One thing that i dont understand is, If i do a search in google with “fwdesign elements” something appears.
Is this real? Is FW the same author here than Elements?
PS; This is not the first time i see some authors blaming about “Elements” and then you can see them in Elements…
I’m jumping in this thread briefly just to reiterate one hard rule for the forums (as I’ve just had to remove part of a post).
You can say whatever you want in here about your own sales, experiences on AJ, Elements, other sites, etc. Even more so than any other part of the forums, this thread is an important place for AJ authors to vent where needed (or occasionally celebrate…) about how sales are going, with the rest of the AJ author community. Staff generally don’t come in here very often, but when we do, we certainly aren’t judging people for anything raised in here.
However, please don’t give pricing advice to other authors - whether that’s in the form of “you should raise all your prices on AJ” or “I’m going to do X to my prices and you should too.”
Collaboration on setting prices between competitors in a marketplace is called price fixing. It is a serious risk, both for yourself, and for the rest of the marketplace. It is not tolerated at all on these forums, and we have to immediately remove it whenever we see it on the site.
In extreme cases, this has lead to forum access being removed, and can potentially get your entire Market account suspended. I can’t overemphasise the dangers of this - whether you’re trying to get other authors to raise or lower prices, or to sell at a specific point, we simply can’t allow those discussions to take place.
Ben, this is the first time I see you here, in the last 3 years I have never seen you in this topic. 
It’s good that you are still working in the forum with the authors! 
Now we know that you too can answer some sales questions (or rather, the absence (or a gigantic drop) of sales in August ???)
Thanks in advance for your answer!
I also have a little question (while you’re here, Ben).
Why does the author in April 2020 make good income (one of the best earnings of the year) with fewer items, and when the author’s portfolio grows, then the author falls into the abyss in August 2020 with 5 sales per month and super low income (I can say it’s like 5 sales = 0 sales), but with a lot of items?(less than half a year has passed and stable loading of items is also there as usual) .I’m talking about myself.
I know i am not quite legitimate to answer your question but please indulge me. I am sure you heard before that this market is a game of numbers.That’s not quite true.Yes. It will boost your chance to be more visible in the search system,but not entirely. The clients are not looking at your numbers, or the size of your repertoire. They are looking for a specific kind of track that suit to their needs.They download a bunch of previews, and put some VO on top of them.If is a advertising company, the client decides which is the best for his needs.It really does not matter how many tracks you have uploaded or their quality superiority.Is about fitting into client’s demands. The really legitimate question you want to ask is - why the newest guys get more exposure than you? Why 90% of the featured tracks are 5 usd? These are the questions.Cheers bro. My 002.
Hi ! You can discuss sales in this topic. Communicate with authors about sales and more …
Except: advise (or impose) other authors on prices for their item. This is prohibited!
Therefore, everything is in order!
Hi,
While I’m totally 100000% agree with you, the total number of item is very important. Especially in these hard time when you have lot of author which are joining stock music library. The idea with lot of track, is to be able to fit the most demand possible. Sometime you can get lucky and have one item which fit for ever, and sometime you need lot of items to be more visible, bring more traffic and fulfill the most demand possible. SO in a way this is really sad to see that an author like @CleanMagicAudio with lot of item just fall into the abyss.
BUT I also would like to add that we are still in summer (this is the end) and summer was always a very bad bad bad month, maybe not at it is right now, but there a LOT of other factor cumulate which explain this lack of sales ( COVID , cheap price / lot of author, summer , a bit long review queue etc etc)
SO stay optimistic 
AND UPLOAD
This year is a bad year for all field, not only stock music, I still have hope to see some good change in the near future when the global mess will end !
About sales :
This month is in my average, the end of the month wake up the sales.
SO stay optimistic AND UPLOAD well… i can’t eat optimism.
You compose music since 1990 as you said,you are largely able to get by beyond the stock, and all while remaining optimistic (Giving some lesson to beginner or whatever)
If you rely only on stock music, yes it will be hard to stay optimistic until you reach a certain amount of item, I think this is not your case
I’m here since only 2 years, on most of my income come from stock, this is very hard, but I’m optimistic, everyday
It was a joke. AJ is a part of my income, aswell the mainstream work, which, as you know is not in its best shape at the moment, due to all those. But in 30 years of activity i learned a few things. You cannot eat optimism and exposure.They help a lot, yes. But the things that really matters when it comes to the business side of the story is Cash and/or Contracts. I know that sounds really pragmatic but thats the ugly truth.
