The most successful consumer-facing brands are those that build vibrant ecosystems around the quality contributions of engaged content creators.
User-generated content (UGC) is considered highly trustworthy, increases conversion, inspires strong brand loyalty, attracts organic search traffic, educates, and provides pre-emptive customer support.
According to data from Salesforce's recent Trends in Customer Trust research, one major challenge that businesses are currently facing is the low level of customer trust on digital platforms. Hard-selling information made by brands is not as effective as it once was, and consumers are more discerning and distrustful with direct advertising messages.
Customers tend to seek recommendations from people they know or people who share their points of view, so they often turn to reviews from fellow customers. In fact, Status Labs’ 2019 Reputation Management Report shows that 78% of consumers trust peer reviews over advertising messages.
User-Generated Content or UGC is any content that comes in the form of text, videos, images, reviews, or anything that is created by users/consumers rather than brands. UGC is often shared on a brand's own social media account, website, or other marketing channels. It speaks to audiences in a more honest tone, and it helps build a long-lasting relationship with customers based on trust. It can also be an important tool for businesses wanting to accomplish authenticity.
73% of marketing professionals agree that UGC makes marketing more authentic and 50% of them also believe that UGC humanizes marketing messages. By encouraging customers to create and share their reviews, brands can nurture authenticity from within their own products or services.
Of course, anything with such a robust upside must bring with it substantial risk. And so it is with UGC. In the absence of sustainable, high-quality controls, opening your platform to outside submissions will end poorly – harming your business and your customers. In order to build a long-lasting relationship with customers based on trust, businesses should take the initiative to cultivate an open environment for discussion, interaction, and knowledge exchange between their customers.
Everise specializes in content moderation that ensures the safety of your customers and the security of your platform, by merging the best of human-powered empathy and judgment with AI-powered speed and scalability. The outcome is moderation that is consistently wise, accurate, considerate of brand-building, and protective of the moderators themselves.
Discover content moderation evolved for the Experience Age by downloading our case study.
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