$1M Case Study: Hiring an FHM Model
Written by Glen, this post has 64 Comments
I haven’t written about my $1M case study for quite a while so I thought now would be as good a time as any to give an update. If you don’t know anything about my attempt to build a $1M website in 12 months then read the first post here. I wrote follow up posts on buying a $550 domain and my CMS and content strategy.
A few months ago I decided it would be a good idea to hire a model to create videos that would add more credibility to the site. I ended up choosing a girl previously featured in FHM and shot footage (non-adult) of her last week.
Before I go into the details of how I went about hiring a model and getting the necessary paperwork together, it’s probably a good idea to go into the real reasons of why I would want to do this. After all, despite being a typical 20-year old male when it comes to women, I don’t just spend my money for the sake of it.
Why I Hired a Model
I did have the model – let’s call her Sarah – sign an NDA so there wouldn’t be too much risk in revealing who she is but I would rather keep her identity private. Just showing her picture would make her easy to find and I’m sure she doesn’t want to deal with internet marketers trying to uncover what I’m working on.
There were quite a few reasons I decided to hire Sarah so let’s get to them…
Rank in Universal Search
Because my niche is so competitive, I want to give myself every opportunity to get more search engine traffic. Especially from Google. You may have noticed for a number of search queries that videos, images, and even maps show prominently in the results pages.
As it’s probably going to take at least another 6 months for me to rank on the first page for my main keyphrase, I thought I would try and get a video ranking highly in the results. This would take a lot less links than an entire site needs to rank and I could also use the other video ranking factors (views and ratings) to my advantage.
You can see how videos play a part in universal search with this example for Cristian Ronaldo below:
Instead of just making one long video (the main one is around 4 minutes long) I also cleverly asked Sarah to introduce different sections of the video whilst we were recording. This meant that I could chop them up individually and essentially create around 7 different videos from the hour that we spent together.
7 videos means 7 different opportunities to rank in Universal search and get more traffic to my website.
Add Credibility to the Site
I did not hire Sarah to do one of those annoying flash ads where women pop-up and start talking on product websites. I hired her in order to create legitimate, useful videos for my niche and represent her as part of my website. In other words, I wanted to give genuine value to the audience and throw some social proof in there as well.
The industry I’m targeting has mostly male buyers so having a very attractive woman say “Hey, I’m Sarah from Glens Awesome Site.com” is probably going to be enough to convince people the site is the real deal. Which, in fact, it is.
Get Youtube Traffic
Not only can I get more traffic to my site from Google searches that click on the video, I can also get traffic from people who are using Youtube search to find videos. Many of the videos in this industry have millions of views but not one of them had a title that was based around my keyphrase. If my keyphrase is getting 100,000+ searches per month in Google, I’m sure it must be getting quite a few in Youtube.
I haven’t uploaded all of the videos yet but I do expect that they’ll get quite a lot of views. Sarah introduces the website at the start of every video, there is a logo for the site at the end of the clip and there’s also a clickable link in the video description so it should be easy to convert those views into visitors. Having utilised this tactic in the past I know it works well and it certainly wont hurt to have an attractive female in my videos this time.
I Thought It Would Be Fun
If you can’t tell through my writing, I really love the life I live and how I spend my time. If something sounds fun and it’s not going to hurt anyone (except my wallet) then I’ll generally give it a try. I have absolutely no experience working with models, writing scripts, or using video to promote a website, so the experience I could gain was another reason to do it.
Not only did I learn a bit about an entirely new industry and increase my knowledge for the next time I do something like this, but I also had a blast doing it. I shot the video with one of my best friends (so we could have multiple angles) and we were joking around with Sarah the whole time.
The main reason I chose her over the other applicants was not just because she was pretty but because she seemed very chilled and fun in her emails. She personally requested that my release forms didn’t have a hidden clause which meant she had to give me her first child. I liked that. I didn’t want to have to deal with a serious girl who was going to expect a professional set-up for the first time I did something like this.
How the Process Worked
This probably won’t be interesting to most of you so feel free to skip this section. I’ll forgive you. I’m now going to cover exactly how I went about finding a model, dealing with the paperwork and shooting the video. I’m sure a few of you will take something out of this and I personally think the whole process was quite fascinating.
