Performing femininity: Comparing self-presentation on childcare and sugar dating platforms

Abstract

The platformization of feminized labor such as childcare and sugar dating introduces new mechanisms for reproducing gender inequalities. On platforms like Babysits and Seeking, visibility determines access to jobs, requiring workers to strategically curate their self-presentation. Drawing on a thematic content analysis of 800 worker biographies from Brussels and Milan, this article examines how workers navigate gendered platform affordances through digital self-branding. We identify three strategies: (1) constructing an authentic self to cultivate trust and credibility, (2) leveraging transitional life stages (e.g. studying, migration) to signal both affordability and aspiration, and (3) adopting stereotypical feminine traits to align with platform logics and user expectations. We argue that self-branding functions as a gendered survival strategy in feminized digital labor markets, employed by workers to reframe reproductive labor as skilled, complex, and capability-intensive. It converts relational, emotional, and gendered performances into client-recognized value, while managing platform incentives and reputational risks.

Introduction

The platform economy has expanded rapidly, mediating a wide range of services, from food delivery and freelancing to caregiving and sex work. Women perform a significant share of this labor (Ticona and Mateescu, 2018), particularly in reproductive work (Federici, 1975) that is increasingly platformized. These jobs combine physical and emotional caregiving, contributing to social reproduction.

Prior research indicates that the platform economy creates new pathways for reproducing gender inequalities (Gerber, 2022; Van Doorn, 2017). These stem not only from labor market dynamics but also from platform design and logic. Many women turn to platform work due to unstable employment and the need for flexible schedules to manage unpaid care (Gerber, 2022). At the same time, platform environments reflect racialized and gendered hierarchies, with algorithms frequently disadvantaging women and people of color (Fetterolf, 2022; Schor and Vallas, 2021) and mediating intimate interactions that pose safety and privacy risks (Recio, 2022b; Ticona and Mateescu, 2018). In addition, this labor is closely tied to workers’ identities, reinforcing stereotypical feminized roles like the nurturing nanny (Schoenbaum, 2016). By positioning women in such gendered roles, platforms perpetuate cultural and occupational hierarchies, deepen precarity, and further obscure women’s labor (Di Cicco & Vandevenne, 2023).

Visibility on platforms is crucial for securing work (Mateescu and Ticona, 2020). Much like in other sectors of the gig economy, individual access to work depends on the ability to negotiate both the apps’ affordances and the assumed expectations of the audience (Ronzhyn et al., 2023). Crafting appealing profiles and building client trust requires emotional and relational labor (Duffy and Pruchniewska, 2017). These dynamics are especially pronounced in domestic and sexual labor, where curated identities and client interactions directly shape the employment relationship (Khan et al., 2024). Thus, profile curation involves a performative dimension shaped by stereotypes tied to femininity.

While platform work has received growing attention, less is known about how platform workers in feminized sectors navigate gendered stereotypes in their digital self-presentation. This study addresses that gap by analyzing how digital self-presentation in biographical narratives from two forms of feminized reproductive labor—childcare and sugar dating—reproduces or challenges gendered stereotypes. We conducted a thematic content analysis of 800 self-authored worker biographies written by women on Seeking and Babysits, collected in Brussels and Milan in September 2022.

We argue that self-branding functions as a gendered survival strategy in feminized digital labor markets. Focusing on childcare and sugar dating, we show how platform-mediated care and intimacy are shaped by intersecting logics of gendered visibility, affective labor, and marketized relationality. Our analysis identifies three core strategies—constructing an authentic self, signaling an “affordable potential,” and performing stylized femininities—through which workers seek to maintain visibility and secure income. By strategically leveraging life transitions, personal traits, and gendered performances, workers transform relational and emotional labor into client-recognized value. In doing so, they navigate platform incentives, manage reputational expectations, and subtly challenge conventional assumptions that care and intimacy are intuitive and inherently feminine. This study thus contributes to ongoing debates on gender, reproductive labor, and self-branding in the platform economy. The following sections review the related literature, outline our methodology, present findings, and discuss implications for future research.

Background

Our research is grounded in the premise that childcare and sex work—examined here through the practice of sugar dating—are linked as feminized forms of reproductive labor, a claim we develop in the first section. We then explore how platformization has made visibility and self-branding central to accessing earning opportunities, creating new challenges for workers. Finally, we examine self-authored biographies as a lens for understanding the gendered dynamics of platform work.

Feminized reproductive labor in the platform economy

Childcare and sugar dating can both be understood as feminized forms of reproductive labor (Constable, 2016). Childcare, often facilitated by labor platforms, connects families with workers for short-term care (Ticona and Mateescu, 2018). Sugar dating involves a transactional intimate relationship—typically between an older, wealthier person and a younger, economically disadvantaged one—also increasingly mediated through digital platforms (Recio, 2022b). While both involve economic exchange, platforms frame sugar dating ¹ as leisure-oriented, blending its transactional nature with stereotypical notions of femininity, such as women pursuing luxury lifestyles (Recio, 2022a). Despite these differences, both constitute reproductive labor (Federici, 1975), providing care, intimacy, and affective support essential for reproducing labor power, even when unpaid or socially framed as leisure. It is precisely this insight that feminist theory on reproductive labor advances in challenging the division between work and non-work (Federici, 1975).

