For Newbs

An excellent post by Evvie on Ambercutie forums that I found to be very informative and absolutely essential for everyone looking into becoming a cam model and cam models that are new to the profession to read. So I'm re-posting it here, and hope that others re-post and pass on this info as well.

I do not believe that MFC is a good site for beginner models, although you all may change my mind! Here is my argument:

♥ Camming has a steep learning curve. Juggling everything at once and spinning it in to a successful shift where the model is on top of everything takes at least several shifts to get the hang of; and yet, MFC starts punishing models as soon as they log on by reducing their camscore when they don't bring in enough tokens.
The only new models I see with high camscores are models who already have experience working on other camsites.

I've only worked on MFC and SM, but I would call SM more beginner-friendly, and here be why:

♥ Camming has a steep learning curve. When you log in to SM, your ranking is never at risk if you don't earn X amount of money. You can log on for hours at a time to get the hang of things and it will not hurt your ranking.
Now I'm not denying that MFC is a super website. I do believe that an experienced model can make ridiculous amounts of money on MFC in a way that other websites haven't fully harnessed. But I think MFC should be a website that career models sign up for after they've worked a month or two on some other site. MFC is very unforgiving; if you mess up your first five shifts, you're stuck with the camscore you've got until you spend months building it back up again.

Now I'm not denying that MFC is a super website. I do believe that an experienced model can make ridiculous amounts of money on MFC in a way that other websites haven't fully harnessed. But I think MFC should be a website that career models sign up for after they've worked a month or two on some other site. MFC is very unforgiving; if you mess up your first five shifts, you're stuck with the camscore you've got until you spend months building it back up again.

On the same note, this post isn't to imply that SM does take lots of hard work and that good models can't make bank there. I just think that it's much more forgiving.So, what do you guys think? Is MFC a site that's more difficult for beginner models, or am I just a big poo?

[* know that some models that work on SM do spend many full hours working on 'behind the scene' stuff that is important to their careers. From my own experience, when I stopped spending hours of my time social networking on MFC, my earnings dropped to the point where I could not longer make minimum wage. On SM, I don't network at all (even though I probably should do some minor things) and I'm making just as much as on MFC when I did spend all that time doing extras.]

As a follow-up, if MFC holds so many pitfalls for new models, why are so many new models wary of joining a different website? Here are my thoughts.

♥ MFC has a negative-style ranking system. A model will continually be pushed back in the ranks unless she makes X per hour. This puts huge pressure on new models (many of whom don't even understand how the rankings work) and inevitably means that the majority of new models, who cannot compete with established models, will have their camscores tanked by the time they are out of new model status.

♥ New model status, while generally bringing in more traffic for new models, lasts for only 10 hours of streaming time instead of, say, 5 days. This puts extra pressure on an informed model who knows she only has 10 hours to get the hang of MFC, collect regulars, get tokens, and push her camscore up before she's on her own. Models who don't understand the New Model status may just squander the time, not realising that soon they'll be dropping off the radar.

♥ MFC is a website where many models find they need content, games, prizes, raffles, and very interactive shows to be successful. I would be surprised if a new model was able to include such elements to her shows - which, while being money earners she really needs for her camscore - she may be unlikely to manage until she has more experience down the road.

♥ While we know there are some exceptions, once you have an account on MFC, you're stuck with it. No do-overs.

♥ If a model makes early mistakes, it may take months to earn her camscore back, even if she has drastically increased her skill level and really improved her shows.

♥ When a new model logs in, what might she do? A countdown? A nudity countdown? Should she take all her clothes off at once? Should she take only privates? Only groups? Should she use a dildo? Hitachi? What about a shower show? Wax? Lotion? Should she try not being overly sexual and many just hint at things? The possibilities on MFC are endless - which is what attracts a lot of people. But for a new model, the possibilities can be overwhelming.

♥ SM has a positive ranking system that is not dependent on money earned per hour. Your ranking on SM is judged by your Internet speed, your feed quality, whether or not you use a phone, star ratings, and time spent online (apologies if I've missed something). This means that during one day, the longer you stay online, the higher and higher you will be ranked. Your ranking will never be hurt if you stay online for a long period of time without earning money.

♥ New SM models do not need to rely on new model status to boost their accounts before they drop out of the spotlight. I'm not familiar much with how long models on SM are listed as "new", but because SM is not a site with a huge amount of pressure to be perfect when you start and you are always rewarded for time spent online, new model status is not a precious gift to be carefully used.

♥ SM is not a website where models need to spend their own money on prizes, host raffles or do other MFC-esque things; a model can log on, work, log off, and not pay much attention to camming until she wants to work again*

♥ SM support will allow you to create a new account if you want to.

