What does Smugmug have that Zenfolio does not - let's make a list...

jfriend · August 4, 2006

Spun off from this thread:
http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=34259

Andy wrote:

No doubt Zenfolio's got some cool stuff, but it's been a long time that SmugMug has had Web 2.0 stuff like Keywords Tags, AJAX, GeoMapping, User Customization to the max, themes, RSS Feeds, PhotoRank, our open-since-forever API and more :deal

I'll take this list as a starter, but if there are even more things, I'd love to have that list somewhere. Over in other online forums, it used to be primarily Smugmug vs. pbase and I had the rap down for why people should come to Smugmug over pbase and it usually worked (I'm over 200 referrals now so that rap was working). Now the debate is more commonly between Zenfolio and Smugmug and I don't have a good rap down for why to choose Smugmug over Zenfolio.

So ... perhaps we can take this thread and make it into "what does Smugmug have that Zenfolio doesn't have" thread?

Andy's initial list of features that Smugmug has that I don't think Zenfolio has is:

Geomapping
RSS Feeds
Photorank
CSS customization

I'd add to that:

Print Ordering (though they are promising it)
Pro package for making money selling prints
Advanced pro features (selling digital downloads, sales statistics, purchase notification, proof delay, custom watermarks)
Dgrin online community for help and support

And, others in the thread have added these so far:

38 themes (http://themes.smugmug.com)
Color and exposure correction service, no charge (http://blogs.smugmug.com/pros)
Variety of 3rd party applications built on an open-API (uploaders, downloaders, sales statistics, etc..)
Affiliate program (I'm not sure what this is or how it benefits an end-user)
80,000,000 photos so far (they know how to scale and grow)
No vendor lock-in (http://blogs.smugmug.com/onethumb/2005/07/06/vendor-lock-in-sucks-making-it-easy-to-leave-smugmug/)
Javascript customization
Full header/footer customization
Less intrusive site branding by Smugmug compared to Zenfolio
HTML allowed in descriptions, bio, album title and captions letting you embed links and other things or make your own HTML pages
Multiple, geographically dispersed backups of all your images (http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/060712/20060712005340.html)
Custom rendered photo sizes (you can have any photo size you want)
Profitable, debt-free company devoted to and passionate about photo sharing (http://www.smugmug.com/aboutus/about.mg and http://www.smugmug.com/aboutus/aboutus.mg)
Smugloupe for seeing fine detail without loading a giant image (http://www.smugmug.com/help/smugloupe)
The ability to gift subscriptions with your referral credits (http://www.smugmug.com/photo-sharing/gift-subscriptions)
Keyword search of only a specific user's site and much more useful multi-keyword search.
Printing with true color or auto-corrected color (http://www.smugmug.com/help/too-red)
Color effects: auto-color, tanning salon, sepia, black & white (http://www.smugmug.com/help/photo-websites)
Sharegroups (http://www.smugmug.com/help/share-groups)
Communities (http://www.smugmug.com/help/communities)
Larger maximum file size for pros (16mb vs. 10mb) (http://www.smugmug.com/help/upload-photos)
Upload by email or camera-phone (http://www.smugmug.com/help/camera-phones)
Timeline feature to make it easy to find photos anywhere in your site by date (http://www.smugmug.com/help/timeline)
Video support (http://www.smugmug.com/help/video)

What else does Smugmug have that Zenfolio doesn't? I don't know Zenfolio well enough to provide more detail myself. I'd be happy to edit this message and keep a running summary.

Andy · August 4, 2006

Geographically distributed data storage network.
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/060712/20060712005340.html

Annual Tuition-Free Professional Workshops (attendees pay their lodging and meals) World Class professional landscape photographers on hand as guides, instructors. (Marc Muench)

2005: Yosemite
2006: Bryce Canyon and Zion National Parks
2007: Glacier National Park, September 2007

DodgeV83 · August 4, 2006

jfriend wrote:

I'll take this list as a starter, but if there are even more things, I'd love to have that list somewhere. Over in other online forums, it used to be primarily Smugmug vs. pbase and I had the rap down for why people should come to Smugmug over pbase and it usually worked (I'm over 200 referrals now so that rap was working). Now the debate is more commonly between Zenfolio and Smugmug and I don't have a good rap down for why to choose Smugmug over Zenfolio.

