Steve Lightspeed wasn't always the owner of a successful Adult entertainment company. Not long ago, he was just a fan. Yet he was a fan who wasn't satisfied with what he was seeing online. Although he enjoyed the college "cheerleader" niche, those companies that were producing cheerleader content were getting it all wrong. The girls just didn't look like cheerleaders. Believing that he could do better, but knowing next to nothing about photography, Steve Lightspeed ventured into the Adult Internet industry with a brand new company, and without any experience. He had no portfolio and no list of industry contacts.
"I was a surfer, you know, a porn addict basically, and I just kept surfing around and I never really found anything I liked" says Lightspeed. "My personal thing was cheerleaders and there was nobody doing it in a realistic way. Anybody who thinks cheerleaders wear high heels and thong panties has never seen a cheerleader."
Steve's first Adult pay site launched in 1999 when the Adult Internet was booming, but it wasn't until 2001 when he first began to heavily promote his new affiliate program, Lightspeed Cash (www.lightspeedcash.com). By that time the industry had already been saturated with Adult Web site affiliate programs, and elevating a company to from obscurity to celebrated fame and fortune would not be a simple undertaking. Nonetheless, Steve pulled it off... and quickly. Today, when Adult webmasters are asked which company produces the best softcore Adult content for the Internet, many of them point immediately to Lightspeed.
"My idea all along was I'm going to shoot what I like and let other people watch" explains Lightspeed. "We had criticism from the very beginning. It's not enough hardcore, we need to put more makeup on the girls, blah blah blah, and I say, 'Hey, fuck you guys, I don't care what you like, I'm going to shoot it the way I like it. You want hardcore? Go to the other ten million Adult sites.'"
Considering Lightspeed's successful string of Adult Web sites, it's hard to question his methods. While many other photographers were still shooting "cheerleader" content in unconvincing studio settings with fake backdrops and mature models in pigtails, Lightspeed tried the novel approach of shooting persuasive, naturally beautiful models in believable settings. His models certainly appear to be having a good time, and let's face it, don't most of us somehow hope that the average college cheerleader has a sexual wild side that she only likes to show off after the game? Lightspeed's cheerleader content is credible because it gives us exactly what we expect in cheerleader content, and it is popular at least partially because it invites its audience to take part in the fun.
"One of the things that I always insist on is happy pictures" says Lightspeed. "Every picture that we shoot, every thing we deal with, has fun things going on, or the girls just look happy. They're smiling, they look like they're having a good time. I've seen a lot of amateur sites where they're trying to make the girl look dramatic or sensuous or whatever, and a lot of girls can't really pull off the supermodel look, so if you look at anything at Lightspeed, the girls are always smiling."
Veteran Adult actor and producer Dave Cummings (www.davecummings.com) agrees that Adult content is at its best when its stars are having a good time. Cummings takes extraordinary steps to keep his female co-stars comfortable. After all, few porn viewers want to fantasize about having sex with someone who keeps looking at her watch in the middle of giving a blowjob.
So what kinds of things does Cummings try to avoid when creating an Adult video?
"The routine formatted oral, three positions, and a pop shot" says Cummings. "And you see the actor and actresses looking like, 'Okay I'll do you first then you do me, and then let's do doggie and then let's do missionary and then let's do spoon and we're out of here. Ho-hum. Going through the numbers. Where as I try to make the girl have some fun."
Cummings isn't afraid to break out his funny side if a situation calls for an ice breaker.
"I try to get the girl to giggle a little bit. I try to say something funny and I'll compliment her, but not in a phony way" says Cummings. "My content is built around the girl being comfortable physically, emotionally, and sexually."
"I tell them if you're not having a good time let me know because then we'll talk about you trying to act like you're having a good time."
Actress and model Trisha Uptown (www.trishauptown.com) agrees that Adult content producers can get the most out of their stars if they treat them with both dignity and respect.
"No matter what you think of the girl personally you should always make them feel comfortable" says Uptown. She adds, "I have a fake smile and a real smile."
Presenting the fun side of sexuality is a popular approach with successful Adult companies. ATKingdom.com is well known to many fans of Internet-based Adult entertainment. Kim Nielsen, CEO and Founder of AT Kingdom, has also found success in a specific market niche: young amateur models with that "real world" look.
"Some photographers are really good at bringing the model's funnier side out, and we have specific instructions to put the models at ease, to get them to laugh, to, you know, appear as though they're having a great time" explains Nielsen. "We tell photographers right from the get-go that if a model comes across as doing this just for money and she sort of has an attitude, is not smiling and willing to sort of portray all of the positive elements, then just cancel the shoot."
But having a good time while the cameras are rolling isn't always enough. Sometimes content doesn't work simply because its producer has failed to find models who are credible for the target niche. Steve Lightspeed is quick to admit that when it comes to picking models, he relies heavily on his physical attraction to the applicant.
"My interview process takes five seconds. I can look at the girl and if I don't want to have sex with her then I don't want to shoot her either" says Lightspeed. "We're definitely picky. I would say we turn down 90 percent of the girls who apply."
Nielsen, who also rejects his fair share of content, has a different test when considering a prospective model. His primary concern is that a model might appear too glamorous.
"We definitely try to stay away from sort of the typical glamour type model" says Nielsen. "We're looking more for that girl-next-door type of look. I sort of use as criteria, if I was a guy dating a girl and I were to bring her back home to meet my parents, if she would raise their eyebrows too much, and they, you know, sort of, 'Hey, where did you pick her up from?' type of thing, we would probably reject her."
For the type of content that Dave Cummings produces, the look of the model isn't as important. After ten years of starring in Adult movies and videos, Cummings knows that his star power and celebrity persona are assets that can help to add character to his content. His "average guy meets average girl" approach helps create a sexual fantasy that he feels is accessible to his audience.
