“How to Make a Million Dollars in Microstock” was the title of stock analytics site Lookstat’s blog issue last month.
They crunched some numbers over at Lookstat, and it turns out that if you make $4 per image, and you add 400 new images to your portfolio per month, you’ll be a millionaire in less than three years.
I’m not THAT ambitious, but I crunched some numbers on my own, and even with a pretty modest upload rate, things are looking good for our $20 per week goal. Very good.
Let’s say you start now with zero images in your portfolio. If you upload 20 photos per week to four different agencies, that’s 320 new images for sale per month.
Assuming you’ll earn around $1 per image per month, by this time next year you’ll have made over $23,000.
Keep uploading 20 new photos to four agencies per week, and your monthly income will continue to grow…
In your second year, you’ll make $69,120.
In your third year, you’ll make $115,200.
It keeps going up from there.
Of course, this is assuming you can upload 20 new photos per week, that they’re all accepted, and that you can maintain an average income of $1 per image per month — which won’t be possible for some.
To do that, you’ll need to consistently take good photos that sell. And the sooner you get to that point, the sooner you’ll be able to reach your income goals doing something you love.
It’s easy to learn — and fun, too — but it DOES take practice.
So, in the next couple of weeks, I’m going to tell you about some big plans I have for Snap & Sell Photo Club… plans to accelerate our sales and stock success. It’s a new program designed to keep you learning and uploading more every month.
In the meantime, here’s a little challenge for you…
Industry sources say that November is the busiest month in stock. Designers and other photo buyers are looking for all kinds of seasonal images — Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s…
So let’s get our first sales off the ground by uploading seasonal images now. Ideally, we’d be doing this in September, but it’s not too late.
Get out the Christmas decorations this week and start taking seasonal photos.
Don’t have studio lights? Try using natural light and photographing wrapped presents, tree baubles, tinsel, candles, lights, candy canes, and other Christmas goodies.
You’ll find a good tip on shooting in natural light here and some pro insights from the last Challenge we created together on shooting breakfast items, here.
20 new photos a week — we can do it!!
