The Black Hole agency's Sarah Birtles (Senior Account Executive) shares her views on how User Generated Content is becoming such an important factor in modern digital marketing.

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User Generated Content

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Let’s start with a fact we all know…
Marketing is undergoing a fundamental change.
Three technical innovations are combining to
transform the way brands relate to their customers:

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As a result, peoples are creating and sharing
images and words like never before.
Two thirds of the content in the digital universe is
created by consumers, not corporations.
72% of all internet users are active on social media,
and they’re using it every single day

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Let’s give all that activity some daily perspective…

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Smart brands are taking advantage of this sharing
economy.
They’re taking user-generated content that refers
to their own brands and using it for their own
benefit.
Research suggests that it’s much more effective in
engaging and influencing customers than their
own branded content.

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For example…
Nike often use authentic content generated by
their consumers on Instagram rather than use
expensive photography for their campaigns.

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Consumers trust their peers.
They take inspiration from other people’s
experiences, ratings, reviews and their sharing of
products and services.
A brand is now defined by how its community
perceives and uses it, rather than by expensively
commissioned marketing stories.

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Fact time…
A New York social media agency analysed data from
100 million impressions, including ad campaigns
from more than 15 advertisers.
A recent study by Nielsen suggests that 92% of
consumers around the world trust word of mouth
over any other form of advertising.

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Content creation
Brands spend a huge amount of time, energy and
money creating content.
But most just aren’t able to produce the volume and
variety of content that will resonate with their target
audiences.

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User-creators
Today’s consumers publish words, photos & videos
online to share all aspects of their lives, including their
favourite brands.
The Pew Internet Research Project found that 54% of
adult internet users now post 50% more original photos
or videos online than last year.

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Consumers are skilled at selecting the most
appropriate channel for each piece of content.
 YouTube for long videos
 Twitter for news & updates
 Instagram for photos and short videos
 Vine for ultra-short videos
 Snapchat for messages they don’t want hanging
around
They have become expert marketers themselves
and potentially of the brands they love…

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Research suggests most brands have not seized the
opportunity that user-generated content presents for
transforming web experiences and driving socially-
referred commerce.

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Things are changing…
Marketers are changing their campaign objectives from
generating likes on a social network to landing
consumers on their own websites.
In 2012, Facebook and YouTube accounted for 69% of
all campaign destinations.
By the end of 2013 this fell to just 30%.
In contrast, websites as the primary destination rose
from 25% to 61% in the same time frame.

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Why is the website becoming the main campaign
destination?
Brands are starting to realise that pointing traffic to a
single social network isn’t the best way to engage
customers. A single network provides rather a narrow
view of a brand and it’s community.
Instead, websites & microsites now represent an
effective central location for authentic user-generated
content that has been sourced from a range of social
networks.

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The bottom line? 84% of millennials say user-generated
content has influenced what they buy.
While user-generated content is one key to a successful
website strategy, brands shouldn’t ignore their own
professionally produced content. Brand engagement
rises by 28% when users are exposed to both types of
content.
Featuring relevant user-generated content at the point
of purchase boosts conversion rates by 7%.

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Brands that take this approach have had some
impressive results…

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Start mixing it up!
Link in other elements to get customers involved.
Build on user-generated content, include ratings,
reviews, promotions, hashtag competitions and why
not throw a poll in there?
Because… basically, the more involved people become,
the more engaged they become, the more insights we
can gather and more the client can sell!

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In summary…
Consumer generated content has exploded and
branded content is starting to taking a back seat.
However, there are no shortage of photos and videos
featuring the brands’ products.
On top of this, customers love the recognition of having
their content featured on a brands website.
User generated content isn’t just out weighing
branded content… it’s out performing it.

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So what?
 Lets start looking where we can integrate user
generated content for our clients in their campaigns
 Is this something TBH can use to showcase the
potential increase in engagement?