The Problem with The eModel Business Model

The problem with the emodel business model with respect to aspiring models is basic: it is inconsistent not only with online advertising but also the modeling industry. It does not follow the principles of either.

The modeling industry works by commissions. Modeling scouts can earn a finder's fee of about 15%, and modeling agencies receive 10% to 20% of the work they get models.

The internet advertising industry works by commissions, too. Essentially there are two kinds of advertising rates, click-throughs and commissions.

Click-throughs are where a company pays when someone clicks on their advertisement (like a banner ad), and reaches their website.

Commissions are when a company pays only after someone clicks on their advertisement and buys something at their website, joins a program, or signs up for something.

The common denominator in both cases is results. Commissions stress results more, but click-throughs are very similar, because there is the result of getting someone to visit your website.

Most internet affiliate programs today are based on valuable performance. In the early days of the internet, the focus was on eyeballs. If you could just get people to visit your website... and performance was measured by hits, or visitors.

The paradigm shift broke that silly mentality (a bit geeky), to the real-world or offline mindset of results or sales. Today it is difficult to find online affiliate programs which offer rewards (cash) for eyeballs, it is now all about sales.

The internet programming can monitor a visitor to a website store, knowing if the visitor came from an affiliate website, and it keeps this information in the memory, at least for a short time, so the store manager can know if the visitor actually bought something at the store, and didn't just visit.

Internet technology makes it possible to monitor website visitors, also known as traffic, to determine where they came from, i.e., if they visited from a link, such as a banner ad.

Internet technology is also able to monitor return traffic, thereby preventing people who are being paid for advertising from abusing the system by repetitively clicking on the same banner ad.

Internet advertising has limits but one of its greatest strengths is the ability to monitor the effectiveness of online ad campaigns: you know if they are working, and you know if you are getting your money's worth for your advertising dollars.

Traditional print advertising is expensive, but you know who the readers are, at least the publication does, because it has the addresses of subscribers.

Through that information and further research, or questionaires, they are able to determine the demographics of subscribers, and provide this information to anyone interested in advertising.

Certain ads, of course, include a code, so that companies can monitor how effective their advertising dollars are, or they simply come right out and ask the $64,000 Question, "Where did you hear about us?"

The big difference between print advertising and internet advertising is the payment timing. Online you pay only when there are results. With print ads, you pay even if there are no results.

The print approach to advertising could be used online, but why would you want to do that? If you had the choice of paying regardless of results, or paying only when there were results, why would you choose the former?

It makes absolutely no business sense, but this is exactly the approach of anyone who signs up with emodel. They make you pay for online advertising even if there are no results. They make you pay even if nobody clicks to view your picture.

The only fair way for an aspiring model to advertise online and make payments is only when there are results. You should not be forced to pay for something that does not deliver. Internet business does not work that way, nor does the modeling industry.

Your picture in a database is not advertising or promotion. It is only advertising or promotion when it is seen. But you don't know if it will be seen or when it has been seen (unless, of course, you are contacted by a modeling agency). Even if you are not contacted, you will want to know, and you have a right to know if you have been seen.

A business model for an internet modeling company would be more fair if it were similar to the business model for some internet dating companies. Some of them don't charge the singles whose pictures are posted, but only the people who want to contact them.

For example, say there are two people, Tom and Lisa, both singles. Lisa has her picture on a singles website, without any contact information. Tom sees her picture and wants to write her. He then pays the website for her address, about $15, and he can begin to dialogue with her. She then has the right to respond or not, but she never paid, for her it was totally free.

The website shows not only the pictures of the single women, with details about their background and interests, but also the number of times their larger pictures have been viewed. Thus they at least know if they are being seen, even if they are not contacted.

Allison Meyers, a young woman who was approached by emodel.com in West County, Missouri, wanted more information, but she said they would not provide it:

The company wouldn't provide me with specific numbers of how many of their customers actually get jobs. They said they don't track that data.

They wanted money up front but they refused to answer the most basic question.

An internet modeling company should charge the models either per click-through on their thumbnail picture, or when there is a contract that results from the exchange.

One of the most popular search engines, Overture.com, is based on advertising. Companies wishing to advertise are charged per click through, and the cost to the advertiser is noted in the summary of details next to the website address.

The point here is that the technology exists and is being used without difficulty. Models could be charged only when interest is expressed by an agency. The modeling photo database could be set up in a similar format for modeling agencies who were looking for models.

The need for a performance-based modeling photo database system is all the more important when the talent database gets big. The bigger it is, the lower the chances are that models will be seen. The pictures of many models are unlikely to be seen, because they are virtually lost in a sea of faces.

A former scout for emodel wrote: "The scouts work on a sliding commission scale." If they work by commission, why isn't the same approach used for aspiring models?

Why should aspiring models have to pay in advance instead of paying commission for the work emodel does to get them work, like the rest of the modeling industry?

