Stock Photography Business Guide - Selling Your Photos Online

You have taken some great photographs, and you really want to do something with them, instead of letting them get old on your computer. For enthusiast photographers, there are many options to tell people about your best photographs and even make money from them.  What's great about the Internet, is that everyone can create it own stage and show the world his creations. The problem is not everyone knows how to create a presentation for their images, and less knows how to profit from it. In this practical guide, I want to give you some tips about how to present your pictures online and how to profit from your creativity.



If you are not a professional photographer, you need to know what tools are available for you in web-based photography business. There are both paid solutions and free solutions to share you creative art with others and sell you photos online. Here are some of the most popular things that people do with their photographs:

• Share them online on social networks
• Sell them on Stock Photography sites
• Create online galleries' websites
• Create portfolio websites
• Create their own Stock Photography website to sell their photos (microstock photography)
• Share their photos on dedicated photography communities and forums
• Create a website for a niche photography subject
• Send their photos to online photography competitions
• Send them to print online
• Create a photo book or a photo CD and sell it online
• Work with Stock photography agencies

As you can see, there are many things that you can do with your photos. The questions is, have you decided what you want to do with them. Many photographers know that creativity has its price. Means, that if you are good at something, at least get paid for it. Making money online is not an easy task, but if you are good at what you do, you can even leave a current job and start working from home, promoting your creative work.

In this article, I want to emphasize on online small business aspects. How to sell your photos online, what are the available options for me to earn money from it, and so on. Let's start with how to make money as a photographer. This is probably the most interesting subject. If you can make money from being a photographer, it means that you can work in what you really love and want to do. This is the perfect combination of work & pleasure. Building your own stock photography website is a great start for an online photography business. You can build a portfolio website and allow people to see your artworks and give them contact information to contact you. That of course if you main target is to work as a freelance photographer. You should also know that you can sell you photographs online too.

So here are the main paths that you can choose from (also can be combined of course):

• Sell your digital images on stock photographer sites
• Create a portfolio/business photographer site and promote yourself
• Create you own stock photography site

These are probably the most popular ways to make money as a photographer. Let's go over each one and see what options are available for you.

Sell photographs through microstock sites (Brokers)

Probably the most efficient way to start making money as a photographer. You can make money selling your photos in just a few steps. The pros of joining a stock photography site are:

• You don't need any technical knowledge to build your website and maintain it
• You are already part of a large community of professional & enthusiast photographers.
• Large Stock Photography sites already have a large number of loyal customers. That means that you don't need to heavily market your business right from the start. Just join, upload your photos and start earning money.
• Stock Photography website have built their credibility for many years. so they actually saved you the trouble to do it yourself.
• Initial investment savings
• You photos will be available worldwide 24/7

The reason why Stock Photography websites ('micro stock' sites) exist, it's because online photography business works!. bottom line.  So it means that many photographers are selling their photographs online in stock photography website and make very good money out of it. Of course you will need to pay brokerage fees to the hosting website, but you much more from bring a part of it, especially if you are just starting out.

Some popular stock photography websites that you can join and sell you photos:

• iStockphoto - Probably one of the most known and appreciated Royalty free images & photos websites.
• Getty Images - A company that license imagery online for online and offline businesses. It has its own unique licensing model. Many of the most popular online portals and magazine get their published articles images from GettyImages.
• Fotolia - Sign up and become fotolia contributor and start converting your creativity into cash. Buyers from all over the world will see your images 24/7 and 365 days a year.
• Shutterstock - A very popular stocky photos website that sells Rotalty-Free subscriptions stock photography & vector art. It is very popular among web design companies, who are searching for a long term subscriptions in an overall reduces price.
  

There are many more. You can just Google it by using phrases like: "sell stock photography", "royalty free stock photography", "stock photos", "submit stock photography", etc. You can query it with words like "contributes", "sellers", "photographers", in order to get more detailed results that fits your online business needs.

Some people ask me: "But there are some many free stock photographs, why would someone buy paid ones?". Well, it is a good question. However, you should know that many online businesses must work with special licensing in order to publish digital images on their commerce websites. They want high quality images, and they want it fast! - So the best option for them is to register one of the largest stock photography websites, and use their services. The selection of high quality photos is huge, and it keeps updating every day. This is the choice for most online business websites. You can rest assured that there are enough customers to satisfy your business for many lifetimes. Still not convinced.... oh, let's say it that way; If you can get 0.0001% of iStockPhoto customers to be your loyal customers, you will be well funded as..mmm.., I don't know, well funded.