Finding My Girl
The main criteria I had for a model was simply that she must be slim and have a pretty face. That was it. I didn’t care about her ethnicity or her background — there are many variants here in South Africa.
The three ways I looked for a model were:
- Posting an Ad on Gumtree (the most popular classifieds site in this country)
- Creating a thread on a popular model forum in South Africa
- Sharing a tweet saying that I was looking for models in Cape Town
Out of all of these methods, the response rate was quite different. As an estimation, I would say that each strategy received the following number of applications:
- Gumtree: 45
- Model Forum: 8
- Twitter: 3
In the end I was undecided between a girl who applied on Gumtree and one who emailed me but said she found my tweet through a friend. Because of her humour I went with Sarah – the girl who found me via Twitter.
Dealing With the Paperwork
I had never worked in this industry at all but knew that there must be some paperwork involved. My friend Diggy who models (and owned the site in this case study) told me that I must create some release forms which make it clear that I can do whatever I like with the footage. This also protects me in case, for whatever reason, Sarah decides she doesn’t like the work and wants to take me to court.
I found a photography company in Los Angeles who had a lawyer-approved release form that I could use and simply modified it with my company name, address, and so on. The release forms clearly state that the model “must understand that he/she may be shown in media with persons of different ethnicities” which I thought was interesting. I wonder if certain models have had issues with that in the past?
Apart from signing a release form I also asked Sarah to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) so that she wouldn’t talk about my website to anybody. You can’t literally stop people from mentioning it to their friends, of course, but it would put her at legal risk if she was to write about it online or talk about me and the site in an interview.
This site that I’m building could well be the most profitable that I own so I want to keep myself safe from the competition for now.
Shooting the Footage
Before offering Sarah the job I made it clear to her that this would be very unprofessional in the sense that I had never done anything like this before and would be using fairly basic equipment. I didn’t want to have her arrive and expect something completely different.
We used two Sony HD video cameras which are worth around $650 each so it certainly wasn’t amateur equipment but it wasn’t industry standard either. The complex that I stay in has two swimming pools: One indoors which is heated and one outside which is surrounded by palm trees.
We had originally planned to shoot inside but the outside pool looked much better through a camera and the natural light meant that I didn’t have to fiddle with the lighting when editing the movie before putting it online.
The actual shooting time took around 65 minutes and I have around 7 minutes of usable footage. I don’t know if that’s a good ratio, but I have everything that I wanted from the day.
Update in General
Hiring a model was fun and I learned a bit about the process but I’m certainly not relying on it to bring in the majority of the income for the site. As many of you know, my aim is to rank in Google for a very competitive search term and promote a product to the visitors I receive. When I started the site my keyphrase was getting 110,00 exact searches per month. Now it’s getting 140,000 and according to Google Trends that isn’t going to slow down anytime soon. As I own the exact match .com that’s very good news for me.
The site is receiving about 25 visits per day and getting a 20-30% CTR on the affiliate links, even though they aren’t that clear. The numbers are still way too small to make a meaningful income, but I completely expected this. Two weeks ago the site was ranking 357th in Google and now we’re around 228th. This means we’re way back on page 20+ but, again, I completely expect this. As we’re finally building decent links now, we should see the rankings increase substantially.
On that note I should say that I hope you’re not just waiting for me to make this a success before you try to build your own profitable affiliate site. I’ve outlined the whole process over here, in detail. What do you have to lose?
Great post, I like how you keep your formats close to what you think would work on you (correct me if I’m wrong though
“The industry I’m targeting has mostly male buyers so having a very attractive woman say “Hey, I’m Sarah from Glens Awesome Site.com” is probably going to be enough to convince people the site is the real deal. Which, in fact, it is.”
Besides the social proof, you are of course very aware “sex” sells to men anytime. I like the approach on this, it’s creative thinking in an obvious way. Very curious to read how this story continues.
Haha. The industry is something I have an interest in, yeah. That’s how I know that the videos I made can genuinely help people.
I think it will get my videos a lot more views but it’s still down to my copywriting skills (or lack of
) to convert those visitors into buyers.
Thanks for the comment!
Hello!