Predominantly performed by women, these jobs are shaped by gendered assumptions about women’s presumed natural roles in caregiving, emotional labor, and sexual availability (Khan et al., 2024). Such expectations drive systemic undervaluation and underpayment. The work is often informal, lacking contracts or social protections, and is frequently performed by students and migrants (Maury, 2020; Nayar, 2017; Pulignano et al., 2023).

The informal nature of these arrangements implies that working conditions are shaped by interpersonal relationships between workers and employers, relying on mutual trust and often latent coercion, rather than enforceable rights (Khan et al., 2024). Consequently, workers are required to perform emotional labor (Hochschild, 1983) to build and maintain positive client relationships, managing their own emotions to foster trust, meet client expectations, and maintain personal boundaries (Khan et al., 2024; Ticona and Mateescu, 2018). This relational dynamic makes self-presentation a crucial aspect of employment, adding a performative dimension to labor (Blyth et al., 2022). These performances are shaped by persistent gender stereotypes. Childcare workers are expected to be nurturing, maternal, and self-sacrificing (Pettygrove et al., 1984), while sex workers are often represented as fulfilling heterosexual male fantasies (Carbonero and Gómez Garrido, 2018). Such portrayals position reproductive labor as an extension of “common female sense” rather than skilled work. These entrenched stereotypes strongly influence how feminized labor is performed, requiring workers to strategically navigate and engage with them to build trust and secure jobs (Schoenbaum, 2016). This is especially evident on digital labor platforms like Babysits and Seeking, two popular platforms in their respective fields that form the basis of our case study. These platforms mediate gendered labor dynamics and shape how workers present themselves online to potential clients. The following section explores the centrality of visibility and gendered self-presentation in these platformized labor markets.

Digital visibility and the labor of self-branding

Digital labor platforms function both as socio-technical infrastructures where transactions are mediated and as “shadow employers” that extract value from workers without assuming the responsibilities typical of traditional employment relationships (Van Doorn, 2017). Childcare mostly occurs informally, while sugar dating often functions as a shadow transactional relationship where financial exchange is downplayed (Nayar, 2017; Pulignano et al., 2023). Moreover, platforms often operate outside formal employment regulations, offering workers flexibility but also exposing them to heightened risks, such as income instability and unsafe working conditions. This deepens precarity by shifting responsibility onto workers (Poell et al., 2021).

Such precarity is further compounded by the ways in which visibility and opportunity are algorithmically distributed. Platform visibility is often governed by algorithmic ranking systems that promote top earners to maximize profits, intensifying competition among workers (Fetterolf, 2022; Mateescu and Ticona, 2020). Moreover, these systems tend to reinforce biases related to gender, race, and ability, with white, cisgender, able-bodied workers generally achieving greater visibility (Fetterolf, 2022; Poell et al., 2021). In this opaque environment, workers rely on trial-and-error strategies to optimize their profiles, investing substantial unpaid time in digital self-presentation (Gandini, 2016). This labor sustains a “reputation economy,” where visibility, rankings, and client feedback become vital forms of social capital (Gandini and Pais, 2020). The intertwining of digital technologies, self-presentation, and reputational dynamics signals a fundamental transformation in how value is recognized and generated within the platform economy (Gandini, 2016). As digital labor platforms proliferate, building an online reputation increasingly hinges on strategies of self-presentation and self-storytelling, enabling workers to differentiate themselves and highlight their skills alongside personal traits (Pera et al., 2016). The ability to curate an appealing online identity thus becomes central to securing economic opportunities.

Workers across various platform sectors adopt self-branding strategies (Duffy and Pruchniewska, 2017). Digital self-branding involves presenting oneself as a valuable commodity through carefully curated and amplified online personas to attract target audiences (Duffy and Hund, 2019; Whitmer, 2019). These practices mirror algorithmic optimization tactics used by professional content creators to boost visibility (Abidin, 2016). Originally applied to everyday social media users (Duffy and Hund, 2019), the concept of visibility labor now extends to platform work, where self-optimization shapes both time and material conditions of labor. In this context, workers must carefully construct professional personas through features such as profile images, experience listings, distinctive attributes, and biographical narratives to secure employment opportunities (Gandini and Pais, 2020). The next section explores how self-authored biographies serve as a central site for gendered self-branding.

Worker biographies as sites of gendered self-branding

Beyond visual elements and metrics—such as profile photos, clicks, or ratings—workers’ self-authored biographies offer a distinct lens into the gendered dynamics of platform work. Biographies require deliberate self-narration, in which workers describe, frame, and justify their labor to appeal both to audiences and platform affordances (Duffy and Pruchniewska, 2017; Gandini, 2016). These narratives constitute a form of visibility labor, translating personality, emotion, and professionalism into marketable identities. As Illouz (2017) emphasizes, digital self-presentation merges affective and economic labor, making authenticity and relational competence both self-expressive and economically consequential.

