It is the brand's job to get people to share material that supports their product or service, and a UGC campaign is their organised way of doing that. Even though UGC can and does happen on its own, brands should plan for it to support specific messages or campaigns so that it works much better.
Do you remember the "Share a Coke" scheme? Coca-Cola may have been the first company to use user-generated content (UGC) marketing, as they had the best UGC strategy. In 2011, their marketing team had the idea to print about 150 of Australia's most popular male and female names on their bottles. The goal was to get people to share a Coke with their friends and family.
Because it can be customised and is easy to share on social media! This trend made everyone crazy! Everyone got their bottles, took pictures, and shared them on social media. People got excited about the idea and supported it in 80 other countries worldwide. Many images of people sharing a Coke with their name were posted on social media.
Apple quickly started the #ShotOnIphone campaign to rebuild trust after learning that users were unhappy with how well the average iPhone camera took pictures in the dark. That UGC promotion, which was aimed at both new and experienced shooters who took photos in the dark and shared them online with their iPhones, had the most incredible pictures taken by regular people with their phones' cameras in low light. Under the title "Shot on iPhone," some nice low-light shots were put on YouTube.
Thanks to all that creative user-generated content, Apple won back the trust of doubtful users and cut costs by not having to redesign the iPhone camera. Apple made its customers feel special by using their photos and videos in a worldwide ad campaign.
Starbucks started a great campaign in 2014 called #WhiteCupContest. As part of it, customers were asked to draw something artsy or creative on their white cups. The winner will get extra credit, and Starbucks will put their image on their new cups.
Anyone could participate, and it has to do with the customer's favourite product they want to share on social media. Another great reason for young artists to do well is the chance to win a prize like this one.
When CLUSE, a watch business, posted UGC in pictures on its site, social media, and side pages just for UGC, it got good press. This kind of behaviour makes people want to post their pictures so many people can see them.
The makeup brand Glossier gets its name out there through pictures sent in by customers. It shares pictures of people using its goods and touching stories from customers who have always fallen in love with its cheap skincare line. Glossier gives them back their lost confidence and shows off their natural beauty.
Instead of spending a lot of money on model and product shots, the company focuses on user-submitted pictures that are shared one at a time on social media pages. This is a new trend for beauty brands.
Many people shared pictures of themselves wearing the brand's Mega Greens Galaxy masks with the #MaskForce word below the pictures when they first came out. Glossier shared the photos again, which got even more people to interact with it.
In August 2020, when theatres were returning after being closed because of the pandemic, Atom Tickets made getting tickets on Snapchat more fun. Snapchat users can share their plans to go to the movies by sharing stories, starting or joining group talks or sending direct messages. For example, they could ask friends to help them get seats for a close spot.
One of the best ways for fashion brands to sell themselves is to make projects with content that gets people to interact with it. This leads to more traffic, sales, and return on investment (ROI).
Quickly realising these benefits, fashion brands began using user-generated content and saw a rise in conversion rates and a drop in the cost per gained customer.
In the 1980s, Brooke Shields sang "Nothing Comes Between Me and My Calvins," making people feel linked through their pants worldwide.
This month, Calvin Klein used the slogan again to create #MyCalvins, an Instagram contest where people can share pictures of themselves wearing the brand's clothes to be featured on Calvin Klein's website gallery. What do you think? It got so popular!
It only took a few months for the term #MyCalvins to take over Instagram, with more than 190,000 pictures tagged by users of all ages.
It turned out that this campaign linked with the brand's audience better than any paid ad or celebrity post, and it helped them get millions of new fans on most social media sites.
PetRescue is Australia's most popular website for adopting animals. It lists over 800,000 cats, dogs, guinea pigs, horses, bunnies, and other animals and wants to connect emotionally with its audience through user-generated content (UGC) pictures. However, with all of this information, PetRescue has to deal with more than 25 million photos uploaded by users.
End users had difficulty adding pictures (up to 30 pictures per pet file) because they needed help not cropping or resizing them. PetRescue knew this. There were also long wait times because of back-end jobs like waiting and picture changes, which made the UGC campaign less successful.
Cloudinary was a great option. By putting all of its picture files in the cloud and using Cloudinary to automate the process of optimising user-generated images, PetRescue can now get more people to share photos and then display them in a visually appealing way on its pages. With very little clerical work.
#AtTheMoxy is an ongoing Instagram campaign for Marriott International's Moxy Hotels. Its goal is to get people to post pictures of themselves using this unique name to be featured on the brand's page.
This campaign is one of a kind because it uses physical activation places all over the hotel, such as lifts, toilet stickers for taking pictures, TV screens with recent tags and similar social media posts. These all help Moxy connect with its audience and make content important to the brand.
Based on the cases above, here's what you should do to be successful with UGC:
Make it simple to make UGC: If it's simple for users to create UGC content, they'll do it more often, and your promotion will reach more people.
It should be easy to spread UGC: Giving people a clear, simple way to promote your cause can help it become popular.
UGC should be a part of your product: Adding UGC features to a product gets more people to participate and get them excited.
Make bad things into good things: If people say bad things about your brand, start a UGC campaign to change that and show the product in a good light.
Add user-generated content (UGC) to product pages: UGC on product pages lets people quickly see how the goods are used in real life, which makes the relationship more personal.
Add user-generated content (UGC) to home pages: This bold method puts user-generated content (UGC) in the spotlight on your site, giving your brand a unique front. However, it may only work for some sites.
Stars can help your campaign reach more people. To do this, ask social media stars to share user-generated content (UGC) about your product.
Link to things people care about: People often back and give money to UGC efforts that play on people's morals and causes.
Users should be shown how to make and share content; UGC is more than just creating content. Make it easy for people to share information and get more people to see it.
To automate: Doing things by hand is often slow, awkward, and prone to mistakes. Users and site managers will save time and effort by automating UGC tasks.
Usually, making a UGC campaign takes a lot of work and involves several steps:
Make your goals clear; decide what you want to achieve: company recognition, customer involvement, income, or building a group;
Pick the right platform - find out which sites, like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, Twitter, etc., your audience spends the most time.
Set clear rules about the type of content you want, any themes or ideas, and any limits or restrictions that apply;
Offer prizes, praise, or deals to encourage people to participate.
Spread the word about the campaign through the outlets you already have, like your website, social media, and email newsletters;
Engage with members by liking, commenting on, sharing, and showcasing their efforts to build community and get more people to join;
Review the entries and ensure the material fits your brand's ideals and rules. Get rid of any material that isn't proper or on-brand;
Track measures like participation rate, amount of submissions, and conversion rate to see how well the campaign is doing and learn more about it.
Videos from users are the most potent material you can use in your campaign, so encourage people to make them.
Showcase the best content - post the best pieces on your public channels and give credit to the people who made them. This will celebrate the community and help the campaign reach more people.
Thank the people who took part. When the campaign ends, thank everyone who participated and share the results or most important points.
Remember that being real is the key to a reasonable UGC effort. So, ask your audience to send you accurate content. This will help you connect with them more deeply.
User-generated content projects make more people aware of and interested in your brand. They also help your website's SEO and bring you new customers from all over the world.
Customer reviews, comments, social media posts, blog posts, and anything else people write and post online are all user-generated content.
Relevant, accurate, and original UGC efforts, like the ones above, get more people to know about, interact with, and buy from a brand.
To plan a UGC campaign, marketers need to do several things, such as figuring out their target, setting goals, and creating the campaign.
You can use social media platforms like EmbedFeed to get the content shared with brand-related hashtags for your UGC campaign. You can also make an Instagram wall on your website.
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