Selling Photos - How and where to sell photos

For the record, when we say photos, it is short form for photographs. We will mainly consider digital photos. One of the easiest ways of making money online is by taking and selling photos. All you need is a digital camera and an avenue to sell your photos.

Please note that I have conveniently left out the word expertise. This is because any photo that can be taken, by anyone, can be sold. You can be an amateur photographer or a professional one. It really does not matter. All you need to know is where to sell your kind of photos.

I want to put down a list, which we will keep updating regularly, of some of the websites where you can sell your photo. But first, how do you get to the point of selling your photos? Basically, you need to take some photos using your digital camera. The photos can be on anything. However, the sites that we provide here do not allow you to post offensive or pornographic photos. We do not advocate for them too.

You do not have to prearrange what you want to photograph. The best photos are those taken by surprise from nature. For instance, if you are walking home from the shop and you come across a lizard warming itself on a rock, take that photo. It would sell like hot cake. Note, you did not tell the lizard to pose for a photo, did you? You would even be lucky to capture such an image. The lizard might move away on your sight!

So, if it interests you to get such an image, and from nature for that matter, then your photo will interest thousands if not millions worldwide. As a result, this would get you a nice flow of cash.

Take a second scenario. If you take all your pens in the house and arrange them nicely on a table, then take a shot at them, would that photo be interesting? Of course depending on how you arranged them, and the angle of your shot, it might be. Now, the question is, how many people would be interested in buying a photo with arranged pens? They can do that themselves, can't they? So, even if you you were to make sales from that photo, they would not be as much as in the first scenario of the lizard. This is because you interfered with nature.

Please note that I do not want to imply that only photos from nature sell. You can have pre-arranged photos that can sell too. But only if you are quite a professional. For amateurs, try to stick to natural settings as much as you can.

There is one kind of photos that you should avoid though. Photos that have people in them, or those containing brand names and trademarks of products. These are the photos that may land you in to legal problems.  A photo with a person in it may require you to get a written consent of the person in it, showing that they agreed to have you sell their image. On the other hand, trademarks in a photo can lead to legal tussles.

Now, once you take a photo, upload it in any of the websites I have listed below. Of course you will need to sign up to each site first to be allowed to submit your photos. Some of these websites will allow you to set your own price for the photo. Others have a predetermined price for photos in different categories and sizes. Some others will require that you hand them copyright to your photos or at least, not have the same photo posted anywhere else. These are called exclusive rights.

However, most will allow you to post the same photo to any other area you want.

So, upload your photo, set your price and then relax and wait for people to download your images.

If for instance, you upload a photo and then set its selling price at say $3, this means that for every person who downloads your image, they are charged $3 which goes to your bank account. Assuming only about 500 people download your photo from about 3billion internet users, that would make you a good $1,500! And this because am being conservative.

That's why I said that photos are some of the simplest ways to make you quick money online.

Professional photos can fetch much more than this. For instance, check the top of this website. Do you see the photo of a couch. Guess how much it cost us? $20?....$50?........wrong. We bought that photo for a whooping $170!!!

That's the power of photography. Assume that other 500 buy the same photo, this would make the photo owner a cool $85,000!

So, with most sites that sell photos, you simply need to sign up, upload your photos, set the price and that's it. Wait for money to come your way. But instead of waiting for money to come your way, why don't you walk towards the bank with your camera in hand and you never know, a new opportunity may present itself on the way and you could make extra dollars.

So, here are the sites:

www.fotolibra.com

www.istockphoto.com

www.shutterstock.com

www.vizero.com

www.freedigitalphotos.net

www.the3dstudio.com

www.picturestock.com

www.shutterpoint.com

www.chic-art.co.uk

Keep checking this list. We intend to populate it with other suitable sites. Remember, most of the sites we list are free to join. However, some charge a fee for their services and storage space. Please use the free ones first and then you can join the paid ones after you make a good earn.

If you know a website that we should add to this list, let us know. Just write to us.

We will appreciate.

Enjoy earning from your photos.