If emodel pays only for results, why should aspiring models have to pay even if there are no results?

WHY IS THERE A DOUBLE STANDARD?

Another huge issue and example of how the emodel business model is fatally flawed relates to the performance and commission issue. It is demand.

An expert on the modeling industry suggested there may be more emodel modeling scouts than there are models in the modeling industry.

To really understand the modeling industry, to see the big picture, one would certainly benefit from knowing its size, i.e., how much money it generates, and how many models work full-time and part-time.

Blackwood-Steele is the parent company of R&L Model Management, the largest commercial model management firm in New York City, and Manhattan's fourth oldest agency. Their clients are the big commercial accounts, and they have hundreds of Manhattan models in their files.

In a guide for aspiring models, entitled, "Modeling Primer for Newbees and Wannabees," Blackwood-Steele said:

As an industry modeling is a small one. In spite of the high profile of a few models, the entire industry is somewhere between $500,000,000 and 1 billion dollars. To put this into perspective, consider the fact that General Motors alone is about a $ 150,000,000,000 corporation. So all of us combined (all over the US) are about 0.6% the size of General Motors.

Although the numbers of models are not readily available, it is still important to consider if there are a lot of empty positions to fill.

emodel seems to infer the modeling industry is both huge and not saturated. Is the modeling industry saturated? Is it growing?

Look at the industries associated with modeling. Fashion, for instance, the most glamorous side of modeling.

There are a fixed number of runway fashion shows every year. Is that going to increase? Besides London, New York, Paris and Milan, are we going to get Fashion Weeks to fill up the rest of the year in all kinds of different cities? Is it suddenly going to change, or is it going to remain the same as it has for years and years?

Next, fashion magazines. A few women's magazines have shut down in the last year or two.

Mademoiselle published its last issue in November 2001.

Mode Magazine, "a fashion monthly targeted to full-figured American women," published its last issue in October 2001. The failure was a result of "difficult economic conditions."

Talk Magazine folded in 2002, partly because of the advertising situation, apparently. It was tough to get advertising revenue. By all accounts, this is a difficult time for advertisers, and a difficult economic climate for magazines.

What about catalogs? Fashion catalogs? Clothing brands publish a fixed number of clothing catalogs every year, don't they? Is that number going to increase all of a sudden? Or will there be a large number of new clothing brands, each with huge catalogs, in the next year or two?

Next question. Are the models in the catalogs of major brands all going to be different in each issue for the next several years? Or will many of them, as is quite common, be the same? If they are the same, how many new models will need to be scouted?

If you look at each sector of the fashion and advertising industry that requires models, break it down and project its future, huge growth is neither guaranteed nor likely.

Unquestionably, there are many girls and women who would like to be models. But that is not going to change the demand of the modeling industry.

Reports of the sheer numbers and aggression of emodel scouts do not reflect the demands of the modeling industry. It is not as if the modeling world could barely exist without emodel.

Models serve the advertising industry, but during a recession, one of the first things or first budgets to be downsized is advertising. Economists suggest we are now in a recession; advertising has been down in different industries, including advertising online.

This simply underscores the idea that demand for models in the next year or two is unlikely to be much greater than it is now, and until there is a big change in the economy, all hype surrounding recruiting to model should be taken with a grain of salt.

B2B

One fundamental business model issue is use of a modeling photo website by other businesses. Will modeling agencies use emodel.com or any modeling website? Will advertising agencies use them?

The success of the emodel.com business model/concept depends on the use of emodel.com by other businesses. If they don't use it, emodel.com is nothing more than "a pile of pictures sitting on servers."

One eyewitness to the emodel approach who works at an advertising agency in New York made the following observations.

I work at an ad agency literally down the block from the NYC office [of emodel.com].

 

In the mornings on my way to work, I would see "model scouts" crowd into vans... God knows they were going to prey on some "starry-eyed model wannabe."

 

At night as I left for work, I would see lines of people waiting for the "open casting calls" (more like cattle calls).

 

I would constantly see these "model scouts" ask semi-attractive people, "Have you ever modeled before?" and proceed to hand them a business card.

 

I knew it was a scam even before I stepped in the office.

 

One day, my girlfriend was asked to come to a call; I went with her.

 

First of all, they claim they have a 5th Ave address. The truth is it's off 23rd Street, and once you walk in the dilapidated building, you know bad things are in store.

 

Once you actually step into their NYC office, which should be swank, and decked out to the hilt, it's absolute SHITE!

 

You would naturally assume that they would have pictures of their models on the walls. A few headshots, a couple of print ads... not a single one. Just some bad stock photography you can pick up at K-Mart.

 

Notice the paint job on the walls... shite. Their make-shift coffee table is actually some crappy storage container used in the back of pickups. BAD BAD BAD.

