One of the downfalls of email marketing is over-saturation. Creating original and fresh content while striving to sound honest is not as easy as it once was. The truth is that people are sick and tired of being bombarded with traditional call-to-action campaigns, starting with unwanted spammy emails.

To address this negative trend, marketers have been combining email marketing strategies with User-Generated Content (UGC). UGC is any content generated by users, such as reviews, unboxing videos, tutorials, and testimonials. To put it simply, UGC is pretty much the digital equivalent of word-of-mouth.

When combined with email marketing strategies, UGC can help you boost engagement and foster brand trust, while also reducing the constant stress of regularly creating original content. In this article, we’ll explain how to use UGC in email marketing campaigns.

 

What Is User-Generated Content and Why Does It Work So Well in Email

User-Generated Content (UGC), also known as User-Created Content (UCC), is any brand-specific content published by users on social media or other channels.

Types of UGC

• Text-based:
  • Reviews
  • Testimonials
  • Tips and hacks
  • Blog posts
  • Social media captions
  • Forum discussions (Reddit posts, AMA threads, Q&A, etc.)
• Video-based:
  • Video reviews
  • Product demos
  • Unboxings
  • Stories (Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, etc.)
  • TikToks
  • YouTube shorts
• Image-based:
  • Social media posts
  • Product in use photos
  • Before and after photos
  • Memes
  • GIFS
• Audio-based:
  • Podcasts
  • User remixed audio or jingles

There’s no lack of options with UGC, and the truth is that it can have a significant impact on sales and brand growth. In fact, according to TurnTo’s 2017 study, 73% of the surveyed consumers assumed that UGC increases the likelihood of purchasing a service or product.

It all comes down to authenticity. People are more likely to trust what a friend, colleague, or even a stranger says about a product than the company itself (which more often than not oversells its offerings).

There are endless studies about how effective UGC has become, such as Nielsen’s 2012 study, in which 92% of consumers said they take friend recommendations much more seriously than any other type of ad.

 

Matching Types of UGC With Campaign Goals

There are many ways to include UGC in your emails, but you have to be selective and adjust them to your email marketing campaign. Above all, it’s imperative that you match the type of UCC with the campaign’s goal.

Goal	UGC type	Example
Conversion	Reviews Testimonials Before & after	Testimonial video showing how a fitness product changed their exercise routine for the better.
Trust-building	Video testimonials Podcast mentions	Positive user review about how a restaurant’s food and service exceeded expectations.
Brand awareness	Social media posts (mentions & tagged content)	Instagram story commending a company’s sustainable, eco-friendly practices.
Retention	Success stories Social media shoutouts	Sharing with the audience a tip from a loyal customer on how a an home improvement product solved a particular and common issue.
Lead generation	Photo or video contests Referral programs	Follow-up email after purchase asking the customer to write a review of the product.
Community building	Online forums Social media groups Webinars with user contribution	Creating a customer-run online forum where users can discuss tips, tricks, and offer feedback on the product/service.
Engagement	Comments & reviews Memes Interactive challenges	Creating a social media poll where users can provide feedback on a new ice cream flavor.

 

How To Find and Collect UGC

There are plenty of ways to find and collect UGC:

• Monitor social media platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and X for content relevant to your brand. Search for tags, mentions, and branded hashtags.
• Create a unique hashtag relevant to your brand to track UGC more easily.
• Encourage customers to share their experience after purchasing a product or using a service. Use incentives to increase the submission rates, such as discounts, contests, and exclusive deals.
• Scan popular review platforms for customer feedback (Google, Yelp, Facebook, Reddit, etc.).
• Integrate review widgets and extensions like TrustPilot within your brand’s website.
• Browse customer support tickets and chat logs for positive feedback that can be turned into UGC.
• Include ‘Share your experience’ options after using your service or product, and make sure it’s easy to do it (e.g. using a feedback QR Code).
• Celebrate important customer milestones like a full year with your service or product, and ask them to share how it’s been.

While these key points can assist you in collecting UGC, it’s critical that you have full clearance to repurpose and reuse it. The risks of using UGC content without permission include severe brand trust damage, social media bans, DMCA takedowns, and copyright claims.

 

Best Practices for Repurposing UGC in Email Campaigns

UGC is a content goldmine that you definitely should repurpose in your email campaigns, but there are a few considerations to take:

• Promote authentic content: Avoid heavy editing to keep the original tone, voice, and style.
• Fine-tune visuals: Optimize images and videos to ensure mobile friendliness and compatibility with email content restrictions. This includes resizing, compressing, trimming, and cropping.
• Clarify context: All used UGC should be contextualised, explaining who created it, what it’s about, why it matters, and how it relates to your brand.
• Use clear CTAs: Pair UGC with straightforward, actionable buttons. Depending on the content, it can include product links, reviews, guides, webinars, tutorials, and others.
• Be inclusive: Ensure all emails are perfectly crafted and easy to navigate for all types of users. This includes avoiding visual overload and using enough contrast between the background and text to make the email pop.
• Draw on storytelling: Share real, authentic, and relatable stories about your product and service, such as how it helped overcome a challenge. This humanizes your brand, making it easier to connect with.
• Run A/B testing: Try different approaches to using UGC in emails. This includes testing different text and visual placements, colors, target audience, and delivery time, and then fine-tuning it after analyzing the marketing campaign.
• Confirm compliance: Guarantee that all shared UGC has explicit permissions for redistribution and marketing actions. Although all types of content require this, it’s especially crucial for images and video. In addition, always keep records of consent to avoid future unexpected legal actions.

How To Encourage More User-Generated Content From Your Audience

Due to business size, industry, and other factors, it’s common to struggle with a lack of UGC. In those cases, there are a few strategies to motivate audiences to share their experience with your brand.

Use UGC Aggregator Tools

Track, compile, and manage UGC in one centralized place with specially designed tools, such as Taggbox, and Yotpo.

Encourage Tagging

Craft creative, fun, and captivating marketing actions to encourage your audience to tag your brand. A few examples are challenges, themed events, and celebrations.

Collaborate With Micro-Influencers

Find an influencer with real engagement and a social media profile that meets your industry’s values, and develop a strategy with them for encouraging their audience to share experiences. That being said, take into consideration that paid UGC isn’t as efficient as organic most of the time.

Make Sharing Easy

Ensure that anyone, regardless of how techy they are, can quickly upload and share feedback.

Highlight UGC

Feature UGC regularly in your emails to build a sense of recognition and appreciation. It lets your customers know their content is valuable.

Acknowledge Your Audience

Interact with your audience. Sometimes, just a thank you goes a long way, and publicly communicating with them is a step forward to improve loyalty while encouraging further participation.

 

Maximize the Impact of UGC in Email Marketing

Businesses can greatly improve their loyalty, reputation, transparency, and public perception by using UGC. In fact, it’s one of the best methods to build trust with customers.

However, blindly using UGC isn’t the best approach. To tap into its full power, it’s fundamental to develop a concise email marketing strategy that matches user content with your campaign’s goal.

Organic UGC is cost-effective, spontaneous, and genuine, offering unmatched authenticity and relatability. You can corroborate this easily by asking yourself or some of your friends how many times they’ve looked into a review or unboxing of a product before purchasing it.

Anyone who hasn’t tried using UGC in their marketing campaigns yet should begin today. Start small and test how it works for you by including a simple UGC block in your next email campaign with a testimonial, review, or brand-related social media post.