How to Publish Photos Online and Sell Them!

If you want to sell your photographs, the easiest option is to use an established stock photography website, like www.istockphoto.com, but having your own gallery website can generate more income and will give you much more flexibility over design, layout and content.

Create Your Own Photo Gallery Website

Easily the best solution for professional photographers, using a system such as Photo Gallery from Rubber Dragon, you get your own domain name, a custom design exactly how you want it and you can simply and quickly add as many photographs, categories, links and text content as you wish through an easy to use content management system. It's ideal for a professional looking portfolio.

Click here to see a sample Photo Gallery website in action.

Selling photos is managed through an easy to use administration area, create product types (poster, print, digital file, tshirt etc.) and you set the price, then select which photos you'd like to sell and associate them with product types. They are added to an order form and users can add photo to a basket and pay online.

Once you have your website and order form up and running, you can use a service such as
myPIXmania, to supply photo products such as jigsaws, mousmats, calendars etc. with your photos on the products!

The main advantage of the Photo Gallery solution is that you decide the price, whilst a stock photography website will usually set the price for you (low value). The main advantage of a stock photography website is that it will have a community of users already looking to buy photographs; if you want to create your own website you will need spend time and / or money to promote it in order to generate traffic.

Stock Photography Websites

Sometimes termed microstock websites, these are collections of images available for sale, submitted by photographers, often at very low prices, like even under a dollar! A microstock website is fantastic for designers and art directors, it means they can purchase stock at low cost and use it for their projects.

As a photographer, you can register with a microstock website and upload your photos, you may need to pay a registration fee and / or go through some questions to test your knowledge, photographs are reviewed by moderators to ensure only good quality shots are added, so you won't be able to add all your photographs even if you think they are fantastic, a moderator may reject them.

Microstock sites such as www.dreamstime.com and www.istockphoto.com allow you to have a profile so you can add information about your services, links to other websites etc.

Whilst it's cool to sell your photographs in this way, the prices are relatively low, (stock.xchng even offers photos for free) and you only get a cut of the proceeds (the larger share is usually taken by the microstock website), but if you wish to have a free portfolio and make some money at the same time, it's well worth a try.

Links to Microstock Websites

http://www.istockphoto.com
http://www.stockxpert.com
http://www.fotolia.com
http://www.123rf.com
http://www.imagesource.com
http://www.bigstockphoto.com
http://www.dreamstime.com
http://www.shutterstock.com

Photo Selling Website Solutions
http://www.onlinepictureproof.com
http://www.redbubble.com
http://www.everybodysmile.biz

Free Social Networking Websites for Photographers

Social networking websites like mySpace.com allow you to create a profile and publish photographs with text. The great benefit of these websites is that you can network with other users and that generates traffic. We would recommend everyone to setup a profile just to see how it works.

This solution isn't ideal for creating a professional portfolio, usually your profile and photographs are surrounded by advertising and other information, however, using social networking websites is a great way to start off and even for professional photographers it's a great way to drive traffic to your main website, go to the bottom of the lens for recommended links.

Links to Social Networking Websites

http://www.myspace.com
http://www.ecademy.com
http://www.facebook.com

Free Photo Album Websites

Photo album websites like flickr.com allow you to create your own photo gallery, often these services are free because the website makes money by selling advertising space in and around your photos, once again that doesn't make it ideal for creating a professional portfolio, but if you just want to show your photos to a selected clients or friends, it's well worth a try. See the links at the bottom of this lens for more photo album websites.

Photo Album Website Links

http://www.flickr.com
http://photobucket.com
http://picasa.google.pl
http://www.clikpic.com
http://www.webshots.com
http://www.photoblogs.org
http://www.photography-gallery.com
http://www.meetthekids.co.uk

Summary

Most photographers and graphic designers will want to display their work in an online portfolio, the question is how to do it to best effect. The top solution is having your own content managed website such as Photo Gallery, if you have the time, setup multiple websites and profiles in as many places as possible and then redirect users to your main website.

Photography Articles in Preparation

Stock Photography Websites Compared - which ones generate the highest returns?