Workers’ biographies draw on gendered cultural scripts that shape perceptions of value and authenticity. Digital self-presentation often involves performing care and emotional attentiveness, generating value while remaining largely invisible or uncompensated (Jarrett, 2016). In this sense, the logic of reproductive labor extends into digital environments, where maintaining a credible, appealing persona sustains platform economies of trust and perceived authenticity (Federici, 1975; Jarrett, 2016). Self-branding, however, remains largely aspirational, performed with hope but no guarantee of financial reward (Duffy and Pruchniewska, 2017). Biographies thus render feminized labor visible and tradable, connecting contemporary digital self-presentation to historical patterns of gendered work.

Platform design mediates how biographies are written and received, shaping which forms of femininity are rewarded (Ronzhyn et al., 2023; Schwartz and Neff, 2019). Care work platforms typically allow clients to rate workers but not vice versa, whereas sugar dating platforms nudge workers—rather than clients—to emphasize sexualized appearance and indirect financial exchanges, such as gift-giving (Di Cicco & Vandevenne, 2023). Across contexts, workers navigate multiple platforms and broader media ecosystems, drawing on circulating trends, aesthetics, and cultural scripts. Accordingly, biographies translate affective and relational labor into textual performances shaped by platform design, social norms, and gendered cultural imaginaries.

This study examines childcare workers and sugar babies—two groups that combine intimate, in-person labor with digital self-presentation to attract clients. This duality is particularly relevant in feminized, informal sectors, where trust is central to employment relationships (Schoenbaum, 2016). We ask: How do platform workers in feminized sectors perform femininity in the written, self-authored biographies they provide on digital labor platforms? Building on a prior walkthrough analysis of platform interfaces (Di Cicco & Vandevenne, 2023), which found that design and affordances reinforce normative femininity while undermining professional identities, we investigate how workers respond to these expectations. Specifically, we explore whether self-presentation strategies conform to or resist stereotypical imaginaries of femininity and whether patterns emerge across these two forms of feminized labor, highlighting the tensions between platform-imposed logics and workers’ agency in negotiating visibility.

Methodology

Case studies: Babysits and seeking in Brussels and Milan

Founded in 2008, Babysits connects parents with childcare providers and operates in over 90 countries, claiming more than 6 million users (Babysits, 2024). While childcare demand in Europe was historically met through public provision, shortages and austerity have increasingly pushed families toward platform-based solutions (Piletić, 2024). In Belgium, publicly subsidized childcare covers 51.4% of children under 3 years, though access gaps remain (Agentschap Opgroeien, 2025). Platforms therefore primarily serve families with non-standard working hours, occasional needs, or higher incomes seeking supplementary care. In Italy, public childcare is generally high quality but unevenly accessible and costly, with only 26.9% enrolment (Corazzini et al., 2021). Cultural norms also shape childcare arrangements, as more women than in Belgium remain at home with children (Mussino and Ortensi, 2023). Consequently, platform childcare in Italy likely functions more broadly as an extension of informal care networks.

Founded in 2006, Seeking presents itself as a “luxury dating platform” with 46 million users worldwide (Seeking, 2024). Although it formally distances itself from explicit sexual commerce, research shows that sugar dating constitutes the platform’s core practice (Recio, 2022b). These relationships involve instrumental intimacy between a “sugar baby” (worker) and a “sugar daddy” (client) (Nayar, 2017), blurring boundaries between dating and sex work. The platform monetizes subscriptions rather than direct payments for encounters, though financial compensation is often implicitly expected (Recio, 2022b). National governance frameworks shape these practices: Belgium’s regulatory approach renders sex work more visible through licensed platforms and red-light districts, whereas Italy’s tolerance-based system offers minimal oversight, pushing activities into informal spaces (Di Ronco, 2022). Partial criminalization in both contexts likely sustains hidden practices such as sugar dating and contributes to the platformization of sex work.

Childcare and sugar dating both rely on affective, bodily labor (Fetterolf, 2022; Recio, 2022a). Despite their shared basis in feminized reproductive labor, they are rarely studied together (Constable, 2016). Studying them comparatively offers insight into how workers negotiate gendered stereotypes and employ self-branding to manage relationships with clients.

Data collection and analysis

We analyzed 800 self-authored biographies written by women: 200 childcare providers on Babysits and 200 sugar babies on Seeking in Brussels, with the same distribution in Milan. These cities were selected for their comparable socioeconomic contexts (Baertsch et al., 2024) and our linguistic familiarity with Italian, French, English, and Dutch. The top 200 profiles per city and platform category were sampled from each platform’s homepage. To focus on narrative self-presentation, only written biographies were analyzed; images, reviews, and platform metrics were excluded.

Data were accessed using mock accounts tailored to resemble typical users—a prospective employer for Babysits and a “sugar daddy” for Seeking. This approach raised ethical concerns: transparency was important, but revealing our purpose was unfeasible due to strict platform access barriers and frequent deactivation of researcher accounts (Elkin-Koren et al., 2024). To minimize disruption, data were collected immediately after account creation, and accounts were deactivated without initiating contact with other users. To protect anonymity, all quotes were paraphrased—altering wording while preserving meaning (e.g. “I love” became “I adore”). While this may reduce some nuance, an important quality standard in qualitative research, it was necessary to safeguard subjects’ privacy. Moreover, the study protocol was reviewed and approved by the Free University of Brussels ethics committee (ECHW_376).

