I received the shocking email about the change in Shutterstock royalty rate couple of months ago. If you do not want to read all the way down then this is the summary: The new Shutterstock royalty rate is $0.1 per download. Yes, you heard it, $0.1 per download.

Background:

In late 2017 early 2018, Getty merged iStock with Getty Image. Along with that, they changed the earning structure, or what they called it a standardization, into percentage of the price of the image. Non exclusive contributors earn 15% while exclusive contributors 25%.
I remember the rage online. Some microstockers were wondering why do people upload to Getty anyway while there are nicer agency like Shutterstock. Those people were real believer on the idea that Shutterstock is an agency that cares about its contributors. Others on the other hands were smarter and made a prediction that it is just the beginning and other agencies will follow Getty’s bad behaviour soon.
I was not happy either. I started to see some $0.01 earning per download. And that was it. I stopped uploading to Getty/iStock.

The email:

"Hello Hajarimanitra Rambeloarivony,

In the coming weeks, Shutterstock will be updating the earnings structure that determines how much you get paid when customers license your work. We are making this adjustment in order to reflect changes in the market for creative content, help to create fair opportunities for all our contributors, and reward performance with greater earnings potential."

Did you notice how they formulate it to make it sounds like they are doing us a favour here! So keep reading.
Here is a table summary of the new earning structure which is based on a % of the price of the photo and on how many photo have you sold from 1st January of the current year.

And this is for video (the same crappy story!)

However, do not feel blue, “the payout for subscription plans will not be less than $0.1”

And to make it even more appealing have a look at this last paragraph of the email:
“ All contributors reset to level 1 for both images and videos every year on January 1st.”

According to Shutterstock, this is to provide create fair opportunities for new and old contributors.

My position

$0.1 per download, are you kidding me??? Then you may shout out loud "But in which level are you?" I am at level 3 and still keep collecting $0.10 !!

The reason why I stopped uploading at Getty/iStock was that same change of the royalty rate into a percentage of the price of the image.
Some contributors are thinking that the higher their rank the high their earning will be. But in reality NO NO NO! I am at level 3 now and my lowest earning per download is still stuck at $0.1! A quick look at their image pricing explains it.
Here in this table, I compiled the theoretical earning per type of subscription download. Remember that in microstock industry, 90%, or even more, of your sold images are sold via subscription.

It seems like no matter in which level you are, your subscription download earning will be at $0.10 if the buyer buy the 750 images pack. If the buyer purchases the 350 images pack, even the contributors at level 6 will still earn less than $0.20.
This next table is even more interesting. It summarize the standard deviation of the earning per subscription type.

The contributor level is the most relevant if the buyer buy the monthly no contract 10 image pack. As soon as the buyer buy yearly 10 image pack or a 50 image pack then the significance of the contributor level is already halved. The contributor level is almost irrelevant when buyer purchase the 350 or 750 image packs.

Those two tables showed that it is the buyer decision which predicts the contributor earning rather than the contributor’s level. It is clear that in order to get back to my $0.33 per download, it does not depend on me. All I can do is to pray that the buyer will not buy those big image packs!

Shutterstock decision is not for the benefits of the contributors at all. It is a malice way of announcing a reduction of the royalty rate to more than 50% (from $0.25 or $0.33 to $0.10)!
I used to think that it is a good idea to sell my photos on microstock rather than having them staying in my hard drive for nothing. But I changed my mind. I rather upload my pictures to my own website (this one and the new hajakely.com and give them for free for personal use or for a small fee for a non personal use. In this case, I do not need to:
- take picture that I think may sell but focus on the think I really want to photograph.
- stress myself processing the image in the “microstock standard” but process them in the way I like it.
- waste my time on key-wording and uploading them to be rejected with some stupid reason.

I do not know about you but I am out. I will not withdraw my portfolio but I will not upload new content any longer.

Just in case, if anyone is interested, I would be happy to build a photo gallery website for you for FREE. If you already have a domain name then I can also host it for you. If you are new to web development and web hosting then I can do all for you and you receive an up and running website!
Please, contact me if you are interested.

If you want to see it yourself and want to still give microstock a try, then have a look at Shutterstock. The registration is very straight forward and you can fill it here. It is free, and quick, nothing to lose, except your valuable time ;-) for $0.10 !!!
I tried Dreamstime as well but it was a disaster. However, who never know maybe Dreamstime is the one for you. If you want to give Dreamstime a try then you can register here

May the camera be with you!

Hajakely