Build An Adult Camming Site
Camming has revolutionized the adult industry and the way people consume porn. Unlike video, camming is highly interactive. Camming also features real amateur performers, instead of professional pornstars. This is something that a lot of porn consumers want. For those wanting to jump into the camming industry as a webmaster running their own camming site, there’s multiple camming CMS to choose from that make it easy to get started. Here’s all the information on starting your own camming site.
Camming Site Vs Whitelabel Vs Affiliate Site
Before we jump into how to go about building a camming site, let’s first look at how it compares to some of the other routes a camming webmaster could go. Outside of building a camming site, it’s also possible to make money in the camming vertical as a webmaster running either a whitelable or an affiliate site. Here’s how they compare:
Building A Camming Site: Building a camming site can be expensive, involved and high-maintenance. You’ll be responsible for managing models, members and possibly affiliates and studios. There’s also payouts to manage and more legal liability. It’s also worth noting that the camming site success rate is fairly low.
Running A Whitelabel: A whitelabel is where an affiliate / webmaster rebrands an existing camming site. The webmaster earns a percentage of all sales that occur on the whitelabeled version. The company providing the whitelabel manages the hosting, performers, payment processing and other technical aspects. The only requirement for a whitelabel is as domain name.
Camming Affiliate Site: Most the camming sites offer an affiliate program. An affiliate program is where a webmaster earns a commission for all new members referred to a camming site. The camming sites offer promotional tools for the webmasters. There’s also some scripts and tools out there to make it easy to deploy camming affiliate sites.
Which Option Is Right For You?
Now that we know all the different options available, it’s time to decide which option is right for you. If you decide to go one of the other routes, we’ve got tons of content on building out affiliate sites or running whitelabel sites. If you’re still wanting to run your own camming site, we’ve got all the information you need to know.
What’s Required To Build A Camming Site
In order to build out a camming site, you’ll need a couple things. It’s also going to cost some money, but if you’re going at it bootstrapped, it’s not going to be expensive as you might think. There are some CMS and scripts that make the entire process much more turnkey and affordable. In fact; if you go completely bootstrapped, the legal fees will most likely be the most expensive part of getting started. Here’s what is required:
What’s Required To Get Started:
Domain Name: You’ll need a domain name (website name). The price varies based on the TLD (.com, .net, ect) and where the domain is registered through. It’s possible to get a domain name and WHOIS protection for around $25 annually, so this is not a major expense at all.
Web Hosting: You’ll also need web hosting. If you’re partnering with a CMS they’ll have a list of server requirements available. Make sure the hosting is adaquate for the site you’re hosting. Also be sure to make sure the web host is adult-friendly, as not all of them are.
Camming CMS: There are multiple camming site CMS to choose from and it’s recommended to go this route. A CMS (or Content Management System) makes it insanely easy to deploy sites, add content and manage content. Most CMS come with a wide range of features and functionality, and the platform can always be modified as needed for further customization.
Payment Processing: The camming site will also require a payment processor. Make sure that you partner with a “high-risk” payment processor that supports adult-content.
Webcam Models: In order to make a camming site work, you’re going to need performers. This is by far the most challenging aspect to running a camming site. We’ll go more in-depth into this further down.
Legal Requirements: There’s some legal requirements as well. This includes; filing a business, 2257 Compliance, model agreements, ToS, Content Policy and Privacy Policy. More on this later.
Camming Site CMS / Scripts
As mentioned above, there are multiple CMS and scripts that can make it insanely easy to deploy your very own camming site. It is possible to code something proprietary from the ground up, but the process can be time consuming, and if you’re not a savvy coder, outsourcing the development is going to be more expensive than it would be to go with a CMS in the first place. Here’s what is available:
ModelNet: Camming CMS With Model Sharing
ModelNet is a camming site CMS with one very unique and helpful feature. ModelNet has a model-sharing feature that allows webmasters to feature their performers on other ModelNet sites, as well as other ModelNet models on their site. This is insanely valuable, as it eliminates the issue of needing models to attract customers, while also needing customers to attract models. This is by far the largest issue that a brand new camming site will face. Outside of the model sharing feature
Adent XCam: Turnkey Camming Script
XCam by Adent is another option to consider when building your camming site. XCam has all the bells and whistles you’d expect from a camming site, but be aware that there’s not the same model-sharing capabilities as there is with ModelNet. XCam supports member, model and affiliate accounts and everything is documented and customizable. In addition to camming, XCam models can also make money through clip sales and premium social media subscriptions.
How To Recruit Webcam Models
Building the website is the easy part. Promoting it is the difficult part. And even more difficult than marketing to the customers is marketing to the webcam models. First, it’s a tough sale to get a performer to switch from the site they’re already established and profitable on, to a brand new camming site with zero traffic and no customer-base. Many brand new sites will either put performers on hourly or offer 100% payouts initially to ramp up their performer-base. Allowing splitting is pretty much mandatory for new sites as well. This allows webcam models to continue to perform on their main sites, while splitting to your site for that 100% or hourly wage as well.
