HOW TO HARVEST QUALITY UGC AND PUT IT TO WORK FOR YOUR BRAND TO DRIVE RESULTS

WHAT’S IN THIS GUIDE?

If you’re looking for a User-Generated Content success story, look no further than Coca-Cola. In summer of 2014, Coke launched its “Share a Coke” campaign where customers were encouraged to find their names and those of friends and family on Coke cans, and share these stories and photos using #shareacoke.

Coke was rewarded with a deluge of great content submitted by their fans around the globe, and in turn they rewarded these fans and their creativity by featuring them on Coke’s site, social channels, and even interactive billboards.

STEP 1

Coke isn’t the only one riding this wave to success. From Sephora’s Beauty Board to

Belkin’s #LegoXBelkin integration with Lego, User Generated

Content marketing has become a key component of any visual

marketer’s toolkit.

UGC COMES WITH SOME UNIQUELY POWERFUL BENEFITS, SUCH AS...

Customer photos and videos are becoming the new standard for peer reviews and ratings. That’s key because Millennials, who make up the vast majority of users on visual networks like Instagram and Pinterest, state that UGC is 20% more influential on purchasing decisions than any other typeof media.

High quality UGC can connect your brand to your fans in a much more real, authentic way than company- produced media can. A recent Forrester study found that 45% of people go to brand websites to keep in touch with brands that they like or purchase from regularly, almost triple the number that visit those brand’s Facebook pages for the same reason. But many consumers don’t trust corporate site copy when they’re evaluating products and making purchasing decisions. Rather, most consumers find that content from friends or other people within their social networks is the most trustworthy . So if you deploy UGC in a thoughtful, strategic way, this authentic content can seriously outperform traditional marketing content as far as engagement is concerned.

UGC provides validation that real people are using and loving a product or service, enhancing customer trust.

Featuring UGC keeps those users (and others hoping to get recognized) coming back to you for more. And by featuring their photos on your social feeds and website, you tell your fans know how much you love fostering loyalty and creating powerful brand advocates.

Finding great content on social networks can be difficult. An effective UGC –generation plan enables you to take control of this by having the content you are looking for come to you , rather than expending time and effort seeking it out.

Your fans and customers are creating a vastly greater amount of content than your marketing team could ever hope produce itself. By guiding and encouraging your fans’ efforts, you can turn on a fountain of content that not only works on your visual social feeds, but also on your website, advertising, or even in store if you’re a retailer.

However, the increased use of UGC has raised new questions for marketers. Most know they need it, but how to generate high -quality UGC and how best to deploy it to drive maximum impact are still at the forefront of marketer’s minds. And that’s exactly why we wrote this guide.

STEP 2

Passive submissions are organic, unpaid, un- incentivized content submissions made by your fans. This could include fans organically posting to one of your brand’s hashtags, or tagging your brand in one of their Instagram posts. Active submissions come as a result of your brand issuing a call to action for your fans to submit content to you, either through your channels or via paid media or a promotion. Each has their positives and negatives, but your brand should be using both of these tactics.

THERE ARE TWO MAIN STRATEGIES FOR GENERATING AND HARVESTING UGC: AND SUBMISSIONS.

UGC plays a central role in West Elm’s Instagram strategy. A huge percentage of the beautiful photos of their products that they feature on their Instagram page come from their fans, who are more than happy to share their creativity because West Elm showcases it and gives them a positive, grateful shout out every time they use a fan’s photo. This lets their audience know that by tagging West Elm in their posts, they might get their beautiful homes that they’ve worked hard on seen by thousands of people. In turn, West Elm benefits from stronger customer relationships and free marketing content.

UGC GENERATION STRATEGIES

If your brand is trying to acquire content from your fans, you need to give them a reason to respond, and make it easy for them to do so. The best way to do this is by selecting a relevant, catchy, brand specific hashtag that inspires an emotional response and is fun to respond to. Check out Red Bull for inspiration; their #KissABull campaign generated some amazing responses!

A common complaint that we hear is that UGC content can suffer from a lack of quality. A surefire way to boost the quality of your fans’ submissions is to simply tell them what you want. In asking

your audience to submit content, regardless of where you do it, you need to do more than simply cause a reaction; your goal should be

to entice people to connect with your brand. Assess the content and conversations that are connecting most with your customers.

Once you’ve tapped into your audience’s motivations, you can issue prompts and CTAs that will inspire them to submit content that is

in- line with what you’re looking for. Volkswagen asked their followers to submit their photos, along with their stories about their lives and cars, to #VWDriver. Volkswagen now features these submissions in their incredibly successful and engaging Driver of the Week series.

While passive strategies can be effective, Instagram Photo Contests are the single best way to harvest valuable User- Generated Content. They are also powerful tools for enhancing content discoverability, inspiring brand awareness and engagement and building your follower base on Instagram. There are a several ways to maximize the success of your promotions, and get the desired results.

UGC GENERATION STRATEGIES

BEACHBODY’S #SWEATYSELFIE PHOTO CONTEST IS A GREAT EXAMPLE OF A WELL- RUN UGC PROMOTION. THEY OFFER SIMPLE, EASY INSTRUCTIONS WITH GREAT TIPS FOR PHOTO CREATIVES, AND INCENTIVIZED PARTICIPATION BY OFFERING A PRIZE THAT THEIR FOLLOWERS WILL VALUE AND WANT TO STRIVE TO WIN. THE RESULT? TENS OF THOUSANDS OF AUTHENTIC PHOTOS SUBMITTED TO THEIR BRAND.

