How To Create A “Dark Post” On Facebook

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By: Ceci Dadisman

Updated on December 19, 2016

Have you ever experimented with so-called “dark posts” on Facebook?  A dark post (also called an unpublished post) is a post that doesn’t show up on your page but can be promoted through an advertising campaign.

How To Create A “Dark Post” On Facebook

Dark posts can be really handy when you want to reach out to specific groups of people but not clutter your page with too much varying content.  Some examples of how you could use dark posts as a part of your Facebook marketing might be:

  • To run a companion campaign for your young friends group for event RSVPs, ticket purchases, or even membership
  • To engage a specific demographic group with imagery and messaging that is meaningful to them
  • To reinforce subscription renewal messaging to a custom audience of your existing subscribers

As you can see, there are lots of ways that you can use dark posts to your advantage!

Let’s get started on how to make a dark post and use it in your campaign.

Step 1

Go to your Business Manager, select your Ad Account, click on the menu button in the top left (right next to the Facebook logo), and then select All Tools. This will open up a menu that looks like this where you can select Power Editor

 

Step 2

On the left-hand side of the page, click on Ads Posts

DarkPostStep2

Step 3

Click on the Create Post button and it will bring up a dialogue box where you can create your post.  My favorite kind of posts are using photos, so you’ll see that I have that type selected here

DarkPostStep3
Be sure that “This post will only be used as an ad” is selected at the bottom.

After you create the post, you should see it in your Power Editor and it will look like this:

PowerEditorPost

You can click on the post and see what it will look like in the feed.  Here is the sample post that I created:

DarkPostSample

Step 4

Go out of Power Editor and back to your Ad Account.  You can either create a new campaign (as I’m doing in the screenshot below) or add your post to an existing campaign.  Either way, you should now have this post as an option in the dropdown

DarkPostStep4

From here, you will be taken to the Ad Set level to choose your targeting and budget.

To track your dark post’s performance, you will need to go to your Power Editor and it will show you the stats there.

Have you ever utilized dark posts on Facebook?  How did you use them and were they successful?

Ceci Dadisman
Author
Ceci Dadisman
Ceci Dadisman is a marketing professional with more than 15 years of experience creating effective communications campaigns utilizing innovative, forward thinking methods. She is nationally recognized as a leader in digital marketing and specializes in multichannel communications campaigns. A frequent public speaker, Ceci’s recent and upcoming engagements feature national conference appearances at NTEN, Museums and the Web, National Arts Marketing Project, Arts Midwest, American Alliance of Museums, OPERA America, Midwest Museums Association, and Chorus America in addition to many other local and regional events. Known for her easy-going and vernacular style, she creates open learning environments with an emphasis on information sharing and useful takeaways. She is a member of the National Arts Marketing Project Advisory Committee and the West Virginia University College of Creative Arts Visiting Committee, and is a mentor in West Virginia University’s Creative Consultant program. She also teaches the arts marketing course at West Virginia University’s College of Creative Arts and is on the faculty of Chorus America’s Chorus Management Institute. Ceci was born and raised in Pittsburgh, PA and graduated from West Virginia University’s College of Creative Arts. She currently lives in Cleveland, Ohio.
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