This article is really interesting. I discovered your blog yesterday, but I wish it wouldve happened earlier. There is so much information around! However I have a question: You wrote in one of your articles (I cant remember which one) that it takes about two weeks to build a mini site which makes money trough affiliate marketing, and make money with it. Is there any way I could get a hold on the step-by-step guide on how to do it? I have read your post thousands-of-dollars-online, however I’m not at all familiar to SEO and stuff like that. Do you have any advice for me? It’s OK if you want to contact me trough email.
Cheers
Hi Rafi,
I prefer communicating through comments
I have had sites which make money in 1-2 weeks but that’s either because I build a site for a competition to start or I find a small, untapped niche. This was over a year ago though and the web – especially affiliate marketing – is just getting very, very competitive.
I took down that guide as I was receiving hundreds of support emails (as you can imagine) and I just didn’t have time to answer them all. That’s the main reason I wrote Cloud Living
I hope that helps.
Hello and thanks for your answer.
Sorry for bothering, as my english is not that good I dont really get it. Do you mean now, that you have put that guide into Cloud Living, or that you have deleted it from the ebook as it was generating too much work?
Thanks in advance for your answer
Hey Rafi,
The main reason I was getting so many support emails was because the free guide was not complete. It was more of an outline, rather than specifics. It left a lot of things out – which is my fault – although it did help a lot of people making money online.
I hope that helps
Hello Glen,
And is this information shared in Cloud Living? If yes then I might buy it now…
Thanks for your reply in advance
Indeed. I’ll be working on an update (buyers get a free copy when it’s finished) in the next few months as well as the industry is fluctuating all the time.
Well then, I just bought it, hopefully it holds your promises
Cheers
Fascinating stuff Glen. Didn’t expect humour too – nice one
Isn’t the pic of ex-S-Clubber Rachel Stevens?
I’m pretty sure it is, yeah. As an awkward side-note i used to be able to sign language their song “reach for the stars” haha.
Interesting, but I still don’t understand why all the secrecy. I know pretty much everyone in this industry doesn’t like to be public about his/her websites, and you are already more transparent than many others. Still, I believe that having a business that you can’t talk about is not very ethical. I was wondering if you have ever thought of this viewpoint and what you think about it.
But you say “Why all the secrecy?” – which is it?
As I stated in the post, I don’t want this girl to be harassed.
There’s a good reason for that. When I revealed a site that was making me money I found at least 20 other sites popping up in the next few days. In fact, people even commented here with the same site niche asking how they can promote it.
I talk about the business to my friends everyday. Parading it online is not going to help me, especially in the early stages of the project.
For secrecy I was referring to domain names. However if you really have that level of competition then I can understand your choice, especially initially. When you will be big tough, maybe some competition will reinforce you
OK thanks, so I was right in the comment below. Interesting when I’ve spoke to you for almost 2 years now, but it’s all good
I recommend you getting in touch with Aaron Wall (SEOBook.com – the biggest SEO website online) and asking him what happened when he revealed one of his own affiliate sites. Rankings tanked, he lost money, and the data he gave away was essentially useless.
Google are good guys on the outside but they have shareholders to please.
I sense your comment was more of a “please tell me the site” rather than you really thinking I’m unethical.
Am I right?
To be honest it’s something I thought a lot lately, so it’s not directed to this case in particular. I asked other people’s opinion too.
I have also suspended my existing affiliate websites last month because I was not aligned with what they were becoming. Right now I’m focusing on other things (studying mac and iphone programming), because that’s my thing. I still want to develop my understanding my affiliate marketing knowledge tough, because I want to build an authority website in the future about something I really like. Sorry if I gave the impression of *you* being unethical, but I was thinking in general.
Ethics are debatable, boys
Glen, as I’ve already mentioned, love this $1M case study and we’re all really looking forward to the progress. I’m an owner of Cloud Living and will be looking forward to the update.
Thanks Moon,
I appreciate your support, as always.
Hi Glen,
That was a really interesting post and definitely useful to someone if they were looking to hire a model for the first time. It seems like quite a daunting task but after what you’ve said it should make it a lot easier.
I hour on a shoot. Wow! that was quick. I’ve done shoots (and TV filming) for 12 hours just for 5 minutes of footage. I hope this works for you. The Youtube idea was a great one. Many people who use that site do not cross over to blogs. It was a good idea to try to amalgamate the two.
