5 Ways to Sell your Photos Online (that actually make money!)
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I see you, photographers. Your days are full of long editing hours, answering emails, and being interviewed by potential clients on zoom. I get it because I’ve been there.
What if I told you that I have five possibilities for you to take on less work each year and still bring in the same amount of income? Or that you can diversify your business to safeguard against difficult times (like a pandemic).
These are 5 of my personally tested passive income streams for making money selling photos online so that you can generate passive sales that relieve the pressure to work long hours.
Microstock Sites
Microstock sites are the best entry point for selling your photos online, especially if you’re not ready to call yourself a professional photographer. A microstock website (ie: Shutterstock) aims to sell large quantities of lower-priced images. The application process to become a contributor on one of these sites is relatively simple. Usually, you just need to submit a handful of your best photos. As far as what you can sell- lower quality images are often accepted, as long as your images are in focus and meet quality standards. This includes your phone photos! Beginning with a microstock agency can help you build your portfolio and learn which types of photos sell best. Download my Little Black Book of Stock Photo Agencies if you want to learn more about your agency options.
Macrostock Sites
For any professional photographer one of the best ways to make legit income selling your photos online- and I’m talking anywhere from $100’s - $1000’s each month- is through a Macrostock site. Macrostock websites, such as Offset and Stocksy, sell rights to super high-quality images, often royalty-free. Macrostock sites are more selective about the artists they accept as their contributors as well as the images they accept. Even after an artist is accepted they may only accept 20% of their images. During the application process, they usually prefer to see a portfolio rather than just a few images. The payout is higher -$100's for an image compared to $10 or less from a microstock company. In my opinion, it’s worth it to push through the acceptance process for a passive income stream that can make an immense contribution to your monthly income. If you want to increase your chances of being accepted, show the agency that you have the content their customers are looking for now! In this bundle,” Subjects that Sell” I share exactly what agencies want to see in the current season.
Etsy
Did you think Etsy was just for handmade earrings and cutting boards? Not anymore! Etsy has actually made it possible to deliver digital goods like photos and printable pdfs instantly. When setting up your shop on Etsy it’s important to choose a niche market to set yourself apart. Who is your target market? What are they using these photos for? Social media, Zoom backgrounds, etc.
A great example is the Etsy shop Halftoune. Their market is made up of artists and designers who use their photos as shop Images. Designers are able to photoshop a digital image of their work onto the backdrop and it's instantly ready to be sold online without having to print their products and prep a photo-shoot.
Have you heard of Creative Market? It’s a slightly addictive resource for anyone who needs ready-to-use design assets. I was recently accepted to open a shop and sell my photos on their site. A great way to sell photos on Creative Market is by creating bundles or collections of photos with a specific theme. On CM it’s also extremely important how you brand and present your images. Compared to Etsy, CM is much more selective about who can set up a shop on their site. I had to fill out an application which took about a month to be approved. If you’ are accepted this can be another excellent source of passive income. The downside: Creative Market fees are currently 40% of each sale.
Did you know you can sell professional-quality photo prints completely passively? With Instaproofs all you do is set up your galleries and marketing emails and choose a lab to work with. This way you can set up your gallery as a fine art print shop and sell prints to your existing audience or make sales to your current clients. Instaproofs calls this “Pajama profits”. Some of my favorite features with Instaproofs include their clean and minimal online gallery platform, shopping cart with custom pricing and products, built-in marketing tools and email tracking, Lab fulfillment services, watermarking multi-lingual galleries, and payments through stripe.
Now that you know how to generate passive sales that relieve the pressure to work long hours and diversify your income are you going to try one out?
Wanting more tangible advice and guidance for selling stock photography? Download PHOTO TO PROFIT, The Ultimate Stock Photo Starter guide!