Vivozoom is a new agency and officially launched in 2009. How does any new agency make their mark in a very competitive market that makes up the microstock industry? They offer something that very few others do, Warranty. What that means is, Vivozoom guarantees the legality of its images. A lot of advertisers may have found themselves in lawsuits over misuse of certain images in the past, so now Vivozoom aims to bring their buyers a peace of mind. See below for their image warranty guarantee.

Not only do they guarantee their images, but they also guarantee a saving of 40% when compared to pricing at iStockphoto. This is a bold statement from them saying “we can do it better and cheaper”. They just might be onto something.

iStockphoto has held a large marketshare for a long time and could possibly get away with inflated pricing. Maybe Vivozoom is the next big agency to look out for – they already have an impressive list of microstock contributors on their books and a very strong portfolio. They are offering customers the choice of pay as you go credits and the ever more popular subscription packages. Their own mission statement states “ Our mission is to provide a quality service to the professional image buyer”, which does not mean that they don’t look after their contributors. They are offering a 40% commission structure which is considered very fair in the microstock industry.

Another one of their secret weapons is the people they have involved in operating Vivozoom. A vastly experienced and well known team head up Vivozoom; their CEO is Lawrence Gould who brings to the table 20 years of experience including the former position of CFO to Getty Images. Tony Stone, photographer and founder of Tony Stone Images which later became one of the first acquisitions of Getty Images. Tony also stayed on the Getty Images board up till 1999. Tom Donnelly who heads their IT department, comes with 16 years of experience with IBM. Lastly, Creative Director Stacey Goldberg has 11 years of stock industry experience ranging from stylist to photo editor.  Furthermore, any contact I have had with their support team has left me with nothing other a happy resolution. I find them very helpful and easy to communicate with.

With a powerful team like this, I expect great things.

Applying to contribute to Vivozoom is not as easy as most of the other microstock agencies. You have to contact Vivozoom and request an invitation code from them. Usually they want to see a sample of your portfolio so they can decide if your work is something they want to include in their portfolio or not. The upload and review process with Vivozoom is not as slick and clean as some of the other agencies who have been around for a while, but I think they will iron out the bugs and streamline it in the future.

One of the problems I encountered was that model releases I had attached were not appearing as attached when they went for review, so I had to submit them again. Little things like that, but nothing major. I have not been with them for very long so cannot report on sales statistics just yet, but will in the future. If you have a microstock portfolio I would suggest signing up with Vivozoom today.

Sign up with Vivozoom here