Thanks Anne. Now you can see I’m an amateur
Great info, thanks for sharing. If you add up legal costs, the model’s time and equipment costs, etc., what was the approximate cost for producing the entire package of videos?
I replied to this and then closed the tab before hitting submit
Doh!
Anways:
– Legal costs: $0 (A friend sent me lawyer-approved release forms and I already had an NDA from working with various companies)
– Equipment: $0 (They were worth $1,200+ I think but neither of them were mine. I borrowed them from my friends.)
– Model Cost: R1,000 which is about $134
– Video Production: $0 (I edited the footage myself in iMovie)
I hope that helps
Geat post as usual Glen.
Do you find that most new sites get caught up in the Google sandbox initially or do you find it varies by niche? From experience I can start one site and it can take at least 6 months to get anywhere near the top 10 but start another one in a different niche and get to the top 10 very quickly. Both would have similar levels of competition and exact match domains.
I have went very, very slow with this site. Since it was indexed I have not built any links for a good 3 months. Now I’m ramping that up (which is why the rankings are so low) but I’m pretty sure I’ve avoided the sandbox in some forms.
Update as of today: ranking 19th in Yahoo for the main keyphrase. I guess they don’t mind
Just started reading this blog…likin’ what I’m reading. Keep it up man
Thanks TJ
I’ll try my best.
Thanks Glen, seems like a good early stategy. You’ve got to love Yahoo!
Just wish they had more traffic.
Glen,
I’m loving your posts man. I did what you suggested and started an affiliate site. It’s small but it’s something I believe in and feel comfortable putting my name on. I’m tracking with you so I’m hopeful through your help that I’ll turn my site into a small measure of success. Link is in the name if you ever want to check it out.
Thanks Kevin,
Best of luck to you!
Thanks for posting the $1m case study update:
Couple of interesting things: 1) I’m surprised that the model expense was so reasonable… Just goes to show that it’s possible to do something different & interesting on a limited budget.
2) Way to think outside of the box – in two ways a) doing something different, and b) executing a long term success strategy, vs. gaming the system for ‘instant’ results.
Hiring someone is a great idea to promote a website or a product. For instance, I would not make a video featuring myself but if I could hire someone to do it then it makes it easier. Thanks for the idea!
Very cool article, and frankly a subject I’ve never even thought about. I’m blown away each week as you take us all down your path to success. It’s a joy to be along for the ride. Keep up your greatness!
Some guys get to have all the fun! This whole project you’re working on is really intriguing Glen. I’m hoping you eventually create something of an ebook detailing the entire process after you’ve attained success, seeing that Cloud Living was quite useful and easy to follow.
Thanks, Ron!
I’m 99% sure I won’t be releasing an eBook guide about the whole process. If I feel like I have to then I’m not providing enough value in these updates.
I bought cloud living the other day becuase I really enjoy this site and your style of writing, best of luck and look forward to reading more updates.
Greg
Thanks Greg,
Best of luck to you!
You’re my hero man.
I’m the worst hero. No superpowers
This is interesting. I’m looking forward to seeing how things will turn out for you. As usual, you’re always trying and learning different things and that’s a good inspiration for all of us. Thanks Glen!
Good stuff Glen.
I started a site with a similar approach to this case study a few months ago and I considered letting it go after a while, but these posts have inspired me to keep it going, and I’m actually quite confident I can get my site ranked well for a phrase that receives 25,000+ searches per month. I’m ranking 28th for it already, and that’s with minimal link building.
Plus, the more time I spend with this project the more I enjoy it, because the problem with my blog is that it’s so broad that it’s difficult to choose what to write about, but this niche site I’m creating is so specific, and I’m 100% my target market, that I’m weeks ahead with content creation and I publish at least a few hundred words every weekday (with the occasional 900-1000 word guide).
Glen,
I just wanted to let you know I found your blog earlier via the post on TheUniversityKid and you have already skyrocketed to being one of my favorites. I’ve read about 10 posts so far and all of them have been awesome. I also subscribed to your RSS feed and that’s saying something because I am extremely picky about what blogs I subscribe to. And I am now following you on Twitter. Anyway, I just wanted to say hi and let you know that I think you are doing a great job with this blog. Keep it up man! I’ll be back for sure.