Create a portfolio/business photographer site and promote it by yourself

When you compare Stock Photography vs. You own online business, it is like being self employed to one who is not. Getting started using 3rd party stock photography websites, it is probably the most recommended path for new comers. After you built your reputation, you can think of building your own. Nevertheless, it is not all black & white. Here are your options:

• Built you  own hosted stock photography website (Photo store scripts)
• Use a White Label stock photography website
• Use a 3rd party stock photography website (not White Label)

The easiest one and most affordable one is to use 3rd part stock photography non-White Label hosting solutions. It makes selling your images very easy and fast. You can choose from the following (but there are much more):

• PhotoStockPlus- Convert your photos into cash by building your own website & photo gallery online.
• ShutterFly - Build your own Pro photo gallery and start getting profit from your photos online. Set you own prices in a fast and easy to use customized online photo selling store.
• SmugMug Pro - A professional and my favorite choice for selling & printing online services. Offers unlimited space for storing you photos & brand it. (read more about SmugMug photographs hosting)

 You can see this photo sharing services comparison page (not exists anymore). It lists the pros and cons for probably the most popular pro photo sharing websites. Most of them will even give you a free trial, so you can test it and see if it fits your online business needs. On digitalphotographywebsite.com comparison page, you can compare the prices and see what fits your budget. By using those services, you should know that the responsibility for marketing your product is on you. You need to bring your customers to visit your shop and buy digital images. Usually the commissions are better because you can set the prices by yourself.

Create you own stock photography site

This is probably the most advanced path that you can choose from. You can download Stock Photography free scripts from the internet and install them on your servers. Even so, many thing have to be done before you jump straight forward and start making money. You need to take care of the payment gateways, install the script, promote your website (SEM & SEO), manage your server and make backups. Even tough that some hosting services have a "One click installation" for some of the most popular stock photography free scripts, it is still hard to manage it all. Technical knowledge is a must in many cases. If you are not a programmer and don't have the skills to manage it by yourself (and lack of initial funds), you will probably better with the hosted ones.

Here are some popular Stock Photo scripts to help you start your online photography business:

• Xpoze - A full All-In-One solutions for selling you photos online. Easy to install script that help you manage all your digital assets. Administration is easy and  help you get control on your website elements right inside the administrative control panel. Create custom subscription, automatically watermark images, support batch uploading, SEO friendly URL and tags support and much more.
• Ktools.net - Choose between Ktools PhotoStore or PhotoHost as your professional online photo software. It is one of the best photo selling software.  That means no commission fees!. It has support for unlimited photos, videos & other type of media files. Supports FTP, preview, monthly subscriptions, and the list is long.

The advantage of using your own installed photo gallery script for selling you photos online, is that you don't need to pay commissions. You get 100% of the sell -- Isn't that COOL!
But again, consider the cons & pros, before you decide to choose this path.

Summary

I can write hours after hours on this subject. Even so, sometimes you need to keep things short and simple. I recommend browsing through the web and compare the available solutions in terms of prices and features. If you have great photographs, there is no reason to keep them in your drawer (OOPS, on your computer hard drive or CDs). You can start making money in just a few minutes. In addition, you should know that some websites like iStockPhoto, have an initial test before you can join its online photo selling services (microstock). You should also give attention to the terms of service and copyright notices. I am sure that in about a year from now, you will come back to my blog and tell me "Hey! - I've just left my job and start my own online business..". I sure hope that you will have the motivation, freedom & inspiration to take your creativity and make something useful from it. For yourself of course. I hope that this article gave you some initial guidance and motivation to get started. See ya soon on my next article.

Related articles:

StockPhotographyBusiness.com - Informative articles related to stock photography business. Answers questions like "Where is the best place to sell stock photography?", "What are cost expenses for a photo shop business?". Great for both newbies and experts a like.

stock.mklav.com - 5 page in-depth free online guide to getting paid for taking photos. It will teach you the basics of how to sell your pictures online, going through the most important business strategies that will help you elevate your business online.

Guide to iStockPhoto - A full guide to iStockPhoto stock photography website. How to buy royalty-free stock photos, search the site, viewing and managing lightboxes and much more.

Stock Photography Business Books - A list of popular stock photography business books from Rohn Engh, Michael Heron & Ulrike Welsch.