Agri/horticultural Photo Website - any comments
Geoff Bryant
through several incarnations of the stock photo website. The latest
www.cfgphoto.com has been running for around 14 months and I'm fairly
settled on the basic layout and operating method but I just wondered if
anyone here had any ideas.
The site currently has well over 6000 photos and is designed primarily for
publishers and photo researchers who have some idea what they're looking
for. However, as we also get plenty of visits by gardeners and farmers I've
recently added a "how to find your images" guide to the front page and main
image page. And as I'm also a garden book writer I've included amazon.com
links. I really don't like to make it too wordy or include advertising but
visitors do need to know how to find pictures and, well, those are my books.
Any ideas appreciated and just so it's not too OT, by far the majority of
the images were shot with Canon DSLRs.
Thanks,
Geoff Bryant
www.cfgphoto.com
Tony Polson
>I've been marketing photos online for about 3 years now and have passed
>through several incarnations of the stock photo website. The latest
>www.cfgphoto.com has been running for around 14 months and I'm fairly
>settled on the basic layout and operating method but I just wondered if
>anyone here had any ideas.
>
>The site currently has well over 6000 photos and is designed primarily for
>publishers and photo researchers who have some idea what they're looking
>for. However, as we also get plenty of visits by gardeners and farmers I've
>recently added a "how to find your images" guide to the front page and main
>image page. And as I'm also a garden book writer I've included amazon.com
>links. I really don't like to make it too wordy or include advertising but
>visitors do need to know how to find pictures and, well, those are my books.
You are offering some excellent images but they are very difficult to
browse. Offering a search facility is all very well, but many
potential casual buyers will be turned off by long lists of image
names without actually being able to see any images other than by
making a single selection from a list or by using the search facility.
For example, anyone wanting an image of Clydesdales ploughing is
offered eleven images in a list, all identically titled "Clydesdales
Ploughing". Clicking on one of those brings up one image with a link
to "Clydesdales" but that brings up 27 thumbnails spread over two
pages, 16 of which are presumably not related to ploughing, although
even this is not clear. To view the 11 ploughing images, it is
tempting to keep returning to the index page and clicking on the next
link until you have repeated this laborious process 11 times.
Putting "clydesdales AND ploughing" in the search box does bring up 11
thumbnails, but simply searching on "clydesdales ploughing" brings up
47 images spread over three pages, 36 of which are presumably not
relevant. Most casual users of the site would not bother to insert
the all-important search term "AND".
I suggest that you should consider recasting the site to group the
images into albums with the all-important thumbnails that will entice
people to buy. Each of your (many) lists would make an album, and
navigation would be eased by having one thumbnail from each album on
an index page, choosing each thumbnail to be both eye catching and
representative of the content of the relevant album.
At a more fundamental level, I would ask why you chose to host your
own images rather than place them with agencies? While agencies take
a substantial cut of your sales income, they also tend to generate far
greater sales than an individual web site ever could. The agency web
sites are generally the first place professional image buyers tend to
look, because of the ease of finding images that fit their needs.
I hope that you can accept my comments in the spirit they are
intended. You are clearly a talented photographer but I think the
full potential for selling your images has yet to be realised. Your
site might be adequate for your existing buyers, but it probably needs
to be recast to broaden the market for your excellent work.
Geoff Bryant
One question though. Why didn't you use the drop-down category list just
below the search box or look at the page of category lists? If you had you
would have found a direct link to Clydesdale images. Having albums with a
thumbnail header would certainly be possible, though there would be over 340
of them, hence the all-ignored drop-down list.
Now that's no reflection on you search method, it seems to be a common thing
to many visitors, who overlook the category links. Perhaps I should renames
categories as albums or galleries. As regards having to insert a Boolean
operator in the search, well, that's just how the system operates. I know
agencies have problems with that too. A recent look at the
bit.listproc.stockphoto newsgroup will reveal discussions along those lines.
I do have work with various agencies, including the traditional stock
libraries Photo Researchers and NHPA and online agencies such as Acclaim
Images, so my website is not my sole sales outlet. However, other than Photo
Researchers it has been the most successful of them.
I've been shooting stock for over 10 years and it is an increasingly
difficult industry and from the photographer's point of view digital hasn't
helped. I used to enjoy making up submissions of slides to send to the US or
Britain but processing files and all that damn keywording is just hard work.
What ever happened to simply having a decent descriptive caption? That's the
real reason for having my own site - I have control over what ends up on
screen and how it's presented.
Thanks again for replying,
Geoff
"Tony Polson" <t...@nospam.co.uk> wrote in message
news:8877k1dmompice53u...@4ax.com...
Geoff Bryant
"clydesdales ploughing" now returns just the relevant 11 images.
--
Geoff Bryant
www.cfgphoto.com
Tony Polson
You're very welcome.
>One question though. Why didn't you use the drop-down category list just
>below the search box or look at the page of category lists? If you had you
>would have found a direct link to Clydesdale images.
If I was a regular visitor to your site, I might have found that. But
as a first time visitor, with a couple of minutes to spare, your site
appeared more difficult to navigate that it needed to be.
>Having albums with a
>thumbnail header would certainly be possible, though there would be over 340
>of them, hence the all-ignored drop-down list.
>
>Now that's no reflection on you search method, it seems to be a common thing
>to many visitors, who overlook the category links.
I'm not surprised that it is a common thing!
