Um, well, let’s see. Somewhere between local car dealer advertising and Satan.
Why? Because they have made me hate photographers. And I love photographers.
If you haven’t felt their talons sinking into your tender parts yet, Adbase is an email mailing list and blast company that specializes in matching commercial artists to agencies. And I cannot count how many emails over the last several months I’ve had to delete, and how many unsubscribe procedures I’ve had to complete. Hundreds. And like the Terminator, it never stops. I am disgusted.
At the rate I get charged out to clients, I am also robbed. Of, uh, a lot of money.
Hate hate hate!
Can you feel the hate, Adbase? You debaser of sacred photographers and defecator into my mail box, you! A pox upon you all! (Hint to photographers: they are not doing you any service, as far as I’m concerned.)
– Doug
Well, today I got a nice email from Adbase Customer Support that starts off:
Dear Doug,
Thank you for your email requesting to be removed from ADBASE mailing lists.
Uhhh, yeah. I didn’t exactly email a request to be removed from the database because I didn’t know how to do that, because I was never offered that option.
I wrote a nasty blog posting. But I guess it worked as well as an email.
Free at last.
– Doug
Doug,
As a young photographer looking for ways to find clients, something that I have no idea on how to do, adbase has intrigued me. I also have a few friends that swear by it. I ran into your blog post in searching for reviews on adbase and have seen a couple of post like this. Can you offer any insight for other viable marketing options for new photographers trying to find clients?
Ric,
perfectly good question.
First, let me say that there might be art buyers out there who appreciate the constant stream of photographer promotions landing in their email box every day. I’m not an art buyer. I’m a creative director.
Creatives do not want a constant stream of such. Not in their email boxes.
The age-old proven method is the postcard of your work. Perhaps a sequence, sending a new one every month or so. Perhaps a folded card showing multiple shots.
What’s good about this is, in the time it takes to see you’ve received yet another email and to try to decide whether to open it or not, you’ve looked at the postcard and made a decision to either 1) recycle it or 2) put it in the keeper file. Frankly, the ultimate achievement is when the creative not only keeps it, they put it up in their space. And that does happen.
Postcards rock. They also aren’t surrounded in rep hype, which no one wants. They just want to see your work.
Honestly, the other best way is by doing stellar work and getting it used, published, and in the award show books. Making friends with an agency or two and then doing free work for them – free or cheap – is great. As long as they know only the best creative concepts get done for free or cheap. And that you need to assert your creative vision, not just copy some other photographer’s style.
Lars Topelmann did this with the Klein bicycle catalog back in the ’90’s. He teamed up with friends at Cole and Weber, which was pitching the Klein account with unsolicited spec work, and shot the catalog for free. But he shot it in his style, and it was gorgeous and amazing. Klein ended up producing it. And it helped put both Lars and Cole and Weber on the map.
Sadly, a badgering series of emails from hundreds of photographers and their reps just doesn’t cut it.
But truly, a photographer is better off putting all the time and effort they can into coming up with a unique, truly new, and therefore valuable vision. Far too many commercial photographers are just aping what art photography did five to ten years ago. Or, worse yet, aping other successful commercial photographers.
Hope this at least partially helps.
– Doug
Doug,
When you shop for food, is it free ?
Do you need money to pay for your gasoline ?
How about your rent ? Is it free ?
How on earth can you justify that working for free is okay ?
Unbelievable.
Do you work for free ?
Robin
Robin,
believe me, I understand your point. And you’re right, no one should have to work for free on an ongoing basis. It’s not fair or smart.
On the other hand, does a general want to retreat? Sometimes it’s the strategic move that will lead to a victory.
I suggest doing free work as a strategic move to accomplish a similar victory. I’ve done free work many times during my career. But only because it absolutely served my own interests. And I’ve taken pay cuts for the same reason.
It’s a way to do something that shows your abilities when no other paying assignment can show what you’re capable of. When Cole & Weber did that Klein catalog, they did it without knowing if they’d get paid or not. And Lars shot the work in the same uncertainty. But I guarantee you he would say it was the smartest thing he could have done for his career.
Nothing is absolute. It is neither always right nor always wrong to do free work. But it can be the loss that drives a big gain. In Lars’ case, very very big. The work got in all the award shows and he has been a very successful photographer since.