So ... perhaps we can take this thread and make it into "what does Smugmug have that Zenfolio doesn't have" thread?

Andy's initial list of features that Smugmug has that I don't think Zenfolio has is:
Geomapping

RSS Feeds

Photorank

CSS customization

I'd add to that:
Print Ordering (though they are promising it)

Pro package for making money selling prints

Advanced pro features (selling digital downloads, sales statistics, purchase notification, proof delay)

Dgrin online community for help and support

What else does Smugmug have that Zenfolio doesn't? I don't know Zenfolio well enough to provide more detail myself. I'd be happy to edit this message and keep a running summary.

Andy, if you want to break this out as a new thread topic to make it more visible, feel free to do that.

Its more than just CSS customization, you can customize almost ANYTHING with javascript, header, footer, etc...

The "powered by Smugmug" is much less intrusive then Zenfolio's header+ footer (though this may be different for non-pro Smugmug users).

You can use html in gallery descriptions, effectively allowing you to embed video (hosted elsewhere ofcourse) into your site no matter what level account you have.

KEYWORDS! Right now I can instantly see ALL pictures I have EVER taken with both Earl and Toni...I don't think any other service has keyword support as deep as Smugmug.

Homepage slideshow, though I kinda already said this

There are SOO many things to cover! Really though, you need to be comparing the Smugmug standard account vs. Zenfolio account, because they are the same price...thats when it gets alittle tougher to compare!

kevin.coppalotti · August 4, 2006

jfriend wrote:

I'll take this list as a starter, but if there are even more things, I'd love to have that list somewhere. Over in other online forums, it used to be primarily Smugmug vs. pbase and I had the rap down for why people should come to Smugmug over pbase and it usually worked (I'm over 200 referrals now so that rap was working). Now the debate is more commonly between Zenfolio and Smugmug and I don't have a good rap down for why to choose Smugmug over Zenfolio.

So ... perhaps we can take this thread and make it into "what does Smugmug have that Zenfolio doesn't have" thread?

Andy's initial list of features that Smugmug has that I don't think Zenfolio has is:
Geomapping

RSS Feeds

Photorank

CSS customization

I'd add to that:
Print Ordering (though they are promising it)

Pro package for making money selling prints

Advanced pro features (selling digital downloads, sales statistics, purchase notification, proof delay)

Dgrin online community for help and support

What else does Smugmug have that Zenfolio doesn't? I don't know Zenfolio well enough to provide more detail myself. I'd be happy to edit this message and keep a running summary.

Andy, if you want to break this out as a new thread topic to make it more visible, feel free to do that.

The key quality my clients want is good quality pictures dispayed fast.
Zenfolio is slick, smooth and has a beautiful big picture display. And its fast. Did I mention that its fast?

DavidTO · August 4, 2006

kevin.coppalotti wrote:

The key quality my clients want is good quality pictures dispayed fast.
Zenfolio is slick, smooth and has a beautiful big picture display. And its fast. Did I mention that its fast?

Yeah, in the other thread. This thread, however, is for listing what smugmug has. Not sure we need both threads, but since we do, why not stick to the agenda that jfriend set out?

kevin.coppalotti · August 4, 2006

DavidTO wrote:

Yeah, in the other thread. This thread, however, is for listing what smugmug has. Not sure we need both threads, but since we do, why not stick to the agenda that jfriend set out?

The main function of a photo hosting site is to display pictures. All the features in the world count for zip if the host cannot meet the basic criteria. Smugmug pics are too small and the displaying of pics is too slow, when compared head to head with Zenfolio.

Andy · August 4, 2006

kevin.coppalotti wrote:

The main function of a photo hosting site is to display pictures. All the features in the world count for zip if the host cannot meet the basic criteria. Smugmug pics are too small and the displaying of pics is too slow, when compared head to head with Zenfolio.

Another thing we have is a pretty darn good record of soliciting direct customer feedback on issues just such as this

http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=32241

Kevin, we'd love your feedback on this

kevin.coppalotti wrote:

The key quality my clients want is good quality pictures dispayed fast.

Don (Onethumb) has posted numerous times about our speed vs. other sites. And we're actually in the process of putting in yet more and faster servers. I hope you see the performance boost!

jfriend · August 4, 2006

What keyword advantages does Smugmug have?

