The Definitive Guide to Negotiating Brand Partnerships for Creators: Part II — Demystifying Content Boosting, Licensing (Whitelisting), Dark-posting
This is part two of a nine part series for creators who want to improve their hand when negotiating brand partnerships. If you tuned in for part one, Exclusivity & Monetizing Opportunity Cost, feel free to skip the intro and dive right in.
Introduction for the unacquainted
The saying knowledge is power holds true for every profession and industry. Any power disparity in professional partnerships can and will be exploited to the detriment of the party with lesser knowledge.
Having worked with social content creators for the past 5 years, I have seen this dynamic on full display. Influencers who negotiate for themselves unknowingly make concessions leaving huge amounts of revenue on the table.
On the other hand, creators who put this knowledge into practice thrive. The secret to their success isn’t working harder. It doesn’t require more followers or producing more content.
It’s quite simple: as a creator, if you want to earn more income from brand partnerships, you need to negotiate from a position of strength, with a full understanding of the meaning, implications, and value of specific conditions of your contracts.
You do not need a lawyer or a talent agent to utilize the knowledge any of these terms. However, if you are not aware of them, you are likely earning less than half of what you could be as a creator.
Having reviewed thousands of brand partnership contracts for creators and spent time on both sides of the negotiation table, I’d like to share a guide to the secrets that have enabled creators to double their brand partnership earnings almost overnight.
In part II of this guide, we’ll focus on “Content Boosting, Licensing (Whitelisting), and Dark-posting — some of the most nuanced and underutilized terms when it comes to brand partnership agreements. We’ll cover what each of these terms means, why they are important, and how to negotiate them to your benefit as a creator.
Disclaimer: the following is not legal advice, nor should it be used to replace the guidance of certified legal, tax, or accounting professionals.
Boosting / Licensing (Whitelisting) / Dark-posting explained
Estimated increase to contract value: +5–40%
What they mean:
There are a variety of platform-specific terms for it, but if your client is planning to dedicate a budget to amplify your content on social, you should be charging for it.
- Boosting allows you to allocate funds to increase the otherwise-organic reach of a post or story on Instagram, TikTok, or other social platform.
- Licensing (formerly known as “whitelisting”) requires that you provide permission to your client within Instagram that allows them more granularly control over spend and targeting, as well as deeper insights into content performance. This process can be burdensome, but is preferred by many brands because it delivers the same access to information and control as a typical social ad on Facebook or Instagram, but appears more organic to an audience since it appears as posted from your handle.
- Dark-posting is a method where brands acquire creator content and allocate additional budget to promote it, without the content showing up on your feed or appearing like it is posted by you. Similar licensing, clients have all of the granular control and data access, but unlike licensing, the post remains unpublished.
Why they are important:
Especially when working with smaller creators, brands often want to extend the reach of promotional creator-generated content. They may also want to acquire (UGC) content from smaller creators due to its implied lower cost and put the majority of their budget behind maximizing reach/views/impressions.
Although with boosting you are in control when licensing your content, the client may promote your content to audience members who are outside of (or even have nothing in common with) your community. This can result in negative comments, poor engagement, or worse — flagging your content inappropriately. Due to the additional effort and/or risk to your account’s credibility involved, I always recommend charging an additional fee when Boosting, Licensing or Dark-posting is required for a brand deal.
How to negotiate them:
Your content and usage of your “likeness” are assets to your brand clients, yet require more from you, the creator.
To effectively negotiate an additional fee, first scan your contract for “usage”, “promotion”, “boosting”, “whitelisting”, or “licensing” and carefully read the associated terms.
Inquire about the budget your client has set aside to promote your content specifically. If this information is revealed, you should request an additional fee of 5–10% of the boosting budget. If no, budget is given, you can feel comfortable adding 20% or more to your standard rates.
Keep in mind that, even if you have already agreed upon rates for your content, no deal is final until you have signed the contract. Partners with foresight will reveal these details ahead of time, but it is often easier to ask about boosting, licensing, and exclusivity upfront so there are no surprises.
In closing:
Do you have experience negotiating for boosting, whitelisting, or licensing rights as a creator or brand? What do you think are some of the most common mistake creators make when negotiating these terms? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
In part III, we will explore “content licensing” beyond social and “usage” to reveal how you can negotiate to increase the value of your brand partnership agreements by 50% or more.
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