How Cam Models Use Multiple Platforms To Build A Profitable Audience

Cam site users want – and expect – a lot from their favorite models. Whether that’s full-blown nudity, dirty conversation, games, or a deeper sense of companionship, camgirls have a lot to offer.

So it’s no surprise that the top models are often found on multiple platforms, including video and clip sites, instant messaging apps, and even competing webcam sites. Why broadcast on one… when you can simulcast on several?

Ultimately, it’s a numbers game.

Using multiple platforms in this way builds better exposure and a potentially more lucrative audience – but what are the different types of platforms out there that models can use, and which are the most effective?

What Do I Mean By Platform?

First and foremost, what do I mean by a ‘platform’?

Facebook is a platform. Twitter, OnlyFans and TikTok are platforms. And yep, Chaturbate is a platform.

Let’s turn to some interesting research published in Sexualities Volume 26, Issue 3.

Jon Swords from the University of York, Mary Laing, and Ian R Cook from Northumbria University studied 54 webcam workers and 55 of their most-used platforms to see how different websites and apps connect.

In their research, titled ‘Platforms, sex work and their interconnectedness’, they explain how they define what is meant by a platform:

“A platform is a digital system which facilitates interaction between third parties,” their article says. They add that this can include business-to-business and business-to-consumer platforms.

Some platforms are designed specifically for sex workers to use (like our trusty favorite adult webcam sites) while others are more general (e.g. social networks with a huge public audience).

While you will find some sex workers who make excellent use of a single platform, most cam girls are leaving money on the table if they inadvertently make themselves ‘exclusive’ at the expense of the other available platforms. This can have some major repercussions as we’ll see below.

Why Do Camgirls Use Multiple Platforms?

Joining a cam site gives new models the basics of a camgirl account, complete with profile page, the technology needed to live stream, their own chat room and direct messaging, and crucially, access to a payment processing platform.

This takes a lot of the leg work of starting a camgirl profile, but in many ways, the responsibility lies with the model to build her audience. Without capturing massive tips from rare heavy spenders (I like to call them the ‘whales’), you will be relying on your fan base’s slow and steady growth to drive revenue.

Exposure across multiple platforms can attract viewers – and regular tippers – who might otherwise never find your cam room.

Diversifying onto platforms that offer direct revenue streams of their own can help further, by adding new types of income to supplement on-cam earnings. This includes everything from custom sexting services, to flogging home-produced porn clips. And, of course, banking on nude selfies.

Tips For Building Your Online Audience

Live sex cam site Cherry.tv tells models to make good use of multiple platforms to sell content and increase their audience:

“The more platforms you are on, the easier it will be for fans to find you. The aim is to be spread across a wide range of websites so you will have a stronger social presence on the internet and gain customers from different types of platforms.“

Cherry.tv recommends:

• Sign up to as many social media platforms as possible
• Link back to your cam room from your social profiles (if allowed)
• Create content (pics, clips or videos) and sell on multiple sites
• Focus on platforms with high traffic to maximise sales
• Make good use of tags and categories to reach relevant buyers

The camsite adds that “consistency is vital when it comes to camming“. Models should aim to upload regularly to the platforms they choose. “The more content you upload, the more views you will receive, which will equate to more money.“

How Can It Boost My Earnings?

New beginner camgirls typically make less money than those with more experience, partly down to building a long-term audience. Rapid breakout success is hard to come by.

The 2024 Cam Girl Salary Report from Ready Set Cam found a link between experience and earnings:

• Beginners (less than 1 year on cam): $40-50 per hour
• Intermediate (approx. 2 years on cam): $60-70 per hour
• Expert (3+ years on cam): $80-200 per hour

“A camgirl with this level of experience can take home as much as $1,000 from a full 8-hour day,” the report said. “Most cam models choose to work less than a full 8-hour day on average though, so earnings for a typical cam model are more like $300 per day for 2-4 hours of work.“

In a separate guide to making money as a camgirl, Ready Set Cam advises: “With experience comes the opportunity to leverage new streams of making money… Camgirls who have multiple streams of income will earn more than those relying solely on their camsite performance.“

Expanding on the $300 figure mentioned above, this guide suggests that new models should expect to make about $200 for 3-5 hours of work, but that top models can make over $10,000 a month – showing the impact of experience, and expansion on to other platforms over time.

How Do Platforms Interconnect?

So there’s good sense behind using multiple platforms – but how can performers connect them together?

This is the number one reason why many performers stick to a single platform. It takes time and resources to promote yourself effectively on one platform, let alone several.

