Models gain voice via social media

By SAMANTHA CRITCHELL

AP Fashion Writer

NEW YORK

Social media is giving a voice to models who, for the most part, have built their careers as pretty, non-speaking faces.

They’ll tweet what they had for breakfast, post behind-the-scenes photos on Tumblr and use Facebook to cultivate “friends” around the world. Tech- savvy fashion followers are eating it up, gaining entry to a world that is so often behind velvet ropes.

“I realized there was an audience interested in what I had to say, not just the images from my work,” said model Coco Rocha, who alternates personal posts and lighthearted tidbits with a more businesslike platform to highlight brands and magazines she’s shooting for as well as her favorite social and charitable causes.

At age 23, Rocha is no longer the new girl in town, but her fan base of more than 200,000 Twitter followers and 66,000 Facebook friends (plus Tumbler, Google Plus and Instagram accounts and blog readers) gives her “longevity,” she said. “Because I have a voice and I’m sticking to having that voice, I feel like I have extended my career.”

Name recognition increases a model’s value, said Sean Patterson, president of the Wilhelmina agency. Models who become celebrities, online or otherwise, might even help reverse the trend of movie and pop stars with “relatable” personal stories taking the A-list advertising jobs and magazine covers that used to go to models.

In addition, social media lets models show the interesting lives they lead off the runway, and it’s a way for chatty, likable personalities to shine. That could tip the balance of who makes it big and who doesn’t, said Michael Flutie, of the E! show “Scouted.”

Flutie, a veteran agent and manager, added that being photogenic is no longer the only requirement: “If you can’t walk and talk, you can’t really be a successful ambassador of a brand. You have to be able to communicate.”

Models also should know how to Google. There’s no excuse for a model with thousands of cyber followers to not know the name of a company’s CEO when she shows up to shoot its catalog, Flutie said.

Liane Mullin, co-founder of Modelinia.com, an online industry hub, notes that models have a lot of credibility when it comes to posts about “fashion, beauty, fitness, nutrition and food. That’s what they’re experts in. If they recommend a mascara, they’ve had it put on them 10,000 times, and I’ve never worn that much mascara myself, then I trust her opinion.”

Models also tend to be very active online once they start. “They’re traveling all over the world, sometimes with people they don’t know, and they’re lonely at times. Social media keeps them company and connected,” Mullins said.