I’m totally agree with you, and I trust your experience,
I mean by staying optimistic is that bad things or bad situation can’t last for ever, as the good one can’t last for ever. While most of us are impacted, stop the work or stop to upload, complain (even if there’s lot of reason to complain, yes) won’t help to get more sales or exposure.
I also believe there’s a lot of difference between stock music and the mainstream work, and you were right about everything you said before about the music has to fit with the customer need etc,
Compared to sync licensing or mainstream work I believe stock music is a mix between a big number game, (sales , number of rate / traffic) and quality linked with full fill the need, this is why is important to keep to upload as much as you can. Especially in these hard time !
Agree. It’s not about experience. Truth be told.I have met bad musicians/producers/artists 30 years ago, they are still bad. Or the opposite.Anyone has an experience.Just by passing through life.Bad or good.The Stock Market is entirely different. We are not talking to clients.We have no briefings and directions.No producers to lead you in a specific directions.Just some top selling artists and some advices on the board. And the rejects.Some of them quite arbitrary tbh.So is about uploading and hoping your track will fill some gaps in the catalog and will be chosen by the clientele.
With all due respect, every time I hear “keep a positive mindset” or “complaining won’t bring you anything” or the today’s super trending “stay away from toxic people” I think of women who were sistematically fired when pregnant, women with lower wages than men for doing equal tasks, of the 8 hours workday, health insurances, paid vacation periods, health conditions in work places and a never ending list of etceteras. I’m glad they didn’t listen to some “I-read-the-7-tips-to-success” guy and I’m glad they did complained and stood up for their (and today our) rights.
Not related to your comment @Osynthw! You’re the man and I share most of your insights.
I do not feel targeted but I still want to clarify that of course, you have to know how to defend your rights, and not simply accept by playing the “successful guy”, by selling dreams to everyone and saying that “everything is easy”, like someone who sees the world with blinders !
And of course “my musical struggle” is insiginating as billions of people go through complicated, violent, sad situations and a whole lot more. You have to know how to be indignant and fight for everything to go better, that’s undeniable!
I watched that video again because I kept thinking about it and how it affects the authors in the long-term. I am shocked by the pitifully low return of placing items within a subscription service make but this could also be attributed to a whole manner of things this year and when the assessment was made during the Summer months. Who knows how much was downloaded and possibly incorrectly used without an appropriate license. Who knows, no detail on Elements account activity only how much revenue has been generated for each item.
I would imagine that the AJ market top sellers who are also on Elements have good returns but low level contributors it would seem really is not worth it. Extended licensing is where the survival is for us and I do not think the subscription alternative has the best interests of the community at large.
Who is this author - AJ author?
I hoped to overcome this threshold by the end of the month. But it looks like a miracle will not happen…
I saw this video too and I really cant understand how anyone can look at those 78$ as just another «stream» of income. I would think that for many/most authors the reduction in income from AJ would be much larger than the extra income from Elements, especially if the Elements earnings typically are around 100/150$.
To me it is incredibly naive to see the Elements earnings as an additional source of income, while at the same time closing your eyes for the loss of sales in AJ.
Im sure there are some authors earning much more than this, but I would be surprised if their AJ sales didn’t take a equivalent hit.
I will have the lowest sales count for the year this month but thanks to a number of big licenses, it will also be the month with best earnings.
78$? 
Whilst I completely agree with you, I could be wrong and I acknowlege if I am but Elements was pitched to authors as an additional revenue stream.Of course, as you have correctly identified that this tiny revenue source impacts the revenue from AJ. Also the buyer mentality shifts as promoting this “New” service on an existing marketplace erodes the potential to sell one-off licenses and all authors will ultimately be disadvantaged.
This is not cricket especially when it is only available to a limited set of authors.
If that are the real numbers, elements maybe has an end,who knows,… because Envato is not making enough money and authors of course neither.
Im sure Envato earn big money on Elements. They get their 50% or whatever it is while all authors share the remaining percentage.