– Doug
This is the 21st Century Doug. Getting 15 emails a day is so horrible? I wonder what you’ll do to try and find new work once the job you have now comes to an end? I wonder if you’ll email anyone? 🙂
You say you don’t like getting spammed? There is an easy way to opt out from Adbase or Agency Access lists. It’s not hard and takes less time to do that to come here and whine about 15 emails from photographers a day. I can understand about mortgage, viagra and other such spam being evil but come on man, these are creative people looking to work and do what they love. Not everyone has a cushy job that pays them a salary with benefits. Photographers who freelance are technically unemployed the moment they finish a gig. We are constantly looking for the next job.
While suggesting to use Blackbook, Workbook and such services is a good thing, please understand that not everyone has the budget to take pages out in these very prestigious publications. You then have the audacity to suggest we work for free and then cry “At the rate I get charged out to clients, I am also robbed. Of, uh, a lot of money.” Nice double standard!
Free is not a business model mate. We have equipment to pay for, rent and mortgages, insurance, have to keep up to date with new cameras and computers as well as the latest software. When I work for “free” it’s for stock and not to give away my copyright to another company who will never hire me because they will just find another sucker to work for free next time.
I’m sure that a lot of the photography that you see in these emails for lack of a better term “sucks” and YOU don’t want to see any more. This does not mean that other creatives do not get inspired by the good email promos they see. If at least you had some suggestions as to how photographers could promote themselves other than postcards you’d have much more credibility. You are suggesting we cut down more trees and pollute the planet with ink and paper, nice.
The only evil here is your laziness to not take 3 minutes to unsubscribe to a reputable company. To suggest we stop using them and to offer no alternatives is unimpressive to say the least.
Nice attitude toward a creative director who’s trying to help photographers not step in shit.
I unsubscribed a long time ago, “mate.”
Excellent points Doug. Thanks for taking the time to write this up.
I’m intrigued by this, since I was just researching ADBase as the next step in my stock photo business (btw, this is the second thing that comes up in Google when you type in ADBase, probably how they found it so quick!). I like the postcard idea, and doing something new. However, my question is, how am I supposed to know where to send these postcards to if I have no addresses? Is there another way besides ADBase to get addresses/names for art buyers and creative types short of stalking? Just curious…
-Nick
Nick,
good question. I think postcards work best for photographers who have a unique style and vision, because the photographs speak for themselves. But with a stock photo business, unless your photos are highly unusual, an image probably won’t work. You might be better off doing a postcard that has a message about what makes you different.
I’d recommend that you find some art director/copywriter team that’s looking for a creative opportunity to do something cool for their portfolio. And then encourage them to be amazingly inventive, but true to your brand (which you might have to figure out first).
A campaign of related postcards will work better than one-offs.
As to getting addresses, I’m really not sure. Sorry. The key here is to be more specific in finding people who are likely to want what you offer than in slapping postcards at anything that moves. No one wants to get stuff they don’t care about. So I think you’re better off with a targeted, smaller mailing list. But that’s just my opinion.
It’s not easier. But I think it’s better. Plus, when everyone else zigs, you should zag. Good luck.
– Doug
Dear idbranding,
I just read your blog post and I must disagree with you. I’ve also done my “shopping” of list services and ADBase does indeed help photographers.
Nick, who commented above on your post asks the question “Is there another way besides ADBase to get addresses/names for art buyers and creative types short of stalking? “.
You are unable to give him a response. You go on to suggest to him that finding specific people who are likely to want to look at his work is the better option.
You definitely have not talked to any person from ADBase because your great idea of sending postcards is actually something they recommend to their clients. Please get your facts straight before bashing such a great service.
Stop living in the old age because as everyone knows email is the new way to communicate. Sending an email including my work and then following up with a postcard sounds like a perfect 1-2 punch to increase my chances of landing a job.
Seriously, before you talk about how evil a service is try and learn a bit more about what they are actually telling their clients. They have been around for 12 yrs. and if their ways really didn’t work I’m sure they wouldn’t have been able to make it this long.
Oh and Nick, frankly there is no other way to get comprehensive lists of contact info aside from using ADBase unless you want to spend your hours where you should be shooting photos researching that information.
– Chris
Chris,
c’mon, admit it. You work for ADBase. Or your wife or sister or brother does. That’s cool.
I just was pointing out that creatives like me absolutely hate the idea of getting deluged with ten to fifteen unsolicited emails a day from anyone who calls themselves a photographer.
