How to Whitelist Influencers on Facebook

Running influencer campaigns on Facebook but feel like you're hitting a wall with ad performance? You might be missing a vital step: whitelisting. This guide breaks down exactly what influencer whitelisting is on Facebook, why it's a game-changer for your campaigns, and how to set it up step-by-step so you can start getting better results.

What Exactly is Influencer Whitelisting on Facebook?

Influencer whitelisting is a formal collaboration where a creator grants a brand advertising access to their professional Facebook Page and/or Instagram account. Think of it like being given a special key. Instead of just sharing an influencer’s post, whitelisting allows your brand to run paid ads directly through the influencer's account, using their name, handle, and profile picture.

This process takes place within the Meta Business Manager and gives brands a set of powerful permissions. Once whitelisted, you can:

• Amplify an existing post: You can take a successful organic post from the influencer's feed and put an ad budget behind it, turning their authentic content into a high-performing ad.
• Create and run brand-new ads ("dark posts"): You can build ads from scratch using your own visuals and copy, but publish them under the influencer’s identity. These ads appear in the target audience's feeds but don’t show up on the influencer’s organic profile, which is perfect for direct-response marketing.
• Test and optimize creative: Whitelisting allows you to A/B test different headlines, calls-to-action (CTAs), descriptions, and even audience segments using the influencer’s handle, without ever asking them to create more content.

The best way to think about it is this: the influencer is handing you the keys to their car (their social media presence) for a specific, pre-approved road trip (your ad campaign). They still own the car and set the rules, but you get to drive it to reach a much larger, more targeted audience.

Why You Absolutely Need to Be Whitelisting Influencers

If you're already paying for influencer content, skipping the whitelisting step is like leaving money on the table. It transforms a one-off organic post into a scalable advertising asset. Here are the biggest reasons why it’s so effective.

1. Supercharge Your Ad Authenticity and Social Proof

Let's be honest - we've all developed a bit of "ad blindness." We can spot a corporate ad from a mile away and instinctively scroll past it. But when that same ad comes from a creator we know and trust, it feels different. It feels like a genuine recommendation.

By running ads through an influencer's handle, you borrow their social proof. The ad appears as native content from a familiar face, leading to much higher engagement rates, increased trust, and often, lower ad costs (CPMs). It breaks down the natural barrier between a brand and its audience.

2. Unlock A/B Testing and Creative Optimization

An influencer might create one perfect video for your product. But what if a slightly different headline would double conversions? Or a "Shop Now" button works better than a "Learn More" one?

Without whitelisting, you have no way of knowing. With whitelisting, you gain full control to test these variables. You can take the original video and create five different versions of the ad, each with a different caption or CTA, to find the absolute winning combination. This allows you to scale your campaign and maximize your return on investment (ROI) without creating more work for the influencer.

3. Tap Into Powerful Lookalike Audiences

This is where whitelisting truly shows its power. When ads run through an influencer's account, you can build custom audiences within your Meta Ads Manager based on people who engaged with that content. You can target people who watched the video, liked the post, or visited your website from the ad.

From there, you can create high-quality Lookalike Audiences. Meta's algorithm will find new people who share the same characteristics as the influencer's highly engaged followers. You get to clone their most dedicated fans and put your product in front of a perfectly matched new audience.

4. Gain Full Control and Deeper Analytics

Say goodbye to asking for blurry screenshots of an influencer’s post-performance. When you run a whitelisted ad, all of the performance data lives directly inside your own Meta Ads Manager. You see everything:

• Reach and Impressions
• Click-Through Rate (CTR)
• Cost Per Click (CPC)
• Add-to-Carts and Purchases
• Conversion Value and Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)

This level of data allows you to make decisions in real-time. If an ad isn’t performing well, you can pause it. If it’s doing great, you can scale the budget. You’re no longer guessing, you’re managing the campaign a professional marketer would.

The Step-by-Step Guide to Whitelisting an Influencer

The whitelisting process involves two parties: you (the brand) and the influencer. Making this process smooth often comes down to giving your influencer clear, simple instructions. Here’s a breakdown of the steps for each person.

Part 1: For the Brand - What You Need to Do First

Before you even send instructions to the influencer, you need one piece of information.

Step 1: Get Your Meta Business Manager ID. This unique number identifies your business in Meta's ecosystem.

To find it, navigate to your Meta Business Settings. In the menu, click on Business Info. Your Business Manager ID will be listed right below your business name. It's a long string of numbers - copy it!