DodgeV83 wrote:

KEYWORDS! Right now I can instantly see ALL pictures I have EVER taken with both Earl and Toni...I don't think any other service has keyword support as deep as Smugmug.

What does Smugmug have that Zenfolio doesn't around keywords? I don't know Zenfolio that well, but their web site describe keywords for images, galleries, collections and search:

http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/help/?topic=photographs/photo-keywords
http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/help/?topic=galleries/gallery-keywords
http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/help/?topic=collections/collection-keywords
http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/help/?topic=search-browse/search-and-browse

bwg · August 4, 2006

zenfolio has no Andy

jfriend · August 4, 2006

bigwebguy wrote:

zenfolio has no Andy

Agree, but the Zenfolio customers I've heard from are saying that they get prompt answers to their email questions. I can't tell if the quality level is there in the answers or if Zenfolio will be able to scale that service as they grow (which is actually the hardest aspect of great support), but today it's a bit hard to explain the difference.

Since I do believe it's a difference, I'm open to how to simply explain it, but am unsure how right now.

dmc · August 4, 2006

I gotta say that the Custom Rendered JPG Sizes is one of the coolest features Smugmug has added recently... I use it all the time....

jfriend · August 4, 2006

Is this documented somewhere?

dmc wrote:

I gotta say that the Custom Rendered JPG Sizes is one of the coolest features Smugmug has added recently... I use it all the time....

Is there a Smugmug help page that describes this? I know I've seen it discussed here at dgrin, but couldn't find a reference for it on the Smugmug help site.

Andy · August 4, 2006

jfriend wrote:

Is there a Smugmug help page that describes this? I know I've seen it discussed here at dgrin, but couldn't find a reference for it on the Smugmug help site.

It's on Anne's List

http://blogs.smugmug.com/release-notes/2006/05/16/new-features-may-16th-2006/
for now, you use the release notes.

I've been adding more to my post above..

DodgeV83 · August 4, 2006

jfriend wrote:

What does Smugmug have that Zenfolio doesn't around keywords? I don't know Zenfolio that well, but their web site describe keywords for images, galleries, collections and search:

http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/help/?topic=photographs/photo-keywords
http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/help/?topic=galleries/gallery-keywords
http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/help/?topic=collections/collection-keywords
http://www.zenfolio.com/zf/help/?topic=search-browse/search-and-browse

For example, I keyworded 3 pictures. Picture 1: Earl, Picture 2: Toni, Picture 3: Earl Toni.

I then did a search for Earl, and I found ALL PICTURES ACROSS ALL OF ZENFOLIO that were marked Earl. It was the same for Toni. It seems there is no way to only search your site like on Smugmug. Also, when viewing the picture in the gallery, the keyword is not displayed (if it IS displayed in another view I haven't seen yet, then its definitely NOT a clickable link to see all of Earl's pictures).

Even if they change this to only search your site, it would still need more work, because my search for "Earl Toni" came up with 0 results! On Smugmug if I do a search for "Earl Toni", I see all pictures I've ever taken with them in it. If I do a search for Earl, I see a bar at the top like this

+Toni +Rob +Lynn +Sean +Domo +Avital

Where I can easily see who Earl commonly takes pictures with, and view those pictures with them together instantly. If your clever

and you tag your pictures right, you can even see all of the pictures you've taken with Earl and Toni together in Florida on the Beach with the Moon in the background

Andy · August 4, 2006

jfriend wrote:

[*]Affiliate program (I'm not sure what this is or how it benefits an end-user)

Check out the link. http://www.smugmug.com/affiliates/ Anyone can become an affiliate. We have all sorts of businesses and people who act as affiliates. It's really an open program. Who's it for? As we state on the affiliates page, "Any website that attracts visitors with family or friends. We figure that's probably you."

jfriend · August 4, 2006

DodgeV83 wrote:

For example, I keyworded 3 pictures. Picture 1: Earl, Picture 2: Toni, Picture 3: Earl Toni.

I then did a search for Earl, and I found ALL PICTURES ACROSS ALL OF ZENFOLIO that were marked Earl. It was the same for Toni. It seems there is no way to only search your site like on Smugmug. Also, when viewing the picture in the gallery, the keyword is not displayed (if it IS displayed in another view I haven't seen yet, then its definitely NOT a clickable link to see all of Earl's pictures).