Sometimes, you just need a ton of new photos very quickly, and for that you should make the barriers to entry as low as possible. “If there is one thing we’ve learned

from Instagram contests, it’s to make the concept simple and digestible so that both brand advocates AND those who have never heard of us can enter,” said Loren

Mattia, a social media manager at Z Gallerie. “We try our best to avoid adding unnecessary steps or flourishes that the average potential customer doesn’t care

about. The easier it is to participate, the more people will.”

Offering a great prize gives people a compelling reason to participate in your contest. Based on our research, the average Instagram contest reward has a value of approximately $850, but a great prize doesn’t have to be mammothly expensive. It’s far more important to focus on choosing a prize that will resonate with the interests,

passions and values of your fans, and is in line with your brand.

Run a judged contest with more specific entry and creative requirements. Instagram is the perfect place to crowdsource beautiful, original marketing content. A judged

contest encourages maximum quality for each submission, as contest participants will step up their game if they know that they have to compete against others to win. The

participation rate might be lower, but the quality of photos will usually be much higher, enabling you to republish those photos and tell a beautiful visual story about your brand.

Piqora’s Instagram Photo Contest support helps you get the most out of this resource with turnkey promotion hosting, support from an expert Customer Success Manager, and detailed promotion success metrics. To learn more about launching a successful Instagram photo contest, download our in -depth guide to Instagram Photo Contests.

The more opportunities people have to see

your requests for content, the more

UGC you’ll generate. Promoting on all of your social outlets,

website, and running follow- up promotions

can boost your UGC acquisition.

STEP 3

From a marketer’s perspective, incorporating UGC into your content strategies can be a massive force multiplier, allowing you to effectively scale your creative team.

Quality UGC saves you big bucks on paid creatives, photo shoots, and creating visual testimonials. Many brands struggle with meeting the demands of content volume and production; by incorporating effective UGC generation tactics, you harness your fans to create your content for you. All of this comes with the added benefit of deepened

customer relationships, as your fans feel like they are part of your brand.

Beyond your marketing efforts, UGC can have a major impact on sales and ROI. In fact, CMO’s report that the highest social media ROI comes from UGC. So now that you’ve

decided to invest in UGC, it’s time to get the return on that investment. And here’s how we can help you take your efforts to new levels >>>

PIQORA CAN HELP YOU

Piqora’s advanced UGC search tool allows you to quickly find the best UGC that relates to your brand. Our tool filters results to display only the most popular, socially– validated images and allows you to combine your search keywords with additional operators (i.e. and, not, or, love, etc.) to further produce more relevant results so you can spend less time searching for and more time publishing great content.

In addition to Piqora’s industry- leading Instagram Photo Contest support to generate UGC, we offer powerful tools for acquiring permissions to use the content that you want. Our Permissioning tool makes it simple to request the rights to use the photos you find, enabling you to quickly and effortlesly build your content library.

Our Smart Scheduler makes it incredibly easy to collaborate with your team to schedule and publish thousands of images to Pinterest and Instagram. On Pinterest, Smart Scheduler enables you to create new boards and schedule Pins to them easily. For Instagram, you can schedule a day, week, month, or more worth of Instagram posts easily from your desktop. When it’s time to publish a photo, you’ll get a notification on your iPhone, and can make it live with one swipe.

Featuring UGC on your website can lead to significantly enhanced revenue and sales prospects, and Piqora’s Foto

Gallery lets you seamlessly and easily integrate shoppable Instagram UGC Galleries on your site . Adding UGC from

Instagram to your site creates authenticity, builds connections with brand advocates, and showcases your products in

beautiful, natural ways. The latest version of our Foto Gallery enables your brand to create fully moderated galleries of UGC

from Instagram on any website page or Facebook page tab.

CREATE A GALLERY ON YOUR HOMEPAGE FROM YOUR

BRANDED HASHTAG, LIKE LAND OF NOD DOES WITH

#LANDOFNOD.

Our advanced analytics tools show you exactly how your website images, Pinterest, and Instagram posts are performing with easy– to –use reports for

total Likes, total comments, most Liked, and most commented on photos. These reports enable you to continuously improve your content strategy and drive gains in engagement, traffic, and followers. Piqora also makes it easy to see detailed revenue data from Pinterest and Instagram for any time period.

Brand- building, inspiration, and engagement are critical social media goals, but represent only part of the UGC equation. Piqora’s TapShop enables you to instantly transform Instagram into a revenue generator in the form of sales transactions driven directly from your photos on Instagram. You can make any image in your brand’s library shoppable by adding a product or category page link. With a single tap on the profile link, your audience will find a custom page of products they’ve liked, and they will receive an email with links directly to your product pages. By doing so, Piqora supports your email marketing by retargeting those users who have liked your products, keeping your products in the forefront of their minds.

ADVANCED ANALYTICS MAKE IT SIMPLE TO

TRACK YOUR CONTENT’S PERFORMANCE

See your visual marketing ROI results in one place

INSTANTLY SEE AND ANALYZE YOUR INSTAGRAM REVENUE OVER TIME

VISUALIZE WHERE YOUR TRAFFIC IS COMING FROM

Marketing on visual networks is all about having a conversation with your audience. Next time you’re brainstorming hashtag campaigns, in -store advertisements, promotions, or even

everyday posts, think of ways to include your audience and lean on them for

inspiring content.

Team Piqora

FINAL TAKEAWAYS

Piqora is a multi– channel visual content marketing platform based on socially validated photos across networks like Pinterest & Instagram. We can help your brand discover,

acquire, publish and generate revenue from UGC.

Go to www.piqora.com and request a demo to learn more about the only complete marketing suite the Visual Web.

VISIT OUR WEBSITE REQUEST A DEMO