♥ If a model makes early mistakes, it doesn't matter - those early mistakes will not hurt her ranking and by the next time she logs in, her ranking will be back to normal.

♥ On SM, you log on and take exclusives or privates. If you want to do something specific, you can do a GOLD show. There is no anxiety about what kind of show to do that night hours before you get on cam, and no worry that you'll be "out of ideas" when you log on. You log on, get taken to private chats, and work.

♥ It seems like MFC's reputation as a "social" camsite is very attractive to many models, who are afraid to try out another website - even though myself and I believe AlexLady can attest that there is just as much socialization on SM as on MFC.

♥ Even if models are willing to do sex acts in public chat on MFC, they are scared away by sites like SM who advertise with "live sex cams," "sex 24/7".

♥ Many models seem to incorrectly believe that because the payout percentage is higher on MFC, they will make more money. Or, they just can't stand the idea that they earn fewer cents per dollar spent, even if they may make vastly more dollars total on a lower-percentage site.

To read the OP and how others responded click here

Pros about Group Shows

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Social Networking to get Followers

Well I’m in no way a top model or anything, and I still have a great more to learn.
Here’s some basic stuff I’ve learned…
How you get followers. Social networking on Ambercutie Forums and signing up for Twitter are a GREAT start!
Let’s start with Twitter basics:
I personally never liked Twitter back when I first signed up for it under my personal email account and real name years ago back when it first came out. But after becoming a cam model, I learned that this is essential. 

Make sure you tweet a little something at least once every other day, even if you’re not going to get on cam. But you don’t want to get carried away and tweet so much that everybody’s home page gets full of nothing but your minute to minute tweet updates either. I hate that and so does everyone else, it’s the fastest way to get “un-followed” by someone who once “followed” you that’s for sure. No body wants their home page to be all spammed up by one user’s account you know?!
Send out one simple “Hi, I’m on cam guys” tweet right when you go live. After I’m done camming, some times I send a little “thanks for the awesome time on MFC tonight guys. See you tomorrow at [insert time here]”
Every cam model should have a twitter link on their MFC profile… Click those links and follow those women!!! The more models you follow, the more models will follow you. And doing this will put you on the “suggestion” list of people to follow on all of these models followers/fans, and so on and so on. And of course, follow suite by making sure that you also have a clickable link to your twitter on your MFC profile as well.
Remember that even though twitter is a great real time alert advertising resource for you to let people know when you’re on and any deals or specials you might be selling, you never want to give off the vibe that you only tweet for solicitation purposes. You want to use your tweets to give everyone a glimpse into your personality. You want your tweets to be your opportunity to intrigue people into wanting to get to know you more.
Who knew that there was such a science to learning the “art of twitter”. 
Let me get my thoughts and words together for the next few pieces of camming advice.

Basics of cam modeling on MFC in a nut shell

There's good money to be made in webcam modeling and even more money in G/G shows on cam with the proper planning, a good promotion a head of time.

Here is an example of a good promotional ad of a successful webcam show from AedanRayne and Oohthatlady

Here's a screen shot of their show:

There is also good money to be made in selling content of past shows (ie, Photo sets, and videos).

Here's an example ad of content from one of AedanRayne and JolenJolen's past shows:

Like I said, there is good money to be made in webcam modeling. Either from from tips, doing private shows, and group shows.

Here's how getting paid works:

Customers purchase Tokens and then spend these tokens on models through Private shows, Group shows, Voyeur Shows, True Private shows, and Tips.

For all tokens earned by the model, the model is paid 5 cents per token.

For example, if a model earns 2000 tokens during a pay period, the model will be paid $100.00 immediately after the end of the payment period.

The following table explains the cost of each type of session or "show"...

REMEMBER: A token is worth 5 cents to a cam model.

Converting Token amounts to dollars, either take the token amount and multiply by 0.5 or even easier way would be to just divide the amount of tokens by 20.

Now this won't happen every time you're on, but it sure is great when it happens.

In a nut shell
Here's what you're gonna need.

• A valid ID A good (external) web cam, not the one that is built into a lap top, those are crap.
• You'll need your own blog, twitter account, and model status on acf.xxx for social networking purposes.
• You will need to set a schedule on your profile, and stick to it.
• Have a plan before you go on cam, be entertaining. Don't just sit in front of the cam not saying or doing anything.
• Go to myfreecams and study the successful models.
• Get yourself an account on this forum http://www.ambercutie.com/forums/
  And then get verified as a model so you'll have access to the models only section. Best thing I ever did for my cam modeling career.  

That's all I can think of right now.

Happy Camming