Data extraction was automated through a Python-based web crawler. For analysis, we employed Braun and Clarke’s (2021) reflexive thematic approach, involving iterative and immersive engagement with the data. Biographies were coded in their original language to retain phrasing and meaning. Both authors independently coded the dataset and then collaboratively refined codes and themes across multiple analytic cycles.

The analysis focused on two key dimensions:

1. Linguistic constructions of femininity, including word choice and self-descriptive patterns.

2. Narrative strategies of identity construction, particularly how workers presented their motivations, skills, and professional ethos within the context of platform work.

Semantic and latent themes were distinguished, revealing underlying discourses and social assumptions (Braun and Clarke, 2021). NVivo software supported data organization and theme development. The codebook is provided as Supplementary Material (Table A1).

Findings

This section presents the findings from our analysis of workers’ self-authored biographies. We identified three self-branding strategies: (1) constructing an “authentic self,” (2) framing work as an “affordable potential self” within broader life narratives, and (3) performing a “gendered, feminized self,” which together illustrate how workers navigate gendered stereotypes in their digital self-presentation.

Across both platforms, worker biographies revealed distinct patterns in structure, content, and language. Profiles were mostly unilingual—English or French for Brussels, and English or Italian for Milan—with multilingual profiles being rare. Both platforms encourage predefined self-presentation scripts through suggested text or gendered tags (e.g. “caring,” “sweet,” “sexy”), which partially explains recurring patterns. Babysits profiles were longer (around 70 words) and narrative, starting with greetings and personal details, followed by work preferences, experience, and skills, whereas Seeking biographies were shorter (around 40 words), brand-like, and elliptical, often omitting pronouns and greetings. Babysits biographies had a 200-character limit, whereas Seeking profiles allowed between 50 and 5000 characters, so these word limits do not explain the observed differences. Instead, they likely reflect platform objectives and audience expectations: Babysits prioritizes trust and credibility through storytelling, while Seeking emphasizes concise, suggestive self-presentation to attract attention quickly. This context sets the stage for examining the three self-branding strategies we identified.

Constructing an authentic self

Conveying authenticity emerged as a central pattern across both childcare and sugar baby profiles. Workers deliberately signaled genuine interest in their roles, frequently blurring personal and professional boundaries. This construction of authenticity was reinforced through the repeated use of terms such as “love” and “passion,” cultivating impressions of sincerity and emotional investment. Childcare workers, in particular, emphasized authentic attachment to the children they cared for and reflected on how these relationships fostered their own character building, thereby portraying their professional role as an extension of their personal identity:

I love children. Watching them g row, learn, and smile fills me with joy. I laugh, trust, and discover new things alongside them. Taking care of kids makes me feel connected to this wonderful world, and spending time with them truly makes me feel like a better person. (Childcare provider, Milan* ² )

For about a year, I cared for two boys—a 3-year-old and an 8-month-old—and became deeply attached to them. I truly loved my work, which is why I continue to seek opportunities to work with kids. (Childcare provider, Brussels*)

A similar discourse emerged among sugar babies, where expressions of “true love” and “mutual understanding” were used to signal sincerity and emotional depth, distinguishing their roles from purely transactional arrangement:

Sometimes I find myself dreaming about my future. I hope to gift my man the blessings of true love, tenderness, mutual understanding, and admiration. (Sugar baby, Milan)

This emphasis on authenticity resonates with broader cultural narratives that romanticize labor—particularly care and affective labor—as a source of personal fulfillment (Zaeemdar, 2024). The valorization of authenticity in care and affective labor stems from post-Fordist “do what you love” narratives (Terranova, 2000), which frame work as self-actualization. Critics argue this ideology masks exploitation (e.g. Duffy, 2017), particularly in feminized sectors where passion justifies inadequate compensation. By erasing labor’s economic dimensions, it reinforces gendered inequities: women are expected to derive fulfillment from self-sacrifice, a dynamic well-documented in care and sex work. Here, demands for emotional authenticity sustain undervaluation and exploitative expectations (Gerber, 2022; Nayar, 2017). On digital platforms, these dynamics are intensified as profiling, self-branding, and user reputation are critical for accessing work. This is especially true for sectors reliant on intimacy and trust (Duffy, 2017; Gandini and Pais, 2020), such as platformized sugar dating and childcare. In our data, sugar babies often communicated trustworthiness by presenting themselves as being emotionally transparent, incapable of deception and naturally straightforward:

An authentic girl who only knows how to be one person—my true self. (Sugar baby, Brussels)

A person who loves life, even with a mind full of thoughts—someone who often acts and speaks without overthinking. (Sugar baby, Milan)

For childcare workers, trust was instead conveyed through demonstrations of responsibility, adaptability, and compliance with both parental expectations and the children’s needs, while underscoring genuine passion for the job:

I care for children with warmth and love, making sure they’re happy while respecting the parents’ rules. (Childcare provider, Brussels)

I understand the responsibility this role carries, so you can feel at ease. I’m supporting my studies, and honestly, caring for, teaching, and spending time with children is truly a joy for me. (Childcare provider, Milan*)

While the specific markers of authenticity differed between the two professions—emotional openness and romantic sincerity in sugar dating versus responsibility and care in childcare—both discourses reflect the romanticized status of intimate labor (Constable, 2016). In reproductive labor, emotional genuineness is expected, despite an economic exchange occurring. Bernstein’s (2007) concept of “bounded authenticity” illuminates this paradox: clients seek authentic emotional experiences within explicitly transactional boundaries, acknowledging the commercial nature of the interaction while demanding emotional investment. This framework can similarly apply to childcare, where affection and emotional investment are constructed as inherent to the service, not optional extras. Just as sex work clients pay for intimacy that feels real, parents pay for care that feels genuine.

