To be thinking about starting adult webcam work?

[StaringAtMyWalls]

I'm in a really bad financial situation.

Due to physical and mental health I cannot work full time, I struggle to even work a part time schedule (good and bad days), but part time isn't nearly enough to pay my basic bills.

I've honestly tried all avenues already - applied for LCWRA and PIP numerous times and keep getting declined even though my issues are genuine, I already live in a cheap area rent wise, cut down all bills.

I'm considering doing webcam work as I could completely choose my own hours around medical appointments, insomnia, and bad days I could take time off. It would reduce my social anxiety as it's behind a screen and if I freaked out I could just shut down the screen.

I am a shy person though and I have a LOT of stretch marks. I'm not sure I have the balls for it tbh.

I don't care if anyone finds out or records me etc, so long as it doesn't massively impact my chances of a 'regular' job - I'm happy to accept that if found out I won't be able to be a politician (!!) or work with children or say as a lawyer (!!), but would it stop me doing care home, retail or cleaning work?

Does anyone have any experience of webcam work?

I doubt you’d even make £350 a week, it’s VERY competitive and you have to be consistently perfect at what you do or the men will lose interest. It’s hard to build up a loyal fan base. Do you have some niche selling point to make you stand out in an oversaturated sea of tits?

I'm not against sex work. But it is not easy work.

To make decent money and keep clients you need to be consistent. If you aren't posting content daily, subscribers get fed up and leave. You have to be sexy even if you're not in the mood. The people earning £££ doing camming part time are people who worked non stop 7 days a week initially and made a name for themselves. There's so much competition out there, you won't be successful by just doing it a couple of days a week as an unknown.

And yes it can affect your other work - I saw a TV show where a lady lost her job as a carer when her boss found out she was doing sex work.

I used to do this (nc obviously)
My friend who is a glamour model and very experienced has given it up thru lockdown as the market is so flooded :(
I used to make about £150 per week logging on for a few hours a night. You CAN make money, but you'd need to put in a lot of hours and the hourly rate therefore wouldnt be great and the market isnt good at the moment. It didnt destroy my self esteem, that very much depends on the person. Ive done lots of jobs, and some have affected my self worth badly but webcam never did.

If you do decide to give it a go,

1. you need to be ecstaticly happy, smiley, enthusiastic. Most important thing ever. Nobody likes a miserable cam worker. Only exceptions to this are women who market the mean and moody or dominatiex thing-but it takes years to build up their niche. Can you do this?
2. you dont need a niche, but you do need a 'thing'thats you. What would yours be? What would you advertise as? What are you happy and unhappy with?
3. PM me if you need anything else.

Being very honest, you’ll need a good niche to make decent money from this; and you’ll need to take requests. People generally won’t pay to see what they can see for free in porn, so the requests tend to be “unique”. Your goal is to build up repeat customers and referrals, so shutting the screen wouldn’t be a great idea. If you think it’s a valid choice for you, go for it, but go into it with your eyes open.

I have a close friend whose business has basically failed in lockdown and so has started an Onlyfans after seeing a newspaper article about someone who makes thousands. She’s barely getting members at £7 a month and the only way she’s making any money is by letting guys send her things in the post and then tell her how to use them. She was imagining vibrators and the like... she got a stapler; a guy wanting her to suffocate herself, someone who wanted her to duct tape her mouth closed with as much stuff as she could fit in it and let him watch. I knew none of this until she ended up in A&E, and she’s made just over £200 in three months.

It’s not an easy choice... a lot of the people who used to work sexy text lines have been pushed into it; too, as texts don’t pay anymore.

Do you think you’ll be okay with that type of stuff? Have you got regular hours you could work; and somewhere you won’t be disturbed?

Don't worry about your stretch marks or your shyness, people like bodies in all different shapes and sizes - it's not all implants and fake perfection.

Be careful about your expectations though, you will struggle to make that sort of money. Definitely to begin with and many people give up and become disillusioned before they get much of a following.

It is unlikely to cause long term problems for your career though, these are just scare stories to deter you. Obviously if you ever get in the public eye your background will come out, but for most people in normal jobs it won't affect you. First, someone has to find it - assuming you don't use your real name, there is so much porn out there it is like finding a needle in a haystack. Secondly, if someone stumbles across it, they will not automatically assume it is you. Think of it this way, if I saw a friend doing sex cam work, my first thought (other than, why am I looking at this?) would be it couldn't possibly be them. Thirdly, you could claim it was di$crimination because the vast majority of sex cam workers are women and therefore it's inherently sexist to penalise former workers.

Have you considered a VA position. There are LOTS of roles out there on indeed for VA’s.
Sex work/webcam work is NOT lucrative and if you want to make the big bucks, you’ve got to put in the time/effort, which you don’t seem to have?!
Look for positions on indeed.com or look on LinkedIn!

Even people with robust mental health find that adult web cam work impacts them mentally. Please don't do this .

I think you'd be better off doing customer services work from home - can you have a google re remote working ops?

I see the financial urgency, but I think web camming will clobber your MH, and also I doubt you will make as much money as you would doing remote call centre etc.

From everything you say about yourself, your state of mind, your mental health and so on...dear God don't.

The people that earn a significant amount of money on places like Onlyfans and Manyvids are usually those who already have a significant social media following.

