Published on May 24th, 2017 | by Guest

Building your Brand: A Look into User-Generated Content

Consumers are skeptical of taking sales messages at face value and mostly ignore advertisements. They look for relevant information from trustworthy channels to guide their purchasing decisions. Technology has made the advertising world smaller, more global, and better connected. Thanks to adserver platforms, there is relevant information rushing to every personal device these days.

All businesses need a traditional marketing strategy, complete with flyers, banners, pamphlets, and even door-to-door advertising exercises. But the internet is giving small businesses new ways of reaching consumers. Traditional methods of advertising are being complemented with novel means to entice. The secret to attracting the right consumers lies in sending relevant information through a number of channels, so that people begin to recognize you as a trustworthy brand.

What can brands do to build high levels of trust with customers and maintain a solid customer base? The answer is endorsements. Customer endorsements have a great impact on brand awareness, trust, and credibility.

While all online businesses need a professionally-guided ad campaign, perhaps the best way to promote your business is through your customers. When your consumers start to speak on your behalf, that’s when you know you are making your strategy tick. As we know that consumers are smart and don’t blindly trust brands on information, if consumers watch, read, or interact with similar customers, they will trust their word; good or bad. That’s the basic premise of user-generated content.

User-generated content is essentially the bridge that people will cross (from being potential customers to being purchasing customers). The feedback, reviews, comments, or hashtags that you see being given by users is all user-generated content. Funnily, it is nothing but online conversations, sporadic mentions, and tags happening around your brand. The art lies in inducing your customers to make those happen.

Apart from providing social proof of your business, user-generated content offers several benefits to your business. One of the greatest advantages is better SEO. Users are more interested in organic content, or in simple words, what other customers think about your brands and products. But you cannot afford to go the hit-or-miss (trial & error) route in the long run. To be able to induce enough user-generated content, technology is the key. It is important to devise your strategy based on market information accurately. It helps to use adserver solutions to let your company decide what the best topics would be in order to induce user-generated content.

When your customers give your brand positive reviews, potential customers get a peek into the value you can offer. The entire process induces a sense of trust and credibility. Websites like Amazon or eBay, and the companies using them, thrive on user-generated content. Customers are the ones who largely influence others to purchase.

Adserver solutions make it easy for you to know what consumers want. Consumers are always on the lookout for information about interesting products, but what exactly is that in your scenario? Even if you don’t sell products, you can merely have a website to advise online purchasers and drive your revenue, i.e., when you know from adserver analytics what your readership wants to know.

With user-generated content, comes the chance to interact. You give your potential customers the opportunity to get to know you, your business, your products, and your brand. Good feedback or reviews definitely help in propelling consumers. There will be times when reviews won’t be so great. But it’s an opportunity to listen to online conversations and use them to your advantage, i.e., by shaping your brand to match customer expectations.

Tags: brand, building, content, look, user generated