120+ Sales And Counting

Wow, with "dumb luck" like that you hardly need to promote. I DO promote and have only had four sales in four years. Being found is half the battle and looks like you are winning!

Congratulations Paul. Well done.. I mean, great luck!

At first that seemed incredible but then I did the math. With how many images you have that equals about 1.5% of your images being sold on average every year. I have quite a bit less than 100 images and have been here 8 months with no sale, but to match your performance I'd only have to have one sale this year so there's time, but then again I do promote, so far with zero results.

Well Paul, what can I say... you have almost 2k of excellent and exceptional work in collection, I would be surprised if you don't make sales ;) Great done and keep it going!

Oh, and I just wonder how many more sales could you have with auto promotion all over out there... ;)

Congrats Paul.

Actually, unless you are one of those artists that only puts up absolutely wow level work 1.5% of images sold per year is not bad.

WOW!!!! Fabulous! Hope some of that rubs off on me! I have sold 31 images in 1-1/2 years, and I can honestly say most of them that sold were not at all my best work. Kind of surprising what people want.

That's pretty cool! I noticed that you blog and I would consider that some of the promoting that I read about as a suggestion to sell your work. Also a Facebook page where you share your work.... but you don't promote anywhere?

Actually Diana, doing the math you are not far off now, over 1% a year anyway. I hope some of your success rubs off on me! lol

I agree, blogs and facebook pages are definitely promotion.

" and I can honestly say most of them that sold were not at all my best work. Kind of surprising what people want.'

Yup... that is why say if you listen to those that keep saying post only your best or only the best will sell.... you will be leaving a lot of money on the table. A lot.

Not bad for dumb luck. Large quality portfolio.


I'm close to 300 but I promote.

We started the same year:

My views: 442,532

Your views: 80,919

You work is amazing, and that combined with the numbers - having over 1700 images helps.
Lucky you.

Look at the sheer number of images that Paul has uploaded at FAA.

"Dumb luck" works so much better with such a high number of images to offer.

I'm working on it.

Valerie I find it difficult to believe you've only had four sales in four years- you have some beautiful prints!

I agree with the others... great images + a lot of them = sales

Aw, Toby...that was nice of you to say. Sadly, it's true. I keep plugging away though. If nothing else it's worth the $30 a year for the online presence/portfolio.

Congrats on all your sales, Paul! I've never counted my sales. Will have to do that.

it keeps count in the sales list right at the top.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Thanks, Mike! OK Mike, now put us all to shame with your sales!

just need a few more right now its at 1295. waiting for the odometer to roll over.

anyone want to buy 5 from me so the number levels off? :)



---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

WOW! But that doesn't surprise me. You'll probably make those sales in a minute!

i hope so...

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

"and I do still add my images to groups, but lost all track of what is in them as well."

I think part or your sales comes from how several members / admins tell me that when a new image is added to the group that google finds them. They also say, when your in a group, featured or not (though it helps to be seen on the front page), your image is then associated with others. and without having to add new keywords, or spam words, people can find your image through random google searches and your image will show up in the group or contest. Never underestimate the power of groups here.


Thanks, Paul, for sharing your progress.

close to a sale... got a mail from senior from the carolina's.... i mean nigeria.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

will try to make this a blanket reply as I only get on here a few times a year and then only to find out something that I see going on.

I do show my images on my Facebook page but I have few followers and they are just FB friends who don't buy a dam thing.
I also have a blog but that has set idle for months and I need to redo it this winter and add a sales section to it since I do
get it promoted on the photo web site I write for. All that comes down to time to design and then create it and you can't do
that over a summer that you are out shooting all the time. Yes, those two places could be called promoting, but I
consider it real promoting when you do it full-time and not on the side. I have never even used the promo things they
offer on FAA and the ones members come up with. More future projects.

Image count means a LOT and don't let anyone tell you differently. The more images you have in subject galleries the
more images people will see, and you can't make a sale for an image that is not in your gallery.
As far as quality images uploaded, as JC talked about, I use about the top 80% of what I have.
I even have to go back and redo some of those that I now don't like the looks of.
If you start getting too picky with what you offer and leave the "very good" images out there might have been some one
that thought what is very good to you is just what they were looking for.