You are not going to of been the first person to consider it, especially when you read stories of these women making thousands a month by just taking some pictures, not even nude, etc. But that is not reflective of the true reality. Most won't make that much.

A few years ago, the cam girls made more because there wasn't as many doing it. But now, with onlyfans etc. so many are that you really do need to amass a loyal following to be in with a chance of it being a money maker.

So many people are now on webcam work and doing only fans, it absolutely boomed with the pandemic.
The money may not always be as good as its made out to be, most of the people earning loads already have a huge following. Newbies are in so much competition and are been asked to do more and more degrading things to earn money.
I know it's seem like such an easy option when times are so hard but you have to really do your research and ask yourself what your prepared and not prepared to do.
Look at YouTube and recent reports of girls who are doing cam work and their experiences.
But try and find any other job you can or have a clear out and start selling unwanted items.

I know someone who does onlyfans.

She makes around £7 per month, per subscriber, before onlyfans takes their cut. She is asked to do more and more extreme things, and loses subscribers if she doesn't. When she isn't on the webcam she is updating Instagram and tiktok and Facebook trying to get more subscribers, its more than a full time job.

She has had some of her videos leaked onto porn sites alongside her name too and she hasn't been able to get them taken down yet.

Do you think you could talk to perverts asking you to do all sorts of degrading things to yourself for the sake of £7 a month?

It isn't just logging on whenever you choose, there's no money in that. Its a full time job, and if you shut down when you get freaked out then nobody will come back to you, and even the actual cam companies pay you less if you cut the call off, and will dismiss you if you do it a few times.

I really, really don't think this is the job for you

The people that earn a significant amount of money on places like Onlyfans and Manyvids are usually those who already have a significant social media following.
This is an excellent point that a lot considering this type of work overlook. I follow a woman who does OF work and she makes BANK from it (so much to have outrightly bought her own home from it) but she is quite an exception, had a big following first and is very open about how hard it is to break those kind of figures. I think you really need to fill a niche now to have any kind of shot and that leaves the more obscure kinds of fetish porn that you may not be comfortable with.

If you think that it is your only option then try but honestly it's not going to be the answer to your problems.

I also noted you say you need about £350 a week. I don't think you'll be able to find any part time job that pays that much if you have no qualifications or experience. That's full time wage. Where do you love and what are your outgoings if you need almost £1.5k a month? You must be able to reduce your outgoings somewhere.

To PP, how on earth can the OP do cleaning, dog walking etc if she can barely function most days?

Customer service via email and online chat. Look into it.

Onlyfans is flooded and you'll need a strong mind to put up with the shit on there

Definitely find someone else to help with your appeal for PIP, DP also suffers extreme anxiety, panic attacks, insomnia etc and was awarded PIP.

We provided a letter from his GP showing his years of history with it, his various medication etc and used a few websites that explain the point scoring website to help with the answers and his Universal Credit work coach supported him too. I think it helped that he already had a Universal Credit claim and they'd declared him as having limited capability for work.

Are you receiving Universal Credit?

I really feel for you OP. Are you getting any help for your health issues?

@StaringAtMyWalls try Appen jobs, they offer different admin type jobs, working from home transcribing work or internet evaluation jobs, you get paid by the amount of work you submit. There are not full time roles, irregular but something that may help.

OP, be aware that it is a heavily saturated market at present. Only a tiny percentage of people make lucrative money, and they really put the hours in, not only on cam, but on social media promoting themselves. Also be advised that most cam site will take at least 30% + VAT from your earnings too, and as you have to pay to advertise that you are available, you might not break even.

What I would suggest looking through SAAFE and reading not only the articles, but the cam section on their forum too.

Doubt you'll make the money you're hoping for due to the competition but remember the internet is forever and videos travel faster than light.

I should have mentioned that if you are serious about cam work, you will need an area of your home set up with lighting, a decent camera and also an up to date laptop as many of the sites cam software does not work with older models. You will also need some photographs of yourself. They need not be professional ones, but they need to be good enough to entice men in. Also, many sites have private galleries which can bring in a little extra cash too. However, again, you will expect to pay 30% + VAT from anything you earn.

Additionally, do you have outfits? Lingerie? Sex toys? If you do not, then this is problematic as most men will expect this.

Think very carefully before taking this route because if you decide to do so, and if you decide to invest in yourself in order to do cam work, be prepared that even if you have a few good months when you first start, interest can diminish in an instant.

If you do decide to take the plunge, good luck.

Absolutely nothing wrong with doing cam work, and no judgement here. But as PP have said, it's not the silver bullet you're hoping it will be. You've got to have a brand, a niche and build a following. All of that takes time and effort and confidence.

Give it a go if you want to (I agree it's unlikely to be a problem unless you're working in a care providing profession) but consider other avenues too. It's not a long term solution and £350 a week is a lot of money to try to find.

Many of us with significant mental health issues end up in sex work. It is what it is. You may take a while to make anything significant though.

If you struggle with your mental health then the very last thing you should be considering is "cam work".

OnlyFans seems to be the 'YouTuber' of 2021.

Lots and lots of people want to do it, lots of people think it looks easy, but only a tiny percentage will ever make any money from it.

Plus as others have said - because porn is so freely available, you are going to get people asking for stuff they cant get elsewhere. Nasty stuff. Its not something for someone who is desperate with poor MH and PTSD