Best Match – way of sorting images in search results or portfolio at Istockphoto. This is default setting (others being Age, Downloads, Contributor, Rating, Size, Title). The exact algorithm of how images are ranked in “Best Match” is unknown, and is subject of continuous speculation among community. Exclusive images
are rumored to have a higher weighting in Best Match, as well as image downloads and age. Other factors to likely have impact are views, ratings, relevant keywords, disambiguation status.
“Best Match” is tweaked by Istockphoto from time to time, and sorting algorithm remains one of the closely kept secrets of the industry.
At one point, sales in first few days, had a great impact on “Best Match”. This was discovered by a group of contributors who abused the system by buying each others images, and boosting them in the ranking. Once Istock learnt of this, it banned all offenders.
Most microstocks have their own versions of “Best Match”. See relevant wiki artciles:
Related posts:
- Most popular – Shutterstock (wiki)
- Relevancy – Dreamstime (wiki)
- Relevance – Fotolia (wiki)
- Popularity – Stockxpert (wiki)
- Ranking – Fotolia (wiki)
Tags: best match, istockphoto, Wiki