Many people just upload every thing they have with no consideration of the quality, but when you consider that there is no
accounting for the taste of many buyers, that still works at times for them. BUT it can also work against you.
If people get used to seeing run-of-the-mill everyday images from you they will start to expect nothing more and go somewhere else.
When that happens you can expect to get very few sales.

I view the groups as one more way to get my images seen. I guess buyers know about the groups and will go there when
looking for certain images and what better place to find them than in a group that has nothing but what you want.
It's just common sense to use them.
It would also be common sense for me to check on my activity once in awhile - which is another thing I don't do here.

I also need to try to get more views as one person above covered. I know my totals are low, but then as I said I do not promote
so that makes a difference.
And the last thing you need to do to get those views and sales is to use the best keywords you can come up with.
The best keywords are a gold mine - poor and very few keywords are nothing but lost sales.
I use every word I can come up with, including different forms of the word - you'd better do it up front because
it is one hell of a nightmare job to have to go back later and fix each and every image you didn't do right in the first place.

Closing - thanks for all the congrates.

uploading poor work never works for you. yes. there is that off chance that a person likes the shot anyway, however if your trying to create your own name, for your own art, then you should only post the best.

i compare things to cooking because everyone eats - your a baker in a fancy hotel. you can make a cake that is stunning and you should because its your reputation on the line. technically people will eat a donut off the floor if they are hungry enough. both things are cake, but only one will make you memorable.

views are semi important. they don't tell you the whole story though. you can have an image on a blog that's viewed 9000 times. but on this site its only viewed twice. or it can have 10,000 views, but most were bots. i just see views as something to look at and get a quick gauge if there are people around or not.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

I'm still waiting for that first sale. Maybe there is hope, but there is so much out there.

Paul I think I get what you are saying and I'm glad you started this discussion. Seems like many say promote like crazy and it seems like you did your work from the start with good images, lots of key words, and already having a good online presence. So then you aren't spending a daily amount of promoting just simply doing your own things. Thank you so much for sharing. I think it gives a bigger picture of what works. I see myself making some adjustments to what I have uploaded and maybe getting rid of some images. All a learning process and I'm grateful that everyone shares their stories.

I have said this before but on another POD site, I do no promotion and I make many sales. What is the explanation for this? Is it the price point? The search?? The other site also will promote my work on Facebook, Twitter etc. FAA does not do this.

I have been on numerous sites over the past 10 years. A few things have stayed the same from 2005 to 2015 as it pertains to me. I make approximately the same number of sales per year regardless of which site I am on. I make same the number of sales every year when I do market a lot. I make the same number of sales every year with no marketing. I think the biggest myth on pod sites is that you have to market yourselves extensively to make sales. Can marketing help. Of course. Is it the big game changer people say it is? I highly doubt it. Not for pod sales. For fine art sales, sure. To get your name out there in the art community, sure. To sell shower curtains? Highly doubt it. If you have interesting works and good tags, and a the site has a decent search engine, you will be found by potential customers. Found as in viewed by potential customers. No guarantees on sales. So I really think marketing to sell on pod is grossly exaggerated. When most people claim how well marketing has worked for them they are usually giving examples of where they made a handful of sales because they posted something on Twitter or Facebook. I do not consider a handful of sales a consistent business model.

other pods - it depends which ones... some rotate artists to the front. others actually find it by keyword and don't depend on the sales part of it. others simply have more products to show for. some run crazy sales so its the lowest one.

i don't push that hard, but i try to stay consistent. a few tweets a day. you really need the gift of gab to push your way into a sale by convincing people of this and that... i can't do any of that. marketing can either be spending cash to get sales, or not spending anything (like me), and getting sales because they liked the images. but its really a matter of being consistent. sending a vague tweet every few days or weeks - won't get a response. getting a facebook or twitter account, but not collecting friends, won't help. you want to make a chain of where you are. so my facebook page, hopefully people will find me. make sure your facebook has all the links to every site. and then make comments with a facebook link on other sites so people can reverse search you easily.

