Exclusive Author to Non-Exclusive ?

Envato Authors Author Hangout
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Hello All,

I’m wondering on this for a while, and would like to hear your advice about it:
I’m an Exclusive Author since 2009.

I used to make more sells back when I only had around 40% Exclusive few years back it was nice compare to not so many content I had compare to the amount of content I have now on my AJ profile.

Not complaining but these are some facts:
The thing is, every time Envato is getting bigger and bigger… we the average Authors only lose exposure, and of course sales. which make sense because there are more authors… but there are also more buyers.

Everytime Envato adding “new rules”, categories, or just expanding the website to get more complected for the average consumer and the authors to survive here. for example extra taxes… which we didn’t have before now reduce the overall % of sales.

Reviews:
As you can hear for yourself since 2009, my Audio is high quality produced at our studio with lots of hard work and pure love to every single creation.

Every year it is getting MUCH HARDER to add a new Soundtrack / Music / Pack without getting rejected for a really no real reason… I have nothing against the reviewers their doing their job but compare to how it was before, they are WAY TOO HARSH on a very good creations but I’m not here to criticize anyone I’m sharing my experience for the many years I’m in the Envato family which I love!

The dilemma:
It is not a secret, but EVERY AJ REJECTED high quality creation I uploaded to a different marketplace (no names, sorry) and GUESS WHAT?
Not only that it sales, but the buyers are asking for similar versions and not only that… the SALES ARE CRAZY!!!

On the last few months I’m getting CRAZY SALES from a different marketplace that actually 90% of my content there is a REJECTED AJ… so I stopped bother uploading to AJ new things because I already know that I will get the exact same “criteria” or any other robotic-text for reject because AJ Reviewers demands are not make any sense, the prove is that people are buying my “rejected” AJ content in other marketplace like crazy!

So first I’ve been thinking:
Why not delete all my AJ content (that’s a lot), and move to the other marketplace because not only I’m getting more sales, but their percentage is much higher so the overall giving me much more profit and extremely happy costumers who’s nagging for more in my message box, which makes me very happy.

But my other side of the brain told me to keep my current content on AJ and just not add new like I did on the last few months.

But… what if I’ll just convert to Non-Exclusive and share my AJ content on the other marketplace and gain lots of sales for non-exclusive there, while AJ is not really getting exposure, high rate percentage or sales in overall.

What do you think?
Did you think about this yourself with your own experiment of X years in AJ?

I share this because I’m wondering about YOUR opinions, and if you’re non-exclusive author I would love to hear what do you think and what do you recommend?

Sorry about my bad English, this may sound like complain or something but I only shared my experience and I am truly respect Envato Family and feel a part of it for many years so please don’t get me wrong if I may sound bad.

Thanks ahead!

1 Like
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I guess if they weren’t that strict with the reviews, then there would be even less exposure due to all the items on the site. Plus, there may be no taxes on other sites, but if they’re in the US then there should be… so that might be something that comes along in the not too distant future. And last but not least… if you’re getting loads of sales in the other place then probably other people are getting loads of sales as well. So… everyone will start uploading there and then there’s loads of items and less exposure there before long.

I’m not saying Envato is perfect, but there’s always an element of the grass is always greener, swings and roundabouts and history repeating itself.

The best course of action would be to keep all your items here even if you go non-exclusive… and then you can always go back to exclusive if the promised land isn’t all that!

1 Like
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Thank you very much for your opinion and advice I appreciate it a lot!
I guess I should consider and maybe give it a shot, as you said I can always switch back to exclusive. :blush:

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What’s this other marketplace you’re talking about? I’d like to give it a try!

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VideoHive!

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I went non-exclusive awhile back and never looked back. Without naming names, other markets are really nice in terms of higher commission rates and accepting AJ rejected material. It really takes away the sting of AJ rejection when a track has already been approved and accepted elsewhere and maybe even sold by the time Envato reviews it. I think the best strategy these days is to spread yourself across as many markets as you can, and to refer traffic to the one or two markets that work best for you, whether it be AJ or not.

Oh, and I don’t think it really matters how many tracks are on a site, it’s all about promotion, referrals, SEO, and much effort you are willing to put into marketing your music, the same as with any other online business.

2 Likes
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Thanks! so I’m not alone here… that’s good to know! :slight_smile:

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Well I guess if you calcuated your income from different platforms, compared with Envato and if they win in this case, then go ahead!
There is no single solution in market for everone, unfortunatly.

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I had little to no luck selling on other stock music sites. If it works for you, go ahead.