Clip Visibility and Search Results

Hey folks, interested in your thoughts on the following. It seems to me Pond5 is extremely saturated with content - as it should be as a market leader. Naturally, the way Pond5's search algorithm works is that results are based on what clips have been successful in the past (probably based on sales, bin adds, views). This is great for everyone who has had content on Pond5 for years and years - they're raking it in, and as they continue to do so, their content continues to stay on the first page of results - increasing the likelihood of more sales. Meanwhile, all the new content is on page 77+, with no chance of rising in the algorithm, because it never gets seen.

Is there any kind of mechanism for showing NEW content mixed in with those search results? Do you think there should be? Obviously, if people are buying the clips at the top - that's great for Pond5 as the buyers are the ones who make P5 money. But how much service should we expect as creators? If there's zero chance of exposure - wouldn't that just push creators to competitors?

I'm not a full time stock creator so I don't expect cash to be rolling in, and I'm not complaining. I'm just trying to weigh how much effort I should put in going forward. For all the hours I've put in to editing, uploading, tagging, content - if there's no chance at visibility then it doesn't seem like it's worth doing.

So, interested on your thoughts on if it would be in Pond5's interested to mix things up in a way that accomplishes good results for buyers while giving new creators a chance. What are some ways it could be done?

Cheers!

Buyers can and do arrange search results to show the newest ones first. However, if they simply opt for the default search, it will most likely show best sellers first. I’ve ofted waded through page after page of them and often can’t believe they’re the best available. Yes, a buyer who’s not too bothered might just grab a clip which seems to fit the bill from the first few pages, but others will surely take the time to dig a bit deeper for the most appropriate clip.

Even if a seller from clips uploaded years ago continues to see a return due to the preferential search placement, it’s only going to be for those particular clips. Newer clips by the same contributor will suffer the same fate as for everyone else, in that there’s a window of opportunity if a search is for ‘new’ as opposed to ‘popular’, but as those fresh clips are superseded by someone else’s newer ones, everything in theory drops down the search pages unless sold.

But, having said all that, search algorithms across libraries tend to be more sophisticated than simply basing search results on clips sold or viewed. Alamy, for example, bases much of its image search results on the overall performance of its contributors, and their ranking will change up or down over time, according to ongoing sales and views for their portfolio. This means that a contributor with a good ranking can see new images appearing in the first few pages of a search, even if they’ve yet to sell or be zoomed. Back to Pond5 and I’ve observed a similar pattern for my own clips. So, if I upload new ones now, they won’t start life at the bottom of the search results pages, even if the buyer opts for ‘popular’. Instead, I’m likely to see my newest clips much higher up the search results, which would suggest that Pond5 deploys some kind of overall contributor performance measure, in addition to the specifics of sales/views for any given clip.