Even if they change this to only search your site, it would still need more work, because my search for "Earl Toni" came up with 0 results! On Smugmug if I do a search for "Earl Toni", I see all pictures I've ever taken with them in it. If I do a search for Earl, I see a bar at the top like this

+Toni +Rob +Lynn +Sean +Domo +Avital

Where I can easily see who Earl commonly takes pictures with, and view those pictures with them together instantly. If your clever and you tag your pictures right, you can even see all of the pictures you've taken with Earl and Toni together in Florida on the Beach with the Moon in the background

Got it. Thanks.

Andy · August 4, 2006

DodgeV83 wrote:

Where I can easily see who Earl commonly takes pictures with, and view those pictures with them together instantly. If your clever and you tag your pictures right, you can even see all of the pictures you've taken with Earl and Toni together in Florida on the Beach with the Moon in the background

Onethumb worked really hard on SMUGSEARCH and Keywords. Thanks, Dodge!

Baldy · August 4, 2006

Sustained innovation.

We were first compared to Shutterfly, then Webshots, then PBase, then Flickr (and about 10 others along the way)—all of whom were great innovators but for some reason they all slowed their innovation.

JBurt · August 4, 2006

Wide product range
Smugmug offers products as well as prints and I can set my own prices.

At least I didn't see any on Zenfolio.

jfriend · August 4, 2006

Andy wrote:

Annual Tuition-Free Professional Workshops (attendees pay their lodging and meals) World Class professoinal landscape photographers on hand as guides, instructors. (Marc Muench)

2005: Yosemite
2006: Bryce Canyon and Zion National Parks
2007: ? TBD

You have a killer list of features going so far which I'm collecting into one place.

In the interest of accuracy, are the photo trips limited to Smugmug subscribers or are they actually open to anyone who hangs out at dgrin, knows about them, signs up and pays their way?

jfriend · August 4, 2006

Good one, how to explain it with credibility

Baldy wrote:

Sustained innovation.

We were first compared to Shutterfly, then Webshots, then PBase, then Flickr (and about 10 others along the way)—all of whom were great innovators but for some reason they all slowed their innovation.

I agree with the general sentiment, but I'm wondering how to say it and have it sound credible and not have it sound like something that everyone says about their service. Any ideas?

Andy · August 4, 2006

jfriend wrote:

I agree with the general sentiment, but I'm wondering how to say it and have it sound credible and not have it sound like something that everyone says about their service. Any ideas?

I hope Baldy will come back to this thread - but until then, as with anything, the proof is in the pudding. Have a look at our news page, and our release notes blog, it shows a steady stream of innovation and improvements.

http://blogs.smugmug.com/release-notes/

JT redid the news page a while back, it's easier to navigate back to the beginning of (SmugMug) time

http://www.smugmug.com/aboutus/news.mg?page=11

Andy · August 4, 2006

jfriend wrote:

You have a killer list of features going so far which I'm collecting into one place.

In the interest of accuracy, are the photo trips limited to Smugmug subscribers or are they actually open to anyone who hangs out at dgrin, knows about them, signs up and pays their way?

Our workshops are open to anyone, SmugMug member or not. First come, first served, until the slots are filled up. Most all who've attended are SmugMuggers but it's not a requirement.

peestandingup · August 5, 2006

DodgeV83 wrote:

Really though, you need to be comparing the Smugmug standard account vs. Zenfolio account, because they are the same price...thats when it gets alittle tougher to compare!

Agreed. The $40 SM account is pretty bare bones compared to the $40 Zenfolio account, its no contest. Even beats the SM Power account, IMO.

I think at this point & time, its a wee bit premature to compare their features to a SM Pro account. They're only like 7 months old & SM has had years to get all their features together. Plus, we dont even know yet if Zen will make a more expensive "pro" account or leave it at the current price points. If they do leave the price alone & keep adding features as quickly as they have been, then that will be hard to compete against.

georges · August 5, 2006

Interesting reading but...
This is all interesting for those of us that like to compare sites, but I wonder if the average person that views our photos really cares all that much.

When I talk to some of my friends that view my photos, and a smaller group that actually posts a few on sites like shutterfly and webshots, they just really don't see that much difference between any of them.

