shadowbanned

[davidsalamanca]

I was making like $1000 dollars average each month, now I am making $0 dollars in my Adobe Stock contributor account, does anyone knows how their SEO works or if you can get shadowbanned, because that drop in my earnings is like kinda insane for me, or maybe everyone is dropping a lot of artworks and AI videos and the platform is saturated, idk 😕

[daniellei4510]

You have not been shadowbanned. If you make money, Adobe makes money. Why would they shadowban someone who was making them money? Your drop in sales does seem excessive, however. Was it a gradual slowdown over time, or did it happen suddenly? Like, last 30 days, $1000, the next 30 days, zilch?

[davidsalamanca]

November and December of 2023 I was making $1000 to $1300 USD average, January the sales dropped to 600, February sales dropped to $400, March, $120, april $70 and multiple days making $0 and next month probably I am going to make $0, I am still uploading but I am kinda tired and thinking seriously to do something else with my life

[daniellei4510]

Well...something else is going on here, but I doubt it has much to do with AI submissions or we'd be hearing more complaints about a drop in sales...especially such a serious drop as you've experienced. I certainly understand your frustration.

[Sinanna]

I don't earn as much as you, but I'm in the same situation. Earnings are falling lower and lower. This is because buyers now buy their licenses for 33 cents. And they reduced it to 29 cents. It's not worth it.

[Jill_C]

Adobe has NOT reduced their regular subscription royalties. They do have Custom Subscriptions, perhaps for very large customers, which is why you're occasionally seeing royalties below $.33.

[Abambo]

I don't earn as much as you, but I'm in the same situation. Earnings are falling lower and lower. This is because buyers now buy their licenses for 33 cents. And they reduced it to 29 cents. It's not worth it.

By @Sinanna

That's not the same situation. Until now, there is no lowering of the minimal payment for subscription sells. Low earnings are “custom” sells, those are special. You could start contributing to Shutterstock. They pay 10 cents per licence.

[Jill_C]

There is no such thing as a "shadow ban" on Adobe Stock. Assuming your account has not been suspended, there can be a number of explanations for the sales slump including competition, seasonality of your assets, better quality assets in the same category, and perhaps saturation.

There are now nearly 61 million AI assets in the database, which constitutes ~15% of all assets in the database. When I search on the Buyer portal, I see many, many AI assets on the same topic, and I also see a lot of quite poor quality AI assets. I regularly read from Buyers who are fed up with AI, and specifically filter out AI assets when searching for useable assets for their designs, because they don't want to waste time wading through all of the poor quality stuff...

[daniellei4510]

Here's the problem with AI (and to some extent photography as well). Just as there are contributors who post their rejections here and are unable to discern obvious issues that most of us are able to point out immediately, it goes to follow that there are many buyers who can't discern those issues as well. So the assets sell regardless, especially for those who have uploaded thousands upon thousands of unedited AI assets. So unless and until those contributors are called out, they continue making a profit. Meanwhile, those with more discriminating taste filter out AI, which hurts those who are are submitting quality work. My AI assets do sell on a daily basis, but I suspect I'd be doing better if it weren't for the bad reputation AI has acquired as a result of those bad assets that have accumulated over the past year. 

[Abambo]

I do not license AI if I need an asset. 

[Nancy OShea]

Are you telling us you made USD $4100 in total sales one month? 

At 33% commision, that's what it takes to net $1300 in royalties. 

Or perhaps I misunderstood your base. Your royalty was 33% of $1300 total sales. That would net you approx $430.

A significant drop in sales is "unusual activity." 

• Contact Stock Contributor Support: https://contributor.stock.adobe.com/contact

[davidsalamanca]

erm, yes I was making $1000 USD average, each month, now I am making $0 dollars each day and is very concerning for me because it took me a lot of time and effort to build my portfolio, my business is dead.

[DailyLifeImages]

How many assts do you have in your account?

[Abambo]

That's an impressive decline. How many assets do you have in your account? What type of assets do you have? Video? 

[davidsalamanca]

“I have over +1000 assets, mostly 4K videos and animations, but I also have a few images and illustrations. I am done with this, after all that hard work, my content is now deprecated and my business is dead.

[Nancy OShea]

I work in video. We experience upward & downward trends, too.  But nothing is ever really deprecated.  It's what we call 'sold through' until someone buys it again. 😊

Are you submitting new content regularly to keep your portfolio fresh?

[davidsalamanca]

No way, before AI, I used to upload a video and it would get between 40 to 80 downloads per video. Now, I’m lucky if someone buys it even once. Everyone is uploading hundreds and hundreds of AI videos, and SORA hasn’t even been released yet. I’ve been burned badly. It’s not even worth my time anymore. Perhaps if you have a team of 10 employees working very hard, uploading 100 videos daily, then perhaps you can make a good profit. 

[Abambo]

A team with 10 employees would also crash, if generative AI is the reason for your decline.

[Abambo]

You should contact contributor support. I really can't figure out why you should go down so rapidly, except if indeed generative AI videos are taking over. 

With over 1000 video assets, you did not start yesterday, dindn't you? A year to year comparison may help. The starting of the year may be a slow going periode. 

[Abambo]

I've forgotten to include the link to contributor support: https://helpx.adobe.com/stock/contributor/help/Need-Help-Contact-Us.html