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It’s been 3 months since I started my site, and I’ve spent a couple hundred dollars and untold hours on it to get one $5 sale. All that time could have been spent generating more illustrations for the micro sites, so I would have made more money instead of spending it. It seems a few people are successful, while the vast majority are not.
I’ve watched as people who were interested in Symbiostock a few months ago gradually dropped away, until there are very few of us left posting here.
I’m finding it depressing to check my site each day just to see if I got any traffic…I don’t even bother checking for sales any more.
Unless someone comes up with a promising plan to attract buyers, I think I’ll be checking out.
A shame…I had high hopes.
Whatever path you choose to go, we’ve all been thankful for your efforts. I am especially. Instead of putting effort into it, why don’t you just let it sit and upload to it like an agency? Just push the upgrade button occasionally.
Other than kind members on here I only had two sales in the early months, a third in December then another last week (via Google) that earned me enough to totally revive my interest and will pay for my advertising on PE this year
http://kerioakimaging.com - trying to reopen
http://nail-art-at.kerioak.com - Art and Nail ArtAnyway… I PMd you.
If EVERYONE gave Symbiostock a break right now, it would be a HUGE advantage to me as a developer.
Right now I’m taking care of many of Symbiostock’s biggest issues;
Bugs
Professionalizing the image (main site, community site, theme)
And so forth.If Symbiostock became a ghost town for a while, that would not be a bad thing —
Here’s one of my favorite proverbs:
3 To everything there is a season, and a time for every matter or purpose under heaven:
2 A time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to pluck up what is planted,
3 A time to kill and a time to heal, a time to break down and a time to build up,
4 A time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance,
5 A time to cast away stones and a time to gather stones together, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
6 A time to get and a time to lose, a time to keep and a time to cast away,
7 A time to rend and a time to sew, a time to keep silence and a time to speak,
8 A time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.
9 What profit remains for the worker from his toil?
I think right now its time for EVERYONE to just enjoy some idleness while I work hard on making everything prettier and more professional 😀
This will happen much, much slower the more spread thin I am. I see it as a win-win if everyone takes Shemla’s position right now.I am into Symbiostock for the looong haul. We can’t change this game in a few month. If we can at all it will be a marathon. So better save some breath and strength for later.
Dear Michele,
I would be very sorry to see you leave Symbiostock. You’ve been a tremendous contributor to this effort, especially in the wonderful Facebook page you created and continue to keep fresh every single day. I do find it sad that so few people from this network seem to drop by regularly to “like” the images and sites featured on the page and otherwise support your efforts.
And from a personal standpoint, I am extremely grateful for the fine design help you gave me a month ago. The new header and two watermarks (giving me great flexibility!) you created for me have turned out to be a huge upgrade to my site. (To others who haven’t yet seen those new features on my site… check ’em out!)
As for seeing results, I haven’t even had my first $5 sale yet, but I’m not giving up. Maybe it’s because I know I fill a small niche with tons of competition. Maybe it’s because I’m older and don’t have to make a living from this. But still, I do take a lot of pride in it. I’m proud to tell people about it. Proud when they visit my site and come back with Wow! comments. Proud to be able to add my 1500+ images to the overall collection. And I feel confident that sometime soon, one way or other, I will start seeing some sales.
So, thank you for everything you’ve done for me personally and for this group. You have done your best to help us all, collectively, and I think you have. I hope you’ll stick around.
Martha
I can understand people that make a huge investment of time and energy. There is only so fast you can make a tree grow though — its best to let things rest for a while. The new site (.com) is going to be awesome, and the theme will model slightly after it.
Mostly (for Shemla and those who contribute like her) it can be like pushing a rock up hill…I think a rest is needed while I continue to put in my work around the Symbiostock garden. 😕
Thanks all, and especially to Leo, Jo Ann and Martha for all the work and support. And thanks to the people who helped out with info and donations for the Facebook page. But if only three or four of us like and comment, it’s fruitless. Facebook reduces the number of people who see the posts without community involvement.
Instead of growing, the page is shrinking. And I’m spending a lot of time and effort reaching Martha, Jo Ann and myself. 🙂
Michele, it’s a long haul from the starting line to somewhere “big” and I think I’d say it might be time for you to throttle back a bit but not quit altogether as a way to rebalance things.
I don’t think it is realistic for most of our sites to become our main earners in the near future, so feeding the agencies and doing new work in between tending to our sites makes a lot of sense IMO
You’ve put in a ton of energy – and that’s been wonderful – but perhaps update the Facebook stuff weekly instead of daily and work on some new illustrations before you make a big decision to remove your site?
Jo Ann pretty much summed up my thoughts regarding the long haul and dialing back a bit. I was getting discouraged then scanned my e-mail late one night to see my first sale and it was for $20 – got rather pumped up over that. It made me realize that the sales can come any time and without warning.
It’s been my intention to revamp my site a bit and then promote it more (including a request for site of the week) but some family health issues have me sidetracked right now. I think your FB efforts are valuable and I’d hate to see them fade away. I’ll make more of an effort to comment as I didn’t realize that FB rewarded that so much. If you do drop out I hope you’ll pass the FB torch on to someone else to manage it and keep things going.
You’ve done the work on your site already too so unless it’s up for renewals that will add more cost it seems it might be worth letting it coast for awhile to see what comes to pass while you focus on other projects and directions and get your energy back.
the reason many people are not posting as often is a sign of success.. not necessarily success of artists but the success of the project..
in my book, it means the theme is a lot less buggy now, so people just decided to sit back and relax.. personally I just left it sitting there and when the sales happen, great, if not, not a problem 🙂
hosting is like $5-6 a month so it’s impossible to lose 🙂 there are no further costs.. paid advertisement is not necessary for symbiostock artists.. so just hold on to your pockets and don’t pay anything apart from hosting and wait.. good things will happen..
the best anyone can do is spend time for SEO if you wish and nothing else..
So you’re sitting back and relaxing? Great. I’ll do that too. Gah, what a freaking idiot I’ve been.
I don’t think most of us are sitting back and relaxing. I’m not, for sure.
I do think most people are relaxing. And a few are not. Of course, you are among the latter, Martha.
Well, yes, I do add a few new images to my site every day. Over the last month, I manually redid all my images with those beautiful new watermarks (picking the best for each one). That was fun!
Right now, I’m cleaning up a bunch of stuff that I uploaded early on and somehow didn’t get onto pages along the way. I’ll be on another trip this spring and want to have my existing inventory all cleaned up before I start uploading again.
I can’t imagine anybody went through the trouble to set up their own site and then wouldn’t continue to keep it fresh. Things take time to develop.
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