W Magazine was looking for a new top model on Instagram. The winner of the model search, which was held in partnership with Instagram and IMG Modeling Agency and supported by Coach, would appear in the September Issue of W Magazine, in a fashion story shot by photographer Mario Sorrenti and styled by W's creative fashion and style director Edward Enninful. 5 finalists would be chosen out of the pool of applicants, and one would be named the winner. The objective was to discover new talent on Instagram that would change the face of fashion.
For the contest, W Magazine, IMG, and the judges created a hashtag on Instagram to announce the competition. Over 22,000 users submitted via the #WmagModelSearch hashtag on instagram, and W's editors and IMG modeling scouts looked through all of these submissions. W and IMG also built an entry page with legal rules and regulations where users could submit photos of themselves, and answer questions in a more detailed way. The IMG modeling scouts and combed through every single entry looking for girls who had the potential to have real careers as models.
W, IMG, Instagram, and Edward Enninful all supported the campaign on their social media accounts - Twitter, Facebook, Instagram.
The competition was narrowed down to 5 finalists by the judges and 1 winner. After the winner was announced, there was a people's choice winner named. Voting took place on W's website.
The winner, Alexis Primous, was shot for the September issue of W Magazine by Mario Sorrenti. She also appeared in a digital editorial for wmag.com. The people's choice winner Blair Bohuny was also shot for a digital editorial for wmag.com. Both models have had successful careers so far and continued their relationship with W Magazine. IMG signed all of the winners and runner's up to their agency, as well.
The campaign was a huge success for all parties - Instagram was able to demonstrate that its community is talented, IMG was able to sign future models, W Magazine was able to reach a new audience and demonstrate its status as a talent scout in the industry, and Coach received alignment with the program and key integration into social media posts and programming.