marketing means lots of things to different people. personally i'd rather be making something new. i have to force myself to tweet every day. and its not like its all that hard to do either.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Photographers have quite an advantage, by default 1700 images compared to my 100 images will get more views therefor more sales. I do have 7 sales this year on that 100 and I haven't yet advertised not sure where the best place to spend money is, so im not complaining. Always want more though.

not always. photographers have to fight to get a good picture of something because everyone else already has that same image. i have more, they have more and so on. its said its the other way around because a painting can be unique.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

67 sales here in 3.5 years - I had more last _month_ in my gallery exhibit. "Rent" here is a lot cheaper, though. :)

It really is a tough game on the internet with millions of images (billions?) with which we compete. Then when rankings are boosted by sales, it means the rich get richer and the rest of us hope to get discovered. Because of that, I really started focussing on local art for local people and tourists to this area. That is why I have success in the gallery more than here.

I wish good fortune to everyone trying to sell art.

John -- You have a great point. Since I've been groups mod, over the past year, I have learned there are a number of members here who do nothing more than just spend time in groups every day and make several sales per month. They have learned how to make groups work for them ...

back for a few minutes
I see that I need to spend more time on my site here. Today was the first time I have looked at my Activity page this year
and I see that I just got about a half dozen new people following my - probably because of this thread.
I must put this on my schedule more often, but trying to keep up with projects like shooting for the Strasburg Railroad promo dept.
and maybe soon doing he same thing with the Gettysburg Foundation, and getting prints ready for a one man show the first of Oct.
plus writing for an online photo travel magazine does not make much time for looking at pages on this site. Then there is all of the home
matters to take care of which includes a pretty large garden to grow the flowers I use to photograph, and the past year of major remodeling
work on the house. That doesn't even count my blog that needs redone (this winter) - - - so - - - just doing this takes away from
my huge 2-DO list, so you can see why I almost never can promote anything.
That is all going to change after this fall when most of my shooting for the year will be done.
Then I will start taking care of what a lot of people on here have said - looking into promoting things.

I only have my images on this site and no others. I used to have several hundred on RedBubble, but that turned out to be one
big waste of time for just a few dollars in sales - which they keep as long as they can to keep from having to pay you.
I have looked at a couple other places that do what FAA does, but just in passing. Some are too expensive.
I don't like more monthly bills - got enough of them. Other looked too Mickey Mouse.
Maybe I'll shoot John a message this winter to see who he uses. (that is if I can tare him away from his hounds)

I don't think I'm interested in doing the Twitter type things. When you start those things you then have to spend the time building on
them and if I don't have enough time for this I sure as hell don't have time for more work. Facebook already wastes enough of it.
They get addictive and not after very long you are just spending time on them and not USING them for what you wanted in the first place.

I'm going to just "KISS" it all. = "Keep It Simple Stupid"

back to work - - -

I agree about having many other things to do. As I sit here typing between folding laundry and feeding kids. It's hard to get on here as often as people suggest to try and promote. I have been framing and matting photos and don't always have time to try and keep up with the 2 groups that I started but I still try to accept images and feature some weekly. I just don't go to the extent that some moderators do. I want to leave some time to go out and actually photograph things. I wish it was that easy for a photographer to post a bunch of pics like one said above. It takes time to get quality images and I agree with Mike, more than likely someone else has photographed the same thing. I'm with John about selling locally. I live in a tourist town which is nice. I've done one vendor event and did better with it then in here. Just hope that it's all the start to many more sales.

Congrats to you all! I am still waiting on sales to kick in! And waiting! ... I follow advice of many on here and plug away at it every day! I would like FAA to be my only POD site but I am getting small sales from others. Because of my situation online POD are my only means right now of selling my images. I think that if you are selling anything on here, regardless of how much and no matter what your effort; you deserve an applause! There are so many beautiful pieces on FAA, buyers have a lot to choose from!

Congrats Paul. I'd like to see a picture of your biggest seller, if you get a chance. Glad you are making some $$$ on FAA.

I'm happy for you and congrats :) I'm still waiting for my 1st sale.