I can’t speak for art buyers. They’re kinky that way. Maybe they like it.
– Doug
I’m going to have to agree with Doug. I’m glad I found this blog while looking for people experiencing the same lack of professionalism with ADBase as I have experienced. Sad that when this was first posted the problem continues this long.
As a professional in advertising that realizes the importance of e-mail marketing I notice there are a lot of things that ADBase is doing that is in direct violation of CAN-SPAM laws — beyond their eBlasts being intrusive and unwelcome.
No matter how many times I’ve unsubscribed from their overwhelming, unattractive eBlasts, I continue to receive more.
Not only did I never sign up for anything — ever — with my company e-mail account, I never signed up for unsolicited messages from even one of their photographers or ADBase. Period. So it’s easy understand that I didn’t sign up for any of the photographers and illustrators I’m getting pinged by every day.
I have contacted ADBase customer support on multiple occasions and tried to help them understand why they are in violation of the FTC rules against SPAM, and I continue to receive their communications because they are illegally supplying my contact information to other artists and not removing me from their complete database. Then again, their address is Ontario, so perhaps I need to ask them in French, or they don’t think the rules apply to them.
To me, their failure to understand good marketing practices is good reason to never shop their clients’ portfolios. Ever.
Thank you, Andrew. I was starting to think I was crazy. Either that, or the only sane person left in the universe. (Poor universe, if that were the case.)
Easy doesn’t mean good. Or even useful. In fact, sometimes it means bad. As in, very bad.
– Doug
Hey Doug,
I think the “devil’s advocate” is a legitimate stance on this one. I have his vivid memory of an art director visiting the illustration department and plopping a trash bag on the desk and saying, “I’ve hardly even seen any of these.” I whole-heartedly agree that the best advertising is actually getting work or being chosen to be printed in annuals, but everyone has to start somewhere and catch those few early “lucky breaks”.
Given the cost of paper mailers and postage versus a free alternative, i.e. e-mail and compounding that is the issue of actually even locating the art departments at various publications. Here’s a perfect example: I decided that I was going to sit down and find three art directors a day and e-mail them samples starting tonight. After 30 minutes of googling various terms and publications, I failed to locate a single art director or art buyer. What I did find in my attempts, various outlets willing to sell me contact lists.
While you’re deciding to click “open” or not on that random
e-mail, think on this: many fledgling creators of media are working day jobs to fund the production of new works then coming home at night and working on the art and then finally trying to figure-out how to market it, most likely on their weekends. The starving artist community apologizes for the inconvenience.
-Ryan a.k.a. illworx
Doug:
I find your candor refreshing and I appreciate you sticking your neck out on this one. I am assisting my husband in returning to the market of illustration after a break. I have used ADBase before and though it eased my mind to think I was making an effort that may someday payoff–all my husbands job came from postcard/website and word of mouth.
I would like to know what CD’s think of options such as blackbook.com. Do you use the website or prefer the hardcopy book–or none of the above.
Thanks–and thanks for your generous input on the process of selling any type of art.
Thanks-
Wendi
Wendi,
I appreciate your…appreciation. Thanks, Wendi. Just trying to be honest and helpful. I know no one wants to hear it, but I would if I were a photographer trying to make friends not alienate them. Not surprised the postcard, web, and word of mouth works. I’d also consider Facebook and even Twitter. But first someone has to see your stuff and like it. And the work has to be severely likable and different or else you’re competing on price, and that hurts everyone.
We all use BlackBook, Alternate Pick, Workbook, and, of course, CA and other awards books. I think people here use both hard copy and digital. But it’s so easy to pick up a book and leaf through it with stickies to attach. It’s also an easy way to show work to others in the shop.
Good luck, Wendi.
– Doug
I too came upon this blog after Googling Adbase. I was one of the earliest subscribers to their service, because I found the accuracy of their data surpassed all of the “static” published lists at the time. I’ve been a rep for over 20 years, and have found Adbase to be a valuable tool, not just for executing printed or emailed promotions for my talent, but also for more accurate data on agencies, design firms, publishers and clients than I could possibly maintain internally – data we need and use on a daily basis. That said, I feel your pain, Doug. But, I wouldn’t put the blame on Adbase. They are only providing information. It’s up to the users to be smart with how they use it. The information IS available from many other sources – the closest to Adbase being Agency Access, which I switched to last year for their European coverage. There is NO one “right” way for photogs to establish themselves. It obviously has to start with the work. I’m not a big fan of freebies. In my experience, they’ve NEVER resulted in the windfall Lars and Cole & Weber experienced. I think times have changed a HELLUVA lot since those days, and relationships between agencies and photographers along with that. Be looking for email, coming to your inbox soon! – John
I’m thinking Doug’s on to your solution with the twitter/social-media strategy.
