As a business owner, you want to make sure your money is spent wisely. Sometimes stock photos can seem expensive, but this does not have to be the case. With many solutions out there to help your business get the cheapest stock photos, you just need to know where to look.
When it comes down to it, you want to make sure you’re getting the best price per photo. Whether your business uses 10 stock photos each month or 750, finding the lowest price per photo will give you the cheapest stock photo for you. In this post, we are going to help you perform a stock photo audit so you can determine if you’re getting the best price for your business.
Your Monthly Photo Usage
Before we can help you find the best stock photo solution for your unique situation, you need to understand your average monthly stock photo usage. If you have been using stock photos recently, take a look at the last 3-6 months. Log into the stock photo agency you currently utilize and see how many photos you purchased each month.
Armed with those numbers, find their average. For example, Business A used 25 stock photos in January, 30 in February, 15 in March, and 10 in April. Business A’s average stock photo usage is about 20 stock photos per month. On the other hand Business B used 700 stock photos in January, 700 in February, 690 in March, and 650 in April so their average monthly usage is 685.
If you don’t have a stock photo buying history or if you’re expecting your business to significantly grow, do your best to estimate your monthly usage. Identify whether your business has stock photo usage more like Business A or more like Business B and then read the descriptions below. With this information you can start to compare offerings and find the cheapest stock photo for you.
Find the Cheapest for Lower Monthly Usage
A few things stand out about Business A’s stock photo usage. First off, the business is not using too many stock photos and the amount they use each month varies significantly. Knowing how many photos your business will use helps you eliminate many of the options out there. This makes it easier to choose the offering which will get you the cheapest stock photo.
For businesses that use only 10, 20, or 30 stock photos each month, you will benefit most from a plan that offers monthly download flexibility in addition to the lower price. After running the stock photo audit on Business A and discovering they use about 20 photos each month, we can conclude they will need about 240 stock photos for the entire year.
One solution for this business is 99Club which offers 200 stock photos for $99 and then just $1 for every photo downloaded over 200. That means Business A can expect to pay just $139 for stock photos for an entire year. When you compare this to a subscription plan from DepositPhoto which gives you 360 photos for the entire year (which is the lowest amount available that reaches their requirement), you are saving a whopping $770! If Business A chose 99Club over Dollar Photo Club, they would also save $101! Doing the math certainly helps you find the best solution!
Find the Cheapest for High Monthly Usage
If your business more closely resembles Business B which was using about 685 stock photos per month, you’re going to look to other providers with subscription plans to find the best solution.
Businesses that utilize hundreds of stock photos each month will find a subscription plan model to be their cheapest solution. For example, if Business B purchased the Plus plan on PhotoSpin they would pay just $599 for 750 images each month. Since this business is using about 685 photos each month that means they’re paying just $0.87 per image.
The best option for this business on DepositPhotos would give them access to 900 photos each month and cost $1,899 for the entire year. That means by choosing PhotoSpin this business could save a stunning $1,300. On Shutterstock, Business B could buy a subscription plan that gives them 750 photos each month for a yearly price of $2,388. If they use PhotoSpin as an alternative to Shutterstock, they save $1,789 for the year on stock photos.
The trick to finding the cheapest stock photo is to know how many photos you need each month. Once you can determine that, you will be able to do some simple arithmetic to figure out which solution is better for your business’s budget. If you ever need any help figuring out the best stock photo solution for you, please contact me today. I’ll be glad to go over your options with you.