The Pixmac microstock agency is proud to announce that we now offer 7 million stock photos for our customers. Only a few competitors can say the same. Our collection consists of 3 sources. Two are creative and one editorial called “Celebrity”. Pixmac is the fastest way to get a stock photo or illustration for your design for a price that might surprise you.

When the pink company launched its marketplace in September 2008 it might have seemed like just another microstock company that is trying to make it. But look how much we have grown in a year! Pixmac has partners in 9 major markets and its sales are growing faster than expected.

Our company is  growing faster than other competitors in the microstock market according to respected site Alexa.com and  the amount of pictures grows with it. Not only that, Pixmac invented the “One Stop Shopping” way to get inexpensive quality photos in a matter of seconds without need of registration. Lee Torrens, a well known microstock blogger, says: “I LOVE your one-stop-shopping idea! It has always been a missing element of microstock agencies…” Yes, Pixmac focuses on speed and user friendliness.

Pixmac offers a lot now and has more in the oven to offer our customers. For example, Pixmac is working with a University on a project that will change your searching abilities and will make searching quicker and easier. We are also adding another few million photos to the database soon and working on some nice stock photo searching tweaks.

This week we’re launching a new updated website together with features such as Moneybookers payment method which added with payments by PayPal and/or  Credit Card. Also we have included a popular feature that sorts search results by downloads or date.

Vitezslav Valka (CEO) comments: “I’m always thrilled to see our customers happy with the user interface. Everybody deserves an easy tool that just works. I’m watching everything that happens in the company and believe me, it’s better than Red Bull and Duracell together!”

And one last thing for insiders. Watch our Twitter for special offers!

Many of you searching for photos were confused with credits, our virtual currency. Pixmac has solved that now for you. You don’t have to learn what credit is and you even don’t have to register at Pixmac if you need just one picture.

This idea came up from our research that most buyers are searching for just one picture first. Usually they realise later that Pixmac is so easy that they can use it twice or more times! The second thing is most users don’t have time. When they’re in a hurry and they don’t have time to learn how the credit system works. Or perhaps they don’t have the time to register at Pixmac. And finally they don’t wanna purchase more credits just because they may not use them in the future.

Our solution? One Stop Shopping.

You can just search for picture you need, click the download button, pay the price and that’s it! Your project and your life is saved. We’ve saved some electricity, you can take more time to watch the wildlife out of your office window. And if you want a better price, then credits are there for you!

Lee Torrens says: “I LOVE your one-stop-shopping idea! It has always been a missing element of microstock agencies so I’m very glad to see you leading the way with this. I imagine there’s a minor loss of leads through not collecting email addresses, but as the market reaches further toward less sophisticated buyers, I expect this easy transaction style will be particularly handy. Great work!” – More about Lee at Microstock Diaries

It is as easy as 1-2-3

You’ll need 3 minutes to have the picture on your disk.

1. Search for the desired picture in the Pixmac stock photo gallery and click on it.
2. Choose the required size and click on Download.
3. Pay for the picture via PayPal or Credit Card. That is it!

We will be making some changes soon that will affect you if want to you upload your pictures via FTP. These will come into effect on 2009-06-16. The changes to be made are:

1) You will no longer need the special FTP username. Please use the same nickname and password as you use to log onto the website.
2) There will be two directories on your FTP account. These will be ‘creative’, for creative pictures and ‘editorial’ for editorial pictures. Please make sure you upload your picture to the correct directory.
3) You will no longer be able to create your own directories.

We hope these changes will make it even easier to upload your pictures. If you would like more information, or have any problems uploading by FTP, please contact us at customersupport@pixmac.com .

We were talking with Erik from Imagery Majestic this weekend about questions popping up in communities and forums about the approval process. And we want to be fair and clear about this. For clarification of the issue, read more below.

Why were the all pictures rejected at once on Friday 3th April?

Vitezslav Valka, CEO: “Our approval system was under heavy development over the last few weeks. We’ve finally made a number of crucial improvements there. As you may know, the process was slow but we have found a solution to fix it. I would like to walk you through the process as it was on Pixmac until the end of last week. I’ll also go over the new one, which will be more effective and clear to our contributors.”

Old approval process

• picture is uploaded and sent to approval
• reviewer inspects the photo and sends it to editors (team coordinated by Denisa Haveldova)
• editor verifies the decision and finally sends it to web or to rejected pictures
• user gets an email per photo (lots of emails sometime)

New approval process

• picture is uploaded and sent to approval
• reviewer inspects the photo and sends it directly to web or to rejected pictures
• user gets an email once a day
• user can dispute (complain about the rejection) up to 30 decisions per week until a month from rejection
• disputes go to editor in chief (Denisa) and she makes final decision

The approval process is unclear to us. Solution?

