10 User Generated Content Campaigns That Actually Worked [+Expert Insights]

Consumer-generated content material (UGC) has develop into more and more vital over the previous few years. 

The truth is, in a current HubSpot survey of 500+ entrepreneurs who promote content material by way of social procuring options, 92% say user-generated content material will increase model consciousness of their merchandise.

And, as Emplifi’s Chief Technique Officer Kyle Wong advised me, “Consumer-generated content material is a 24/7, 365-day advertising channel and alternative.”

Right here, we’ll dive into 10 examples of spectacular UGC campaigns to encourage your personal campaigns. Plus, hear Wong’s 5 ideas for taking your UGC technique to the following degree.

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Examples of user-generated campaigns

Kyle Wong’s 5 tips for creating your own UGC campaign 

10 Examples of Wonderful Consumer Generated Campaigns

1. Sephora

Cosmetics powerhouse Sephora describes its on-site Magnificence Insider Group as “your one-stop vacation spot to share magnificence recommendation, inspiration, information, and proposals with actual folks in actual time.”

Along with textual content threads and teams that customers can work together with, Sephora’s Community Gallery options UGC from actual clients in an aesthetically-pleasing, interactive design.

Sephora sources this content material from social media and direct uploads, and UGC is made shoppable so web site guests can simply discover merchandise featured in footage from group members.

The gallery mechanically updates as new UGC is authorized, demonstrating Sephora’s dedication to its clients whereas driving conversion and product discovery.

2. Farrow & Ball

Producer Farrow & Ball is thought for its daring wallpapers, paints, and artistic product names — in addition to a knack for uplifting its clients. With several active displays of UGC throughout the model’s weblog posts, product pages, and different web site pages, Farrow & Ball celebrates its proficient group whereas showcasing concepts for up-and-coming inside designers and on a regular basis consumers alike. A devoted community gallery additionally permits guests to filter UGC by colour, room, type, and product kind.

Farrow & Ball boasts a powerful, engaged group of 1.6 million followers on Instagram, and UGC makes up the vast majority of the model’s posts.

3. The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas

The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas is without doubt one of the most Instagrammed hotels in the world, and doesn’t go up the possibility to proudly showcase its visitors’ spectacular pictures.

The Cosmopolitan options dazzling UGC on class pages for its completely different choices, from restaurant pictures to on line casino moments. Mixing influencer content material with UGC on the resort’s Instagram has finally pushed over 250 million impressions, partaking followers and contributing to web site visitors.

4. Article

Article is an online-only furnishings model recognized for creating stylish, Scandinavian-inspired fashionable items. Promoting on to clients, Article lacks standard showrooms that permit clients to visualise merchandise in actual life.

That’s the place UGC is available in: Article offers its clients a plethora of genuine pictures exhibiting how folks type the model’s furnishings of their areas.

Article shows actual buyer pictures and furnishings pairing suggestions on product pages to extend time on web site and decrease bounce charges, along with a shoppable inspiration gallery of UGC.

5. Vitamix

Vitamix gives its clients a wide array of juicers, blenders, and different meals processors, and takes a inventive method to partaking its culinary group. Along with sharing recipes and UGC on Instagram, Vitamix ran a “Smoothie of the Year” contest asking followers to vote for nutrient-dense “nourish” smoothies or Instagram-worthy “flourish” smoothies.

The 2 opposing groups had been led by vitamin influencers, and Vitamix spotlights nourish and flourish UGC carousels on the competition’s touchdown web page.

6. Crocs

Iconic model Crocs is without doubt one of the greatest names in footwear, catering to consumers of all ages and giving clients the chance to customise their appears with various Jibbitz shoe gems.

To have a good time its world group and showcase how they type their Crocs, the model invitations clients to share UGC on social media with the fashionable hashtag #MyCrocsEra.

As a model with an already established userbase, Crocs skillfully provides a component of group to its on-site and social content material technique, boosting buyer retention and buy confidence.

