A few years ago, back when microstock agencies were still relatively in their infancy boasting “only” 1-2 millions photos, i decided to join such a service as a contributor. At the time, i naively believed in the “get rich fast by selling your content” scheme. Armed with a bridge camera which spit out files you would get today with any average mobile phone i set out on a mission to conquer the world of online photography. Several dozen rejections later, with only two images accepted, i got annoyed and decided it wasn’t worth it.

Fast forward to a couple of months ago. I finally succumbed to one of my friends’ propaganda about another stock agency he had been using for quite a while. Unlike the first time, i joined more out of curiosity, since i knew that with very few exceptions the financial gains are quite laughable. Another reason which made me pick that particular service was an apparent respect for contributors, reflected by their rather generous commission percentages when compared to other services on the market. About a month later, i was already contacting support asking them to close my account. So what really happened in the meantime that made me go from hopeful curiosity to complete discontent?

Here are just a few of the issues which i encountered during that short period which, when reported to their support department, were met with standard phrases as fake and plasticky as a magazine cover:

• downright appalling feedback accompanying rejected images. Based on their own documentation, any file would be under scrutiny for anything from 1 to 24 hours. However, they would not spend a couple of minutes (at most) to clarify whether the issues were irremediable or otherwise suggest the changes that would help validate the photo. Instead, you would get the same tired responses taken from a short list of messages that seldom provided any valuable input. Take lack of composition for example which meant anything from improper framing and cluttered scenes to alleged incorrect contrast between two adjacent colors (as later clarified by one of their staff members).
• inconsistent acceptance behavior to the point of absurdity. While i appreciate a fine critique any day of the week, some of those rejections came right out of the blue. At some point i even stopped caring and just became curious just how far can they go. While i can understand subjective reasoning, i do have a problem when it comes to technical issues which are easily quantifiable and thus can be assessed consistently by multiple editors. Softness, noise and exposure are just a couple of the things which despite their mathematical nature were more down to luck. As for their take on white balance, i can only think of the sunrise and sunset sections. Then, there were always the “not what we’re looking for”, “not stock material” and “too many similar items” kindly accompanied by a patronizing advice guiding you back to the study room. As if my skill as a photographer would depend on the amount of flower photos in their database.
• overall useless customer service and improperly trained staff. The way i see it the purpose of human based client support is to provide a live conversation on any issues that might arise regarding the product, which should conclude with a practical outcome. Had i wanted to read lines from a manual, i could do just that without wasting precious time writing emails. I’m not stupid enough to get all warm and cuddly when reading that someone cares a lot about my feedback. Of course, there’s a whole other ball game when you get rejections based on “improper keywording”, only to have it accepted upon complaining. You would imagine that a leading web service would spend more time ensuring their staff meets the basic requirements for the job. Receiving stuck up, insulting responses a week after submitting a question doesn’t help either.
• conflicts of interests and censorship. This might really be nothing but i tend to be a little suspicious when the person accepting my submissions is also competing head to head for sales. Then again, there’s the “recommendation” not to discuss specific issues about the service on any public online outlets. I for one have a very low tolerance for marching with a fist deep in my mouth and even a lower one for accepting an idiotic state of affairs with or without an explanation. As a contributor based system, you have a responsibility both to your clients and your contributors and limiting anyone of those’ ability to express their views is a deal breaker as far as I’m concerned.
• unfair terms of service. The great thing about it, is that i finally learned my lesson as to read the entire Terms of Service and any other attached documents (as hideously long and redundant as they often are) before accepting anything. Unfortunately, it happened right when i decided to close my account (what looked like a bug in the Sell the Rights feature helped me made up my mind). Some of the rather disturbing stipulations i missed the first time were the inability to close your account or remove all files earlier than 6 months. You’d imagine that a service boasting several million photos wouldn’t mind loosing 50 files. You’d be wrong. Remember that they are a company which is only interested in making a profit, so nothing is too out of line if it doesn’t affect the user base. Giving them the benefit of the doubt or trusting their good intentions is either naive or stupid depending on your choice of words.
• lack of transparency and lies regarding the things influencing the search results standings. As a designer, i see the search feature on any stock agency’s website as their most valuable asset when it comes to selling their content. It only matters if it’s effective in helping me find the right content in as little time as possible, without having to try every possible keyword combination in the book. I honestly don’t care about who’s the photographer, what’s his track record, if he’s “harassed” the support department with emails or if he has a high rejection ratio. These are all things which the service should take care internally, without affecting the quality of results and wasting the clients’ time by trying to punish a punk contributor. If you couple this complete lack of transparency with the fact that a lot of editors are also top contributors, it really makes you doubt their integrity.

Still, at the end of the day, as far as most users are concerned, the check is all that matters. Does it really pay that good for the average contributor to make up for the time lost editing, uploading and keywording the files? I honestly doubt it. For me at least it didn’t. Of course, I’ve heard success stories of users making 10-20k or more a month, but let’s face it, that’s hardly the kid toying with his camera type of user. These are probably (semi)professional photographers who have ready access to a studio, props, models and equipment most amateurs can only dream of. For the rest there’s the joy (?) of making a hundred bucks every other month.

