What is a UGC Creator?

Is it just us, or does everyone and their gran have ‘UGC creator’ in their bio these days?

In today’s world, social media is an ever-present force in our lives. At the heart of this digital revolution are content creators, who help shape the conversations and experiences that we have online.

Among these creators are User Generated Content (UGC) creators, who have been rising in popularity in recent years.  But what is a UGC creator, and how can you get started as one?

What is UGC?

Traditionally, UGC content in the digital marketing world refers to any content created by a consumer about a brand or company.

For example, when someone really likes a brand’s product, it’s not uncommon for them to take to their social media and share a picture or video of them talking about the product, reviewing it, or simply just using it. When a brand comes across this type of content from their customers, they might want to re-share it on their own platforms.

Why share content created by their customers? Because this type of content—user-generated, AKA made by the customer—serves as a form of social proof. Brands want potential new customers to hear from people who have actually used their product, like it and have good things to say about it. In general, consumers trust recommendations from others way more than they trust advertisements from the brand themselves.

Consider a hotel brand as a more specific UGC content example. Say they go on Instagram and see that someone who stayed at their hotel recently posted a series of pictures about their stay, snapping photos of their room and talking about the friendly staff.

That brand’s social media team would then ask that person if they could repost the content on the brand’s own page. Not only does the social media team get more content to post that they don’t have to create themselves, but they also share an authentic, human reaction to experiencing their hotel.

Where UGC Content Is Now

Over the past few years, brands’ desire to incorporate user-generated content marketing into their social media strategy has increased. Some reasons we’re seeing this:

• Consumers increasingly turn to social media to get their information: We all heavily rely on recommendations from Influencers, reviews we see online, etc.
• The demand for social media content has gone way up: With most brands having marketing strategies across a ton of social media platforms, email marketing and their website or blog, they need to be pushing out new content more frequently than ever before. This is hard to maintain for most brands, whether they have a dedicated social media employee or not.
• A shift from perfectly curated content to more authentic content: People don’t expect perfectly curated content anymore—not even from major brands and companies. Instead, consumers value authenticity, relatability, and personality.

Brands continue to share UGC content in the way we described above, but that’s just not the only way they’re getting it anymore. According to a survey by Stackla, 86% of consumers say that UGC is a good indicator of a brand’s quality, while 60% say that UGC is the most authentic form of content. This has led to many brands using UGC in their marketing campaigns, with great success.

In order to connect with their audiences better and give off more of a human touch in their marketing initiatives, brands turn to specialized Content Creators— UGC content Creators— to help them out.

Instead of putting the bulk of their budget into professional photo shoots that are highly curated, brands are reallocating some of those funds to pay creators to create user-generated style content for them to use on social media.

The brand will then either:

• Post this content as organic content on their feed
• Post the content with ad money behind it to push it out to their target audience

Where UGC Creators Differ from Influencers

While there is some overlap between UGC creators and influencers, they differ in some important ways.

Influencers are often more focused on promoting products or services, while UGC creators are more focused on sharing their personal experiences and opinions. UGC creators are also more likely to have smaller, more engaged followings, while influencers may have larger followings but less engaged audiences.

UGC creators are an important and valuable part of the social media landscape.

They offer a unique and authentic perspective that resonates with audiences and can help brands build loyal followings.

If you’re an aspiring UGC content creator looking to share your experiences with the world, there has never been a better time to get started with UGC.