Have you ever thought about what it would be like to sell your digital photos?

Are you one of those people who think that your photos are actually only snapshots? Or maybe you think only your friends and family will praise your efforts. If you're a member of a photo club, you might have won or achieved a high position in some photography competitions which could perhaps boost your recognition of your own efforts.

Whether or not you think that you can sell your digital photos, that's truly down to another person - the person who's willing to buy your photo (or not!). Camera magazines are incredibly common, and all want photo submissions from their readers, so sending in a variety of your top photos to them is one way to get into print and wave the obliging magazine under the noses of doubters as you brag about being a "published" photographer. ;-)

Stock Photography

But there is a further way to sell your digital photos. It's called stock photography - images that can be used and reused for commercial design purposes. All photos are non-commissioned; that is - the photographer wasn't hired to do a job.

Book publishers, specialist publishers, magazines, advertising agencies, film makers, web designers, graphic artists, interior decor firms, corporate creative groups, and other businesses all use stock photography to fulfill the requirements of their creative assignments.

Stock Photography And You

With there being so many photo repositories online, many request photo submissions from hobbyist photgraphers instead of using work only from professional photographers. So that's where you come in. Select a number of your greatest digital photos and submit them to some of the online stock photo agencies. If accepted, the agencies will sell your digital photos for you.

Remember that the agencies will review your photos before they make a decision to accept or reject them. Yes, they have a few fundamental requirements that must be met before they'll accept your photos. Different image banks could have slightly different criteria. All you can do is try. You've nothing to lose. Just read what terms are provided so you can match what you submit as closely as possible to what each agency is seeking.

Submitting Photos

There are two ideas to reflect upon when submitting your work for review in order to get an image bank to sell your digital photos : Title and Keywords.

1. Choose as descriptive a title as possible for each of your photos as it'll help prospective customers discern the subject of the photo with less difficulty.

2. The other thing to think over is keywords related to the topic of your photo. These are used to match the search terms typed in by customers for photographs matching what they're searching for. So the greater the number keywords you use, the greater the likelihood of your photo appearing in the search results which, in turn, increases your chances of a sale.

Any agency with whom you sell your digital photos will not take copyright of your work. You always retain that. All you are doing is conferring on the stock photo agency a license to sell your digital photo and not the image itself. Most of the image banks run a non-exclusivity arrangement which means that you can submit your photographs to as many agencies as you like. A few stock photo agencies do provide optional exclusivity clauses which can result in you earning a higher payment per sale but that's something you have to size up against the number of sales you may make for the same photograph at all the other agencies you've submitted it to.

So what sized commissions can you expect to earn if you sell your digital photos?

Stock Photo agencies don't pay a large fee per photograph. They sell digital photos at low rates (from a dollar upwards) and don't forget that they cover the administration fees for handling transactions as well as hosting and serving the photos to customers.

Expect to earn $0.20 to $0.50 on average per sale. Profoundly popular photos will have higher commissions but it's best to assume yours won't be in that category. So you definitely aren't going to get rich overnight.

You've nothing to lose if you sell your digital photos online. The more photographs you submit, the more you will sell and the more money you will earn.

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