As a fledgling creative, I’ve noticed only disdain for email inboxes, whereas, people tend to scour the internet constantly in search of the next interesting photo, video, story – which then gets emailed around the office.
That’s the stamp of approval. I’d like to say that Art is absolute and that I’d key into a masterpiece whether it came from hilarious colleague or sleazy database – but that just isn’t the case.
Push media is so old-school. You want to target stumble and digg and notcot. Twitpic a photo a day, build a following. You’ve already got the content. What you need is people to see it and realize it’s value – then it’ll work it’s way to the right people.
… michael
unfortunately we have to do it all. email blasts, source books, direct mail and getting out there and meeting face to face.
the key is to be sensitive to the people who are not into e-mails, conscious about the environment or just too busy to ever meet.
I am an illustrator who just took a tour of Adbase today. During the tour I was shown contacts that indicated whether or not they were open to receiving emails; maybe this feature is in response to your post. If so, I think both sides of the aisle should thank you.
Your post showed up as I did a search for reviews of Adbase. Coincidentally, you are someone I have contacted by email – but it was after meeting you on a plane and you gave me your card. Of course, that kind of list-building technique is slow and costly. I subscribed to AgencyAccess a few years back and it definitely helped me make the leap to full-time illustration. My DNA is coded to “not bother people”, but when you’ve got mouths to feed, it helps you override your default setting. I can definitely sympathize with your position, but it was a necessary evil for me hit the next level.
Hey, Jason,
bothering people in the right way is the name of the game. You just don’t want to bother people in a way they hate you. It’s an art. Therefore there is no nice, easy, simple solution.
Good luck in the good bothering department.
– Doug
An especially challenging task for someone who as a youth was reluctant to call information because he didn’t want to bother them. True story.
Thanks Doug.
Cheers to good bothering.
Hi Doug,
I came across your blog and I must say that I appreciate your honesty. It can be a very tricky business, the art of marketing to creative people who are extremely busy. My question is, Do you have a tendency to notice promos more than just postcards? And by promos, I mean a postcard with a keepsake such as a notepad with the artist’s work.
Thanks
Kimbrely
Kimbrely,
You know, I only notice really interesting photography when it comes to a photographer’s promo. There are so many photographers out there doing so much similar stuff, what it really takes is something that looks different. That’s all it is. If more photographers put more effort into creating an unusual vision they could put less into their self-promotion, because every promo piece would work harder.
That’s the simple truth. It’s your unique, or at least unusual, vision that will get me to do the single best thing you could hope for out of a promotion: and that’s to not throw it away. To keep it. The really good ones go up on creatives’ walls. And they stay there sometimes for years. And all the while that creative is looking for an opportunity to work with you.
On the wall, in a highly-valued file of photographer’s samples (no one keeps a sample from someone they don’t really want to work with), it doesn’t matter. Keeping it is what leads to the phone call.
Good luck. Have fun.
[…] 8, 2010 by douglaslowell I wrote this post on Adbase, a service that blasts emails to agencies on behalf of photographers, back in February […]
[…] directors and art directors tossing out any emails promotions that just pour into their in-boxes (https://idology.wordpress.com/2009/02/18/how-evil-is-adbase/). I’m not saying that it does not work for some people, but for me now it is simply not […]
After subscribing to Adbase for 2 years here’s my 2 cents.
First, their tech support people are just great and technically their system works very well.
About 20% of the emails I sent were opened and about 1% of the recipients clicked through to my website. That’s about what Adbase promised up front.
Recipients can opt out off of your mailing list with the click of a mouse.
My concern about Adbase came about when I discovered that of the category lists they make available for you to research “corporate” is sadly lacking in numbers. Adbase lists only companies that have internal creative departments. In my 20+ years of being a professional photographer I have made lasting relationships with many marketing and marketing communications department people. To not research and list those departments at companies and make names available is a gross malfeasance on Adbase’s part. There should be more company names made available than any other category they list. Here I am in the San Francisco Bay Area, 4th largest metro area in the U.S. and home to the immense Silicon Valley business engine and their list does not even scratch the surface. Go figure. They don’t tell you THAT when they want you to sign up. This felt stubbornly incompetent to me. I brought the issue to their attention but it didn’t feel like they cared to resolve their shortcomings. Might cost them a dime or so to make their service more representative of the business world. Go figure. As far as my subscription went, they helped me decide to discontinue it by shooting themselves in the foot. Now there’s a smart business plan.