Vitezslav Valka, CEO: “This should be much clearer now. When we were slow with our reviews, we decided to review (review again by Editor) the approved pictures first. The reason for this is simple: Get the pictures online and selling as soon as possible. That is why some of you were getting a few accepted and a few rejected pictures in last few weeks. Friday’s big rejection was a result of the dispute option being implemented. So from that moment, we don’t have to wait for the Editor’s final decision. The process is now pretty fast and I hope it is clear to everybody.”

Why is the rejection rate sometimes about 50% ?

Denisa Haveldova, Content: “The approval rate may sometimes be different from other agencies. Remember that we don’t have any upload limits, we’re happy that contributors upload a lot to Pixmac. Unfortunately we’ve experienced that a huge number of very similar pictures from one shoot will be uploaded, without any review from the photographer. We’ve also found that some contributors don’t check images in Actual size (Zoom to 100%) before uploading. So pictures that seem to be great at first, unfortunately don’t meet our criteria for the technical quaility, sharpness etc.

As to the reasons of refusal: Please keep in mind, that the text of the reasons for refusal is automatic. It aims to fit to the particular picture as much as possible, but of course each picture is individual, and from time to time it can happen that it will not explain the problem of the picture exactly.”

If somebody has 498 pictures approved and needs 500: We’ve seen some contributors who are only a few pictures short of the “500 accepted” goal from February. This is mainly caused by uploading a little more than 500 pictures to Pixmac without keeping in mind that some of them could be rejected. But everybody makes mistakes, so we have decided to pay the $500 or $100 even for 480 pictures.

Contact us if you have an individual problem!

If you have any questions about this issue, contact us via comments below, or send us an email. We’re here for you! Denisa Haveldova is the head of approving/editing team and she knows everything about our content. You can contact her directly: denisa.haveldova@pixmac.com. If you have a question regarding a particular image, the best thing is to mention the ID or put a link to it in the email body. Other technical issues are under the control of Vitezslav Valka, the CEO of Pixmac. Anything else can be solved by Contacting us directly.

Our portfolio is growing pretty fast! We have now launched editorial content at Pixmac. If you ever need fresh photos of famous singers or actors, just jump on Pixmac! The celebrity section at Pixmac already has 300,000 pictures to download from $2 each. They’re ready for your blog, postcard, print, etc. And you know what’s better? Every day more than 10,000 new photos added!

We’re also participating in developing a new celebrity portal. Want to know what Paris Hilton or Brad Pitt did yesterday? Read Everyceleb.com every day!

We’ve also added great new functions for you! So now Pixmac is even easier for you to use.

Multiple operations

We’ve improved multiple operations for photographers. Now it’s really simple to work with multiple photos, add releases or a title to them.

Public lightboxes

Have you found beautiful photos and you want to show them to your friends? We’ve made public lightboxes for you. How does it work? It’s easy. Create a new lightbox and add your favorite pictures to it. Choose the “Show lightbox URL” option. Copy the URL and send it to your friends.

Zoom photos

Now you can zoom photos from Pixmac collection. Just click on the photo to zoom to 100%. Perfect for those who want to check the quality of the original.

Czech version

Pixmac launches Pixmac in Czech this week. In the near future we are planning to launch also other language versions. Almost done is Russian, German, Spanish, Portugese, Italian.

And one last thing. Because of our contract with Fotolia we had to lower the commision for non-exclusive rights to 30% and to 40% for exclusive rights for new photographers coming to Pixmac.

We’ve just finished and polished many functions on Pixmac. In the last few weeks we have made Pixmac even easier, faster and more comprehensive for you – the user.

There are plenty of new things at Pixmac and even more bug fixes. We’ve also had some great records in sales. So lets go ahead with the functions and other news.

Collections

We are now separating our collections. From now on you can choose to search within the Pixmac or Fotolia collection or both. We know this will make the life easier for you. We’re also working on some additions, and we’ll let you know the details in a few weeks.

Better Advanced Search

We’ve made improvements to advanced search. Now you can look for new pictures or pictures from a particular author more easily. For easier browsing of the results you can now turn the Dynamic preview on or off, which is great if you don’t want to be distracted while searching for the best shot.