Talk to you soon,
Trent Brownrigg
Thanks Trent,
I see Jason (TheUniKid) is a big fan of yours as well
Thanks for stopping by!
Haha, yeah I guess he is a fan of mine, and the feeling is mutual. Btw I am showing this blog on page 2 of Google for viral marketing so you don’t have far to go, but I am sure you already knew that. I can’t believe how good you are at getting sites ranked highly in really competitive niches. I thought I was good at it but you certainly have me beat.
Hi Glen, Fair play to ya! Only came across this blog a little while ago but have been glued to it ever since. You have some really great content here. I’ve learnt loads already!
I’m absolutely fascinated to see how you get on with this project. Best of luck with it.
Cheers,
Neil
Hey Glen,
Great post man. Very insight on the key things that someone who would go into this process can learn quite a bit.
Also thanks for the friend acceptance over at facebook and looking forward to see the 1 mil. project.
Have a great day.
Hrvoje
Topnotch as always. I love the FHM spin and the way you’re breaking down this process in to easy to take in segments.
Glen,
When building out an affiliate site do you recommend always maintaining a blog as a component? Or is a simple html site with all the relevant content already there okay?
If it’s competitive then I build a blog. Otherwise a static site should suffice.
wow this is unique. i’ve never read or seen anyone in this industry to do that kind of tactic. I personally think its a brilliant tactic because like you said, you could instantly kill it with youtube and other smaller video sites. Im also curious on how you basically would utilize your model more to your advantage. Im following this case study and I know I would benefit a lot from it. G’luck.
I think you made a mistake in not hiring me to be your model… oh wait I don’t even have a six pack =P
In all seriousness, I love viperchill man. You stole me away from SEOmoz because I feel you are more transparent and open than anyone else. Keep being transparent for me?
Also, Hiring a model is an example of going above what the competition is probably doing.
I like the idea of chopping the video into seven parts. As long as each can stand on it’s own, the more opportunities to rank the better. Did they all have the same title, or were they variations of the same phrase?
They all have very different titles.
Hi Glen,
Even if this was a complicate process for you, I am sure it will pay off. I agree with the fact that a woman may add a lot of credibility to the website, especially when the most of your buyers are male. Again, another very well thought move and yeah, for us another lesson to learn…
Wish you good luck with your new strategy and let us know how it goes…
I’m loving the new project Glen. Running with videos is an excellent idea – I could see that working for promoting many types of industry/product.
I’m happy to report I crossed the point of no return with my own Cloud Living projects. After 2.5 months working full time on building 8 sites (with the Cloud Living blueprint) I’ve finally got some solid sales rolling in on 2 products. Two others were sandboxed by Google, but thankfully now seem to be getting freed up (they’re still down at page 20 in google search). I had set a goal of covering my rent and now that I’ve hit that, I will stick to the CL approach and won’t be going back to corporate life.
Great to see you blazing a new trail with the 1mill project — and delighted you’re still imparting some SEM nuggets to the rest of us
R
Im interested Glen, with so many people doing affiliation sites and many more starting it from reading your book SURLEY the marketplace is saturated by now. If everyone is promoting these products who is actually buying them?
The 6.8 billion people left on the planet
Glen, once again you are taking things to a new level. I can’t wait to see the results. So how much money total are you planning on investing in this project? Just curious about your return on investment.
Hi Joe,
Around $10-$15,000
Thanks!
Hey Glen,
Two questions.
Is there an easy way to see the exact position a site ranks for a particular keyphrase?
You mentioned you are promoting an affiliate product. Do you think you would make more money creating a product around this keyphrase or at least partnering up and becoming a reseller for an existing product?
This case study really does get the juices flowing and it actually makes me want to focus on a couple of sites that I have let slip over the last few months.
By the way, I think I have a good idea which product your site is promoting.
Can’t wait to see how this turns out. Especially with regard to the video content and this seemingly perfect keyword phrase!
Hi Glen, can’t wait to hear how the experiment goes! Loving the site and kudo’s for all the great articles and advice.
FHM Model?
whats that?, Can you hire me as one if you are interested in me.
Email me, I want to know what you are talking about. Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Sarah