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Step-by-Step Guide To Start a User Generated Content Campaign for Your Brand
User-generated content (UGC) is a great way to keep posting branded content on your marketing channels while also boosting customers’ perception of your brand.
So how exactly do you start a user-generated content campaign? In this post, we’ll show you why you should consider using more UGC in your next marketing efforts, then show you a step-by-step process to help you plan your own UGC campaign.
Benefits of using user-generated content
Want to know why you should be using more user-generated content? We’ve compiled a few reasons.
Can increase conversions
This study by Reevoo tells us that people consider content created by peers or “people like them” to be more influential than any kind of content a brand may create.
Image source: Reevoo
Of course, you shouldn’t consider that finding as a sign to stop creating your own branded content, but, instead, consider user-generated content as content that supplements your original content.
For instance, your brand may promise different benefits and features from a particular product or service. But, when a user sees that these claims are backed up by reviews or stories from real-life customers like them, then they’re more likely to convert.
Makes customers feel part of a community.
Another benefit of user-generated content is you’re able to create a community around your brand. By giving users and customers the space to create content around your brand—from your products to your values—you can create deeper ties that will help encourage customers to stick around longer.
In a Community Roundtable report, they found that the majority of brands who try to foster online communities empowers customers “frequently or all of the time” in the following ways: posting questions, delivering solutions, networking, voicing thoughts, getting noticed, and leading.
Ways to start a user-generated content campaign
1. Define your goals.
Is this UGC campaign going to be an evergreen campaign? Or will it only run for a limited time (e.g., a contest)? Depending on the type of campaign you want to run, you can then set campaign-specific goals for each.
For example, if you want to run a contest to get more user-generated content, then you might set goals for the number of entries you want to get.
If you want a more evergreen campaign, think about the amount of curated posts you want to publish each week or month. This way, you know how often to promote your UGC campaign efforts to encourage users to create and submit branded content.
Say your goal for an evergreen UGC campaign was to curate one fan- or customer-made post per week on Instagram. This goal then informs the rest of your campaign: How will you encourage fans and customers to post to get featured on your feed? How will you collect their posts? How often will you post about your UGC campaign?
2. Identify your channels.
Next, identify any marketing channels you can use to help implement and promote your campaign.
Here are a few channels you might already have, as well as channels you might consider adding into your marketing mix for a UGC campaign:
Email newsletters
You can make the most of your email marketing to reach users for your UGC campaign. Send broadcasts and emails about any new contests or ways they can submit branded content that you might feature.
Update your custom email marketing templates to include a section on your UGC campaigns, especially if it’s more long-running and evergreen.
For instance, you can place a “Share Your Experience” section at the bottom of each email, to encourage customers and users to leave a review about their brand experience. Or create a section that reminds customers to use your brand-specific hashtags when posting about your products.
Image source: Shopify
Social media
You can create social media ads that retarget existing customers to answer a survey or leave feedback, or use social media to promote campaigns like contests.
Social media is also a popular place to post curated content that’ll help visitors see social proof from real customers and fans.
Influencers
Influencers and thought leaders in your niche are also great resources to help you promote your UGC campaigns and even get more user-generated content in the long run.
Fans and followers feel closer to these influencers when they purchase products and services they promote, so build relationships with quality influencers who you know have engaged followers.
Create mechanics for your campaign.
You’ll have to iron out exactly how users can contribute content to your campaign, so you can communicate these to them.
Your mechanics for gathering more user-generated content could be a simple brand-hashtag that gives users of the hashtag a chance to be featured. But you might need to put more thought into more complex UGC campaigns, like contests.
Revisit those goals you had for your UGC campaign. This not only helps you craft your mechanics better, but may even help you identify creative ways to get more user-generated content into your campaign.
Consider incentivizing users.
Aside from a UGC social media contest with a prize at the end, there are other ways you can offer great incentives and perks for customers who contribute content like reviews, testimonials, or curation-worthy social media posts.
Sometimes the chance to be featured on your marketing channels is incentive enough for some people, but it doesn’t hurt to get creative and really rake in more engaged users.
Offer a discount code for users who successfully complete a survey that’ll help you inform your next content marketing strategy. Send free gifts to users who often create social media content featuring your products.
Want to use your existing customers as a case study or success story? Interview them in exchange for a gift.
In a campaign by Thrive Themes, for example, they invited some of their active members to become case studies that they’d later turn into video content and blog posts to promote their products.
As a big incentive for participating and completing the case study process, they offered users a free lifetime membership for their existing product suite.
Display CTAs on major brand touchpoints.
Be sure to display CTAs across major brand touchpoints where you’d want to generate more UGC.
One simple application of this can be leaving a CTA on your social media posts and bios asking people to either tag you or use your brand-specific hashtag for a chance to be curated on your feed.
If you sell products, add a “Leave a Review” section on your product pages, and be sure to have the same CTA in any order update emails you might send.
Keep it legal.
Last but not least, be sure to read up on any regulations that may limit or affect your user-generated content campaigns.
Curate content responsibly and respect other people’s privacy. For example, if a user has a private account on Instagram—even if you’re following them—and they post a product photo you want to curate, it’s best to ask for their consent to repost their photo.
While we can assume that people who publicly tag our social media accounts and use our brand-specific hashtags generally consent to our brands reposting their content, the same isn’t true for users on a private account.
If you also have contests or campaigns that require people to submit content you may later use in promotional content, be sure to highlight these terms where users can see them.
Additional tips for a successful UGC campaign
Here are few extra tips to help you execute a successful UGC campaign for your brand:
Make it easy for your customers to contribute.
If you’re relying on customers and users to create content for you—from simple reviews to even bigger projects like fan-made videos—then you’ll want to make things as easy as possible for them.
Make sure your mechanics are clear and simple and don’t require too much effort to understand.
Also use tools that will help you streamline and monitor your user-generated content. Use customer review software to help you collect and manage customers leaving feedback about your products and services and make the most of your social media analytics dashboards to track branded hashtags and ongoing contests.
Give credit where credit is due.
A good rule of thumb when curating or sharing user-generated content is always giving credit where credit is due. After all, your users and customers own their content—you’re simply reposting or sharing them.
Tag users in their own photos and videos. Make it clear that these content pieces were originally created by somebody else.
One good practice is also to always ask for permission before using UGC for major brand collateral (i.e., a website header or paid commercial). In these cases, you’ll need to compensate users for their content because you’d be doing more than simple curation.
Also, if a user requests your page to take down their content, then promptly honor that request.
Take negative reviews as an opportunity.
Sometimes in your UGC campaign, you might receive negative reviews and feedback from unhappy customers.
This actually becomes a good opportunity for your brand to do some outreach and deliver exceptional customer service that’ll change their brand perception.
By actively soliciting user-generated content, you’re able to encourage users to leave reviews and offer feedback. These are valuable insights–customers are essentially telling you what they love and don’t love about your brand.
Be sure to mitigate negative reviews by reaching out individually to these customers, so you can begin the process of turning their negative experience into a small moment and not a lasting impression.
Wrap up
User-generated content campaigns help you deliver better brand experiences for existing customers while inviting new users to be part of the community you’ve built. Follow the steps above to help you plan out your own campaign and you’ll soon start seeing social proof and new content to curate for your brand and business.