While I am new to photography as a business, I have read so much about advertising. I have to agree that emails everyday are a bit much. Maybe once a quarter or once a month at the most should be sufficient and only when you have something new. I appreciate the feedback that Adbase is too intensive and agree that each photographer needs something original. I am doing my projects for free right now just because I love what I do. I will soon have a supporting website that has more than just photos. I have had much of my material and info for a long time but just don’t know which web and email providers to go with yet. I also prefer the permission approach as well.
Thanks for all the info everyone!
Brad
You know, did we find the answer to how evil they are? Of which, how much is necessary evil? Did anyone do some research on their new program FoundFolios?
It is very important to listen to each other and try to understand all sides of an issue….we all feel certain ways at different times in our life. Simple things can become annoying…or something like multi emails from a few different sources in the inbox can be a double edged sword…a kind of love/hate.
There is no one way to market our work to art buyers and clients. No simple solution. Just have to try.
…its frustrating to many cause most photographers are completely outside the loop and have no knowledge or access to inside the industry. Agency Access and ADbase give those people at least a chance to be discovered.
– ian ethan vloke-wurth
P H O T O G R A P H E R
How the hell do you unsubscribe from AdBase? I too get tons of emails a day. I don’t mind the illustrator links but i don’t use photographers. EVER. You’d think they’d have somewhere to go to manage the settings or something.
Doug
While I see your point of view, it seems no different than postcards that you receive in the mail each day. As you say you have the right to save it or discard it, the same goes for deleting an email…or saving it, or clicking through to a web site. I view email blasts as a way to receive information about new photographers and illustrators–it’s less intrusive than taking a phone call, it allows me to either take a look or put it on the back burner–there is no demand that I open the email right away and it’s certainly less paper and postage being used than the traditional postcard. We do live in the digital age and it seems natural to me to use a digital means to contact potential customers. Services like Adbase and Agency Access do a good job of sorting through a potential customer base, not everyone furnishes an email address so when one is given one assumes that they wish to receive email promotions–so why fault the photographers or illustrators? or Adbase for that matter? You obviously gave them your email address–what I’ve noticed is that very few Creative Directors give out email addresses–so why all the complaining?
I’m an Art Director who just reached her breaking point this morning with all of these AdBase emails. In searching for their site, I came across this post and can’t tell you how much I *relate*!! I have nothing but goodwill toward any of the photographer’s using the service and having been a freelance designer myself, I understand the need to get your name and work out there. I’m not mad at the photographers. I think AdBase needs to retool the way they manage their lists… or something has to change.
I just wrote AdBase to request they remove me. In the note, I also included the link to this post and told them I relate *whole-heartedly* to it. Perhaps they’ll get a glimpse of what the end user-experience is like for the art buyers they’re targeting and make some adjustments.
Soon to be free and so relieved….
Amy
I just received over 200 spam emails, in one night, from adbase when one of their spam emails had a glitch in which when you emailed to unsubscribe, it replied all. REPLIED ALL.
Ok I am really confused, let me see if I understand the issue here.
I am going to lump Creative Directors, Art Buyers and Art Directors together here for the sake of discussion. We all know these roles are handed differently by different size agencies.
But as someone who purchases photography, among all the other jobs you have to handle (especially in this economy) isn’t one of them to act on behalf of your client and provide them with the best talent to help execute their campaign?
I would hope you feel like your staff are the best in the business and provide your clients with the best they have to offer. If so shouldn’t you also view finding the best creatives outside your four walls part of your responsibility ?
If not you are essentially creating a firewall around your company and doing your client a disservice. Otherwise it is the same as saying we will only view other creatives work received Wednesdays via postal service in brown envelopes on white post cards between the hours of 10am and 11am by a redheaded postal carrier. 🙂
My point is are you really doing the best for YOUR client? Of course you could also sign up for Adbase and when you have photo requirements you could send out an email to photographers with your clients contact info and we would be happy to contact them directly. This would save you a lot of time and you work on those more important projects you have to take care of.
