Whitelisting and Dark Posting are two highly effective marketing techniques that enable brands to interact directly with their target audience, improving engagement and driving ROI. By allowing brands to advertise through influencers’ accounts, both methods provide businesses with access to a larger audience while ensuring the ad resonates with potential customers.
What is Whitelisting?
What is Whitelisting and Dark Posting in influencer marketing? Whitelisting refers to a process where influencers grant brands permission to run paid ads under their own social media accounts.
Whitelisting started around the insight that reality television was on the rise with shows like Jersey Shore starring people with high followings; brands strategized ways they could highlight their products while simultaneously benefiting online personalities. This technique allows the brand to tailor the advertisement to reach specific demographics, test it in various markets, and create different versions based on the audience.
Whitelisiting often involves partnership ad codes. By using Metas tools, influencers can give brands permission to run ads with their assets. By using Whitelisting, brands can increase reach, generate more impressions, and convert audiences more effectively. For influencers, this can be a lucrative opportunity since they can earn extra income without additional effort.
An effective example of Whitelisting is the brand HelloFresh, who frequently collaborates with influencers and actors to create sponsor posts that resonate with the influencer’s target audience. Rent the Runway also relies on whitelisting and dark posting reporting that 94% of their customers come through these techniques.
What is the Dark Behind Dark Posting
Dark Posting, on the other hand, allows brands to create targeted ads that appear on an influencer’s page but do not show up in their feed or profile. These “dark” ads are essentially unpublished posts, designed to reach specific audience segments based on the product offering.
For Dark Posting, all assets are owned by the brand. Brands take the post and publish the content as a social media ad; however, the ad comes from the influencers account without showing up on their feed.
Dark Posting is ideal for brands looking for greater control over their messaging while maintaining the authenticity of influencer content. It can also boost engagement rates and help brands connect with their target audience more effectively.
Rent the Runway, among other brands, utilize dark posting to cater to niche demographics, leveraging custom-tailored ads that appear only in specific target audiences’ feeds. With Dark Posting, influencers don’t need to share content organically, which allows for more strategic ad placement.
How Brands are Working With These Strategies
There are many advantages and disadvantages to Whitelisting and Dark Posting. On one hand, Whitelisting allows brands to gain more control over when and how content is displayed, optimizing paid social media campaigns while strengthening the influencer marketing strategy. However, it does require brands to coordinate with influencers one-on-one, which often demands more time and effort put into making the content.
Dark Posting, while offering control and customization over ad messaging, requires creating fresh assets specifically for the ads, rather than repurposing existing content. It’s particularly effective on Instagram Stories, where influencer ads outperform traditional non-creator ads. Dark Posting can be especially beneficial for brands that already have a well-established process for working with influencers and running social media ads.
Why It’s The Secret Sauce
Both techniques drive significant benefits in terms of engagement and reach. Using these strategies together can increase return on ad spend (ROAS) by up to 20%. It is known that ads with online creators perform significantly better than those without influencers.
While Dark Posting may limit reach to the brand’s account and targeted audience, it still offers more potential for engagement by leveraging the authenticity of influencer-generated content. Whitelisting, with its more pervasive access to influencer accounts, is best suited for brands that have the bandwidth and expertise to manage ad targeting effectively. Whitelisting optimizes a brand’s paid social media campaigns and influencer marketing strategy simultaneously.
In conclusion, determining whether Whitelisting or Dark Posting is the right strategy depends on a brand;s goals, resources, and the level of control they wish to have over their influencer campaigns. Both techniques are powerful tools that, when used correctly, can optimize influencer marketing efforts and deliver measurable results.
