A Model Studio

My latest distraction has been the 12^th Annual Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show. The event was held a couple weeks ago at the Kodak theatre in LA, broadcast on CBS, and can be viewed on-demand through a CBS-branded site. Aside from a cheesy, “Eye of the Tiger” intro that network producers probably thought was hysterical, the marketing party with a runway in the middle looks awesome.

But then again, I’ve always had a thing for ethnically ambiguous women with inconceivable BMIs, sporting high heels, Newtonian push-up bras, extravagantly funny hats, and too much glitter. And wings. I love a girl with wings.

To breakup the clips of the catwalk, CBS cut in “Up Close & Personal” segments with the Angels. These included answers to generic questions (“Where did you grow up?” “How’s it feel like to be a model?” “What charities do you work with?”) and requisite montages of pre-pubescent and teenage photos that were themselves broken up by clips of the model on a variety of catwalks.

Similar to the state I’m in when mesmerized by Discovery Channel’s beautiful Planet Earth, I could watch Izabel Goulart vacuum clean and be happily entertained. CBS needs to drop the overproduced, sit-down-interview Q&As, and Victoria’s Secret should hand its models cheap video cameras and have them shoot themselves doing absolutely anything.

Basically, it should do exactly what Ford Models (Tilzy.TV page) is doing and just raised a chunk of cash to do more of. ###

Transitioning into a new media age, the agency is leveraging its assets of beautiful people to become a mini-studio, incubating and marketing its talent through entertainment that costs next to nothing to produce. Their undisclosed investment sum will help the company accelerate its global expansions and give it the financial resources to produce a lot more content from around the world.

Despite, or perhaps as a result of their simplicity, clips of models trying on clothes, models giving bikini reviews, models doing gymnastics and yoga, and models involved in other activities have acquired more than 20,000 subscribers on YouTube alone.

We all know that sexy sells, Ford has simply figured out more ways to easily create and sell it. Other entities need to leverage existing resources to do something similar if they want to stay relevant within the digital world.

A similar model could work for literary agents or publishing companies handing out cameras to writers, sports teams with athlete, bench, and locker room cams, or hip, internet start-ups with camera-friendly employees (it’s been relatively successful for Vimeo). Will Ferrel, Adam McKay, and Judd Apatow have also created quality entertainment for Funny or Die by using downtime on movie sets to their advantage.

Yes, not having legs like Alejandra’s is a drawback, but organizations can definitely come up with other means of attractcting an audience without necessarily being that attractive.