Sarcasm aside, we are all just trying to do the best we can for our clients and I want to bust my butt to make sure I give you 110%. I want you and YOUR client to walk off set thrilled that I over delivered. But you have to know I exist first.
The only way we as creatives have to reach you in an efficient and cost effective method is services such as Adbase. Do I wish I could call you on the phone and say “Hey Doug, got some great new work, let me buy you a cup of coffee and show you”. But the fact is that is getting harder and harder if not impossible to do.
I love it when an agency is open to having me come in with my book or iPad and show my work. But for many of us depending on where they are located that is near impossible. I would be curious if your company has regular events for reps and creatives to come in an meet over bagels ?
if you take the time to listen to the monthly podcast created by Adbase with Art Buyers you will hear some like email and some prefer mailers. Regardless of which they prefer the common theme is they are all slammed and rarely even have time for a phone call. This means as my potential client you are overworked, underpaid and have no time for yourself, much less us no talent button pushers. LOL
Part of why I am a photographer is because I love working with other interesting and creative people. But, today we are in a virtual world and creatives are hired via phone calls, emails and using Skype interviews. It is unfortunate but I have never met any of my editorial clients face to face.
Sorry, wish it could be different but we are all having to do more with less. You and your clients are beating up on us on licensing issues, production cost and a whole host of other issues. I love doing mailings and coming up with creative promo pieces, but you are buying stock photography for less than it cost me to send you a mailer.
I know its not fair to beat up on you for an article you wrote in 2009 but your comments raise a host of underlying issues. I think Adbase is unfairly targeted in your post because the real issue is an industry issue not anyone company who is licensing database data. Heck how many of us go to the mail box everyday hoping to find some thing fun only to get a stack of junk mail. I don’t blame you as the CD who came up with the design – campaign and I don’t blame the marketing company you licensed the database from on behalf of your client.
We are all working toward the same goal and that is to reach our intended target market. You do this for your client through multiple forms of media. And as creatives who struggling to find ways to delivery our message to you, we are limited as to how we can do that. So please be patient and spare us 15-30 seconds of your time by opening an email now and then. We might even surprise you and you might be able to take credit for discovering the next Irvin Penn.
I am a photographer and have to agree with this post. I have spoken to some AD’s CD’s and picture eds etc. Some open the emails and some hate them. 15 emails a day is a lot. I get 60 emails a day from various sites and clients etc. and it is tough going. These are mostly solicited or from people I know. If I was to receive 15 more a day from people looking for work I think my head would explode. Adbase and Agency Access are necessary for photographers, but I think maybe we should send more postcards. Lets face it, it is more fun to flick through your mail on a coffee break than try to clean up your inbox.
I can’t comment on a true technical glitch but I suspect most of the problems are photographers & illustrators who do not know how to use a mailing database. The key to success in using Post Cards, Agency Access and Adbase is narrowing your mailing. Throwing your work against the wall to a thousand people to see what sticks doesn’t work and causes these kinds of problems.
This is a photographer education problem not a technology issue.
does anyone knows any way to cancel subscription? I made mistake of signing up and now have to pay 50$ month and it sending ads doesn’t bring me any clients. I tried politely ask adbase to cancel my subscription but they said no/ SO I’m basically their slave and have to pay. I don;t have money because I don;t earn any. Can I just cancel credit card so they stop charging? Please help what can I do ?!
Agency Access acquired Adbase as of Sept of this year. So like it or not, the two offenders are now one. The sites will remain independent but will merge databases, so we’re all going to be “spamming” from the same list now. As a photographer who was once receiving solicitations myself (as a designer)– I wish there was a better way! But unless you want to sacrifice time behind the camera to create your own “list” this is the best way to do it. I do think that the mailer is perhaps beginning to feel more special (takes more time and $$) so maybe a well-targeted list of postcards will garner the most attention.
I just made the leap myself to Adbase, after holding-off for several years. Glad I did. You check out my review of both services here: http://castrophotos.com/blog/?p=267
I despise the adbase spam emails that I’m bombarded with everyday. Infuriating. I agree with Doug that the spam only serves to turn me off from the photographers. And to those that say that Doug should have just taken 2 minutes to unsubscribe, please show us how to do that on the adbase website. I don’t see any links or instruction for opting out on their homepage and when I called their office the rep said that she didn’t know how a person can opt out manually.