The discourse of authenticity in our data reflects the tension between transactional arrangements and expected intimacy. While this tension has long characterized intimate labor (Colen, 1995), platform interfaces amplify it. Workers must perform sincerely while simultaneously managing expectations around compensation in spaces designed to commercialize intimacy. Sugar babies illustrate this dynamic: they navigate platforms officially presented as dating sites, yet whose design implies commodified relationships (Di Cicco and Vandevenne, 2023). As the following quotes indicate, they disavow the label of “arrangement” while signaling economic motives, performing bounded authenticity through platform-specific blends of romantic discourse and financial interest:

I’m not here looking for an arrangement—I’m drawn to ambitious, self-made men whom I truly admire. (Sugar Baby, Brussels)

I’m looking for someone who can stand by my side, who might help me reach my goals, build a good relationship, and share a special kind of connection. I’m attracted to real men—those who know how to handle situations and always know what to do. I like to feel protected. (Sugar Baby, Milan)

This balancing act between emotional sincerity and financial negotiation is further complicated by the blurring of leisure and labor inherent to intimate and bodily work, where the private sphere becomes integrated into the professional role (Carbonero and Gómez Garrido, 2018). Platforms contribute to this by promoting temporal and spatial flexibility and fostering the expectation that users should be constantly visible, available, and emotionally invested (Mateescu and Ticona, 2020). This is particularly relevant for women, who often engage in platform work to navigate the demands of paid and unpaid care work (Gerber, 2022).

Our findings suggest that childcare workers and sugar babies frame their work as a lifestyle or leisure activity, an extension of their authentic selves, rather than as a relentless economic hustle:

I used to volunteer as a weekend monitor in Madrid and really enjoyed it. I miss that experience and hope to resume it here, working with new families and embracing new adventures. (Childcare provider, Brussels)

A Black young woman who enjoys living a luxurious life—traveling, shopping, dining at gourmet restaurants—and, most importantly, taking care of myself and my man. (Sugar baby, Brussels*)

Work as a biographical narrative—Constructing an affordable potential self

A second key theme emerging from our analysis is the portrayal of work as rooted not only in inherently caring or sexually nurturing dispositions, but also as a natural extension of the worker’s biographical trajectory. Across both childcare and sugar baby profiles, workers frequently present their professional roles as logically stemming from their household situations or broader life transitions. This framing casts platform work not simply as a meaningful job, but as a grounding part of a personal journey.

Among childcare providers in particular, caregiving is often portrayed as an extension of roles they already embody in their private lives. Being a mother, an older sibling, or having close familial bonds with children is cited as proof of their suitability for the job. In doing so, they position themselves as individuals for whom caregiving comes naturally (Colen, 1995):

I really looooove children. I have a younger sister who is sixteen, and three wonderful nieces aged eight, seven, and five. (Childcare provider, Milan)

Being the eldest sibling, caring for others has been a constant part of my everyday life. (Childcare provider, Brussels)

These statements reinforce cultural notions of women as innate caregivers (Khan et al., 2024). By aligning their professional identity with their private caregiving roles, workers highlight the authenticity and emotional sincerity of their work. This narrative supports the theme of authenticity discussed earlier, further blurring the boundaries between personal identity and labor (Whitmer, 2019), and between genuine affection and economic transaction (Carbonero and Gómez Garrido, 2018).

Another dominant thread in the data is the representation of work as a temporary step within a period of transition–—most commonly during university studies. References to being a student (592 times) or attending university (465 times) appear frequently, reflecting the large representation of student workers in platform-mediated care and sex work (Maury, 2020; Nayar, 2017). Notably, workers seem to emphasize their status as students to convey a range of strategic messages. For childcare providers, being a student often signals flexibility, part-time availability, and youthful energy—traits considered advantageous in childcare:

I’m 21 and currently in my second year studying Fashion Design at [name school respondent]. Although I’m based in my hometown, I’m happy to travel around the city when needed. I’ve always loved children and enjoy spending time playing with them or helping out with various activities. (Childcare provider, Milan)

I’m a 20-year-old international student currently studying in Brussels. I have a very flexible schedule and plenty of energy to engage and make sure the children have a great time. Feel free to reach out! (Childcare provider, Brussels)

Sugar babies frequently emphasize their student status to signal both youth and economic vulnerability while legitimizing the pursuit of financial compensation. Simultaneously, they present themselves not as “needy” but as ambitious and goal-oriented, emphasizing personal development. In their bios, student identity becomes intertwined with romanticized and eroticized youthfulness—framed as a source of fun, sex appeal, and emotional vitality:

I’m a 20-year-old student facing some financial challenges right now :-(. I’m hoping to find someone who can offer help and support but also build a meaningful connection, which is very important to me. Open to long-distance arrangements. (Sugar Baby, Brussels)