They all think my site looks nice and some of them notice the absence of advertisements, but to them, most of the sites look pretty much alike.

Those of us that post here are into looking at the various sites and comparing them. In the end, I wonder if most folks would see the difference between smugmug and zenfolio.

Frankly, I have more postive comments on the impressive packaging that smugmug uses to keep their prints safe during shipping than I have on the site itself.

For me, I can't even begin to compare the two until zenfolio has been around for awhile and proves they are a viable business. Until then, everything is nice window dressing that may help smugmug decide which snappy looking stuff to add to their feature list.

Hope that didn't sound too cynical. It's just meant to provide a little different perspective.

Baldy · August 5, 2006

jfriend wrote:

I agree with the general sentiment, but I'm wondering how to say it and have it sound credible and not have it sound like something that everyone says about their service. Any ideas?

I think Georges said it well, above. 4 years of continuous improvement and financial stability at SmugMug.

We have seen dozens of impressive sites come along. They're always fast in the beginning, they always bring innovation and the free ones get major traction fast (Photopoint got 1 million subscribers its first year and became, along with Xing, the toast of the Net, like Flickr was last year).

But few could become profitable enough to endure. They either sold to a bigger company and innovation slowed (Webshots, Flickr, Pixagogo, Photosite...), or they went out of business (Photopoint, Xing, Microsoft, Adobe, Canon...), or they had to keep raising money (Shutterfly, Photobucket), or they just never got enough traction to fund improvements and scale (Zoto, Phanfare, PBase, ImageEvent).

We respect them all, learn from them as they learn from us, and if they get to a stable financial situation, we'll tip our hats to them. We know how hard and important that is.

fashion · August 5, 2006

I hate ads
The one thing I hate about most of the sites mentioned above (which by the way all offer some kind of a free account) is the damn google ads everywhere. So so far I like smugmug and zenfolio because they don't show ads and still offer a good set of features.

jfriend · August 6, 2006

Got it

Baldy wrote:

I think Georges said it well, above. 4 years of continuous improvement and financial stability at SmugMug.

We have seen dozens of impressive sites come along. They're always fast in the beginning, they always bring innovation and the free ones get major traction fast (Photopoint got 1 million subscribers its first year and became, along with Xing, the toast of the Net, like Flickr was last year).

But few could become profitable enough to endure. They either sold to a bigger company and innovation slowed (Webshots, Flickr, Pixagogo, Photosite...), or they went out of business (Photopoint, Xing, Microsoft, Adobe, Canon...), or they had to keep raising money (Shutterfly, Photobucket), or they just never got enough traction to fund improvements and scale (Zoto, Phanfare, PBase, ImageEvent).

We respect them all, learn from them as they learn from us, and if they get to a stable financial situation, we'll tip our hats to them. We know how hard and important that is.

I'll think about how to put that into just a short phrase. It is a meaningful advantage - just need to find the pithy way to explain/market it.

Do you know if there are any other independent, profitable photo sites with at least a two year track record?

jfriend · August 6, 2006

fashion wrote:

The one thing I hate about most of the sites mentioned above (which by the way all offer some kind of a free account) is the damn google ads everywhere. So so far I like smugmug and zenfolio because they don't show ads and still offer a good set of features.

Yeah, the lack of ads and the availability of large sizes are the two easy clinchers against the free sites.

Baldy · August 6, 2006

jfriend wrote:

Do you know if there are any other independent, profitable photo sites with at least a two year track record?

Fotki (which I think is sorta becoming a dating site), ImageEvent (fast and reliable), and PBase are the ones I know about.

Baldy · August 6, 2006

jfriend wrote:

Yeah, the lack of ads and the availability of large sizes are the two easy clinchers against the free sites.

We used to lose a few customers to Flickr because you could get a lot of comments on your photos there. And it had buzz & a coolness factor. And they got amazing traction because they were willing to go free.

But I notice we're getting Flickr customers now and one reason they tell us is:

"I was a Flickr user, but what I have been seeing there is a flood of absolute garbage all over the site. I blame the free version for this. It's easy to post your crap snapshots of your drunken buddy passed out on the floor. I don't believe for a minute they would pay money to post this kind of material."

What does Smugmug have that Zenfolio does not - let's make a list...

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