3 Tips For Using User-Generated Content To Increase Social Media Engagement

Social Medial Engagement

User-generated content is very important for your business. Not only does it get your name out there, but it also builds trust between your potential customers and your business by knowing of you from someone they know or follow. Getting your audience engaged and involved is often one of the top challenges that businesses face when taking on their digital marketing. Encouraging user-generated content is one of the many reasons why it is so imperative that you really know your customers and the audience you are targeting. Encouraging user-generated content is most effective when you know which platforms to use. No matter how good your message is, it won’t reach a large portion of your audience unless you know where to find them!

Running a Contest.

One of the most effective ways to get your followers chatting about you is to do a giveaway. Who doesn’t love winning free things? This is a great way to get followers excited and to share the social media page of your company. If you conduct a “share, like, and tag” contest, you are requiring individuals to share your company name, like the content, and tag other people. Just think about how much free marketing that gives you. Not only are people seeing your name on social media, they’re being tagged and directly taken to your page, and other people are likely to follow the opportunity of winning something. This is especially effective when you require all people who are entering to be also following your account.

What To Offer.

Depending on the value of what you’re giving away, this can be one of the most cost-effective ways to encourage user generated-content. Two ideas for cost-effective items to give in a giveaway are: a basket of business swag, and a free service or trial at your business. Giving away a basket of business swag to promote your business gives you the opportunity to get a lot of exposure depending on how relevant your swag is to that person. Offering a free service or trial at your business brings a potential customer into your business and gives you the chance to show them why they should do business with you.

Know The Rules For Each Platform.

Each platform has different rules for allowing contests on their pages and it’s important that you know what is allowed and not allowed. For example, Facebook is always updating its rules and what could once get your page taken down, may now be allowed. For a complete list of the Facebook rules, click here. Hootsuite recently blogged about Facebook contests and offered a quick list of dos and don’ts.

“Ok:

  • Like this post
  • Comment on this post
  • Like comments on this post (i.e., vote by liking)
  • Post on this Page’s timeline
  • Message this Page

Not ok:

  • Share this post on your timeline
  • Tag your friends
  • Share this post on your friends’ timeline

One grey area is asking people to like your Page. Technically, this isn’t against the rules, but it’s not recommended because there’s no easy way to track the folks who have done so.

That said, you can encourage people to like your Page and enter via a less suspect method.” from Hootsuite, February 2019
Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest has their rules too so it’s important you do your research prior to posting your contest.

There are many variations of contests and giveaways that your business could offer your followers. This is also why it’s so vital that you know your audience well enough to predict which kind of giveaway would generate the most user-generated content within the rules of each platform.

Our team at BG Digital Group would be happy to help you encourage user-generated content through giveaways or develop a strategy that would increase engagement. Call us today to let us help you navigate through running effective and successful campaigns.

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