I’m a super young, talented woman with many plans for my future. Ambitious and caring, I’d ADORE to find someone trustworthy to support me in achieving my dreams. (Sugar Baby, Milan)

Sexy and youthful, I have an untamed spirit and an electrifying soul. (Sugar Baby, Milan)

Beyond student status, we also observed many profiles reflecting broader transitions—such as migration, gap years, or exploratory phases. These accounts portray platform work as temporary, with workers emphasizing that their skills, ambitions, or cultural capital exceed the demands of their current role. This framing situates them as overqualified yet affordable, making them especially appealing to clients seeking high value at low cost:

I hold a degree in creative design from [name of the school] and am spending this year exploring and deepening my artistic skills on my own. (Childcare provider, Brussels*)

Hi there! I’m planning to return to college around September or October 2022, but for now, I’m still exploring what path I want to take in life. :-p (Sugar Baby, Brussels)

Together, these narratives construct what we term an “affordable potential self”—a strategic identity that presents workers as temporarily low-cost and accessible alternatives to certified nannies or professional sex workers, due to their life stage or transitional status, yet full of future promise. For parents, platform carers appear cheaper yet competent; for clients seeking intimacy, sugar babies offer a lower-cost alternative to professional escorts while sustaining the fantasy of access to otherwise unattainable women—reflected in Seeking’s slogan: Start Dating Up.

Clients are thus offered an ideal blend: workers who are affordable now but positioned for future success. Emphasis on youth, transience, and framing the work as a student job or hobby reinforces low pay and minimal commitment (Maury, 2020). At the same time, workers signal high value: students cite education; transitional workers emphasize flexibility or multilingualism; carers stress informal experience; and sugar babies highlight academic ambitions—while maintaining a mentee role that affirms the client’s dominance:

I speak Ukrainian and Russian fluently, am proficient in English from living and working in the USA, and I’m currently improving my intermediate French through university studies. (Childcare provider, Brussels)

As a final-year university student, I’m eager to start my life but feel I lack some important insights that only experienced professionals can provide. (Sugar baby, Milan)

Hi, I’m pursuing a master’s in speech therapy, and babysitting offers valuable experience for working with children. I’m available Wednesday afternoons, Fridays and weekend evenings. I’d love to read, do crafts, and assist your children with homework. (Childcare provider, Brussels*)

The construction of the affordable potential self reflects broader platform logic that prioritizes flexibility, short-term engagement, and low-cost services amid oversupply and competition. Both childcare and sugar dating platforms often depict workers as young women and frame the work as casual side-hustles rather than sustainable careers (Van Doorn, 2017). Seeking, for instance, emphasizes a high female-to-male ratio to signal an oversupply of sugar babies (Di Cicco and Vandevenne, 2023). In this context, presenting oneself as simultaneously affordable and aspirational operates as a self-branding strategy that meets client expectations, asserts value, and preserves room for negotiation.

(Re)constructing a feminized self: Demure femininity or defiant brat?

A third overarching theme that emerged from the data concerns how workers (re)construct a feminized self and how they mobilize gendered personas as strategic assets for self-branding.

Across both sectors, workers often reproduce dominant gender norms, emphasizing modesty, emotional restraint, and reservation—traits historically linked to idealized, patriarchal notions of womanhood (Mahoney, 2022). We use the term “demure femininity” to describe this mode of self-presentation marked by composure, attentiveness, and carefully regulated affect. This aligns with Connell’s (1987) concept of “emphasized femininity,” the culturally dominant form that accommodates and sustains male authority. Prior research similarly shows that women in online creative work cultivate a polished, disciplined, and understated “ladylike” persona to avoid appearing overly assertive (Duffy and Pruchniewska, 2017).

Among childcare workers, demure femininity often aligns with the archetype of the idealized caregiver: responsible, affectionate, patient, tidy, and emotionally attuned to others. This persona values listening over speaking, reinforcing a caregiving identity centered around meeting others’ needs rather than foregrounding one’s own:

I enjoy keeping things in order, clean, and cooking, but I believe what children need most is someone who listens, encourages them, and offers genuine care and affection. (Childcare provider, Brussels*)

I’m caring, kind and patient with children, and I’m also able to create a safe environment for them. (Childcare provider, Brussels)

Among sugar babies, demure femininity is crafted as a layered identity, someone who “has it all”: elegant and composed in public, sexually alluring in private. This dual persona echoes the familiar trope of “a lady in the streets, whore in the sheets.” Those who adopt this discourse present themselves as tasteful and intellectually engaging, often signaling poise through colloquial expressions like “no drama.” These traits feed into a romanticized, hierarchical fantasy where the male client occupies a dominant role as mentor, protector, or provider, while the woman remains the refined, receptive, and emotionally attentive counterpart:

I’m a mix of charm and elegance—playful but composed. I can turn heads and hold an intellectually stimulating conversation. Whether it’s talking or listening, I do both with ease. (Sugar Baby, Milan)

I’m not here for drama—only lovely experiences. I’m looking for a teacher, not a fellow student. (Sugar baby, Milan)

I’m drawn to respectful, generous, real men who lead with confidence and let me fully embrace my femininity. (Sugar baby, Brussels)

This demure self-branding resonated with Duffy and Pruchniewska’s (2017) notion of “soft self-promotion”—a strategy commonly used by women in digital labor to remain visible and competitive while avoiding backlash for assertiveness. By foregrounding demure branding, workers navigate a double bind: projecting confidence without violating gendered expectations.