>Perhaps I should renames
>categories as albums or galleries. As regards having to insert a Boolean
>operator in the search, well, that's just how the system operates. I know
>agencies have problems with that too. A recent look at the
>bit.listproc.stockphoto newsgroup will reveal discussions along those lines.
>
>I do have work with various agencies, including the traditional stock
>libraries Photo Researchers and NHPA and online agencies such as Acclaim
>Images, so my website is not my sole sales outlet. However, other than Photo
>Researchers it has been the most successful of them.
>
>I've been shooting stock for over 10 years and it is an increasingly
>difficult industry and from the photographer's point of view digital hasn't
>helped. I used to enjoy making up submissions of slides to send to the US or
>Britain but processing files and all that damn keywording is just hard work.
>What ever happened to simply having a decent descriptive caption? That's the
>real reason for having my own site - I have control over what ends up on
>screen and how it's presented.
>
>Thanks again for replying,
Glad I could help.
Best regards,
Tony
Tony Polson
>I've now changed the default search operator to AND, so using the example of
>"clydesdales ploughing" now returns just the relevant 11 images.
I think that is probably the most useful instant modification you
could make.
Good luck with the site.
David Littlewood
<geoff...@xtra.co.nz> writes
>Thanks Tony, I appreciate the comments.
>
>One question though. Why didn't you use the drop-down category list just
>below the search box or look at the page of category lists? If you had you
>would have found a direct link to Clydesdale images. Having albums with a
>thumbnail header would certainly be possible, though there would be over 340
>of them, hence the all-ignored drop-down list.
>
>Now that's no reflection on you search method, it seems to be a common thing
>to many visitors, who overlook the category links. Perhaps I should renames
>categories as albums or galleries. As regards having to insert a Boolean
>operator in the search, well, that's just how the system operates. I know
>agencies have problems with that too. A recent look at the
>bit.listproc.stockphoto newsgroup will reveal discussions along those lines.
>
say that I also was mystified for a minute as to where to find the
"galleries" referred to in the body of the text as showing thumbnails. I
suppose I was expecting a clickable link rather than a drop-down box.
Other than that I thought the site worked well and showed some excellent
work.
David
--
David Littlewood
Geoff Bryant
news:9LQ1MerO...@dlittlewood.co.uk...
>>thing
>>to many visitors, who overlook the category links. Perhaps I should
>>renames
>>categories as albums or galleries. As regards having to insert a Boolean
>>operator in the search, well, that's just how the system operates. I know
>>agencies have problems with that too. A recent look at the
>>bit.listproc.stockphoto newsgroup will reveal discussions along those
>>lines.
>>
> I think you have answered your own question. In case it helps, let me say
> that I also was mystified for a minute as to where to find the "galleries"
> referred to in the body of the text as showing thumbnails. I suppose I was
> expecting a clickable link rather than a drop-down box.
>
> Other than that I thought the site worked well and showed some excellent
> work.
>
> David
> --
> David Littlewood
Thanks, David. You might like to take another look as I've now taken up a
few of Tony's suggestions.
Geoff
Geoff Bryant
Tony, if you the time you might like to take another look as I've now taken
up a few of your suggestions, especially in relation to using thumbnails for
the category links, at least those in the top two levels. If you visit the
home page and click on one of the images you should see second tier
subcategories accessible via thumbnails. The garden category has the most
extensive list and is rather impressive to look at but would it be too slow
for those not on broadband?
--
Geoff Bryant
www.cfgphoto.com
David Littlewood
David
--
David Littlewood
Tony Polson
>Tony, if you the time you might like to take another look as I've now taken
>up a few of your suggestions, especially in relation to using thumbnails for
>the category links, at least those in the top two levels. If you visit the
>home page and click on one of the images you should see second tier
>subcategories accessible via thumbnails.
Hi Geoff,
That's a major improvement. It makes the site far less intimidating
to browse. I suggest it could be further improved by making *all* the
subcategories accessible via thumbnails rather than folder symbols,
but that will take time and it is already far better than it was.
I wonder whether a fourth main category might be appropriate, to cater
for those looking for what might be called "fine art" shots. You have
some excellent images that stand out to be chosen for this category,
for example:
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=1814
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=6392
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=3939
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=1820
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=4821
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=1825
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=5223
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=216
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=4580
http://www.cfgphoto.com/details.php?image_id=4002
This selection came from a quick look. I feel sure there are many
others. They deserve to be marketed separately from the main
categories because they stand out by reason of their artistic value.
Of course you should leave them in the main categories as well, but a
gallery of (say) twenty of your best shots should sell well to casual
buyers.
>The garden category has the most
>extensive list and is rather impressive to look at but would it be too slow
>for those not on broadband?
I think the days of worrying about people who don't have broadband
should be over now. The number of potential buyers of your work who
don't have broadband is probably very tiny.
Best regards,
Tony
Geoff Bryant
Thank you for all the ideas and the time you put into them. I'll probably
put all of them into effect but other than the extra category they will take
some time to implement.
Geoff
Tony Polson
>Tony,
>
>Thank you for all the ideas and the time you put into them.
Geoff,
You're welcome. I have spent the last day and a half scanning slides,
correcting them in Photoshop then uploading and cataloguing them.
Looking at your web site was a welcome respite while waiting for the
scanner to complete each scan! I'm glad I could help.
Best regards,
Tony