Why Is User-Generated Content Important?
User-generated content is valuable to businesses for several reasons:
1. UGC is often perceived as more genuine and trustworthy compared to content created by brands or organisations. It reflects the real experiences, opinions, and perspectives of actual users and customers.
2. It encourages active engagement and participation from your audience. It fosters a sense of community and can turn passive consumers into active contributors and brand advocates for your business and products.
3. Positive UGC, such as reviews and testimonials, serves as ‘social proof’ (when people look to others for clues about what is good or bad). It can influence the decisions of potential customers, helping them trust and choose your products or services.
4. UGC is highly shareable on social media. Users are more likely to share content they've created or that features them, which can increase your content's reach and visibility.
5. It can provide valuable feedback for improvement in your business. Users' comments, reviews, and suggestions can help you identify areas for enhancement and address issues effectively.
6. User-generated content can help build a loyal and active community around your brand. This sense of belonging and shared interest can lead to long-term customer relationships and increase lifetime value.
7. This kind of organic user-based content often tells a unique story. It can be a powerful way to showcase the impact and value of your products or services through the experiences and stories of your users.
8. Encouraging user-generated content empowers your customers to have a voice and be a part of your brand's narrative. This can enhance their loyalty and connection to your brand.
In summary, UGC is important because it fosters authenticity, engagement, diversity and trust while also offering cost-effective ways to generate content and build a loyal community around your brand. It can be a valuable asset in your marketing and content strategy.
Ultimately, any Shopify business seeking to engage their audience, build trust, provide valuable content, or build a sense of community should incorporate user-generated content into their marketing mix.
Some platforms are better than others when it comes to adding value to your ecommerce business, but here is a list of some well-known platforms for user-generated content and, where applicable, how you can use them to help boost the performance of your Shopify business.
YouTube
YouTube is the largest video-sharing platform in the world, allowing users to upload and share videos on a wide range of topics. It’s also the world’s second biggest search engine, after Google. YouTube's combination of accessibility, community engagement, monetisation opportunities, and a vast library of content in various genres has made it a popular and influential platform for user-generated content.
YouTube is a great channel to take advantage of for Shopify businesses. If you use Instagram or TikTok to share video content, it makes sense to repurpose it and share it on YouTube too: you’ll gain access to a potential new audience without having to create a whole new library of content. If you post any videos under 60 seconds, they not only live on your YouTube channel but will automatically be shared as ‘Shorts’ (similar to Instagram Reels) which are presented to users who are scrolling through videos from different creators. Make sure to use relevant hashtags to increase the chance of your clips getting in front of relevant viewers.
You can also use YouTube to share other video content, for example:
product videos or demos
FAQs or Q&As
behind the scenes clips to give insights into your staff or processes
client testimonial videos
podcasts and interviews
A diverse platform with numerous ‘subreddits’ where specific topics are discussed, Reddit is a place where users can share links, text posts, and engage in discussions.
Reddit is considered a good user-generated content website due to its unique combination of diverse communities, active community engagement and content curation. Users can ‘upvote’ and ‘downvote’ which makes it a popular and influential platform for discussions, content sharing, and information dissemination. It's a place where users can explore, learn, and connect with like-minded individuals, or engage in spirited debates - both of which are great for UGC.
It’s possible to raise brand awareness or position yourself as a subject matter expert by engaging in a natural way in conversations on Reddit. For example, if someone is looking for recommendations for a particular product or service, you could get involved in the topic with something like ‘I’ve heard X product is really good for this’ or ‘this company provides that service’.
You can also answer questions to demonstrate your knowledge on that particular topic. If you answer the question well, there’s a chance other people in the discussion will trust you, and may take a look at your site for further answers on the topic or to look for products that have been discussed and recommended.
A platform for discovering and sharing images and ideas, in the form of pins on boards. Pinterest's focus on visual content, creative inspiration, and user curation makes it a unique and valuable platform for finding and sharing ideas, discovering products, and connecting with a community of like-minded individuals. It serves as a powerful tool for visual user-generated content.
Organic marketing on Pinterest bears a resemblance to other social platforms, in that you share ‘Pins’ (instead of posts) to your feed, which will also appear in your followers’ feeds when they’re browsing the platform.
However, one of the unique features of the platform is that you can create ‘saved boards’ of both your own pins and pins from other users. This means Pinterest is a great platform with which to create a community around your Shopify brand, both by interacting with and saving pins of users and creators who share content in the same industry or sector as your business, and by sharing your own pins for them to use on their inspiration boards. Here are some tips on using Pinterest to support your Shopify store:
Pinterest is a visual platform, so use images that are well put together and appealing
Add pins tailored to your audience demographic
Keep titles short and to the point
Test ‘Idea Pins’ which allow for a multi-page format featuring up to 20 pages of videos, images and text in a single Pin - use to showcase guides, how-to articles and other content rich ideas
‘Rich Pins’ automatically sync data from your Shopify store to your pins - you can choose from ‘Product’, ‘Article’, ‘App’, and ‘Recipe’. (Product Pins are especially helpful for ecommerce Shopify stores)
Test video content in Pins for additional views and engagement
Your own Shopify website!
Your own Shopify store is the perfect space for UGC to help increase engagement, sales and traffic. Splash customer reviews and testimonials on product pages or on the About Us page - it all helps build trust and credibility, and will nudge people towards that ‘add to cart’ button.
You can either manually add relevant reviews or use integrated software to capture and display them, such as Yotpo, Trustpilot, Klaviyo and reviews.io.
Airbnb
Next, we come to Airbnb. You’re probably familiar with this one as well; the popular online marketplace and hospitality service that allows individuals to list, discover, and book accommodation for short-term stays. Airbnb's success as a user-generated content website lies in its ability to connect travellers with a wide array of accommodations, experiences and insights from real hosts and guests. Its focus on trust, transparency, personalisation, and user-generated content are massive factors that contribute to its popularity and effectiveness.
Quora
A question-and-answer platform where users can glean information from a community of experts and enthusiasts. Quora is a good user-generated content website as it focuses on high-quality, community engagement, and personalisation. Its diverse user base makes it a valuable resource for knowledge seekers, information sharers, and those looking to engage with a community of experts and enthusiasts. If you’re an expert in your field, it’s worth taking a look at Quora - there may very well be questions you can answer that help establish you as someone to go to in your niche, and that could bring traffic and sales to your Shopify store.
TripAdvisor
This is a travel and restaurant review platform where users share their experiences and recommendations. It has extensive, diverse, up-to-date content and an active community of travellers and foodies. This community can rely on the platform to make informed decisions and plan memorable trips and meals based on the experiences and recommendations of their fellow community. This isn’t a platform that’s as useful for online businesses but useful as an example of the power of user-generated content.
That should give you an understanding of UGC and how you can capitalise on it to help grow your Shopify business through other platforms. Make sure you subscribe to the blog using the form below to get notified of new articles and stay up to date with everything ecommerce.
