You're Ignoring the Secret Traffic Source: Dark Social

In today’s fast-paced digital landscape, where marketers focus heavily on SEO, social media ads, and email campaigns to drive traffic, there exists a hidden gem that’s often overlooked—Dark Social. For those running digital marketing companies, tapping into the power of Dark Social could offer a unique competitive edge that traditional strategies can't always provide.

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What on Earth is Dark Social?

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Dark Social refers to the opposite kind of sharing-more private and often less traceable. Contrary to public social platforms where posts can be tracked back and analyzed, Dark Social happens within private confines where content is traded among individuals without a public sharing button's help. Some of the more frequently used examples of Dark Social channels are as follows:

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Direct Messages (DMs): Users privately share links via sharing platforms like WhatsApp, Instagram, and Facebook. 

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Private Groups: In the case of content circulated within private groups on Telegram, Facebook, and Slack.

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Emails: Links are shared back and forth in private email threads.

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Copy-pasting Links: Instead of clicking the "share" button, users copy the link and paste it into a private conversation or e-mail. 

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The key difference here is that these shares do not have tracking parameters, so they almost always come up as "direct traffic" in website analytics. Therefore, measuring the impact of Dark Social through traditional means becomes quite impossible, making it an undervalued traffic source for many businesses.

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The Relevance of Dark Social to Your Digital Marketing Strategy

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Dark Social might seem mysterious in a world governed by metrics and analytics, but its importance is undeniable. Here are reasons why Dark Social should become a prime concern in your digital marketing strategy: 

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1. More than 80% of Content is Shared Privately

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Research has established that more than 80% of what is published online is shared through private channels, so most sharing occurs in environments that are extremely hard to track. All the same, people will naturally show preference for links shared by their friends or colleagues over those shared publicly by brands. In this scenario, Dark Social does become one-its effect is like that of a personal recommendation, adding much more value than a public post. This makes Dark Social a strong route to direct coveted referral traffic into any favorable direction for turning the wheel for any marketing company into its favor to build brand awareness along with worth of mouth.

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2. An Increase in Engagement and an Increase in Conversions

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Private sharing, on the whole, engenders higher engagement rates and conversions. Oftentimes the more relevant kind of messages shared privately to their peers' endorsement becomes engaged in environments of trust-meaning far more appealing; thus, this makes the Dark Social-originating traffic very valuable, for it surely attracts persons most likely interested in what your brand offers.

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Also, since those opted for dark-social-recommendations from trusted friends and family, or colleagues, such recommendations carry a lot of weight and increase expectation for very prompt decision-making. People tend to act faster based on what's been seen in a private message than what they see on a public post.

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3. Hard to Track, but Worth A Lot

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The absence of conventional tracking methods to gauge Dark Social makes its use even more valuable. The aforementioned channels of share would be best left unmonitored by traditional means. This, however, should not deter your efforts toward monitoring Dark Social. All external interactions regarding Dark Social must be thoroughly tracked.

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This knowledge then can help determine which of your content, offers, and engagement strategies can be fine-tuned to bring this under-used traffic source to work in your favor. Even partial illumination of Dark Social traffic-tracking metrics can provide the basis upon which to create more impactful content.

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How Digital Marketing Company Can Incorporate Dark Social

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Being a digital marketing company, Dark Social could create that extra edge in today's skyrocketing competing environment. Here are some ways to tap into this powerful but dark traffic creating channel:

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1. Encourage Private Sharing

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The first step toward growing your Dark Social channel is to make sharing content privately easy for your consumers. Some ways you can do this include:

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Add a Copy Link Button: Make it easy for users to copy and share a link privately, whether via WhatsApp, Telegram, or email. By giving them an easy way to share your content, you encourage private sharing without forcing them to use public social media platforms.

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Create Exclusive Groups: Encourage the creation of private groups on platforms like WhatsApp and Telegram for discussions, product updates, or exclusive content. These groups can help foster a sense of community, and members will feel more inclined to share valuable content within their own trusted circles.

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If people see the value in sharing content through private means, more Dark Social activity will be created. 

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1. Use Dark Social Traffic Tracking

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Tracking Dark Social sharing can be tough, but that doesn’t mean it cannot be done. 

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Leverage UTM parameters: UTM parameters provide a way for you to tag your URL to measure traffic sources. Even while they may not work well with every kind of private sharing, they can provide some helpful indicators of how your links are shared. For instance, if some person shares a URL with a UTM on it through WhatsApp, you will be able to trace it back to that as Dark Social traffic.

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Direct traffic? Such spikes can signal a Dark Social connection. By correlating direct traffic spikes with content drops or campaigns, you can begin to assess the Dark Social's outreach and effectiveness.

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2. Use Word-of-Mouth Sharing

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Creating share worthy content is super-important in Dark Social. If your content is super-relevant and valuable, people would want to use it as dark social fodder. These are a few content layers that do well in the Dark Social arena: 

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Infographics: Easy to share and visually appealing. People love sharing infographics that colorfully describe things.

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Reports and Case Studies: Professionals and others seeking knowledgeable advice love this stuff.

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How-to Guides: People flood with sharing once it's a tutorial or a guide that benefits someone in solving a particular problem.

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The key is creating content that people would be excited to share privately with their friends either due to its worth or emotional resonance.

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3. Dark Social for Lead Generation

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Another way to use Dark Social is to refine your lead generation. Here are some strategies: 

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Exclusive Content: Private sharing of reports, white papers, or webinar access within private groups or through WhatsApp transcends the line between exclusivity and dark marketing. This way, people are likely to share that piece of content with their networks since they feel like they are providing them with invaluable or unique material.

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Personalized Links on Email Marketing: Personalized links in email campaigns will help track usage behaviors as far as engagement with your content. For instance, by using UTM codes in your email links, you could know when the recipients' forwards those emails or share those content privately.

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Exclusive content or personalized links engender trust and increase the likelihood of users sharing your content privately, in return driving both leads and traffic. 

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Conclusion

So, in conclusion, a Dark Social is one source of traffic that is advantageous yet one that has not been exploited fully. For all digital marketing companies, tapping into this hidden channel would translate into higher engagement rates, higher conversions, and therefore a more lucrative marketing strategy. By encouraging private sharing, tracking Dark Social traffic, optimizing for word-of-mouth referrals, and utilizing Dark Social for the lead generation, the complete potential of Dark Social can be realized. It may be tough to measure, but it certainly is worth the hassle, and it could be the secret to your brand's next big thing