Marketing To Webcam Models
But first, you must actually find and hire the actual webcam models, which can also be challenging. Especially in post-SESTA world, where it’s much harder to advertise for adult jobs and services. Add to it the fact that many of the social networks are not adult-friendly at all, and the ones that are still do not usually allow adult brand and services to buy ads or traffic from their network. Even though it’s challenging, it’s not quite impossible. Here’s some tips to market to and recruit adult webcam models.
Search Engine Optimization / Model Resources
At the very least, you should have an informational page geared towards potential webcam models on the actual camming site. This should include some form of site-wide navigation, making it easy for any potential webcam models to easily find that page. There should also be a complete and comprehensive model FAQ on the site as well. This should include any and all details relevant to models, including but not limited to: model percentage, what genders are supported, signup process, show types available, cashout options, chargeback policy and descriptions of other site features relevant to performers.
SEO For Model Queries: It is a good idea to try to SEO this page as much as possible. If you can get some organic search engine rankings for model-based queries (IE: “How To Become A Webcam Model”, ect) that will greatly help your site’s ability to prospect and recruit new performers. The more content and resources, the more keywords, queries and traffic your model resources will be able to target.
Building A Model Resource Site: If you want to take it to the next level, there’s many camming sites that have their own niche model recruitment sites. This can help with an additional SEO boost. It’s also easier to setup the navigation specifically for webcam models doing research, rather than have all the model resources shoved into one small section of the site. Another option many sites do is setting up a wiki on a subdomain of the camming site.
Adult Industry Press Releases
When deploying a new site, it’s always a good idea to partner with one of the many adult-industry PR firms for an announcement PR blast. This will get the announcement of the site launch on a wide range of sites, including XBIZ, AVN and YNOT. This will help gain exposure with webcam models as well as affiliates, studios and even potential customers.
Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing is valuable for promoting the site to all parties. this includes customers, models and affiliates. The drawback is that not all social networks are adult-friendly. This can make it difficult to promote any adult sites, including camming sites. There are also some adult-friendly social media sites which can be great for promotion for potential customers, but isn’t as valuable for prospecting potential webcam models.
This is another argument for creating a niche model recruiting site. Because the model lead-gen site doesn’t have any explicit content, it can be promoted through mainstream social networks easier than a model recruitment section of a camming site can be.
Camming Communities and Forums
There’s also a number of camming communities and forums. Most notably AmberCutie and StripperWeb. As these forums are geared towards models, they’re one of the best places to reach models. When making a forum post, be sure to have all the information ready and presented completely. Don’t expect to be able to just make a “Check out my new camming site!” post and have webcam models ditch their current and established site for yours. Be sure to have clear value-propositions / selling points on why performers should ditch their current camming site and choose yours.
Legal Issues For Camming Sites
There are some very important laws that all camming site operators should be aware of. It’s highly recommended to consult with a lawyer and have any documents professionally drafted. You want everything (especially the 2257 Compliance and model agreement) to be air-tight. Here are the major legal concerns facing every camming site operator.
2257 Compliance Record Keeping Standards
2257 Compliance is the age verification and record keeping requirements. Although many camming sites claim themsleves as a “Secondary Producer”, 2257 Compliance and Documentation is still a very important concept and something that all site webmasters should be aware about. It’s also very important that all camming sites verify the age and identity of their performers. This includes requiring performers submit a digital copy of government-issued photo ID, along with a face shot of them holding their ID.
Model Agreement Form
The model agreement form is also insanely important. It’s suggested that a lawyer draft this up, as you need this to be airtight. The model agreement goes over all the terms of the relationship between the performer and the camming site. This includes everything from compensation, to site rules, responsibilities and expectations, prohibited actions and content and more important terms. This is something that every performer will have to agree to before being able to broadcast on the camming site.
Content Policy, Privacy Policy and ToS
These are also very important documents, and they relate to the site members, performers, studios and affiliates. It’s highly recommended that these documents get drafted by an attorney, rather than simply finding a template somewhere on the internet.
Tax Laws and Reporting
All the performers, studios and affiliates working with the camming site are independent contractors. You’ll be responsible for requesting a W9 from each of them (Assuming the site is US-based) and 1099ing them at the end of the year. You’ll also be responsible for filing and paying your own taxes as well.
Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a law protecting copyright holders from digital intellectual property theft. The adult industry (including the camming vertical) deals with tons of piracy. DMCA is one of the easiest ways to get stolen content removed from the internet. For example; most of the tube sites are highly receptive to DMCA takedown requests and will comply with all of them. Unfortunately