时尚视频掘金术

    身披毛皮围巾、脚边放着个Celine大手提袋的斯蒂芬妮•霍巴克祖斯基浑身散发着时髦的气息。但曾担任美国大型零售商萨克斯百货（Saks）营销总监的霍巴克祖斯基绝不仅仅是位时髦女郎：还不到两年，霍巴克祖斯基的初创企业StyleHaul就将时尚生活类内容和视频融入了一个可能利润丰厚的网络。

    StyleHaul的视频十分轻快、包装鲜明且制作精良，而最值得注意的是，这些视频都是由外行制作的。现年34岁的霍巴克祖斯基及其团队管理着由800名视频博主、又名播客作者，运营的1,100个频道。时尚初创公司StyleHaul于今年1月完成了首轮融资，共筹得440万美元，RezVen Partners公司是其主要投资者。过去9个月里，StyleHaul的规模增长了一倍，目前每月独立访问数达到了4,100万。据了解StyleHaul的人士称，到今年年底，该公司的收入可能达到1,000万到1,500万美元。

    时装和化妆品公司大都精于营销，但它们往往不会利用新技术来获得丰厚利润。赫斯特出版公司（Hearst Publishers）今年四月推出了Hello Style频道，发布来自《时尚》（Cosmopolitan）、《时尚芭莎》（Harper's Bazaar）以及《嘉人》（Marie Claire）等杂志的内容。（据称，为了让赫斯特出版公司推出这个频道，YouTube向其支付了1,000万美元。）媒体网络公司Glam Media在四年前推出了Brightcove页面。但调研公司康姆斯科（Comscore）最近的一份报告显示，美国12至34岁人群每月在StyleHaul上观看的视频总时长大大高于Hello Style和Brightcove。今年七月，赫斯特与Glam的用户在这两个网站上观看的视频总时长分别是大约10万分钟和60万分钟；而StyleHaul的用户观看的视频总时长长达1.09亿分钟。

    成功的秘诀在哪？StyleHaul的运营模式乍看起来和Machinima.com很像。后者是一家受到核心玩家热捧的游戏网站，经常播放一些热门游戏的试玩录像，有时则是像“洛克人最后完蛋了”这样的讽刺视频。Machinima拥有超过1,500万订阅用户，每月观看数突破10亿。有件事并不令人意外，那就是，Machinima的联合创始人艾伦•德贝沃伊斯和亚伦•德贝沃伊斯同时还和霍巴克祖斯基一同创立了StyleHaul。

    两家网站都把重心放在了社区参与上，而不是仅仅关注于吸引眼球。同时，他们还为外行制作人充当服务平台。StyleHaul吸引了许多深谙时尚的“大腕”，或者说是制作人，他们为StyleHaul网络制作了许多时装和美容系列短片。StyleHaul在2010年刚刚成立时，霍巴克祖斯基频频接触YouTube上的知名制作人，希望他们能加入StyleHaul，成为会员。不过仅仅过了一年，StyleHaul席卷全球，无数才华横溢的制作人希望能投身其中，为自己的专属频道添砖加瓦。霍巴克祖斯基称：“我们的社区充满激情。我们正在寻找志同道合的人。”StyleHaul目前有34名员工，其中8人专门负责筛选合适的合作伙伴。

    Stephanie Horbaczewski, a fur shawl draped over her shoulders and a Celine tote propped at her feet, radiates chic. But the former Saks marketing executive is much more than an impeccable fashionista: in less than two years, Horbaczewski's startup StyleHaulhas fused lifestyle content and video into a potentially lucrative network.

    StyleHaul's videos are crisp, cleanly packaged, well-produced and, most notably, created by outsiders. Horbaczewski, 34, and her team manage a community of 1,100 channels, run by 800 video bloggers -- or vloggers. The fashion startup closed its Series A in January, raising $4.4 million with RezVen Partners taking the lead. The company has doubled in size over the past nine months and now serves an audience of 41 million unique viewers a month. It could bring in between $10 million and $15 million in revenue by the end of this year, according to a person with knowledge of the business.

    As savvy as fashion and beauty firms have been with their marketing, many have struggled to adapt emerging technologies to turn significant profits. Hearst Publishers' launched its Hello Style channel, which features content from brands like Cosmopolitan, Harper's Bazaar, and Marie Claire, in April. (YouTube (GOOG) reportedly paid the company $10 million to launch the channel.) Glam Media launched a Brightcove (BCOV) page four years ago. But both ventures trail StyleHaul drastically in the minutes of video viewed per month among 12-to-34 year olds in the U.S., according to a recent Comscore (SCOR) report. In July, Hearst and Glam viewers watched about 100,000 and 600,000 minutes of video, respectively; StyleHaul kept users watching for a staggering 109 million minutes.

    How? The model for StyleHaul's success seems, well, unlikely: Machinima.com. That site, on which one can watch a trailer of the latest Halo game or the satirical show "Mega Man Dies At The End," is beloved by hardcore video gamers. Machinima has more than 150 million subscribers and over a billion monthly views. Not surprisingly, Machinima co-founders Allen Debevoise and Aaron Debevoise also co-founded StyleHaul with Horbaczewski.

    Both sites focus on community engagement over merely attracting viewers. They also serve as networks for outside producers. StyleHaul hosts fashion-savvy "influencers," or producers, who create style and beauty series for its network. When the company first launched in 2010, Horbaczwski and her team reached out to popular YouTube users in hopes of convincing them to be StyleHaul members. By 2011, the company was overwhelmed with the number of talented applicants hoping to create content for their network. "We're a very passionate community. We're looking for people who share the same, for lack of a better word, ethical standards," says Horbaczewski. Of its 34 employees, eight are dedicated to reviewing StyleHaul influencer applications.