The stock photo industry needs a change in strategy so all images can be made available for all uses at a reasonable price based on the value the customer will receive from using the image. We need to get away from the whole idea of rights-managed and royalty-free and recognize that, in all cases, the price is based on use.
Rights-managed licensing has always been much more about pricing based on use rather than on managing rights. The vast majority of rights-managed customers are not concerned with rights control or exclusivity.
Royalty-free licensing, particularly in the microstock arena, also establishes its prices based on use. To some degree, the file size controls how an image can be used, and most sites now offer seven different file sizes. In addition, there are many image uses that are not legally allowed, unless a higher fee is paid. Uses in online print-on-demand products and in logos or trademarks are totally prohibited. Fees must be negotiated separately for:
- More than 499,999 impressions in any printed product such as magazines, newspapers, brochures, catalogues, greeting cards, postcards and posters.
- Items for resale, including prints, posters, calendars, mugs, mousepads, t-shirts, games, etc.
- Electronic templates for resale on Web sites, brochures, business cards, e-greeting cards, etc.
- More than 499,999 DVDs.
Thus, to move from current strategies to one focused on use is not really that big a leap. The real distinction between royalty-free and rights-managed licensing is that the former generally uses fewer variables than the latter to establish a price. At the same time, the number of royalty-free variables keeps growing, while rights-managed sellers keep trying to find ways to simplify their pricing structure.
A few years ago, Getty Images instituted the rights-ready category, which had nine different prices that basically covered every type of use. After trying that for a couple years, the company abandoned it without explaining the reason. I suspect there were two main problems: the strategy did not offer enough variables and only applied to certain images in the collection, not all rights-managed images. My 2007 recommendation of a modified rights-ready strategy had a few more variables, but remained simpler than the complex rules of microstock agencies. It did not gain traction.
Corbis simplifies price calculator
Corbis has introduced a new approach that is certainly a step in the right direction. When the customer goes to price an image, she is presented with “quick licenses” for three different broad categories of use: advertising, publishing and online (see table).
| Table. Corbis pricing by category |
| Category |
Use |
Description |
Fee |
| Advertising |
Brochure Interior (Up to 5,000) |
Up to 1/2 page |
$615 |
| Brochure cover (Up to 5,000) |
Up to 1/2 page |
$920 |
| Print Ad (Up to 5,000) |
Up to 1/4 page |
$755 |
| Indoor Display Small (1 only) |
Up to 1/2 display |
$770 |
| Outdoor Display (1 only) |
Up to 1/2 display |
$1,665 |
| Publishing |
Editorial Magazine Interior (Up to 25,000) |
Up to 1/4 page |
$215 |
| Editorial Web up to (150x150px) |
Up to 3 months |
$130 |
| Editorial Newspaper (up to 50,000) |
Up to 1/4 page |
$140 |
| Textbook Interior (Up to 10,000) |
Up to 1/4 page |
$170 |
| Online |
Web - singe page up to 180x150px |
Up to 3 months |
$275 |
| Web - Ad/Banner, one site |
Up to 3 months |
$70 |
| Email - Promotional (Up to 10,000) |
Up to 1 month |
$40 |
| Mobile App Promotional |
|
$75 |
There are 4 or 5 variables in page size or length of time for each type of use. If the customer’s use fits within one of these categories, she can go to checkout and complete the purchase with one or two clicks. If the customer’s use doesn’t fit the category, she can go to “custom license” and get a template with all the variables of Corbis’ previous pricing model.
While this strategy is on the right track, the current implementation has a lot of flaws that need adjustment.
The first major issue is that the real advantage of such a structure is to reach out to the royalty-free and microstock buyers with the pricing simplicity they want while converting them to thinking in terms of use rather than file size. Instead of doing that, Corbis made the decision in January to move all rights-managed imagery off Veer and market it through the Corbis site. When the transition is complete, the Corbis site will only market rights-managed and royalty-free content to traditional customers, and Veer will focus on royalty-free and microstock customers.
The Corbis site will not attract microstock customers, because its prices are too high for that buyer segment. If the pricing variables offered were circulation rather than size of the image on the page, and if the company offered some lower prices for very small uses, it might have had a chance to attract the micro buyer. The company could have limited the size to 1/2 page or less, since nearly all uses are in that range, and forced the buyer to go from quick to custom licenses for larger uses.
Instead, Corbis has decided that the site should just be address the very limited market of traditional professional customers—a market which, incidentally, is declining in size and importance all the time.
With indoor and outdoor displays, Corbis would have been better advised to forget about the size of the image on the display and focus the variable on the number of copies. No company of any size will only print one copy of anything important. It is also not worth the asking price of an image license. Does Corbis not want to sell to the small mom-and-pop store that wants to put a poster in its window to promote a special offer, or to the PTA president promoting a school event? The prices are too high for any such buyers to consider. If Corbis was thinking of billboards when it established its outdoor category, it should not even have included them in the quick license scheme; there are comparatively few such uses, and they can be addressed through custom licenses.
A textbook use limited to 10,000 makes no sense at all, because those who print so few copies are a very small percentage of the market. Again, it would be better to make print run the variable, and make the image size 1/2 page or less, forcing those who need to print the picture larger go the custom route. And, Corbis ought to charge a lot more for high print runs than it charges in its custom license template.
In the online area, categories and lower prices are needed for personal uses on blogs or Web sites, educational PowerPoint presentation and other non-commercial applications. Rather than focusing on how long the image is going to be online, it would make more sense to have the variables deal with the multiple different ways images might be used on the Web.
Quick licenses are a good idea if for those who want to sell rights-managed, royalty-free and microstock images on the same site. It would also be a great way to gradually migrate microstock’s extended licenses to a real use-based strategy, but this application has missed the mark.