There has been a lot of priority placed on the generation of highly qualitative content. However, there is little emphasis on highly effective user-generated content.
More often than not, you come across pictures and videos made for big brands. Some of these photos and videos are done free by customers who fell in love with these products.
There has been a gradual increase in the number of people utilizing user-generated content with research showing as much as 87%.
These contents are easy to get for renowned brands but they can be utilized by up-and-coming brands as well.
What is user-generated content?
In the simplest way possible, user-generated contents are contents posted by customers about a particular product or brand.
This content can either be positive or negative but your focus should be on the positive contents. You can use this free content to raise your social approval of your brand.
How can you take advantage of it?
Source
It's a good feeling when you go online and see free positive reviews of your products or brand. However, it doesn't just happen like that as you will need to be purposeful with your strategies to make it happen.
Thinking and applying strategies that will encourage loyal customers to produce such content are key. When they do, their benefits cannot be overstated.
So, what are the key benefits you stand to gain?
1. Affordable
These contents are very cost-effective and free in most cases. They are generated by customers who enjoy using your products.
However, you can spend some money on organizing competitions and gifts to encourage such content.
2. Drive purchasing decisions
When potential customers are on the fence regarding which product to purchase, user-generated contents become very important.
It can easily tilt this undecided customer into your brand and thus should be taken with all seriousness.
3. Improves social ratings
People tend to rate a product high when random people come up with positive reviews against traditional adverts. They are similar to words of mouth from friends and they are very effective.
4. Increase in organic reach
Once you can secure enough accounts creating content regarding your products, it drives up the reach of your brand. It could spread like wildfire.
The more people post these contents, the more people follow it, and the better your chance of trending.
5. Helps build a vibrant and engaging community
Getting users to post such content brings about positive engagement with your brand. This gives users of your product the real chance to describe how they truly feel about your products.
6. Source of advert resources
Positive testimonies relating to your brand can easily be incorporated into your advert strategies. Once people are to relate to the positive reviews coming from customers, it psychs them up towards trusting your brand.
How to gain access to user-generated contents on Instagram
Instagram stories are one of the many sources you can pick user-generated content from.
Contents harvested from this source can be used widely even outside Instagram as well. Another trick you can use to gain access to these contents is exploring your brand’s hashtag.
Several contents generated by users can trip in when you check your hashtags and these can be used for your campaigns.
Another lovely place you could access this content is from mentions and tags. When you go through your mentions and tags, you get to see several user-generated contents you could use.
Are there ways you can encourage user-generated content on Instagram?
Lucky you, the answer is a big yes. Is there a better way to get it than asking them to?
Be direct and ask your followers to post contents that will show their experience with your brand.
You might want to provide an incentive to this effect which might come from a competition where prizes can be won. Encouraging viewers to use this approach can be very rewarding.
When organizing such a campaign, it's good to encourage the use of a new hashtag. Doing this can enable you to access these specific contents easily.
Another great strategy you could also try out is to give free products to people and ask for their honest reviews as most will be more than willing to oblige.
What can you use this information for?
It's not enough to encourage users to generate positive media content that promotes your brand in a good light. You need to use these to create hype around your brand.
You can do this by…
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Building a content library
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Posting these contents on your Instagram story
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Post them on other social media handles and
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Use them to create adverts for your brand
Remember user-generated contents are the exclusive rights of the content generators. Using any part of this information should be done with appropriate permission.
You are not expected to face challenges while seeking such permissions as most users will grant you such.
Final thoughts
User-generated contents are one of the easiest strategies you can take advantage of as a brand.
When this is properly done, it will lead to a massive increase in your social trust score. An increase in your social trust score leads to increased conversions and sales by extension.
Efforts should be made on encouraging followers to post reviews on your products as this can create authenticity around your brand.
