Use smart submission strategies

As an Adobe Stock Contributor, there’s a lot you can do to ensure that your content gets noticed by prospective buyers. Learn how to set yourself up for success. Part 4 of our onboarding series on the 5 Keys to Stock Success.

In part three of this series, we talked about how to choose the right keywords and titles for your assets before submitting them for review. Search technology is constantly evolving and improving, and artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning technologies like Adobe Sensei can automatically create keywords for you. Once you have that list, you need to refine and add to those keywords in order to ensure that your content gets noticed by customers.

But even though metadata plays a significant role in your success as an Adobe Stock Contributor, there’s a lot more you can do to ensure that you maximize the potential of your content. In this part of our series, we’ll explore all the other strategies you should consider to optimize your assets so they get accepted by the Adobe Stock moderation team and buyers can easily find them.

Plan ahead — time is of the essence.

If you already have lots of images, you can select content from your archives and upload it to your Adobe Stock portfolio as long as it’s relevant, current, and commercially appealing. This is a great way to profit off your existing work. Also, don’t delay in submitting your assets. The clock starts ticking as soon as you upload your content, which means you should enter your metadata and submit as close as possible to your upload date. If you wait a month, the system will treat your asset as a month-old items, which will affect visibility in search.

Always consider your target buyers’ behavior while also accounting for seasonality and key moments. If you submit your content two to three months before a holiday or an industry event, you’ll significantly raise the chances of your whole collection going straight to the top of the rankings.

Boost the quality of your submissions.

At Adobe Stock, a trained moderation team reviews your submissions and evaluates them to make sure they're the right fit for the platform. The team follows strict but fair quality assurance guidelines, and the criteria they look at include uniqueness (both in relation to other content you’ve submitted and content already in our collection), technical and aesthetic quality, commercial viability, title and keyword accuracy, and legal standards.

All Contributors, professionals and hobbyists alike, have files rejected from time to time. If this happens to you, don’t let it get you down as it can be a great opportunity to learn and grow. The moderation team will give you a high-level reason why your content didn’t pass, but as most content rejections come down to just a handful of issues, you can usually avoid them by following the insider tips below.

Aesthetic and commercial appeal:

A lack of aesthetic or commercial appeal is one of the most common reasons content is rejected. To ensure that your assets have the best chance of success, follow these tips:

• Produce what’s in demand to grab buyers’ attention. Try to be as objective as possible and ask yourself: “If I were a customer, why would I buy this content?” If you can’t answer that question, try changing your approach and pay attention to the details. For example, if you create a shot of a great-looking family enjoying a barbecue but the grill is covered in rust, it's clear that the image just won’t have commercial value.
• Get creative with your subject matter. Common subjects like lifestyle and business shots, flowers, pets, and sunsets are heavily represented on Adobe Stock, but don’t be discouraged by the sheer volume of the existing content. Buyers always look for new versions of best-selling themes. If you submit assets for these categories, think about how your content is unique and why your take on these subjects will stand out. Maybe your puppy really is the cutest in the world — and maybe she’s a rare breed that isn’t often found in stock imagery. Such content should also reflect a more diverse set of models and current aesthetics regarding lighting and styling.

Quality and technical issues:

For content to have commercial value, it needs to be high-quality and technically flawless. To make sure your content passes these standards, keep these issues in mind before submitting your assets:

• Stay in focus. Always inspect your content at 100%. If the main subject is in focus, motion blur and shallow depth are usually okay.
• Avoid artifacts. The most common artifact problem is excessive noise, which causes photos and videos to look grainy. This is typically caused by a high ISO setting for content captured in low light. Get to know your camera and determine how far you can push the limits with high ISO before the noise levels are excessive.
• Get the lighting right. Overexposure or underexposure can make for low-quality photos and videos. Always keep an eye on your histogram or camera screen while shooting to ensure that you’re exposing your images properly. If the lighting is a little off, you can adjust exposure using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom or Photoshop in post-production, especially if you shoot in raw format.

There are a few other issues that can negatively impact the quality of your photos, videos, vectors, and templates. Consult our checklist to make sure your assets meet our quality standards.

Non-compliance and IP issues:

If your content is rejected as non-compliant, that means it’s not in line with our Contributor Agreement. This may be due to inappropriate or irrelevant keywords or titles, questionable or defamatory content, or a personal watermark on your image.

The moderation team may also reject content as non-compliant if you don’t supply a model or property release after we’ve requested it, or if you get a reminder to resolve an issue and you resubmit the asset without addressing it.

Also, if your files contain certain elements that are protected by intellectual property laws, we can’t accept them into our collection. For example, commercial products such as toys, fashion accessories, and electronic devices should never be in focus and/or be the main subject of your content if they're identifiable and distinctive in visual appearance (e.g., in shape or color).

If your images are rejected for IP issues, you may find that this is relatively easy to fix. For example, you may be able to remove recognizable logos in Photoshop and then resubmit the images to sell on Adobe Stock.

For more information, review our legal guidelines on right of privacy/publicity, trademarks, and copyright and model and property releases. Also, check out our periodically updated resource of known image restrictions to see if images of common subjects, such as specific buildings or artworks, may not be acceptable due to intellectual property, privacy, and/or private property rights.

Stick with it and upload consistently.

People use a variety of little tricks to optimize content for search, and there’s a lot of competition out there. Remember that if everyone uses the same techniques, those techniques won’t have as much impact. Sure, it’s important to understand the basics of how search technology works, but don’t overthink it and worry too much. Use your own judgment and focus on the quality of your content and your metadata instead.

Keep in mind that potential customers are looking at your images at thumbnail size next to many other images on search results pages. Be sure to do a few test searches to see what kinds of content come up. Where might yours fit in, and how might your work stand out? Try to think like a buyer and be ready to adapt as customer behavior constantly changes.

Patience is a virtue and definitely a key to your success as an Adobe Stock Contributor. Upload consistently and focus on learning about the stock industry — what works, what’s in demand, and technical best practices. It takes time to build up a portfolio, and the work you put into planning an upload schedule will pay off in the long run. As your portfolio progresses, you’ll discover the types of content that work best for you, and you should see increased returns over time.

In part 5 of this Adobe Stock onboarding series, we’ll explore how successful stock contributors strike a balance between the quantity and quality of their content.

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