Going back to that Sexualities research, the team suggested that there are two main ways for platforms to connect – which they termed ‘interpenetration‘. (Yikes…)

These include:

• Technical: Connecting via plugins, APIs and cloud services
• Shared Logic: Platforms with similar functionality or design

To investigate the idea of interpenetration, the researchers studied 54 cam worker profiles from an unnamed camsite, focusing only on streamers who had ranked in the top 25 for at least one month during a three-month period.

With this, they hoped to access “an illustrative cross-section of the most active cam workers working online on that platform at that time” and to learn about the types and number of platforms their profiles linked to.

In total, they identified 55 linked platforms, some of which were dedicated to adult content and services, while others had a more general audience but were also used by sex workers.

Which Platforms Are Popular With Sex Workers?

The list of platforms used by sex workers is long and can be broken down into several categories:

Dedicated SW Platforms

• Agency: Third-party agency sites to facilitate in-person sex work
• Content Delivery: Hosts and sells user-generated adult content
• Customer Review: Forums where users can review SWs
• Escort Directories: Profiles/advertisements for in-person escorts
• Individual Websites: SWers own websites/profiles
• Multi-Service: Combines multiple SW services on a single website
• Webcam Sites: Live adult webcam streaming

General Platforms Used by SWers

• Classifieds: Adverts for general products/services including SW
• Dating/Hookup with Adverts: Connect for dating/sex with space for SW advertising
• Dating/Hookup without Adverts: As above but without dedicated advertising space
• Ecommerce: Platforms for online selling of goods and services
• Funding/Crowdfunding: Subscriptions e.g. OnlyFans, Patreon, Fansly
• Link Aggregators: Links to multiple profiles e.g. LinkTree, AllMyLinks
• Online Retail: Third-party selling sites e.g. Etsy, Amazon
• Social Media: Text and media communication e.g. Instagram, Twitter/X
• Software Platforms: Software via subscription e.g. Adobe Creative Cloud
• Streaming Platforms: Live streaming e.g. Discord, Twitch, YouTube
• Web Hosting: Easy hosting spaces e.g. Blogger, WordPress

Using general-audience platforms is not always easy for people who work in the adult industry. A wider public audience can mean exposure to negative perceptions, prejudice and societal taboos.

There are also risks associated with providing personal identity information to platforms, for example during signup, age verification and proof of identity, and then interconnecting those platforms with others whose security settings might be less reliable.

Finally, if you’ve spent any time as a sex worker on a general-audience social network – or as one of their customers – you’ll be well aware of shadow-banning and of profiles being deleted with little to no warning, even without violating terms of service.

If your entire business is built on one platform… it can be a recipe for disaster. Just look back at the cries of outrage when OnlyFans threatened to ban adult content (and was promptly talked off the ledge).

Or when Tumblr launched the banhammer overnight.

All of this adds weight to the idea that you should choose very wisely when building your audience on a single platform. And where possible… diversify.

Which Platforms Do Camgirls Cross-Promote?

The researchers found that six of the 54 streamers’ profiles they surveyed did not link to any external platforms.

Out of the other 48 profiles, a total of 14 different platforms were linked, in addition to the camsite’s own content-sharing site and some performers’ direct email addresses.

Most Linked Platforms From Camgirl Profiles

Twitter (since renamed X) was the platform linked from more profiles than any other, followed by the camsite’s content site, and then Amazon (potentially in the form of wishlist links and/or affiliate shopfronts).

Here’s the full list of linked platforms identified in the research:

1. Twitter (linked from 34 profiles, 63% of those surveyed)
2. Camsite’s media sharing site (33 profiles, 61%)
3. Amazon (17, 32%)
4. Instagram (15, 28%)
5. Snapchat (11, 20%)
6. No links (6, 11%)
7. YouTube (4, 7%)
8. OnlyFans (3, 6%)
9. Personal website (3, 6%)
10. Email (2, 4%)
11. Bras N Things (1, 2%)
12. Discord (1, 2%)
13. Camsite’s own social network (1, 2%)
14. Reddit (1, 2%)
15. Tumblr (1, 2%)
16. WickedWeasel (1, 2%)
17. WordPress (1, 2%)

Interpenetration goes beyond a single layer of links. Out of the 34 profiles that linked to Twitter, 33 of those Twitter profiles then included links to other platforms:

1. Link back to camsite (15, 44%)
2. OnlyFans (12, 35%)
3. Camsite’s media sharing platform (9, 26%)
4. Instagram (5, 15%)
5. AllMyLinks (5, 15%)
6. Own website (4, 12%)

This highlights that interpenetration can work in different directions. A customer might find a performer’s camsite profile first, and then choose to follow them on social networks. Or they might come across a social media post first, and follow links back to their cam room.

