Getting Started on Model Search

A quick guide to how the platform actually works — from signup to your first booking.

1. What Model Search Is (and Isn't)

Model Search is a self-serve marketplace, not an agency. We don't book you, manage you, or take a cut of anything you earn. Brands — agencies, photographers, production houses — search the platform, and if they want to reach you, they pay to unlock your contact details. You always see who's asking and why before anything happens.

It's free to list here. Always. That's not an introductory offer — it's how the platform is built.

2. Setting Up Your Profile

A few things work differently here on purpose:

• Your display name is first name plus initial only (e.g. "Thandi M."). This is a privacy rule, not a style choice — it makes it harder for anyone to reverse-search you on social media from your public listing.
• Your contact details are never public. Your booking email and Instagram are only visible to a brand once they've paid to unlock your profile — they're never shown to brands who are just browsing.
• Fill in your physical stats, rates, availability, and location honestly and completely. Brands filter on these directly, so an incomplete profile is a profile that doesn't show up in searches it should.

3. Building Your Portfolio

On Model Search, a shoot is the unit — not the individual photo. Each shoot you upload becomes its own album, with its own title, description, and date.

• Upload photos into albums, not as a loose scattered feed.
• Pick a cover photo for each album, and a main photo for your profile as a whole — you can change either any time.
• You can edit an album's title and description, or delete photos, whenever you like.

4. Getting Verified

You'll see a "Verified" badge on some profiles. Here's exactly what it means: a real person on our team has manually reviewed that profile. It's not automatic, and it's not something you can switch on yourself — that's deliberate. It exists so the badge actually means something.

There's no fast-track and no fee. Complete your profile properly, upload real photos, and it'll be reviewed in the normal course of things.

5. How Brands Find and Contact You

Here's the flow, start to finish:

• A brand searches and filters the platform, the same way you'd expect.
• If they want to contact a specific model, they pay to unlock that model's contact details.
• Every unlock requires a shoot brief. No brand can pay to unlock your contact details without telling you what the shoot actually is. No cold, contentless contact requests — ever.
• When a brand pays, their listed contact details — booking email and Instagram handle — are released to that brand. You receive the inquiry in your inbox: the brand's company name and their shoot brief, so you have a record of who asked and exactly what they're asking about.

6. Accepting or Declining

This part matters, so read it properly:

• If you accept, in-app messaging opens between you and the brand immediately.
• If you decline, that's final — there's no re-response once you've decided. The brand is told you declined; nothing about you or your reasoning goes further than that.
• Your accept or decline controls whether in-app messaging opens — it's how you signal whether you want the conversation to go further.

7. Casting Calls

Brands can also post open casting calls — a specific shoot they need models for, with the brief, date, location, and payout attached upfront.

• Browse the public Casting Board any time, no login required.
• Applying to a casting call is free, always — there's no credit cost to models for expressing interest, ever.
• If a brand accepts your application, messaging opens the same way it does for a direct unlock — the casting's own brief covers the "what's this shoot about" requirement, so there's no second form to fill in.

8. Messaging

Once a conversation opens — through a direct unlock or an accepted casting application — it lives entirely inside the app. No phone numbers are ever exchanged through Model Search, at any point, for any reason.

9. Staying Safe on Model Search

A short, honest list of what's actually true about this platform:

• Your contact info is never public — not to brands browsing, not to anyone. It's only released to a specific brand when they pay to unlock your profile.
• No phone numbers, anywhere, by design.
• Every contact attempt carries a real shoot brief. There's no way around this.
• Registration requires you to confirm you're 18 or older, on top of your date of birth — this is never relaxed, for anyone, under any circumstance.
• If something feels off — a brief that doesn't add up, a brand account that seems fake — use the Report button on that brand's profile. It goes to a real review queue, not a black hole.

10. Managing Your Account

You're always in control of your own profile — edit it, take a break by updating your availability, or delete your account entirely whenever you want. If you delete your account, your photos and personal details are removed for good; a few records (like a brand's proof they contacted you) are kept for safety and accounting reasons, never anything more than that.