Sodatech is one of the leading providers of image database solutions and search engine programming. We implement administration and sales platforms for photo agencies, publishers, and companies with a wide range of images. Furthermore we also program search engines for improved picture research, for example a visual picture search. In the process, you can fall back on existing tools, or our experts will create an individual solution for you.
Image Management / CD Management
Are you able to sort, filter, analyze, group, disable, block, export and manage millions of pictures? Can you overwrite a whole series of pictures with lists of new keywords? And do everything online as well?
Image management covers all pictures, whether they are active, inactive, partner collections or archived pictures. You can import data via FTP-/HTTP upload including the creation of upload sessions and you can read existing, embedded IPTC or XMP data. The image management automatically generates thumbnails and previews and assigns any colour mode. You are able to manages releases, manage image master data, request sales histories, export picture series or simply overwrite picture lists with new CSV files. Check the picture quality or run individual, customer specific functions using batch processing. Because of the extensive sorting functions, you will always maintain order in your database.
User Management / Customer Relationship Management
Do you know exactly how much turnover your employees are generating including the amount of time, the region, with which customers and with which pictures? You should – at any time you want.
User management is at the heart of your business relationships and hardly will you find more CRM possibilities somewhere else. Create and manage all photo agency relevant user accounts such as customers, administrators, photographers, export and import partners, keywording stall, models or newsletter subscribers. You can also export your user data. And, you have the possibility to contact the whole user group or individuals via email or newsletters directly from the user management. By the way, there is also a customer-specific price calculator, individual discount systems, communication tools, user statistics, ABC clusters, sticky tags, blocking histories, …
All licence types
Do you offer your customers individual pricelists for RM and RF online? Also RF pictures with editorial pricing? In a subscription, with a quantity discount or graduated prices? Editorial, commercial, press or art?
RF pictures as well as RM collections are the established licence types on the market. Partner networks are exploding and customers are demanding variety. Sodatech helps you to cope with the work involved with different licence types in a professional and efficient way. Compile virtual RF CDs or manage physical CDs with an ERP tool, define prices of your collections, make use of different customer-specific price calculators and offer your editorial customers RF pictures for RM conditions. Determine discounts and special offers and maintain clarity in a legal jungle. Be ready for RF/RM.
Accounting system and bookkeeping
It’s a shame you still have to do your sales reports and accounting for your photographers in an Excel spreadsheet. Do you still handle your dunning or currency losses manually? Treat yourself and your employees some free time – at the press of a button.
Our software is at your service – you can relax! Import the sales reports of your partners and the rest happens automatically. Manage your cost estimates, delivery slips, invoices, dunning, credit items and book them directly into the system. Clear all the commissions of your partners and photographers in the end of any period easily at the press of a button and save a lot of time. Additionally, you can handle and analyze self-payers, subscription billings or currency losses. Of course, we will also offer you an interface to your accounting software.
Partner agency systems and export solutions
Do you still have to send hard disks to your partners? And this in the present Web 2.0 era? What about creating an automatic export task that enables you to send new pictures automatically via FTP, as a direct link, or directly via an interface?
Photo agencies are looking for good partners more and more to market their own picture inventories globally. This means a lot of work – but not with our tool. At the press of a button, you can export your predefined picture lists periodically to partners and other platforms. For instance, image partners of Getty or Corbis are able to create templates with just a few clicks, which generate export files based on detailed settings. In the process, you can define the export quality, the picture resolution, the language or exclusion criteria.
Keywording tool and batch processing
Do you use several different programs to upload, keyword and translate? Or do you keyword and translate hundreds of pictures using a batch process, saving many hours of work?
Keyword online from all over the world. Write the keywords in your language and let the translation system deal with the rest. Keyword hundreds of pictures via batch processing and benefit from functions that were undreamt of so far. Naturally, you will be supported by a hierarchy tool, a synonym tool and a category tool – if you want. Furthermore, you are able to pass on the keywording to external employees and check the number of pictures, the quality and costs at any time you want. Stay flexible!
Sales portal / luxury for customers
Do you use Ajax to clean your windows? Do magic lightboxes somehow sound illegal to you? If so, you better should think about swapping your software, because Ajax will save you time and Magic Lightboxes will increase your sales volume…
Ajax programmed functions make it possible to perform actions without reloading the page. This is a new generation of websites, linked by using the latest XHTML and CSS2 programming. In addition, there is a comprehensive login form for customers and newsletter subscribers, and users can create, manage and send lightboxes (incl. PDF-generator). An advanced search, e.g. for color information, picture resolution, formats, categories, etc. will guide your customers to the desired result. Layout data can be downloaded in the IPTC header or as XMP – including embedded meta data. Shopping carts can be provided with customer-specific RM and RF price calculators. Payments are handled by means of invoices, credit cards or micropayments. Any more ideas?
Access your data – anywhere and anytime
Have you ever managed ALL processes of your photo agency in an internet cafe in Saigon? Or simply from home on a weekend? Do you always have to go to the office for keywording, sending your sales reports and newsletters or to create new user accounts?
Standalone software that is installed on your computer is not up-to-date anymore. Efficient software companies are changing to Web licensing, because service, add-ons, updates and the benefits of course are much greater. That way you can control ALL the processes of a photo agency from anywhere in the world. Or, what about hiring freelancers and authorizing them just to carry out specific areas of administration, e.g. the keywording process or sales. Or give your employees the possibility to achieve their agency’s success from a home office. Think in a forward-looking way
Photographer portal / luxury for your photographers
Don’t your photographers have a portal with a keywording tool? And do you still receive their applications by mail?
Give your photographers their own portal. With the help of a photographer portal, some work can be done by your photographers to save you time. For example, you don’t have to send DVDs anymore; rather the pictures will be loaded directly into the account by the photographers. Existing IPTC data will be readout directly, pictures will be checked for quality criteria and if necessary rejected automatically. Thereafter the pictures can be accepted, rejected or put on the waiting list.
Automatic and intelligent translation
Does your database translate the keywords automatically into different languages? Does it memorize and allow for synonyms? Or does it use an old "language server"?
With the increasing number of international partners and photographers, there is also a need to provide keywords in several languages, independently. The Sodatech translation tool translates automatically and correctly. You decide if you would like to intervene in the translation or if new pictures should be translated, without even having to look at them. And the best thing is that your database is adaptive. Our translation tool memorizes each manual correction – even during the keywording process. This saves time and improves the quality of your data enormously.
Comprehensive statistics
Revenues, sales, pictures, clicks, traffic per day, month, year, periods, hours per customer, customer group, publisher, company as a chart, Excel, CSV, text & and if you want, there is also the weather forecast.
It is getting more and more important for photo agencies to know the behaviour of their customers. With our reports, you will be able to recall all imaginable information in order to conduct marketing activities much more systematically. After all, you would like to know which pictures have been clicked how many times. Furthermore, you can evaluate and export all your reports. Your marketing department will adore you…
Administration and management of picture blocking
Can you block your pictures, manage and search for blocked pictures, send them to partners and retrace the blocking history?
If you are also one of these agencies which still has enormous administration costs with picture blocking, you will like this tool. In the future, you will be able to set all the blocking directly in the administration. You can also define an automatic "expiration date" or send your partner agencies automatic e-mails.
