Before there were Influencers, there was User Generated Content

These days, it’s easy to get sucked into thinking you HAVE to work with influencers to promote your brand. But the influencer market is now big business and lots of brands just don’t have the budget to partake, let alone compete successfully with larger brands with bigger marketing budgets.

But cast your mind back to a time before influencers… It was a happy, carefree time before “hot dog legs” and fobbing off tortilla wraps as a stack of pancakes.

Hard as it is to believe now, social media did actually exist before the influencer. The people who used it were… us. You. Your customers. And the likelihood is you probably used it to market your business pretty successfully pre-influencer, and you can continue to do so without ever having to engage an influencer to help you.  Because here’s the thing…

Your customer is the original influencer

One of the key factors in a customer decision to buy is trust. If a customer doesn’t trust your brand/product/website, the likelihood is they’re not going to buy from you. As a digital marketing agency, one of the things we constantly encourage our clients to do is improve trust elements on their website, as we know it improves conversion rate. And one of the most effective ways you can inspire trust is with social proof. Social proof can take the form of links to your social accounts from your website, and links to review sites such as Trustpilot and TripAdvisor. When people click onto your social accounts they like to see that you have followers, and they like to see people engaging with your brand.

You can capitalise on this further by sharing your customer’s posts. If they tag you in a tweet praising your product, retweet it. If they share a photo on Instagram featuring your product, re-post it and tag them. Sure, that customer might only have 50 followers – they’re not an ‘influencer’ in the traditional sense of the word. But they’re a real person who has chosen to spend their money on your product, and even better, likes it enough to share it. They might not be generating you lots of clicks, but their post is a great trust element that will help encourage conversions.

Users’ posts make great content

We all know it can be hard to keep coming up with fresh content, and that’s where user generated content (UGC) can be really useful. If a user posts a great photo of your product in situ in their home and tags you in it, that’s a post created for you. Of course, companies need to be aware of their brand’s look and feel, and some users’ posts just might not suit your aesthetic enough to be usable, and that’s OK. But a lot probably will!

Made.com have been making excellent use of user generated content for years, a long time before everyone with a roof over their head became a ‘home influencer’ or interiors expert. Whenever someone posted a photo of their home featuring a Made product, Made would share it on their Instagram. This tactic is still a very prominent part of their social media strategy- sharing users’ posts of Made products looking great in situ, and often linking back to particular products to encourage sales:

Encourage your users to tag you in their posts with your products. You can use your social accounts to encourage this, or you can even try offline methods such as including a little note in your deliveries with your social handles and a message asking people to share and tag you.  A lot of customers love their posts to be shared, especially by brands that they’re a fan of.

You don’t have to do social media to have user generated content

Not every brand has a social media presence, but that doesn’t mean you can’t encourage and make use of user generated content. As long as you have an email mailing list, you can make user generated content a key part of your marketing strategy. Here’s how…

1. Segment your email list

If possible, it’s a good idea to segment your email list so you have a segment for your most engaged customers or those who buy most frequently. These are your ‘VIPs’ who are most likely to want to help you when it comes to creating content or reviews. These people are the ‘fans’ of your brand, so much more likely to be positive and excited to see themselves featured in your content!

2. Send an email to drum up some content

Keep your email simple, friendly, and personalised: your email should be personally written by someone within your company. A human approach is always the best way when you’re asking for help.

Let your recipients know that they’re a valued customer and that’s why they’ve been selected for the email. Say firstly that they hope they’re really happy with their purchase from you, then ask them if they’d be willing to take a few photos with your product, or even a video using it or talking about it. Be sure to let your customers know how you’ll be using this content, and ask them for their permission in writing. 

The idea is that they would be showcasing a product they already use and love, but you can also try this method to promote new products (for example, sending early releases for VIPs to try in exchange for giving you an honest testimonial/review).

3. Offer an incentive

If your customers do really love your brand then you might find that they’ll offer UGC without any incentive. However, it’s a good idea to have an incentive up your sleeve just in case you don’t get the response you are hoping for. 

Good examples of incentives are:

• Discount off their next purchase
• A gift card
• Exclusive merchandise
• Early access to a new product (a VIP pre-launch)
• Free product (this one is good if you want them to review a new product)

4. Provide a content and quality guidelines

Sometimes your customers may be unsure of what is expected of them, and this is where a guide can help get them started. If you’re asking your customers to create a video for you, provide some talking points to give them a jumping off point and also ensure that you get the kind of useful content you need.

However, keep in mind that you want your content to seem authentic, and anything too ‘scripted’ won’t come across as genuine. For this reason, we’d advise providing a script: it doesn’t allow room for the customer to express their own opinions and will look obviously fake to anyone watching, thus completely undermining the trust that you’re trying to create.

You can also consider providing your customers with brief guidelines on creating quality visual content, but again there is a fine line between avoiding badly-shot, poorly-lit photos and looking inauthentic. The whole point of UGC is to look more “real” than high-production or influencer content, so a good balance is to provide your customers with brief guidelines on creating quality content without getting too specific on what to include. For example, you can specify whether you prefer content in a specific environment (e.g. the garden or a kitchen) without telling them exactly what to do in the photograph.

This content can then be used across your website, in email newsletters, across social media, or in offline marketing.


The takeaway here is that sometimes the people who can help to sell your products are right in front of you: your customers. They can inspire trust in your brand and be a brilliant source of user generated content. So next time you’re worrying about not having a big enough budget for influencers, look a little closer to home: your customers can be a key source of authentic content, and there won’t be a fake stack of pancakes in sight!