I should point out that this research was carried out in 2019, and we’ve since seen a dramatic rise in yet more platforms where camgirls can reach a wider audience. TikTok is a prime example, and a notable omission from the list.

Many cam girls (like Amouranth below) now use Linktree to consolidate multiple social handles in one easy-to-use menu.

Challenges When Connecting Platforms

If it were simple to appear everywhere, all the top performers would already be there, right?

Well… kinda.

There are plenty of challenges when using multiple platforms and connecting them together – and that’s on top of the challenge of building a profile on a single site.

Even at a basic level, performers need to find usernames that are available across all the different platforms they want to use, and decide whether to use a single password that’s easier to remember, or unique passwords that are more secure.

When we rebranded this site to AdultVisor, it took forever to find a workable brand with the social profiles available and in tact. Even then, we had to comprormise with some of the usernames. It’s the same story for models who have built a recognisable name on a major cam site like Chaturbate or StripChat.

Remembering all of these logins is just the start. When using multiple social networks, content sharing platforms and adult-focused websites, there can be significant variations in T&Cs to try to navigate.

What works on X/Twitter will promptly get you blackballed on Youtube. Just ask many of the world’s top adult YouTubers who’ve learned the hard way!

Some more challenges of platform interpenetration include:

• Branding: Building your hustle consistently across different websites
• Payments: Getting paid reliably from multiple content platforms
• Relationships: Remembering your best customers across different websites
• T&Cs: Making sure every post complies with each platform’s T&Cs
• Technical: Connecting platforms (e.g. auto-posting live stream notifications and new video uploads to your socials)

Recognising valued customers isn’t always easy if they use different names on different websites – and they might not want you to contact them on general-audience social networks. Even a simple mailing list is laced with risks in the adult industry.

Still, building a backup following can be a lifesaver if your primary profile gets deleted without warning.

In the Sexualities report, the authors noted that sex workers are often banned from platforms, losing their audience (and the time and effort invested in building it) overnight.

They pointed to research from 2020 by Blunt and Wolf, who found one in three web-based sex workers had previously been banned by a payment processor, often having their funds seized or frozen in the process.

If I had to guess, they probably chose to work with PayPal, the world’s most famous payment processor, and one that takes a pretty dim view of adult content. 😞

What Are Platforms Doing To Help Models?

Despite some of the difficulties that models can encounter, platforms make many things much easier than going it alone.

As mentioned above, registering with a webcam site gives models a profile, a chat room and the underlying technology needed to start streaming. Beyond that, some camsites support instant messaging and a dedicated cam-name email account, clips/content sites and built-in social networks.

But by outsourcing certain functions, platforms can focus on their own business model, while making it easier for performers and content creators to succeed.

The Sexualities article gives several examples of this:

• OnlyFans creators can sign up using Google or Twitter credentials, giving more confidence about account security and making it easier to interconnect with Google and Twitter services
• OnlyFans profiles can include Spotify accounts, allowing sex workers to share playlists of the music they play on cam, as an extra way to socialise
• Facebook logins can be used to sign up for eBay, Instagram, Spotify and Tinder
• Google logins can be used to access Blogger, MyFreeCams and xHamster

Payment processing is also typically outsourced to third parties, and while the largest payment processors are not always willing to support adult-oriented platforms, there is an ecosystem of smaller sex industry processors in place.

Examples include Epoch and Paxum – familiar names to cam site members and models alike – whose transactions typically appear under generic names on bank statements and credit card bills, ensuring that they are not obviously associated with a porn site.

What Are The Future Prospects For Adult Performers?

The ever-growing number of adult platforms, combined with models creating more and more backup profiles, means that the staggering numbers associated with new signups are unlikely to slow down.

OnlyFans chief executive officer Tim Stokely says that the website receives up to half a million new user registrations per day. Not all of these are from adult creators (or consumers), but it’s surely a large share.

Each new link between profiles on different platforms is a potential for problems. “Technical interpenetration can create further risks as platforms outsource account management, meaning that professional and personal identities could be linked via platform technology,” the Sexualities article explains.

But with new apps, APIs and plugins, AI and automation to fall back on when promoting their content, the prospects of adult platforms – and of interconnecting them – is a risk worth taking.

Here on AdultVisor, we are constantly bombarded with press releases about new adult startups and platforms looking to connect cam models with their fans.

There’s no shortage of eyeballs waiting to consume sexy amateur content.

But with only so many hours in the day, the question becomes: which platforms are most likely to drive revenue and engagement? And from those… which platforms are built to last for adult performers?