Jane - what do you call biggest seller? most often? highest price? largest print?
this is the one I have sold the most times to a gallery in Ca.
Always a large size

this was the largest print size 30x36 to a gallery in Switzerland

So if I get this right, painters are at a severe disadvantage here since they will never be able to pump out the volume of a photographer and volume seems to matter quite a bit.

Wow, I've only been here since last October and I have had 33 sales.... I thought that was pretty impressive but 120 is great.... Tough in my case I did come here with a pretty loyal following base from my town which were the initial bulk of my customers

David R, I'm guessing the fewer images you have the more marketing you'll have to do in order to get sales. Someone that has well over a thousand images (competently tagged and described) probably can just sit back and wait for sales, at least 1.5% a year anyway.

Great thread. Nice comparison Edward, thanks. Congrats to you and Paul both and uber congrats to Mike of course. Obviously hard work and talent combine to = success!

Painters wouldn't need to feel at a disadvantage solely because of number of listings. Many of the painters on here use their paintings as a starting point for further creations...

I'm wondering since you have a ton of images of Pennsylvania and Civil War reenactments if they would be your overall best selling galleries. Location photography and historical can sell better than art photography if you have enough of them.

David Randall -- I don't think there is any proven stats that says you need loads of images to sell art online. For example, look at the top ten or fifteen artists on the best sellers page, many have a few hundred or less on their profile page. Plus, Anne Geddes, the Pixels anchor artist, has less than four-hundred images posted. I think its more about the quality of your work, and how you market it ( how your work speaks ) to your target audience.

Hope this is helpful to you. Enjoy your day!

Actually, both schools of thought can work and work well. Obviously, I am a big fan of covering a lot of things and covering them well. It works for me.

Conversely, even looking just at photographers take a look at either Thomas Zimmerman or Dave Allen. Both have around 180 images and both sell VERY well. Both only put up WOW level work and both market heavily off FAA.

As far as painters vs photographers, in QA I review about equal numbers of each. Considering how many photographs are on here vs paintings painters are doing just fine.

I've been here the same amount of time and have had 69 sales. I about 300 images. I do promote my website frequently and image that it would be a lot less sales if I didn't.

Yes, the fewer images you have the more promo you have to do - unless you have a name that people know.
Then your name alone will bring in buyers no matter how many images they have to choose from.
I use to put images in a couple of stock agencies. If you think a few hundred images would ever make it in that field you have a lot to learn.
Stock agencies won't even bother with you if you can't supply them with hundreds of images a month,
and you have to agree to do that in the contract.
In stock it is figured that you will make one sale (per year) for every 1,000 images you have in their files.
See what percentage that comes out to. - - - Again, if you have a name that number goes way up.

My best sellers are in the Railroad & Old West & Historical sections. I sell some of those many times.
Especially if it is a place well known that a lot of people have been to.
They seem to like the memories the photos bring back.
I don't see nature and landscape images selling all that good unless they are super quality that can be enlarged to
fit over a sofa or fireplace. People just don't buy them to fill small spaces on a wall.
They end up as the postcard sales images.

It mostly comes down to,,, offer a LOT of images or offer a few and promote them day & night.
But no matter which way you go, quality and IDs (keywords) are more important than all the rest.

Painters on the top sellers most likely have a featured painting, in that case you could have 10 paintings and one gets featured and you could get 10,000 views a day that = sales! Say what you want 3000 images compared to 100, odds are stacked no matter how good a painter your are. If you aren't found you can't sell.

Dont depend on being found.

Dave

I had a featured image, Ken back when I first joined. It didn't help sales at all. I got lots of views, but no sales for 6 months and then they slowly trickled in one a month to a few a month, but not one print of the featured image sold.

features might get you 1 sale. i got 1 sale from being there. but not many go to the front page... i guess they will now with that store thing. but features won't mean sales. it really depends how fast you can paint, and if you can create subjects that people want. i know of one place that has 2 paintings (they had something like 20 before that). that gold mary and jesus thing, and it sells all the time. really depends on content. if you create for yourself or if you create with other people in mind, that's what can separate you.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Dave B. -- best comment on this thread I think.