What is User-Generated Content?

Video content marketing and getting visible are important factors in making sure your company is getting the business it needs. However, there’s more you can be doing to truly unlock your company’s potential to attract people to your website. Hotels, clothing retailers, theme parks, and others have figured out that if you engage your customers and give them a chance to win a prize, or even just be featured on your socials, they will inundate you with great content.  

This is called user-generated content and it’s almost like crowdsourcing to find content. You can put out a simple call to action and ask your audience to post about your business while you repost or repurpose their posts (with permission, of course). You can encourage your audience to share unique experiences they’ve had with your brand or a cause that you care about. It’s an easy way to drive engagement as well as conversion rates for your business.

Why UGC is Important

Just about anyone you ask will say that they trust other people like themselves more than any company trying to sell them on their products. For this reason, UGC is highly effective. If potential consumers can see that current users of your products or services are enjoying them, they’ll be more likely to purchase them. In fact, one survey found that 90% of shoppers reported that UGC influenced their decision to purchase more than any other form of advertising. 

With UGC, you can also drastically and quickly improve your content library. It becomes a deep well you can tap back into later when you are having trouble coming up with your own content. It also shows that you want input from your customers and is willing to showcase it. This will help you build trust with those fans and customers. 

UGC Best Practices

Using branded hashtags or issuing challenges across your social media platforms can help you broaden your content library as well as create buzz and engagement. A great example of this includes a campaign run by GoPro where they challenged their users to create and share videos of them performing some of the most incredible stunts and activities. There were over 25,000 people who entered the contest and now their page has over 10 million subscribers. 

There’s no promise of growth quite like that, but utilizing user-generated content can definitely have a positive impact. While sending out challenges and using branded hashtags is a good start, another good tactic is to better understand your audiences on different platforms. Your Facebook fans will react differently than Twitter fans and Instagram fans. Knowing what kind of UGC to share on each channel will help foster better community engagement within them and hopefully generate quicker growth in them as well. 

One of the tried and tested methods for engaging consumers and fans is showcasing brand loyalty. Being able to show off someone else’s use of your brand and their thoughts on it (assuming they’re positive) can go a long way. This goes back to earlier when discussing why people choose brands and that UGC swayed them greatly. Always make customers and fans feel like they matter and that they’re being heard.