Easier tools for Photographers

You may know that we expanded our collection with a lot of new pictures in the last month. That proved our team and also our technology. We’re happy to tell you that the website is about 3 times faster. But for photographers, the tools to manage your collection are easier and more comprehensive. We believe this will encourage those who care about their time to stay at Pixmac.

2.3 Million pictures at Pixmac

We haven’t been around as long as our competitors, but even so you can already choose from 2.3 million pictures at Pixmac. That’s because we have two collections. We’re still the first and only agency in microstock to provide two microstock collections on one site for one registration.

1000 new users per month

More than a thousand new users joined Pixmac last month. That means more than 36 per day! Isn’t that great?

Our Dream Team would like to thank you for this great success!

Yesterday a user FlemishDreams at Microstock Group mentioned that Pixmac leave your images online in the gallery for too long. We didn’t expect that would be a problem, but the change can happen!

It’s great that we can hear our users and respond to them. We’ve brainstormed and now the time we’ll keep your pictures online is set to 1 year. We are currently fixing it on the Pixmac site. But if you find the old period mentioned somewhere, please let us know and we will correct it.

Vitezslav comments: “This is a first step. Remember I am always on your side! And I will try my best so you feel comfortable with us. That is my mission here at Pixmac.”

Again, we are here to give you a really good tool to sell your photos. Thanks to all of you who love the site for its ease of use. It was one of our primary targets and it seems we’re getting there.

And remember – don’t wait and get yours $500 for 500 pictures or just try to guess the number of pictures available on Pixmac on 1st March 2009 and win an iPhone!

There were some small agencies that already are not with us. Lucky Oliver is one of them. Is the field is actually getting crowded? Or those companies were not healthy? Lets dig deeper in it.

The first thing everybody should know is that the reader actually is a possible buyer. So the user interface and its feeling of speed is the crucial thing to have in mind. Then, the photographer.

The Photographer is in totally different position. He or she knows much more about the field, is curious about what’s happening inside the agency, because it’s his pictures what’s selling. And that is something what every agency should keep in mind. Pixmac, as a young alternative to big elephants, is making this true.

The other thing is the target groups. Most buyers, as we have been researching, are small companies or even individuals. Usually entrepreneurs or freelance designers who know a bit about on-line services. They know it’s easier way to get pictures than negotiate with some old-fashioned agencies. The other thing is, that these electronic pictures usually remain there between ones and zeros. Most users are putting this into website designs or as a desktop backgrounds. Some are using them for print or jut for a decoration of their home.

Pixmac tries harder

Because we already know that microstock field is getting a bit crowded we try harder. We’re paying people to do the keywording for free for our photographers. We are thinking about the user interface as a tool that should be fast and easy. No marketing “blah blah” around. And the last thing we do is listening. We reply to every email that falls into our mailboxes. And we actually do the change if there is something that is not working well for the users – usually within hours.

Pixmac is also friendly to buyers. As far as I know, we are first agency who acquires photographers and in the same time sells pictures from other agencies. That is why we already have more than a million of pictures for the buyers. For the short time we’re here its great news for the buyers.

The Microstock phenomenon

The difference between regular photo agency and a Microstock agency is price. Most of the traditional agencies depend on a small group of their photographers. Pixmac depends on a growing community of freelancers and photo enthusiasts. And the digital era brings better prices to everybody. That is why Pixmac can offer more for better price.

There are two new functions just launched. Affiliate program – a tool for friends of Pixmac and Advanced search – a tool for better searching.

If you’re the one who runs a website read more about Affiliate program on our website. Basically it’s a tool for you to share the power Pixmac has. If you put a link to your website or to a discussion forum, with the appropriate code it will bring you happiness. But lets stop just talking – what about some earnings? Yes, there are some.

And the Advanced search? Its a great tool which helps people with precise searching. Lets have alook on the Pixmac homepage. There it is. Just small text right under the search field. But when you open it, the strong search tool pops-up. If you are confident about what you’re looking for – this is a piece of ones and zeros that trully helps.

And one last thing. If the affiliate banners at Pixmac site are not enough for you. Here are some more

As everybody out there already know Facebook is a platform for not only meeting people, but much more sharing their lives. That’s why Pixmac became a “user” too.

Why we did that? It is simple. Basically we want people to know that we’re listening. So almost everything we do is for users. We want to hear them and act as they like that. We like to share how Pixmac is going, and so. For us whole online universe is an inspiration space. We can discuss usability issues, read user feedback and feel the same you feel. That is finally transformed to a better tool – better Pixmac.