If these are all things you can stomach, then by all means go ahead and share your content with the world. After all, without inexpensive high quality photographic content, a designer’s job would be both harder and more costly. Still, a more constructive and transparent attitude from the agencies would certainly improve the overall experience for all parties involved. I for one am done with microstock and focusing my efforts into providing free photography via Flickr. More details to follow soon.

Despite what some might think upon reading the title of this post, it’s not about a troubled  love story gone wrong.  It’s actually about a type of people you should  stay away from, if they ever approach you for any design work. Their  inability to understand the requirements of a professional project or to emphasize with the needs of a designer makes them an unnecessary stress generator and a very unlikely source of profit.

These two were one of  my first clients and to date one of the most annoying people I’ve met. Needless to say,  at that time i was lacking  any experience whatsoever in dealing with problematic people, while also craving for any contract i could get my hands on to start building my portfolio. It turned out that both of these things would come back to bite me,  as  i was struggling to bring the project to fruition.  It was late in the summer when i first met them. The guy was a middle aged foreigner in search of greener pastures. Along with two older associates of his, came to my hometown to expand his existing business. In circumstances which escaped me nor interest me for that matter, he met this rather classless (to avoid the term skanky) young woman who would become his mistress. If i were to take a wild guess i would definitely go with the bar/club hypothesis as the stage of their first meeting.

She was the kind of person who would wear bright, poorly done make-up, shamelessly smoke one cigarette after the other without refraining from blowing smoke in your face while ostentatiously chewing gum. He would often have a pretty poorly maintained look, with the more than occasional unshaven beard and sweaty T-shirt complete with the same smoking habits. Just writing this down makes me wonder what in the world was i thinking going forward along such clients. However, i take it as a valuable lesson about things you should avoid in a business context.

Essentially, we were supposed to build them an online catalog for the several ranges of products they were distributing. Besides the occasional sweaty/smoky setup of our meetings or the half an hour to two hours wait, things went rather smoothly the first few times we’ve met before actually starting to work on the website. We weren’t even concerned about the somewhat low profit we were going to make from it, because we felt the project had potential and it would help us in the long run. However, things started to go sour just a week or two after that. Upon presenting them with the graphic templates, they started requesting all sorts of changes, some of which were not making any sense and I’m sure eventually worked against them. On top of that, they would keep requesting us to try and execute their suggestions just to have an idea  about how those looked like. After all, if your line of work is even touching on marketing services, then you should first take care that you can market yourself the best possible way. Otherwise, clients might think you’re just a smooth talker lacking substance or the ability to follow through.

As a designer you should avoid that at all costs. It is a complete lack of respect to your work and a clear proof that your client has no idea what they’re talking about or what they want. If ever in such a situation, then you’re at the mercy of random luck or some good old NLP. Because you’re working with virtual raw materials, people usually believe that rebuilding a concept or making unlimited revisions should be free. In other words, your time is worth in their minds less than that of a house painter or a carpenter. That’s not really motivating anyone to do more than they’re normally required.

A similar situation is when your clients insists on having more than one template to choose from. While that’s a somewhat decent request, it should also act as a signal that they’re clueless about what they believe to be representative for their product. It might also mean they’re unwilling to spend even the least amount of time to think about it or take the responsibility if their ideas turn out to look below standards. In other words, it’s so much easier to blame it on the designer as being lazy or not getting in touch with their muse.

While aesthetic elements are always subjective, you can’t say the same thing about programmed features. Just a week short from our planned deadline, we received a call that they wanted several changes to the website. If that had happened days after starting the project, this would have been fine, but having spent a lot of time implementing features (designing the database, building the admin, developing the interface etc) it came as a nasty surprise. Suddenly, we would have to rewrite consistent parts of the website. In such cases, again, we have to deal with different perceptions on the amount of work involved. More often than not, i hear people using the words “few quick changes” for what turns out to be a week’s worth of programming. It’s about the same as when they count the catalog section on a business website as just one page (heard it so many times).

Initially, we had made an unwritten promise to upload their products into the database, provided the number was reasonable. We felt it was a good way to test the website while using actual content. However, words have different meanings to different people. That’s how they ended up suggesting we could manage transferring several hundred items.  Needless to say, we grew tired of doing community service at around the 100th mark.

To finish on a high note, after all the extra work we had done for them, when it was time to get paid, they bargained till the last minute. I would normally understand that from a business savvy, calculated individual. However, these were the kind of people who would drop 100 dollars at a coffee shop or rent an office in a high priced residential part of the town. There’s no other way to read this than a complete lack of professionalism and respect. If i were to face the same scenario again i would probably say “pass” from the get go. A clearer brief than the one i had in place, a bigger check  and a firmer approach in dealing with their requests would help a lot. Also, i wouldn’t stray away from trying to explain the aspects they were unfamiliar with. While it doesn’t always work, there are  a lot of people capable and willing to know or learn more.

Yet, the point of all this is not to complain about this particular experience. After all it happened years ago and now i actually get a laugh just thinking about it. What’s important is to treat yourself with the amount of respect you expect from others. This means anything from following your gut instinct to having the patience and confidence to take on the projects which feel right for you. Above all else, you should treasure your time the most because it’s your best resource.