7. Revel Nail

Revel Nail will increase their conversion fee and reduces product web page abandonment whereas including a splash of enjoyable to its advertising technique with colourful, beautiful UGC throughout the model’s digital channels.

Along with displaying buyer pictures on product pages, social media, and an on-site picture gallery, Revel Nail options shoppable TikTok movies from clients exhibiting how they create gorgeous nail designs with the model’s merchandise.

8. Jones Soda

Beverage model Jones Soda boasts probably the most distinctive approaches to UGC, permitting followers to submit UGC by way of Instagram or direct add for the possibility to have their picture featured on a bodily bottle label. Website guests can vote on submissions by means of an interactive UGC gallery.

In 2021, Jones Soda took this chance to a brand new degree with its Reels Label campaign, encouraging social customers to share Instagram Reels to probably be printed on soda bottles and viewable by way of augmented actuality (AR) with the model’s app.

9. Northumbria College

Universities and different academic establishments might not come to thoughts when you concentrate on user-generated content material. Nonetheless, Northumbria College in England embraces its college students and school by means of varied inventive, on-site shows of UGC.

For one, Northumbria promotes an #IAmNorthumbria group gallery, which illustrates college life by means of group pictures. Moreover, Northumbria’s Newcastle Enterprise College even spotlights UGC from actual college students on course and masters pages to offer web site guests a have a look at a day-in-the-life of scholars.

10. NAVY Hair Care

Final however actually not least, NAVY Hair Care is a spectacular chief in the case of sharing and celebrating the genuine experiences of its clients — by means of visible UGC, detailed scores and critiques, and extra.

Based in 2018 on social-forward values, NAVY Hair Care drove a 264% increase in repeat-visit rate and web site engagement upon championing UGC on social and web site pages. Combining buyer visuals with critiques provides a further degree of social proof for the model, exhibiting clients what it’s actually like to make use of their merchandise.

Run Your Personal Consumer-Generated Content material Marketing campaign, In accordance with Emplifi’s Chief Technique Officer

After I spoke with Kyle Wong, he started by highlighting the significance of user-generated content material for small and massive companies alike. 

As he places it, “Each firm has three branches of promoting: Earned, paid, and owned. And one facet of earned media is PR, however the different half is out of your clients, which has historically been largely word-of-mouth advertising.” 

Wong provides, “The largest shift that is occurred over the previous couple of years is word-of-mouth advertising out of your completely happy clients has develop into infinitely extra scalable.”

He continues, “So when investing in a technique round user-generated content material, it is vital to know the fundamentals, which is that this: We’re investing in a technique to basically assist seize extra constructive word-of-mouth advertising from our clients.”

Your clients are already offering constructive suggestions of your merchandise — whether or not that is by means of buyer help telephone calls, product assessment pages, or by way of social channels. A user-generated marketing campaign, then, is crucial for merely amplifying the messages already being shared by your clients. 

Let’s launch into Wong’s 5 steps for creating a powerful marketing campaign now. 

1. Create a repository on your clients’ constructive tales — and supply various choices for purchasers’ to depart critiques. 

There are many buyer tales already being shared about your model. These tales may be in a written format, picture format, video format, or audio format. And there are innumerable locations to seek out these tales: Assessment websites, buyer help messages, social media channels, e-mail, post-product critiques, and extra. 

Wong advised me: “If individuals are posting good tales about your model, the primary query it is advisable to ask is: ‘What are we going to do with it? Are we going to do nothing, or leverage it to develop our enterprise?’ The 1st step is amassing that content material, and inspiring extra of it.” 

You may need to work out a course of for amassing and storing constructive tales on your advertising workforce to leverage in future UGC campaigns.

As Wong places it, “I do not assume a number of manufacturers have a great repository for all of that content material. There must be a central library for these buyer tales. Our platform does a number of that, however even for those who do not use us, there ought to be a central library someplace.”

Moreover, Wong encourages enterprise homeowners to create as many alternatives for constructive suggestions as attainable. For example, you would possibly:

• Create suggestions varieties
• Have a constructive story part of your web site
• Create testimonial pages
• Make sure you’re energetic on all main social channels

This makes it simple for purchasers to share their constructive critiques the place, when, and the way they’d desire. 

