|
Written by Richard Weisgrau
|
|
Tuesday, 05 December 2006 |
 Under pressure from the Microstock, Royalty Free, and Rights Ready stock photography options Rights Managed (RM) stock has to adapt to prosper if not to survive. Studying business strategies is something that I have done a lot of over the past forty years, and one thing I learned long ago is this. When a business is under competitive pressures it has to respond by adapting itself. There are three ways a business can respond. It can give up, meet the competitions’ price/value equation, or differentiate itself by exploiting its strengths and the competitions’ weaknesses. As a prelude to strategic planning, many planners will conduct a SWOT study. SWOT is the acronym for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. Strengths and weaknesses are internal forces, and Opportunities and Threats are external forces. Once you have a grasp of those four factors in relation to a business, you have a basis for strategic planning. |
|
Read more...
|
|
|
Written by Richard Weisgrau
|
|
Sunday, 03 December 2006 |
|
The most challenging question in the stock photography business is what is the future of Rights Managed stock photography? Royalty Free stock captured a large share of the Rights Managed stock market in the ten years it has been around. Today, Microstock is eating into royalty free sales and that will keep royalty free prices down, which in turn will keep Rights Managed prices down. Microstock is going to hurt Royalty Free more than it hurts Rights Managed. While it appears that Rights Managed stock is going to go unscathed by Microstock, there is a new gremlin in the marketplace that could threaten Rights Managed stock. It is called Rights Ready, and it is a Getty Images service. The Rights Ready Model is like Royalty Free on steroids. The pricing is based upon the general class of use and not multiple specific factors of use. In other words, Rights Ready is flat pricing for a class of use like print marketing, Internet marketing, print editorial, etc. What distinguishes it from Royalty Free? It’s simple. The image file sizes are high resolution, the same file sized as Rights Managed Stock Images. |
|
Last Updated ( Sunday, 03 December 2006 )
|
|
Read more...
|
|
|
Written by Richard Weisgrau
|
|
Wednesday, 22 November 2006 |
In my last article I promised to write this one about the impact of Microstock (Micro) on Royalty Free (RF). In the interim, I have been doing some serious research, study, and thinking about the affect of Micro on RF. I fought with myself over the conclusion I came to in this article in an attempt to trash it, but I have been unable to do it because I think it is correct. History has a way of repeating itself.
In 1992 RF, then called “Clip Art” by its detractors, first appeared as low-resolution images on CD-Rom disks. At the time, in spite RF’s low cost per image the low-rez files and the second-best aesthetic quality of the images kept RF from cutting into Rights Managed (RM) stock sales. The producers of RF promised that RF would open new markets among those who could not afford to use RM and in doing so would provide new sources of revenues to the contributing photographers. In fact, that did happen. RF quickly became a successful stock line to carry even with the high production and distribution costs of taking CD-Rom disks to the marketplace. The success of RF made it attractive to companies who produced digital programming and other disk-based products. More and larger companies entered the field. By 1995 there were dozens of companies marketing RF. That is when the paradigm shift began to take place, and when RF began eating into RM sales and revenues.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
|
Written by Richard Weisgrau
|
|
Tuesday, 14 November 2006 |
After my previous article was published at this Website, I received a few emails asking what amounted to be the same question: Is Microstock sustainable from photographers’ and agencies’ perspectives? I think it is.
The first clue to its sustainability is the fact that it is growing. More Microstock agencies are cropping up on the Internet, and those agencies’ collections continue to grow. That indicates at least the minimal necessary supply of images will be available as Microstock. With the supply available the obvious next question is what about the demand? The fact is that there will never be a shortage of demand for good photographs at the unbelievably low prices of Microstock. Buyers are looking for the best deal they can get, and if the image a buyer wants is in Microstock, and the rights needed are available, then why spend more when you can spend less. So the demand equation is settled. Both exist, and by virtue of that fact, Microstock is sustainable.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
|
Written by Richard Weisgrau
|
|
Thursday, 09 November 2006 |
My last article for this Website was published in mid-July. After that I took a break from writing to take advantage of summer’s and early fall’s good shooting weather. I paid little attention to developments in the stock photography during that time, but I just spent the day catching up on the topic. My heavens! Things are changing rapidly in the stock photo business. Here are my observations about those changes.
RM & RF agencies are experiencing declining sales because Mircostock is meeting the needs of an increasing number of buyers. Print applications are beginning to take economic hits because of the Worldwide Web, and the Web is not craving the unique images that print does because Websites use other techniques to grab viewer attention. Demand for RM and RF stock diminishes and demand for Mircostock increases as the demand for high impact images decreases.
|
|
Read more...
|
|
|
|
<< Start < Prev 1 2 3 Next > End >>
|
| Results 16 - 30 of 41 |
All About Business
