Selling your Images

[kevinrstruck]

We have been working on a system to allow users to sell their images to the general public. There is a lot of cost and time involved so before we move to much further, we would like to know if this is something our members would be interested in.

If you are intersted in this type of service, please reply to this post and let me know.

We are looking at a couple different ways of doing this.

1. You get the order, you are responsible for printing and mailing the image purchased. We collect the funds, transfer the funds to your account (via PayPal) minus a small transaction fee (percentage of purchase). You set all prices and sizes.

2. We receive the order, we are responsible for the printing and mailing, and collecting the funds. We take a small transaction fee plus the our costs of the printing and mailing. We would use a professional printing service that would charge us anywhere from $.29 cents per 4X6 to $25.00 for a 20X30 print. The service we would use has a ton of different types of prints and papers so this is just an example.

3. There is one other option that we are looking at but this is the most drastic of the bunch. We would create a completely new site for the sale of photos, much like a stock photography site. We would use everything in option 2 and anytime one of your prints are sold, you get a percentage of the profit, albeit a very large percentage.

So, give us some feedback and any suggestions you may have.

Thanks and have a great weekend.

[oostermeijer]

Yes option Threeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee is the one and it all start to make sense Kevin! Just to give everyone an idea have a look at this site and the prices they charge for photographs. http://www.photoexposure.com/photographers.cfm
I am a member and rather have our own photo-bank. By the way FotoLibra is a bit of a con, they advertised here in the forums and they let you have a free upload of 5 photos, now if you want to delete them of their site they want you to become a paid member first so in reality they received a lot of "stock" free of charge. No I say let's have our own site and have it all in our hands from upload to sale!!! :eek: :D

[kevinrstruck]

Here are some features we are working on:

FTP Uploads
Configure & Sell Prints
Newest Photos Area
Popular Photos Area
Yearly Subscriptions
Monthly Subscriptions
Public & Private Galleries/Categories
Password Protect Galleries/Categories
Sell multiple resolutions of a photo
Upload Unlimitted Photos
Browser based photo uploads
E-commerce enabled with PayPal & 2checkout.com
Fully automated
Photo Search Feature
Automatic Thumbnail Creation
Photo Watermarking
Upload JPG, GIF, PNG image files
Create 360 Spins
Change Image quality settings
Resize images on upload
Create image PORTFOLIOS (photo albums)
Create image SLIDESHOWS
Create AUCTION GALLERIES
Upgrade your plan at any time
Cancel their plan at any time
Change your account settings such as password and email
View a demo account to try it out before you signup

We hope to have the demo up and running this weekend for people to check out.

[delconchey]

I agree with option three (if I can ever find time to go out and take some decent photo's). Of all the members out there, not sure how many are serious enough with their photography who would post their photo's and make it beneficial to the site. Basically would the cost of creating this site allow for just a few or require many without losing money.

[kevinrstruck]

Beta Site is available. This is just to give you an idea of the type of site we are working on. While most features are working properly, you will not be able to upload any images at this time.

http://photoplanet.thephotostation.net

[oostermeijer]

Beta Site is available. This is just to give you an idea of the type of site we are working on. While most features are working properly, you will not be able to upload any images at this time.

http://photoplanet.thephotostation.net

Yes looks good and works great, even fast! Prices are cheap, maybe that sells them quicker then other sites.
For regular buyers there could even be a quantity discount. What about different sizes for downloads? You will be needing a lot of "stock"! and most of all , good advertising of this site as there are many ,many more. But well done so far you can coun't me in :)

[kevinrstruck]

Yes looks good and works great, even fast! Prices are cheap, maybe that sells them quicker then other sites.
For regular buyers there could even be a quantity discount. What about different sizes for downloads? You will be needing a lot of "stock"! and most of all , good advertising of this site as there are many ,many more. But well done so far you can coun't me in :)

Prices are not real. Although you could actually purchase now, these are just temporary prices. I will figure out the pricing later. Each photo can have it's own price, they are just generic now.

The site allows for several different sizes.

We are also working on an another photo gallery for users of ebay and the like. We have had several emails over the last couple months asking for a gallery that will allow members to use for their auctions. We were concerned about bandwidth but figured out a way to limit the amount of bandwidth a user could use. It has some nifty other features also and is meant only for photo hosting these types of images:

http://beta.thephotostation.net/

Let me know what you think.


Both of these new sites, if we move forward would be on their own separate domains.

[oostermeijer]

http://beta.thephotostation.net/

Let me know what you think.


Both of these new sites, if we move forward would be on their own separate domains.[/QUOTE]

Does this mean you move THEPHOTOSTATION over to this last one?
This ebay thing, i thought you could have your pics on ebay itself?
Like the layout of the first site better, its clearer to look at, less confusing.
like the slide show thingy not sure about the auction bit.
Looks your a busy Bee at the moment :o

[kevinrstruck]

No, we would not move the Photostation to any new site. This site will remain the same for the more serious photographer. Ebay does allow you to host images but not a lot, and the cost get's up there if you sell a lot of items. This way, you only pay the small monthly fee or the service is free if you only sell a couple items a week.

This helps us with our bandwidth. A couple weeks ago a guy used our site to host images for an ebay auction and our bandwidth went up 9%...doesn't sound like much but it was.

[kevinrstruck]

Here is a sample ebay auction with the image from the new site.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=7324876310&rd=1&sspagename=STRK%3AMESE%3AIT&rd=1

[oostermeijer]

http://www.fotosearch.co.uk/


Looks like we are in for stif competition. :o

[kevinrstruck]

There are thousands of these sites, but I am not going to sell CD's like that particular one.

[BHalley]

Very interesting idea. I really like the idea of offering my photos for sale.

[oostermeijer]

Very interesting idea. I really like the idea of offering my photos for sale.


Glad to see you are still with us ;)

[LEW]

Did anything come of this?