork that is stolen. I'd rather have that watermark, and make that thief work for it by either editing it out, or cropping it making the image smaller. I agree with Bonfire on the screenshots. That's another reason why I'm adding the watermark. I'm even adding a tiny personal watermark on the new photos when I upgrade to hopefully lead the photo back to me. There's no way to really control it. It's the internet. Each artists has to decide for themselves and JC is providing good information for them to make that decision on their own.

Les: A notice below each picture, you say?

Again, nothing wrong with using a watermark so long as you choose to do so from a knowledgeable standpoint like Edward above.

Les, it is not what I choose to believe but FAA gets enough inquiries on this that I know some potential customers do not know it won't print regardless of the fact that there is a statement that says just that. For every client that asks, how many just clicked away from that art without asking?

It isn't voodoo but backed by real statistics. I have given you the tools you need to verify that yourself. If you choose to ignore the numbers or if they don't change your mind that is your choice.

So far with a 500 image sample size I am showing 8% of the top 500 sellers have watermarks.

I with Les palenik's idea

The watermark statement is not on the "featured" page. It is only seen on a "product" page after someone clicks on one of the products on the right of the page. So if the watermark is truly a deterrent, why not put the statement on the featured page as well?

It would also be helpful if the watermark statement below the image had a larger font size and a darker font color instead of light gray.

Because 70% of artists here don't use watermarks so that would be confusing.

L, that statement is already there.

Please you are talking about a "watermark" and not a signature - a "watermark" won't print on the image - your digital signature will. I don't watermark my work - I do sign it with a digital signature that will print on the image.

I've had a number of sales, and every one of them has sold with a watermark as I recall. Maybe a couple without. I've gone back to watermarking because I'm getting a gazillion Facebook shares through my new FB fan page that links images back to my FAA site, and found it was uncomfortable to allow them to be shared without the mark. Maybe it has cost me sales. I have no way of knowing. But I think each of us must operate within boundaries that make us feel comfortable.

It seems there's really no viable solution.

I think Brad said something in another thread along the lines that individuals should decide which is more important, sales of control. If someone has quality work for sale with watermarks, there certainly can be sales. But I have no doubt sales are less than they could be. And for those thinking that the watermark is 'hard' or 'work' to remove, content-aware fill in photoshop makes watermark removal take less time than typing this post.

I agree with you, Greg. But without a watermark, it seems as if I'm saying, "This image is yours for the taking." I think this topic could be argued forever. Probably the no-watermark people are right, and maybe I just don't care that much if the watermark is keeping someone from buying one of my images. In target-marketing, I'd like to think that my prospects are smart enough to notice the two or three versions of "watermark will not appear on purchased artwork" -- mine and FAA's.

Still, you're right about it being quick and easy in most cases to remove. Another site told sellers to consider it a compliment if someone stole our art. I don't buy that. It's no compliment. It's theft, and I believe eventually they will have to answer for it.

There is no right or wrong answer regarding watermarks. It is a personal choice.

I just wanted to give people one tool to help make it an educated choice.

I understand that perpective Connie. When I share an image in any photography forum, I have a copyright symbol with my name in the corner. This place is business, and a tough one at that. I'm willing to give free samples in order to get reliable sales.

@JC
"There is no right or wrong answer regarding watermarks. It is a personal choice".

Very true, it should be a personal choice. In regards to the statistics that show that majority of sold images do not have any watermarks, it could be interpreted also in the way that many of the bestselling artists were mislead that that is the only way to sell their artwork. However, there is enough evidence that also the prints with watermarks do sell. And the watermark offers at least some degree of protection.

From the programming point of view, it should be fairly simple and much more effective to expand the current watermark functionality to allow the artists to specify:
- watermark size
- position in the image
- opacity

I´ve changed my mind about watermarks at least 10 times since I upload images to the internet. There are good reasons for both opinions.

In a post (http://www.colinutzphotography.com/blog/2014/10/14/watermark-on-photographs-yes-or-no) I came to the conclusion, that I watermark my photographs on social media, but never on sites, where I try to sell them. Some of my pictures on FAA have a personal signature (made with a graphic tablet), and my only sold picture here is one of these.

You guess it: I´ve changed my mind again! I do not watermark my pictures and I post them rather big on my website and on social media, because I want my pictures to look as good as possible for the viewer.

If you have a brick and mortar shop, you have to display the things you want to sell in the best way for your customers. Displaying things will draw thieves into your shop, too. And the better your products are, the more thieves want to have them.

The same thing is true online: If you want to sell things, you have to display them in the best way you can, to attrackt buyers. And if your products are good enough, that somebody wants to buy them, they are good enough for thieves, too.

Will I change my mind again? Maybe ...

Well, all I can say is that I had watermarks on my images for seven months, and I sold a few pieces in that time, then I took the watermarks off and sold five pieces in a single month. Could have been the watermarks, could have been totally unrelated. I guess time will tell.