By letting your users do some of the work for you, you can keep creating new content for your brand to raise recognition, attract new customers, and build a community around it.
User-generated content, or UGC, is any content made by people instead of the brand itself. It can be text, pictures, videos, or music. UGC may have its section on your website right next to your content, or it can be made up of posts on social networks, review sites, and message boards.
Word of mouth has always been a way for businesses to get more people. People want to know what other people think about your company and trust others to tell them about goods and services. This plan can still work in the digital world, as shown by the rise of user-generated material. The best part is that you don't have to hope for good word of mouth; you can find it yourself and use it in your ads!
People constantly receive marketing and selling messages from brands. Because there are so many of them, people sometimes need to pay more attention to ads and other marketing materials. They do talk to each other, though. According to the State of Social & User-Generated Content 2023, people believe true user-generated content (UGC) the most.
UGC is important for gaining potential customers' trust, getting them involved, making your business seem more real, increasing conversion rates, marketing cheaply, reaching more people, and using social proof to sway potential buyers in a good way. By using user-generated content (UGC) in marketing tactics, brands can have a lot more success and last longer.
User-generated material builds faith and trustworthiness by showing real events from real people. People are more likely to believe what their peers say than what they see in ads, which makes user-generated content (UGC) an important part of building a trustworthy brand image.
UGC makes people more interested in and loyal to a brand by getting them to participate actively. When users offer content, they feel like they own and are connected to the brand, which makes them loyal to the brand and helps the community grow.
The "Raise Your Arches" campaign from McDonald's, which started in January 2023, smartly used the brand's famous golden arches. The most important part of the campaign was getting people to raise their eyebrows in a way that looked like McDonald's famous arches but without saying the brand name.
People really liked this new way of communicating. There were over 1,000 Instagram posts and over 5 million TikTok views of customers "raising their arches" to show how much they loved McDonald's. The campaign, which took place in more than 30 markets around the world, showed how appealing it is for everyone to be invited to enjoy McDonald's without saying a word.
UGC is a low-cost business technique. Instead of investing a lot of money in making brand-generated content, companies can use their users' imaginations to maintain a steady flow of interesting content while cutting down on production costs.
With UGC, brands can reach more people and make their marketing more effective. A lot of user-generated content is shared on social media sites, which helps the brand reach people who aren't directly following it. This kind of natural sharing raises company recognition and exposure.
UGC is a strong form of social proof that can change how potential customers think and what they decide to buy. People are more likely to choose a product or service based on the good experiences of their peers when they see positive reviews, recommendations, and shared experiences.
UGC takes many different forms, such as text, music, video, and more. We will help you understand the world of UGC and choose the types that make the most sense for you.
Watch the videos below to get an idea of the kinds of user-generated content you could use on your site, in your marketing, or in social media posts.
A lot of people know about Amazon, but reviews can be found for almost any business that sells goods or provides services. Adding those to your sales platform makes it easy for people to decide if a product is right for them.
Some websites only review products, both in general and for certain types of goods, like beauty or gadgets. Keeping an eye on your reviews on those sites can also give you more reviews from real people.
Every day, 3.7 million new movies are added to YouTube. When you add in sites like Instagram and Flickr, the options are almost endless.
Visuals are powerful, and any brand can use them by asking people to share visual content. Brands like GoPro and Lululemon ask customers to send them pictures and videos of them using their goods so that the companies can use them in their ads.
You can't emphasize enough how important it is to have a strong visual image to attract and keep your users' attention, whether you post user videos on your site or your brand's YouTube page.
When a customer likes your brand, they want to tell others about it. A strong way to build trust with customers is to ask happy customers to write or video reviews about how they feel about a product or service and why they love it.
You can put testimonials on pages about your products or on pages that welcome people to your site. You can ask happy customers for recommendations or look for ones that are already out there. Either way, they can work like word of mouth to bring new people to your brand.
Getting people to create content is only half the battle. You also need to collect that content and use it to attract customers.
Sharing or repeating user-generated content on your business's social media pages is the fastest and easiest way to get it out there. This shows your fans that you appreciate the customers who shared it in the first place and encourages them to do the same.
