Have you ever seen a website or service and told yourself “man, I wish I had the time and resources to create something that neat?”
White labels are your best shot at getting that shiny product or service without spending weeks if not months in development — and all the related costs.
To put it into simple terms, white labels allow you to run your own “clone” of a popular, non-physical item. You don’t have to worry about technology, training and infrastructure yourself: it’s a turnkey solution.
Well, almost.
You still have to create your own branding: a customized logo (preferably), a tagline, a marketing strategy, in short your projected image to the customer — your promise and more importantly, the experience.
Don’t be thinking that because you have a white label, you can afford to skip this step. You need to give your business a personality — yes, even if behind-the-scenes it’s not actually you pulling the strings.
You also have to spare no effort building up your site’s traffic. That alone is a huge task. In fact, it’s probably one of the challenges affiliates struggle with the most. Be sure to read this blog post for some tips — because we’ll have even more tips on how to generate traffic soon(ish)!
The Many Advantages of White Labels
Whether you’re an advertiser/supplier or a webmaster/affiliate, both sides benefit from white labelling.
For Advertisers and/or Suppliers
- Additional revenue stream: the most obvious upside for advertisers (and probably the only reason why white labels exist in the first place) is boosted income.
- Lower cost of customer acquisition: you have access to a new network of affiliates who will promote your brand through theirs.
For Webmasters and/or Affiliates
- Real time saver: with a white label solution, you can dedicate your time promoting your branded website or service. The groundwork has already been done (quick set-up), leaving you to focus on your strengths and strategies.
- Proven product or service: that seems like a given, but if a business offers a white label, it’s a good sign there’s demand and a customer base for said product or service. This gives you a very important headstart in business — and access to clients you would otherwise probably miss out on.
- Peace of mind: you don’t have to care about the legal part, as long as you show only content approved by the advertiser. It’s especially important if you are targeting the adult industry with 2257 compliance and such. Also, don’t underestimate the low maintenance required on your part.
- Reduced costs: all of the above contribute to a much more affordable business. Just think how much it would cost you to host your own tube site or create a website from scratch that isn’t just a customized WordPress theme.
Some Disadvantages of White Labels
There are also some downsides to using white labels, be it from the advertiser’s/supplier’s or webmaster’s/affiliate’s side of things.
For Advertisers and/or Suppliers
- Maintenance fees: setting up the whole affiliate process is already a considerable investment, but you also need to put resources into support and the maintenance of your white label program. Get ready to answer a lot of questions from your partners, some of which will probably even be a little less seasoned than others!
For Webmasters and/or Affiliates
- You are at the mercy of another company: if your advertiser, for one reason or another, stops providing the product or service, you’re out of luck. You have little to no control over the content, except for your branding. This also means that your profit margins and/or commissions are dictated by the advertiser — leaving you with the short end of the stick.
- SEO roadblock: it’s difficult to rank white labeled websites since most of the content is hosted on the advertiser’s end, like for instance with an iframe. This is why these solutions are often restricted to affiliates with a lot of traffic.
- You’re just a pawn: some white labels allow you to track customers with tools like Google Analytics, but in the end, you’re just doing the advertisers a favor. That’s not to downplay your role in the business model, but to keep things real.
White Labels Spotted in the Wild
Some businesses make use of white labels and you probably don’t even know it.
We can’t blame you: they have perfected their art of branding — you know, the stuff we’ve told you is essential to any business.
As a matter of fact, we even have a good and rather unexpected example of this:
Twitch.tv
We can already imagine some people thinking, “how exactly is Twitch a white label?!”
Don’t raise the pitchforks just yet and hear us out...
It is if you are a streamer.
Think about it: your channel is your brand and you are selling your experience through Twitch.tv — you are using their service, their technology to gain exposure and possibly donations ($$$).
The same can be said about YouTube or any other platform where you upload videos to your own channel, really.
Dollar Shave Club
Disclaimer: kinda cheating with this one...
Sold for $1 Billion in 2016, the Dollar Shave Club is another example of a very, very successful white label…err, private label.
There’s a subtle difference between the two terms. Essentially, a private label caters more to physical products, in this case razor blades. Also, private labels are usually exclusive to ONE retailer who gets to rebrand the product and sell it.
The Dollar Shave Club took one problem (rising cost of razor blades) and built its promise around a solution. The real home run though was with the marketing, the experience created for the customer who was able to immediately relate.
See it for yourself — it’s a f****** great source of inspiration!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUG9qYTJMsI
Homemade Examples Using White Label Solutions
We thought you might enjoy seeing real examples of some of the white labels we use ourselves.
The first example is a site that's been running without a hitch for quite a few years now—and it even received a nomination in the "Best White Label Live Webcam Branding" category at the 2015 Adult Webcam Awards...
OK that’s enough teasing! The site we’re talking about is LiveFreeFun.
The first thing you’ll notice is how we’ve branded the website with our own logo. This is an important step to differentiate your white label from the original service. What you won’t see right off the bat, though, is the work we’ve put in creating that perfect conversion funnel, plus numerous SEO tweaks to boot.
One key factor to turn a website into a profitable one is to persevere. For some of our longtime readers, you might remember we talked about new features for LiveFreeFun...almost 5 years ago!
Playing Roulette
Another example is Slut Roulette.
Slut Roulette is our SEO-optimized white label of Streamate.
The idea is similar to Chat Roulette — you chat with random webcam users — only we’ve embraced the adult side, something Chat Roulette couldn't do ... ya know, considering it's a cam2cam site tailored to everyone.
And it works: the average conversion rate of Slut Roulette is astounding (~6%), with the lion share of its traffic coming from India, United States and Brazil, in this order.
Since the beginning of the year, we’ve already hit low $xxx,xxx in revenue.
So if you think white labels can’t be profitable...think again!
Get Your Own White Label with CrakRevenue
Did you know that you can get your own white label at CrakRevenue?
Since we create them based on your needs, we'll accompany you every step of the way throughout the entire process. We can’t make them for everyone, though ... so, spots are limited (think: top of the food chain affiliates).
Unlike solutions you can find online, our white labels are created with a tight conversion funnel. We also put a lot of effort into design, SEO, and every detail that matters in the end.
Got what it takes? Contact your Affiliate Manager and ask them about your white labelling possibilities in his or her vertical!
Feel free to share your thoughts on white labels in the comment section below!