Alongside this restrained narrative of femininity, we identified a contrasting discourse—particularly among sugar babies—that embraces rebellion, directness, and unapologetic self-interest, which we term the “brat” persona. This mode of self-presentation is bold, provocative, emotionally unfiltered, and often infused with humor or flirtation. It contrasts sharply with the sanitized “clean girl aesthetic,” drawing on postfeminist and neoliberal ideals of autonomy, self-expression, and financial independence (Gill, 2007). Analytically, the brat persona aligns with Connell’s (1987) concept of “pariah femininities”: gender performances that disrupt hegemonic masculinity. While potentially empowering, this style can also reduce women to marketable archetypes, reproducing the objectification it seeks to resist (Mahoney, 2022).

In the childcare data, the brat discourse was more subdued, typically manifesting in candid references to financial need or personal goals, without cushioning these statements with expressions of genuine emotional attachment to children or the biographical continuity emphasized in earlier narratives:

I’ve been engaged in horseback riding since childhood. I now have my own competition horse, and that is exactly why I take on extra jobs to help cover his boarding costs. (Childcare provider, Milan*)

In sugar dating, the brat discourse was more explicitly confrontational. Sugar babies who adopted this persona articulated their transactional expectations with unapologetic clarity, often with a playful or seductive tone. They rejected the fantasy of emotional intimacy, reasserting themselves as dominant, self-aware negotiators in the marketplace, making it clear that they—not the clients—were in control:

Been planning on getting breast implants and figured, hey, I’ll just toss that on my Seeking wishlist—but apparently, it’s not something you can click and buy online. So here we are. If you want to pay for them, be my guest. If not, someone else will, so maybe volunteer to help with aftercare instead. (Sugar Baby, Milan)

I live a comfy life and want someone who can give me even more. Tightwads? Hard pass. If you’re not ready to open your wallet, just save us both the time. I’m not here to do charity work—I expect to be paid properly from day one. Thanks. (Sugar baby, Brussels*)

While both childcare and sugar dating require articulating financial expectations, the way this is expressed diverges due to structural differences across platforms. On Seeking, the transactional nature of relationships is formally obscured (Di Cicco and Vandevenne, 2023), prompting sugar babies to either subtly perform demure femininity or adopt bold, brat-like personas to screen unserious clients. Although the latter strategy asserts workers’ agency, it can provoke backlash from clients for disrupting the illusion of emotional reciprocity and undermining the “girlfriend experience” (Carbonero and Gómez Garrido, 2018; Nayar, 2017).

Even in childcare, where this discourse is less extreme, being upfront about pay still carries risks. Workers often struggle with wage negotiation, treating money as taboo (Ticona and Mateescu, 2018). Although platforms offer some transparency, they also exert downward pressure on rates (Schor and Vallas, 2021), individualize negotiations (Mateescu and Ticona, 2020), and frame care work as side-hustles rather than legitimate labor (Van Doorn, 2017).

Together, these contrasting personas illustrate how workers navigate gendered expectations while positioning themselves within unequal platform markets. Demure and brat femininities reflect distinct strands of postfeminist self-management (Gill, 2007): one emphasizing soft self-promotion and accommodation, the other bold self-assertion and strategic defiance. Both are shaped by sector norms, platform constraints, and broader cultural scripts, highlighting how gendered self-presentation becomes a highly managed element of platform work.

Discussion

Across both childcare and sugar dating platforms, workers employ affective, narrative-driven self-branding strategies shaped by client expectations, platform affordances, and governance mechanisms. We identify three overlapping strategies in their worker biographies:

1. Constructing an authentic self—emphasizing sincerity, trustworthiness, and genuineness to build credibility;

2. Constructing an affordable potential self—leveraging transitional life stages (such as being a student or migrant) as assets that signal competence, potential, or cultural fit, thereby conveying market value while maintaining affordability;

3. (Re)constructing a feminized self—performed through two personas: the modest, demure ideal and the assertive, self-interested “brat.”

Interpreted through frameworks of self-branding (Gandini, 2016), visibility labor (Abidin, 2016), and reproductive labor (Federici, 1975; Jarrett, 2016), these strategies show how platform self-presentation operates as a gendered survival strategy. Workers frame reproductive labor as deliberate, skilled, and economically meaningful, positioning platform self-branding at the intersection of visibility economies and historically undervalued care and intimate work.

The first theme extends digital self-branding scholarship into platform-based care and intimacy. While social media research emphasizes authenticity for audience cultivation (Duffy and Pruchniewska, 2017; Whitmer, 2019), here authenticity is integral to the labor itself: curated personas must translate into trustworthy, face-to-face interactions (Duffy et al., 2017). Platforms frame care and intimacy as informal or peer-based (Schoenbaum, 2016), promoting passion-driven narratives that obscure the transactional nature of workers’ engagement. Workers therefore present sincerity to signal reliability, mediate client engagement, and enhance marketability. As an essential component of visibility labor (Abidin, 2016), authenticity becomes a managed resource used to navigate reputational expectations within a precarious digital work context.