Step 2: Share Your Business Manager ID and Instructions with the Influencer. Send a friendly and clear email or message to your influencer that includes your Business Manager ID and the step-by-step directions for them to follow (you can copy and paste the steps from the next section). The easier you make it for them, the faster the process will be.

Part 2: For the Influencer - How to Grant Access

The influencer needs to perform these actions inside of their own Meta Business Manager. Assure them that this process does not give you access to their personal profile, login, or any other assets not specifically shared.

Step 1: Navigate to Partners. The influencer must log into their Meta Business Suite or Manager. From the main menu, they’ll go to Business Settings. In the navigation bar on the left, under the "Users" dropdown, they will click on Partners.

Step 2: Add the Brand as a Partner. On the Partners screen, they need to click the blue + Add button and select the option that says, "Give a partner access to your assets."

Step 3: Enter the Brand's Business Manager ID. A box will pop up asking for the Partner business ID. This is where they paste the Business Manager ID you sent them. After pasting the ID, they click Next.

Step 4: Assign Assets and Permissions (The Most Important Step!). This is the final and most important dashboard. The influencer will be shown a three-column interface:

1. Select asset type: In the first column, they should select "Pages."
2. Select assets: In the second column, their available Facebook Pages will appear. They need to check the box next to the correct Page they want to grant you access to.
3. Turn on permissions: In the third column, they need to grant you "Partial access." The key permission to toggle on is "Ads" under the "Create & manage" section. This allows you to create, manage, and view performance for ads only.

If you also need to whitelist their Instagram account, they will repeat this process by choosing "Instagram accounts" in the first column, selecting their account, and toggling on the "Ads" permission.

After selecting the permissions, they click Save Changes. The request has now been sent to your business.

Part 3: For the Brand - Accepting and Setting Up

You’re almost there! Once the influencer has granted access, you need to accept it and configure it in your own Business Manager.

Step 1: Accept the Request. Go to your Business Settings &rarr, Requests. In the "Received" tab, you should see the partnership request from the influencer. Click "Approve."

Step 2: Verify Access. The influencer's Facebook Page and/or Instagram account should now appear in your Business Manager under the "Accounts" dropdown in the Pages and Instagram Accounts sections.

Step 3 (Don't forget this!): Connect an Ad Account. You can’t run ads from their Page until you’ve told Meta *which* of your ad accounts should be allowed to use it. Navigate to the influencer's Page in your asset list, click on "Connected Assets," and add your Ad Account. Now, you’re ready to run ads.

You're Whitelisted! Now What? How to Run the Ads

With everything set up, you can now create your ads. Here are the two primary ways to do it in your Meta Ads Manager.

Option 1: Promoting an Existing Post

This is for putting an ad budget behind content the influencer has already posted organically.

• Create a new campaign and go to the Ad level setup.
• At the Ad level, under the "Identity" section, you should now be able to select the influencer's Facebook Page and Instagram Account from the dropdown menus.
• Under the "Ad Creative" section, choose "Use Existing Post."
• Click "Select Post" and choose the piece of content from their Facebook or Instagram feed that you want to promote. Add your tracking URL and launch!

Option 2: Creating a New Ad (Dark Post)

This is for running ads that don't appear on the influencer's feed - perfect for direct response campaigns.

• At the Ad level, set the "Identity" to the influencer’s Facebook Page and Instagram Account.
• In the "Ad Creative" section, choose "Create Ad."
• Now, you can upload new images or videos, write fresh copy, and add your desired CTA button and destination link.
• When you publish this campaign, the ad will be delivered to your target audience as if it's coming from the influencer, but it won't clutter their organic feed.

Final Thoughts

Whitelisting influencers on Facebook transforms your campaigns from simple promotions into powerful, data-driven advertising engines. By running ads directly through a trusted creator's account, you gain authenticity, unlock deeper analytics, and can scale performance like never before. It's an essential strategy for any brand serious about getting real results from influencer marketing.

While whitelisting fine-tunes your advertising, managing the overall content strategy with influencers requires a solid foundation. We built Postbase to simplify that chaos. With our visual calendar, you can plan out all your content - both organic and influencer posts - in one place. You can precisely schedule the organic post that you later plan to whitelist, manage conversations that an ad campaign generates in our unified inbox, and track performance without wrestling with outdated, clunky tools. It brings the clarity you need to manage a modern social strategy.