Shutterstock New Keyword Suggestion Tool

Shutterstock is excited to announce the public debut of their latest feature for Shutterstock Contributors: the new Keyword Suggestions tool. Shutterstock heard from you that good keywording can be difficult and time-consuming, so they set out to make it both easier and faster, while increasing the accuracy and relevance of your results.

Continue reading at ShutterBuzz.

Shutterstock Introduces Single Image Sales

Shutterstock announced a new single-image product. They have created the new single-image prduct in response to customer demand, that they think will help Shutterstock contributors to earn more money. Shutterstock is currently testing this product.

Here’s what the contributors need to know:

• For the first time, Shutterstock is offering customers in certain markets the option to purchase one Shutterstock image download at a time.
• Shutterstock's current packages and their royalty rates will not be impacted by this change.
• Shutterstock is using a percentage-based earnings model for this new standard license single-image product, and other products they may test and or launch in the future. This will let them experiment with new offerings in a way that remains fair to contributors.

The Details:

Under the new single-image pricing they are testing, customers can download any Shutterstock image with a standard license for a set price. Shutterstock designed this product to attract new customers who aren’t currently making purchases at Shutterstock.

Royalty rates for this product range from 20% to 30% depending on the contributors lifetime earnings at Shutterstock. They designed these percentages to be very close to what the contributor currently earn for On Demand downloads. You will see these sales recorded in the “Single & Other Downloads” column of your Download Stats page.

For more info take a look at the Shutterbuzz post.

Shutterstock Introduces A New Keyword Trends Tool

Shutterstock introducing a tool to help our contributors discover keywords with high customer demand.

The new Keyword Trends Tool shows you what customers search for on Shutterstock, and how some words rise and fall with the seasons. You can enter up to five words and see a graph of the words’ popularity over time.

Keyword Trends is the first tool of its kind in the industry. You can use it to help plan when to create content (be it vectors, video, or photos) and make decisions about when to upload seasonal content.

When you visit the tool for the first time, you’ll see five boxes at the top. Enter any search terms into those boxes. Or, click on the suggested keywords in the left-hand column, which are personalized based on your portfolio. The page will draw a line graph showing the relative popularity of those keywords over time.

You can use the tool to:

1. Understand seasonality.
Try entering the word “Christmas” and you’ll see that searches for “Christmas” start picking up in August. That’s when you should be shooting and uploading Christmas images. Search for words like summer, spring, autumn, winter, beach, football, fireworks, or snow and see what you learn.

2. Discover emerging trends.
If you think of an idea for an image concept, use this tool to check your hunch. For example, do a search for ‘carbon fiber’ and you’ll see that search volume has been increasing steadily since last year. Search for the terms ‘retro’ or ‘lace’ and see their popularity is on the decline.
A few notes on how the tool works:

• If you enter multiple words in a single box, the Keyword Trends Tool considers all the words together, but not as a phrase.
• The scale adjusts dynamically match the words you enter.
• In cases of keywords with low popularity, the data may look uneven, due to small errors introduced by data sampling prior to January 2011.
• The tool will improve over time as Shutterstock collects more data.

Ready to give it a try? Log in to your contributor account, visit The Darkroom and get started!

Shutterstock introduce Shutterbuzz

For the last few weeks Shutterstock been building an interactive blog for their contributors. Today they are pleased to introduce you to Shutterbuzz!

What you’ll find here:

• The heart of Shutterbuzz is an archive of articles about creating stock photography, illustration and footage, which you can navigate using the green sidebar on the right-hand side of every page. Scroll through it to find the best tips, articles and important Shutterstock resources. You’ll find reviews of top cameras, links to legal information and much more. Shutterbuzz will be editing this index to better suit your needs as Shutterbuzz grows.
• A blog of new posts about the latest Shutterstock happenings. This will eventually become the main channel for posting announcements to Shutterstock contributors. (Fans of the Shutterstock Forum, don’t despair. The forums will still be a place to talk to your peers in the Shutterstock community.)
• Community-Submitted News. Have a fun story you want to tell? A piece of gear you think is really great? A question you think other contributors can help answer? Write it up and share it as a community post! You’ll find a link at the top of every page to Community Posts, where you can see posts from readers or submit your own using a form. Posts will be held for moderation. When approved (assuming they aren’t spam), they’ll appear on the community page for others to read and comment on. Shutterbuzz will promote the most interesting ones to the main Shutterbuzz blog feed.
• Stories by and about the people behind Shutterstock—especially contributors, their influences and how they do their best work.
• A search box to help you find archived stories.

Shutterbuzz goal is to make Shutterstock contributors the best-informed, most enthused, most creative and highest-earning artists in the known universe. With your help, Shutterbuzz will be adding lots more articles in the coming months to make Shutterbuzz a must-visit destination.

You can visit Shutterbuzz at buzz.shutterstock.com, or follow it with their RSS feed. They will also be posting Shutterbuzz announcements on our Twitter and Facebook channels. Shutterbuzz is a companion to Shutterstock's existing blog for customers, the Shutterstock Blog.

Enjoy this new resource and please tell Shutterstock what you think! You can write to blog@shutterstock.com with feedback about Shutterbuzz. (As always, you can contact Shutterstock contributor support team at submit@shutterstock.com.)