The second theme shows that workers’ biographical narratives reflect an agentic—though not always deliberate—process of professionalizing reproductive labor as skilled work. Workers mobilize life transitions as elements of their professional trajectories while presenting them as meaningful milestones of identity formation. In doing so, they repurpose narratives historically associated with feminine care and intimacy into professional assets, challenging both the framing of platform work as mere “hustling” and longstanding assumptions that intimate labor is instinctive and unskilled “women’s work” (Federici, 1975; Jarrett, 2016). Across both Babysits and Seeking, workers recast roles they already inhabit in private life—caregiver, partner, student, migrant—as marketable skills. Cultural and geographical backgrounds become forms of symbolic capital, while temporary life stages are narrated as intentional career phases. Through this narrative conversion, life-course events function as strategic tools for self-branding while remaining subjectively meaningful. Crucially, crafting and maintaining such profiles constitutes a form of visibility labor (Abidin, 2016) that precedes paid work. Before care or intimacy can be monetized, workers must invest unpaid effort in producing credible, affectively authentic selves that make their reproductive labor legible to platform markets (Jarrett, 2016). Our findings extend research on platform work and life-course transitions (Maury, 2020) by showing how biographical storytelling becomes an infrastructural component of workers’ market positioning. The consistency of these strategies across sectors highlights their broader significance: through storytelling, workers reposition their labor as complex, capability-intensive work. At the same time, this strategy reveals a structural tension. The emphasis on authenticity and personal disposition that helps workers establish trust may also reinforce the naturalization that historically underpins the systemic undervaluation of reproductive labor (Federici, 1975). Workers therefore navigate a structural double bind: they render their labor personal to build credibility while simultaneously reframing that personalization as evidence of skill, professionalism, and economic value.

The third theme highlights how workers perform stylized femininities to navigate platforms that commodify affect while masking its transactional nature. Two dominant personas emerge: the “demure”—modest, nurturing, and compliant—and the assertive “brat”—confident, self-interested, and financially explicit. These performances negotiate the material and economic dimensions of reproductive labor (Federici, 1975). The demure persona mobilizes historically feminized ideals as a tactical self-branding strategy, while the brat persona reframes care and intimacy as sites of negotiation rather than naturalized service (Duffy and Pruchniewska, 2017). By rendering gendered affect both visible and marketable, these personas show that reproductive labor is enacted not only through authenticity and biography but also through the strategic cultivation of femininity itself. They also reveal how reputation economies shape gendered branding: demure strategies protect reputational capital, whereas the brat persona risks pushback but asserts agency through financial transparency (Connell, 1987; Nayar, 2017). Self-branding thus functions as both compliance and resistance, allowing workers to navigate value, risk, and agency within constrained platform economies.

Conclusion

Self-branding in feminized gig economies is central to how reproductive labor is made visible and valued. By examining childcare and sugar dating—two sectors rarely studied together—we show how platform-mediated care and intimacy are shaped by shared logics of gendered visibility, affective labor, and marketized relationality. Workers leverage personal traits, life transitions, and stylized femininities as professional assets, transforming relational, emotional, and gendered performances into client-recognized value. Unlike skill-centered platforms such as Upwork (Blyth et al., 2022), these sectors rely on trust, intimacy, and relational care as core sources of market value. This reframes work historically seen as inherently feminine and unskilled as complex and capability-intensive (Federici, 1975). Narrative-driven self-branding mediates client engagement, reputation, and platform visibility while simultaneously reinforcing precarity (Wood et al., 2019), positioning it as a key site where femininity, value, and precarity are co-produced and contested.

Limitations and directions for future research

This study has several limitations. First, the geographical focus was limited to Brussels and Milan. While the urban comparison added little analytical value, cross-platform comparison between Babysits and Seeking was more informative. Linguistic diversity, reflecting market heterogeneity, occasionally complicated coding and interpretation. Future research could focus on a single linguistic or geographic context or expand the scope with systematic categorization by language and region to allow clearer cross-contextual analysis.

Second, the analysis relied solely on publicly visible biographies, excluding backstage practices such as private messaging, negotiation, and platform-specific interactions. These hidden dynamics likely reveal additional strategies for navigating gendered, affective, and economic expectations. Interviews, ethnography, or communication-log analysis could provide a fuller account of platform-mediated intimacy and care work.

Finally, the study focused on two highly feminized sectors—childcare and sugar dating—and included only women. While this enabled analysis of femininity in self-branding, it limits generalizability and prevents assessment of how men or non-binary workers mobilize gendered scripts. Future work could examine other feminized sectors (e.g. eldercare, domestic work) or contrast them with masculinized platform work (e.g. ride-hailing, delivery) to explore how gender norms are reproduced or contested across the platform economy.

Supplemental Material

sj-docx-1-nms-10.1177_14614448261446587 – Supplemental material for Performing femininity: Comparing self-presentation on childcare and sugar dating platforms

Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-nms-10.1177_14614448261446587 for Performing femininity: Comparing self-presentation on childcare and sugar dating platforms by Elief Vandevenne and Margherita Di Cicco in New Media & Society