How to land a beauty modeling gig this summer
✅ 5 minutes of your time
✔ Learn how to book beauty models.
✔ Learn how to find the right models for your cosmetics, hair, and body products.
hello. It's the Spotlite where the world's most perfect talent casting happens.
It's a full summer already. Do you have any favorite summer beauty products? Personally, I like to stock up on aloe vera and cooling products starting in May/early summer. Sunblock is also a must. During the hot summer months, sales of cosmetics and body products are especially strong. As a beauty brand, you're probably trying to stand out from the crowd in an increasingly saturated marketplace. As beauty trends change rapidly, and traditional branding and marketing don't work for the MZ generation, your main customer base, you're going to have a lot to worry about. Still, the importance of models hasn't changed when marketing beauty products. Models still play a role in showcasing your product, but the image you're aiming for has changed. How do you find beauty models that appeal to audiences who prioritize inner beauty, conscious beauty (e.g., vegan/organic), and body beauty (health)? Here's everything you need to know about beauty models.
What is a Beauty Model
Overseas, it is usually used in conjunction with face modeling or makeup modeling to focus on the 'face'. In Korean culture, it refers to any model who works for a beauty brand, not just cosmetic models. I mainly promote beauty products like the ones below.
- Cosmetics (foundations, tints, etc.)
- Hair
- Body products
Whereas before it was all about photo shoots and magazines or TVCFs, nowadays it's all about pop-up stores, digital advertising, and social media. They represent the brand and convey a positive image.
More recently, with the rise of men's beauty, many male models have begun to appear in the beauty industry, which was once a male-dominated industry. We've seen a lot of brands like D'Arcy's launching campaigns with videos featuring attractive male models focusing on routine skincare.
How to book beauty models
So where and how do you find, contextualize, and book beauty or cosmetic models?
1) Instagram
The first thing that comes to mind is probably Instagram. Just searching for #beautymodel on Instagram brings up tons of posts. Many accounts have beauty models in their profile bios. Models use Instagram like their portfolio, so it's fine for brands to use it as an initial check. However, the sheer number of hashtags and posts that come up when searching for #beautymodel, #cosmeticsmodel, #modelcasting, etc. can be confusing. Too much unfiltered information can be more of a distraction than a help. And the calibrated photos and videos on the channel may not be enough to give you the exact specs of the model.
2) Agencies
Many domestic agencies have beauty models. The advantage of working with an agency is that they curate and deliver their own model profiles and portfolios, so advertisers can reduce their own resources to find models. But finding the right model for your brand isn't easy, and it can take longer than you think.
3) Generative AI
This is a popular method these days. Using generative AI, you can enter your concept, product name, tone and manner, and style into the prompts to get an image of the ideal model in your mind's eye. The AI-generated images can be merged with the product to create different and creative campaigns that are different from the traditional ones. It's been used recently by smaller brands that can't afford to pay for models and campaigns. However, AI-generated images still feel unnatural and artificial, making them less appealing to customers.
4) Professional Staffing Platforms
The only alternative that will offset the shortcomings of the above three methods and maximize the impact of your brand's campaign is to use a professional staffing platform. It saves you more than 90% of the time and effort of manually searching and sifting through tons of model profiles, and it saves you money by allowing you to work directly with the talent that's the best fit for your brand, with no middleman fees. Many beauty brands have already experienced successful campaigns with Spotlite.
From a domestic derma cosmetics brand to a global brand, Dermaperm is one beauty brand that has experienced a successful campaign. As a global brand, we pride ourselves on diversity and scalability with models from different countries and ethnicities, not just domestic models, so we caught up with British model Bayiin Spotlite for the shoot below.
TOB, a Korean cosmetics company that finds true beauty in natural ingredients, also met with professional beauty model Park Sun-youngand successfully completed a photo shoot. In Sunyoung's case, she has modeled for various beauty brands besides Tove, making her one of our favorite models. Also, most recently, Sarapham, a natural and eco-friendly brand, cast German model Luca through Spotlite. We ended up with a very nice result like the one below! Luca is a model that books up fast, so you'll want to click the link above to check out his profile and see if he's available soon :)