Best PracticesContent Strategy

How to Leverage User-Generated Content for Demand Generation?

How can we use user-generated content to create demand? This question is more pressing than ever in today’s digital marketing world. User-generated content (UGC) gives brands a one-of-a-kind opportunity to build trust, foster community, and drive demand. In this blog post, we’ll examine the strategies available to brands looking to use UGC as the primary fuel source for their demand generation engine.

The Importance of User-Generated Content

There are various kinds of user-generated content, including reviews, testimonials, posts on social media, and videos made by customers. According to a 2014 report by Nielsen, 84% of consumers trust online reviews as much as the personal kind. This statistic really illustrates the seriousness of UGC in wielding influence over potential buyers.

In addition, UGC makes brands more authentic. Shoppers feel much safer buying something when they see actual people sharing their good (and bad) experiences about it. This is in contrast to the brands telling us how great their stuff is. An enlightening study by BrightLocal revealed that 79% of consumers say user-generated content highly affects their purchasing decisions.

How to Leverage User-Generated Content for Demand Generation?

User-generated content can be a highly effective tool in demand generation. The first step is to pinpoint your target audience. Once you’ve done that, determine the platforms where your audience is most active. For example, if your primary consumer is on Instagram, then that’s the space to inhabit, pragmatically speaking.

After identifying the platform, the next step is to cultivate a space for sharing among your actualizing consumers. Some mandates for achieving this, some throughlines, if you will, are:

Contests and giveaways on social media
Hashtags that are specific to your brand
Motivating factors to share your content could be discounts, or being featured on your official channels.

Plus, flaunt your user-generated content on your website and marketing materials. According to Adweek, using user-generated content can lead to a 29% increase in product purchases and a 24% increase in engagement. Showing off customer testimonials and reviews can increase your brand’s cred while affecting your audience’s purchase decisions.

Building a Community Around User-Generated Content

It’s very important to build a community around your brand for really effective user-generated content strategies. The creation of a space—be it a forum or a group dedicated to the brand, maybe on Discord or Facebook—where customers can not only interact with the brand but also with each other offers ample opportunity for the development of a trust-based relationship. That, to me, seems like a very good recipe for community. And that’s a good recipe for UGC.

Also think about using outlets such as Trustpilot or Yelp to collect reviews and testimonials. Make it a point to respond to all kinds of feedback, both good and bad. This will not only motivate further UGC but also show prospective customers that your brand cares what they think.

Measuring the Impact of User-Generated Content on Demand Generation

Monitoring the effectiveness of your user-generated content (UGC) initiatives is crucial for discerning their impact on lead demand. Track key performance indicators that can tell you a lot about the impact UGC is having on your business. Consider these:

Traffic: Is UGC driving new people to your site?
Engagement: Are the people coming from UGC behaving differently on your site than people coming from different sources?
Conversion: Are the people coming from UGC converting at a higher or lower rate than those coming from other sources?

User-Generated Content (UGC) posts have extremely high engagement rates.

User-generated content (UGC) campaigns have impressive conversion rates.

Customer feedback and sentiment analysis.

As noted by HubSpot, a business that makes use of content generated by its users, for instance, attains a 25% higher rate of engaging those users with the business’s brand. Also, observing the straightforward relationship between UGC and revenue can give you some neat little insights for assessing your demand gen engine’s performance.

To sum up, how does one make the most of user-generated content for the purpose of creating demand? The answer requires recognizing the potency of authenticity and communal experience. Directing customers to share their lived experiences, putting that amplified UGC on display, and keeping a lively sense of place for the UGC within the social feeds of your community can do wonders for your brand in terms of driving demand.