 

You would think with all the dotcoms going bust in NYC, they could at least sub-lease a half way decent space. NOPE.

 

Last of all, I asked a few good friends of mine -- art directors and producers at very PRESTIGOUS ad agencies -- if they ever heard of eModel.

 

They said no. I asked them how they usually cast models and actors in their ads.

 

"The internet?"

 

"HELL, NO."

 

Total scam. I kept telling my girlfriend, no way... scam all the way. I work in advertising. Things are done the old way. They have their people.

 

This eModel crap may sound like a good idea by making the casting process more efficient, but agency/agents/managers would be the first ones to be pissed off.

 

Think about it... if ad agencies started using the internet it cuts out the agency/agent/manager.

 

Agency/Agent/Manager gets pissed (they lose money). So the next time the agency wants to cast a big name, who is managed by a pissed-off Agency/agent/manager, forget it. They'll jack up their fees to compensate.

 

Also by going the old route, they know they're dealing with pros. You guys should take a look at their website... on the models page they use actual models. Milla Jovavich and Mel Gibson.

 

Come on. Second rate all the way.

 

Needless to say, my GF never paid the $500. Total hustle. Sign before you can even take it to a lawyer. Talk about a hustle and a half.

emodel may "sound like a good idea by making the casting process more efficient." That doesn't mean it will be embraced by modeling agencies or advertising agencies. There is no independent data to prove major or many modeling agencies are interested in working with emodel.com.

When there are serious conceptual questions about the B2B use of emodel.com, back up and examine the origin of the business model.

The founder of emodel apparently was not in the modeling industry when the business model was conceived. He evidently had no background in the modeling industry. There is no indication he understood how it works, or, most importantly, if emodel.com was created in response to demand.

It would be interesting to see the marketing research. If there is any.

Was there anyone or a huge group in the modeling industry who said, "Look, we have a serious problem. We cannot find enough models. All these advertising agencies are calling and they want models, and we cannot deliver. Can someone please help us? Is there any way to use the internet to solve this problem?"

Modeling agencies have open calls and receive pictures mailed and emailed all the time. Some of them say they receive so many pictures, so much interest, they can hardly keep up. If they can hardly keep up with what is sent directly to them, why does anyone believe they are going to have time to scour the internet?

They would only scour the internet if 1) they didn't already have enough models, and, or, 2) they had enough time.

emodel.com has made unsubstantiated claims about the number of modeling agencies which have "registered" at emodel.com. Even if the claims are true, and, again, these have not been verified, registration is not use.

Registration could simply mean hundreds of modeling agencies were mailed a password and username, and thus they are "registered" to use emodel.com. (Modeling agencies have to be registered to use emodel.com.)

The issue is how much if at all emodel.com is being used by key people in the modeling industry. There is talk about a network and access but this ultimately is irrelevant, because access is not use, and even use is not signing of contracts.

One major modeling website boasts of the use it gets, the amount of traffic. But they don't say who the traffic is, and it's an open website. The millions of hits could be aspiring models or anyone who likes looking at beautiful models, not modeling agencies. If the modeling agencies don't have time to scour the internet, then most of the hits are going to be aspiring models and others searching online for beautiful men and women.

The point is there was not solid evidence of modeling industry demand before the emodel.com business model was conceived, and there still isn't solid proof after it was conceived that there is demand. Modeling agencies say they don't use it.

But to get the full picture someone interested in buying an emodel.com franchise for $30,000 should independently find out more information and do their own marketing research.

What is the full set of the relevant statistics?

The emodel.com website doesn't provide this data, and it plastered its main page with pictures of a supermodel.

Was supermodel Kim Alexis discovered through emodel.com?

It is interesting there are no pictures of models.

The definition of success is not finding a supermodel to tout your site as a spokesmodel, it is getting aspiring models work at big-name modeling agencies.

Where are the pictures?

It is very difficult to believe that if their models had signed at major modeling agencies, they would refuse or turn down the opportunity to show off and put the pictures in the center of their website.

And no matter how large or how many pictures of Kim Alexis there are on the emodel.com website, they are never going to be more relevant, and never more effective in marketing than men and women who signed up at emodel and signed up, as a result of emodel, at a prestigious model agency.

Sutherland Models, a modeling agency based in Toronto, Canada, and founded in 1985, makes its major modeling signing the centerpiece of its marketing. On their website, supermodel Shalom Harlow is featured prominently, and noted in the dmoz directory description of the company: "Discovered Shalom Harlow."

It wasn't just that emodel's founder had no background in the modeling industry, but the Board of Directors was also lacking modeling industry management experience. On May 1, 2001, the following astute observation was made in an internet forum:

The board of directors of the company is made up of 7 individuals, only one (Kim Alexis) having the SLIGHTEST thing to do with modeling. The rest are CFO's, Bankers, VP's, former beauty queens, etc.... people with no knowledge of or experience in this business.