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How many photos do you take with your phone every day or week? Many, of course! And how much money do you make off of these photos? Our informed guess is little to none whatsoever! Well, that may change for some of you after reading this article. Say hello to Foap, an app that connects us, ordinary smartphone owners, with businesses or individuals that are on the lookout for fresh and interesting photos. There are many Foap reviews, but not all of them are impartial. This one, we promise, will cover all the negatives along with the advantages. We wouldn’t recommend you anything we wouldn’t use ourselves.
But what exactly is Foap, you may ask? And why would anyone want to pay for my great, so-so or downright lousy pics? This stock photography app is talking to you, fanatical Instagrammers. And you, amateur photographers who can’t spend a single hour or eat a single meal without documenting it with appropriate photo material. But is this app legit or a security hole for nasty malware that opens up a way for abuse of your sensitive info? Furthermore, can you really cash in on what you’re already doing for free?
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Your caution is fully justified. These days, even the most trustworthy apps require tons of special permissions that most of us don’t even skim through before tapping that “Install” button. Not to mention all of those money-making apps that stink of scam or dishonesty but boast gazillions of users anyway.
That’s because our fingers don’t think. Our brains do though, so let’s employ them and dissect this particular app from top to bottom.
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A Look Behind the Scenes – Does This Company Seem Legit?
Let’s get this concern out of the way: Foap is a 100% legitimate company. It’s been in business since 2012 and has headquarters in Sweden, Poland, and the US. There are addresses, phone numbers, contacts of all the decision makers as well as links to their LinkedIn profiles. Bogus companies that have something to hide don’t just put everything out there in the open.
Plus, the app has been featured in many reputable media including Entrepreneur, BBC, NBC, CNN, Wall Street Journal, AdAge, Mashable, Wired, and more. Obviously, there’s not a thing to worry about when it comes to the safety of your account and your personal info. You will be paid everything you have earned. Whether you will manage to earn anything is an entirely different question, and we’ll address it below.
How Does It Work?
The app is very intuitive and simple to use. All you need to do is download it from App Store or Google Play, sign up with Facebook or by entering your contact info manually, and you’re good to go. You’ll get some suggestions straight away as to who to follow. This is great since those photographers will be the most successful ones, so you can take a look at their contributions and try to figure out what works best.
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After following those accounts, you can start uploading your pics. Here’s how the process works in a nutshell:
- Choose pics from your gallery. (Even though you can select multiple photos, we recommend you do one at a time due to frequent server issues.)
- Enter a description. The longer and more precise it is, the better your chances to rank it higher, so that more people could find it. Make sure to pepper your descriptions with keywords and plenty of adjectives. For example, instead of just saying “A cat sitting on a branch,” you should say something like “A ginger tabby cat with white whiskers sitting on a green tree branch looking bored.”
- Enter tags or choose from the existing ones. Again, the more tags you have, the easier it is for prospective buyers to find your pics.
- When your upload is finished, you will be prompted to determine if there are people in your image. If yes, are their faces recognizable? Finally, if you said yes, the app will ask you if you have permission from those people to use the photos for commercial purposes. And that’s it! Your image with the Foap watermark is up and ready to make some sales, with any luck. Or at least garner some feedback that you can use to hone your skills further.
Earning Potential
For every photo you sell, you will get 50% commission, which is $5 flat. A great thing is that you can sell the same picture over and over – just like with most stock photo platforms.
Another way to earn money with this app is by participating in the so-called premium missions. Unfortunately, those are not free. To gain entry, you will have to buy the so-called Foap Coins – 1,000 of them for $19.99, 500 for $11.99, and so on. All missions will be limited in duration, and the best contestants will get anything from $50 to $1,000 as a reward.
If you don’t want to splurge cash on missions that you probably won’t even win, you can watch ads instead. You know how it works – if you don’t have money, you’ll usually have time instead! Every ad will bring you five Foap Coins, and you can watch as many of them as you want.
Pros
- Making money off of what you’re already doing for free sounds like a neat idea. And considering that every social media user has already been generating tons of content that businesses normally leverage for free, it sounds kinda fair to the users.
- You’ll get 50% commission on every photo you manage to sell through the app. Of course, we’d love a bigger commission, but making do with half the price is better than earning zilch.
- Each of your photos is worth $10, $5 of which is yours. If you don’t think that’s much, I totally agree. But an average stock photo will bring you less than $0.50 per month, and that’s if it gets sold over and over. And that’s with the high and mighty stock repositories such as ShutterStock, Adobe Stock, iStock, etc!
- You’ll get paid in cash via PayPal. Is it even necessary to explain how convenient this is? First off, it’s available in over 200 countries all across our beautiful planet. Second, it’s easy to use and takes only a few moments for a transaction to process. Third, it’s another layer of proof that this company is legit. PayPal doesn’t do business on a mass scale with just about anyone!
- If you enjoy networking, Foap community is large and (mainly) friendly. You can get followers, tons of useful feedback, and maybe even get to improve on your photography skills a little. It means you’ll still get something from this app even if you don’t manage to make money by using it.
- No need to buy a fancy DSLR camera just so you could give stock photography a try. Anybody can try their hand on Foap, regardless of how expensive their phone is. Naturally, this doesn’t mean you’ll get to sell anything. Still, it’s nice that the concept is inclusive and lets all smartphone users try their luck.
Cons
- Most certainly, you won’t be able to earn a significant sum. In fact, it’s unlikely that you’ll earn anything unless you’re a wizard. And that’s due to the following point…
- The competition is fierce – and sometimes, it even seems dishonest. For example, other users may rate your contributions unfairly just so they could fare better than you. Admittedly, those are vain attempts – but they are nonetheless frustrating.
- Many users report bugs and glitches. For some, the app keeps reporting wrong credentials over and over. Or the photos fail to upload. There are also lags and delays. Sure, it may be due to the server overload, with too many users uploading batches of photos at any given moment. But it still sucks from a user’s perspective.
- They only pay once a month. And not only that, but if you forget to request your payment by 15th, you’ll have to wait another month.
- Some users imply that the premium missions are rigged. I would take these disgruntled complaints with a grain of salt, but it’s probably a sign that you should think twice before paying money to access those missions.
- Foap has no accreditation – or even user reviews – on Better Business Bureau. Sure, this business directory isn’t everything there is. But we always like to see how a business fares there, whether they respond to user complaints, how effectively they solve user problems. The least they could do is apply for an accreditation there, to boost their reputation and build more trust with their common users. Or maybe they did and weren’t eligible? That would make it even worse.
Conclusion – Will You Try the App After Reading Foap Reviews?
The answer to this question largely depends on what your goal is.
If you merely want to have some fun while learning something new in the process, you’re on the right track. Feel free to download the app and use it as much or as little as you want. You’ll get tons of useful feedback, increase exposure for your photos, and maybe even earn a beer or two as a plus.
However, if your sole aim is to supplement your income, this is definitely not a workable way to do it. In all likelihood, you’ll hardly manage to sell any photos here. Making a few extra bucks online is great, so you should better check out these seven types of activities that get-paid-to panels will pay you for. Or, if you’re really into photography and would like to set up your own passive income system, maybe you should give stock photography a shot.
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