Selling photography, illustrations and video footage as a microstock contributor you will sooner or later face an important decision: Do I sell my work exclusively at only one agency and receive higher royalties per sale or do I choose the non-exclusive path, sell my files at several agencies for lower royalty rates. At first glance … Continue reading Exclusivity vs. Non-Exclusivity
Why Depositphotos? Depositphotos is a rapidly growing agency, and what is most important, you can expect sales from the very beginning! Most sales on Depositphotos are based on subscription plans (similar to Shutterstock), but some images sell for Credits too, which obviously provide you with higher royalties. You will soon discover, that this agency … Continue reading Depositphotos – Microstock Agency Review
Why PantherMedia? PantherMedia is a microstock agency from Germany, founded 2004 in Munich. Alexa reports that 69% of their traffic comes from Germany, even though they have an English website since 2008. For me it's a pretty new agency, but because of their interesting partners I think there is enough sales potential to be at … Continue reading PantherMedia – Microstock Agency Review
Why Motion Elements? Motion Elements is another good agency to sell video footage. They are set in Asia and also focus more on Asian customers. They offer free online conversion between PAL/NTSC, HD & 4k resolutions, which can come in quite handy for the contributor as well as the buyer. But Motion Elements is not … Continue reading Motion Elements – Microstock Agency Review
Why 123RF? 123RF, which stand for 123 Royalty Free, was founded 2005 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. They work particularly well for vector illustration artists like me, but you can also sell your photography, audio files and video footage! Sadly the royalty system isn't the greatest, especially in the beginning. Signing Up To join 123RF you … Continue reading 123RF – Microstock Agency Review
Pond 5 is without any question one of the best agencies to sell video footage. They are innovative and have an interesting earning system, where you can set the price for your work yourself. Every clip from HD to 4k will sell well and pay off nicely!
Why Mostphotos? Mostphotos is a microstock agency based in Sweden with offices in Stockholm and Västerås. They are a one of the mid-table agencies I contribute to. With 65,444 contributors and 11,815,942 Total contributions (Status 28/03/2016) it is quite a vibrant stock library. They have a community based rating system integrated, so pictures that collect … Continue reading Mostphotos – Microstock Agency Review
Dreamstime is one of my favorite Microstock Agencies. Their website takes a little longer to get used to and tend to refuse all vector illustrations they think are too simple, but you'll regularly sell your images here and often Dreamstime Portfolios have the best Google Ranking.
Why Shutterstock?
Shutterstock is, without any question, the number 1 best selling agency for most independent microstock photographers and illustrators. I personally earn about 50% thanks to their website.
The company was founded in 2003 by Oringer, who uploaded 30,000 of his own stock photos and made them available via subscription, forming the basis of the company.
Founded in 2004, the agency mostly sells to Europe, in particular to Germany. The Website is of course international, Fotolia is active in 23 countries and available in 14 languages. The agency was bought by Adobe in 2015. This means that you can reach millions of Creative Cloud users and sell directly through Photoshop CC, Illustrator CC, InDesign CC and other desktop apps. Being part of the huge Adobe Stock network should soon start to show an overall raise in sales.
The Microstock Guide 