The year 2020 has been an infinite roller coaster for life and business. The pandemic taught us the importance of being connected with each other, whether it’s in daily life or your professional workspace. It especially forced companies to rethink their marketing strategies without being able to open up shops.
We saw a big surge of online activities over the year and how it benefited the small businesses. And as we move on from 2020, with the pandemic still nowhere close to over, learning from the past for a better future, seems like the best way to proceed. In 2020, user-generated content (UGC) has been a pivotal part of marketing, since it is more trusted by people around the globe, compared to brand-led campaigns.
Hence, it makes sense to understand what we learned from user-generated content in 2020 and use the information to prepare better for 2021. Here are five things to learn from user-generated content in 2020:
Better Brand Relation
User-generated content can be used as a powerful storytelling tool to bring the brand and its audience together. It can help build a better connection between the two. Not only is it suitable for existing businesses, but it can also help startups and small-sized companies with brand awareness campaigns.
For example, Facebook ran a campaign highlighting how people are connected with each other during the pandemic and how it’s helping them cope with the lockdown. The video is a collection of photos and videos captured by users on the platform, showcased as a documentary which is informative and connects with how everyone feels.
Relatability
During the pandemic, people were bound to their homes, not able to meet their loved ones for a long time can make anyone feel alone. At these times, offering UGC as your marketing campaigns can seem more related than any brand-led campaigns. Take the brand made, for example; they turned their product packaging into a collection of customer images that definitely inspired people,
Ever Changing Trends
Before 2020, no one would have thought that we would spend the whole years, separated from each other, bound to one location for most of the time. This also means it was hard to predict what would happen in the next few weeks. User-generated content allowed brands to keep up with the ever-changing trends in 2020. This was extremely helpful in understanding how customer needs change over time.
Sense of Hope
During the pandemic, it was unclear whether we’d get back to how things were before it. But the user-generated content offered hope and helped people to stay connected with others throughout the world. The content enabled us to understand that we aren’t alone; we are all in this together.
Here’s an example of how a brand leveraged the power of UGC for their business.
Employee Generated Content
For many businesses, employees proved to be the most valuable source of user-generated content. Many companies shared how their business and employees are dealing with the pandemic. Brands shared picture collages and videos compilations of their employees working through the pandemic even when they are not in the same room.
Here’s a great example of the same from Cisco
All the points above indicate the same things, that user-generated content has more value than it is led to believe and should be considered a valuable resource as we move forward to 2021.