As you design your promotion for a UGC marketing campaign, contemplate the sorts of “entries” that you just’ll settle for. Photos, movies, or testimonials are all highly effective content material varieties that may be simply transformed for promoting functions.

2. Determine the place the precise place(s) are to amplify this content material. 

Now you’ve gotten a repository — nice. What’s subsequent? 

You may need to work out how you are going to amplify these messages. One main alternative to share UGC is by way of social media channels. On the naked minimal, you would possibly retweet or repost another person’s content material. You might additionally share the publish to your Instagram Tales, and have a devoted UGC Tales assortment saved in your profile. 

However you can even create a touchdown web page to showcase clients’ content material, or create a bit in your product pages or homepage. These sections will permit your web site guests to see how different shoppers are utilizing your merchandise, which is undeniably useful as they contemplate buying your product.

There are main advantages to that includes user-generated content material in your web site. Wong advised me, “We have discovered that user-generated content material performs higher than conventional inventory imagery in the case of conversion charges. There’s a few causes for this. One is, after all, the authenticity ingredient.”

“However two,” He provides, “Is that it is just about not possible to copy the number of the content material that you just get out of your group since you get the product utilized in so many alternative variations, completely different varieties, and completely different locations. Positive, a photographer may get you a similar amount of pictures — however they could not give you the identical number of pictures as your clients can.” 

Merely put, selection helps promote your product. As soon as I see the other ways clients are already utilizing your resolution, I’m extra prone to perceive the way it can remedy an issue in my life, as effectively. 

3. Have a call-to-action on your clients. 

Wong suggests having a call-to-action on your clients after they publish user-generated content material.

For example, you would possibly create a particular hashtag for the marketing campaign, or guarantee they tag you so the content material is affiliated along with your model. Alternatively, perhaps you ask them to fill out a kind for an opportunity to be featured in your marketing campaign. 

CTAs permit you to show all user-generated content material in a single place. A hashtag, for example, permits customers’ to see all associated posts after they click on on the hashtag. 

Wong factors out that there is a main benefit to this: As extra folks see your model sharing user-generated content material, they naturally start to share extra, as effectively. 

He says, “I’ve seen that occur throughout each single firm we work with. The extra an organization options their clients — whether or not it is on the web site or by means of social — the extra everyone else begins to share extra about that firm.”

He provides, “A whole lot of the manufacturers who’ve grown shortly, particularly within the SMB area, are usually sturdy on social and robust with their group efforts.” 

4. Use UGC content material to tell product traces or advertising positioning. 

It is vital to call-out the larger ramifications of listening to your clients’ constructive critiques. 

Constructive critiques can inform your product technique simply as a lot as unfavourable ones. 

Wong advised me, “Consumer-generated content material is a powerful vantage level on what individuals are doing along with your model, and what they’re already completely happy about. And I’ve discovered it may be a supply of inspiration for a lot of enterprise homeowners. The ‘consumer’ in user-generated campaigns will help you with rebranding, product traces, market positioning, and extra.”

In the end, you will need to leverage your user-generated campaigns to make selections in the case of the way you construct and market your product shifting ahead. 

5. Straighten out any authorized points.

For those who’re conducting a giveaway as a part of your marketing campaign, you’d be sensible to seek the advice of authorized counsel on two vital points: the rights you’ll maintain over any content material submitted to your promotion, and any restrictions that govern giveaways.

First, it is advisable to inform individuals about what is going to occur to the content material they create following submission in clear, easy-to-understand language.

But additionally, in case your state or municipality (or the mediums by means of which you run the competition) management how, when, and below what circumstances giveaways can happen, you’ll need to make sure your promotion is in compliance earlier than operating afoul of the regulation.

Given the breadth of the completely different industries highlighted above, it’s clear that any model can observe the same mannequin to advertise buyer engagement and generate favorable publicity.