"They identify with me because I'm not the young, muscular, nice-haired guy" says Cummings. "At the same time, I'm just like a lot of them are, and I get the girls that a lot of them are thinking about when they're walking down the street, in the bank, at Starbucks."
Star power can add a lot to an Adult production, but building up that star power is rarely straightforward. Many actors have tried, but many have failed. Cummings is unique because of his age. It's an advantage that he has not failed to exploit.
"For me it works because I am so old and so different. It won't necessarily work for somebody else who's just one of the same" says Cummings. "I'm different because of my age. Everyone's wondering, 'Gee, I hope he doesn't croak on the set.'"
Of course a good marketing campaign can also play a big role in generating star power. The biggest companies in Adult entertainment have consistently used star power to their advantage. Playboy, Hustler, Vivid - all of these companies have been quite successful in creating new stars and then capitalizing on that star power as a means to add personality to what might otherwise be commonplace content.
Adult film studio Digital Playground (www.digitalplayground.com) has won a lot attention in the Adult entertainment world through the promotion of exclusive contract stars. Known for its popular Adult actresses, including Tera Patrick, Jesse Jane, and newcomer Teagan Presley, Digital Playground relies on its stars when competing for consumer attention. Building up a star's public image is a top priority.
"The personas that are created are certainly built on the girl's own natural qualities" says company spokesperson Adella O'Neal. "They get extensive media training from me before they ever consent to do any interview with anybody."
What works for Adult video producers, however, doesn't always work well on the Internet. Few Internet-based Adult content companies reply on star power. It can be expensive to secure, and Internet porn is often at its best when it convinces its audience that they are seeing something authentic and real. The popularity of "reality" porn sites has sustained for a number of years with no sign of an impending decline. More Adult Internet companies than ever before are focusing efforts on this popular niche.
TopBucks (www.topbucks.com) is a clear leader in the arena of "reality porn" entertainment. Quentin Boyer, Director of Public relations for TopBucks, says the trick to producing good reality content is to balance the need for realism with the need for quality.
"We're looking for a balance between something that looks amateurish enough that it sells as a reality thing and professional enough that you can actually watch it and see what's going on" Boyer said.
When it comes time to develop a scenario for a new reality site, Boyer says his company spends a good deal of time looking at mainstream cultural trends and popular mainstream reality shows. Still, scenarios aside, Boyer believes that every reality site depends on the quality and appropriateness of its models.
"What the reality aspect does is it creates a hook that draws [consumers'] initial interest" explains Boyer. "From that point forward it's the content, the quality of the content, whether or not they like the models."
"I still think that when it comes down to it, what is selling the content is the models, regardless to what kind of scenario you put them in."
But perhaps the biggest advantage of online Adult entertainment is its opportunity for interaction. The Internet is, after all, a powerful communications tool that offers a number of methods of personal exchange; these unique tools can all be used to bring Adult entertainment fans closer to the models and actors, which in turn improves the effectiveness of the content. The more a fan feels like he "knows" a model, the more that model's content will perform effectively for the fan.
"We really try to make it as personal as possible" says Lightspeed. "We let people email the girls, we try to shoot their suggestions whenever we can, they can buy the toys or clothes and the girls can use those in the photo shoots, and then the girls try to answer their own emails and they do their daily journals."
"We have one trick that I've taught anybody who's answering email, to answer every email with a question, or at least end it with a question. A guy feels compelled to answer her again. And then we only answer email once a day. Each guy who writes gets answered once a day."
When true interaction isn't possible, the next best thing is to fake it. If a viewer can't directly interact with the stars then at least the viewer can feel like a participant at the shoot.
"I let the viewer feel like they're actually here during the filming" says Cummings, speaking about his popular video series Knee Pad Nymphos. "I let them see the cameras and the flashes and the tripod cameras, and in the intro I normally tell them, 'Just make believe you're the one getting a blowjob here, it will be a lot more fun for you.'"
AT Kindgom also has a plan to help its audience connect with its models.
"We buy a minimum of about four hours of video content per model as well as the photo sets" says Nielson. "And we tell the photographer to show the model all the way from wearing shorts, blue jeans, everyday type clothes, to how she'd like to dress up if she was going out for a romantic date, and then stuff in between. We ask the photographers to make sure that they capture candid images of the models, candid video of the models. And, you know, show her with her pets. We get the models to submit baby pictures, pics of them growing up, that type of stuff. To submit poetry that they've written, or if they've got any special talents like playing a musical instruments or something we'll try to capture that on video as well, or still photos, or a combination of the two. If they speak different languages we'll ask them to say something to the audience in a different language. We have a very detailed extended model bio which gets into lots of personal details about the model."
At the end of the day there's no one way to add personality to Adult content. Steve Lightspeed found success in a poorly-served niche. He built content that was both fun and convincing. Dave Cummings produces memorable content due in part to his unique look as an actor, but also through his insistence on making his co-stars as comfortable as possible. Cummings would argue that the benefits of being a gentleman are seen in the performances he gets from his co-stars. Digital Playground, on the other hand, commands attention through an impressive lineup of Adult contract stars backed by meticulous marketing and a company dedication to high quality video. AT Kingdom brings its audience close to the "girl next door" by showcasing personality and avoiding excessive glamour. For TopBucks the hook of staged "reality" scenarios is enough to draw a surfer's attention to its models, then nature does the rest.
Adult content that fails to consider the "personality factor" will have a difficult time finding success in today's fiercely competitive Adult entertainment field. For the porn producer who wonders why his by-the-numbers, routine and uninspired Adult video content hasn't resulted in endless lines of eager buyers, well... it's the personality, stupid!
Connor Young is the editor-in-chief of The ADULTWEBMASTER Magazine (www.theadultwebmaster.com).