The share button on Facebook lets you share posts again, and you can use an app like Repost to share Instagram posts again. To thank the customer, remember to tag them. Everyone likes being mentioned.
Some brands regularly share user-generated content on their page, and then there are brands like Airbnb, whose entire Instagram feed is made up of posts from other users.
You need to come up with your terms if you want to run a user-generated content promotion.
Hashtags make it easy for people to find your content and follow the campaign. When you discuss it on social media and other outlets, make sure you stress the importance of using the term.
Whether you use your brand's name in the term or not, it needs to be special and connected to your campaign or brand.
When we talk about important places on your website for user-generated content, the product page(s) is another important place(s).
When customers are on a product page, they are almost ready to buy. A picture or video of another customer using that product can help them decide to buy it. By showing how the product is used, you help potential buyers picture it better, which naturally works as a sales tool.
That being said, the best product pages show high-quality pictures of the item, followed by user-generated content showing people wearing or using that item.
If you think using UGC in your brand's marketing would be a good idea, here are some ways to start a UGC campaign.
Now is a good time to start using user-generated content in your marketing if you haven't already. You should jump right in, but it will pay off to give it some thought first.
You might already be able to use UGC, which is already out there. A Facebook page, an Instagram account, or any other social media account that makes sense for your business should be set up. It makes it easy for people to respond to your social media posts.
UGC is also a great way to get people into the marketing process. You can start by making people aware of your brand through user-generated content, which they may see on other channels, and then click on to visit your website. Your UGC approach can be more focused if you think about how your most loyal customers have found you in the past or what areas have been missed.
Start with the type of user-generated content (UGC) that makes the most sense for your business. For example, you could ask people to share photos of themselves using your product, which could be used on the landing pages of your website. Another option is to have people review products and make UGC videos that you can share on your social media accounts or other channels.
Your marketing team may be ready to go big once they decide to use UGC content. But to avoid getting too busy with all the information available, start small and narrow your focus.
You may see reviews of your site right away. Putting those good reviews on your home page or making a new landing page with them is a good place to start. You can do that with the Mailchimp Website Builder.
Social media sites are also often the start of UGC efforts because they make it easy to post, write, and share. Someone should be in charge of managing your social media accounts, making regular posts, and keeping an eye on what other people are saying about you.
A big part of user-generated content marketing is now having famous people (called "influencers") take part. But you don't have to spend all of your marketing cash on the Kardashians.
There are many types of brand champions: micro-influencers (with 10,000 to 100,000 followers) and nano-influencers (with 100 to 10,000 followers). These people interact with smaller, more specific groups of your audience.
You might not need a famous person to be your best promoter. A regular person who has become a known and powerful social media voice could be better. People who follow these brand supporters on social networks pay attention when they say good things about a product or service.
While there are companies that can help you find the right influencer, another effective UGC strategy is to reach out to passionate users and ask them to help spread the word about your brand.
Using user-generated content (UGC) has many benefits, but it can also be challenging. To ensure your UGC marketing plan gets off to a good start, make sure you know the problems and have a plan to solve them.
It might only sometimes be clear who owns the content that is shared on your site or if you are allowed to use content from other sites. Before you use user-generated content (UGC), make sure that you are allowed to use the content and that it doesn't break any rules about content. Giving credit to people whose work you use is also important.
Having more user-generated content (UGC) is better, but it's easy for people to get lost in a lot of low-quality or useless content. It's important to keep UGC on topic with your business and not let it stray. You shouldn't just ask for any UGC; you should know exactly what you want.
If you let users post anything they want on your website or social media page, you might get into trouble. The sheer volume of user-generated content could be too much for you to handle, and some of it might not fit with how your brand is seen.
Planning ahead for ways to monitor and manage the content shared with the public can be challenging, but it's an important part of your marketing strategy.
There is a way to use user-generated content (UGC) to help your business, whether you're just starting to dabble in it or already relying on a plan that lets customers help make content. Make a UGC marketing strategy that uses the power of social user-generated content and social proof to get more people to use your brand, build trust, and spread the word about how great it is, whether it's influencer marketing, visual UGC or building an online community.
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