Marketing trends never stop changing, and it feels like there’s a new hot buzzword every few months that dominates marketing strategies for a while before it eventually fades away.
We’ve had a few clients think that User Generated Content is nothing more than the next soon-to-be-out-of-style marketing trend, and I strongly, strongly disagree. I’m positive that the future of marketing will continue to value UGC and that “more authentic” user and employee-generated content will be even more powerful.
Whether it becomes more important or not, there’s case study after case study and report after report that demonstrates how influential and powerful UGC already is. We’ve compiled 38 statistics showing the importance of UGC and how it can touch all aspects of your business.
Looking for the latest stats? Here you go: The User-Generated Content Marketing Stats You Need to Know
User Generated Content & Engagement
1. UGC-based ads get 4x higher click-through rates and a 50% drop in cost-per-click than average.
2. More than 50% of consumers want a brand to tell them what type of content to create and share, but only 16% of brands actually do.
3. Brand engagement increases an average of 28% when users are exposed to a combination of user created product videos and professional content.
4. Consumers between the ages of 25-54 create and share 70% of all UGC
5. User generated videos on YouTube get 10x more views than content created and uploaded by the actual brand.
UGC consistently yields higher engagement across all platforms of social media.
UGC & Buying Behavior/Conversions
6. 93% of consumers find UGC to be helpful when making a purchasing decision.
7. UGC results in 29% higher web conversions than campaigns or websites without it.
8. On-site consumer reviews can increase conversions by 74%.
9. User generated content is 20% more influential than any other type of media when it comes to influencing Millennial purchases.
10. 64% of customers will not only value online reviews, but will actively seek them out before making a purchasing decision.
11. 71% of consumers feel more comfortable buying a product after researching user generated reviews.
12. 48% of customers say that UGC is a great way to discover new products.
Customers rely heavily on UGC to make purchasing decisions, so you want to have it placed prominently on your site.
User Generated Content & Customer Trust
13. 70% of consumers trust online peer reviews and recommendations more than professional content and copy.
14. 51% of Millennials trust experienced consumers (even if they’re strangers) over family and friends when making a purchasing decision. This is true for only 31% of Baby Boomers.
15. 87% of brands use UGC in order to share “authentic content” and 72% believe (correctly) that it helps them engage their audience. 
The more customers trust you, the more loyal they’ll become. And customers trust UGC
Bonus Read: 7 Brilliant Examples Of User Generated Content Marketing
UGC & Millennials
16. 86% of Millennials believe that UGC is a good indicator of a brand or product’s quality.
17. Millennials believe that user generated content is 35% more memorable than other media and 50% more trusted.
18. 51% of Millennials trust a UGC more than anything on a company’s site, news articles or blogs about the company or product, or advertising copy.
User Generated Content & Your Website
19. 84% of Millennials say that the user generated content on company sites has at least some influence on what they buy.
20. 86% of businesses are utilizing UGC as part of their marketing strategy, of December 2015.
21. Sites with featured UGC saw a 20% increase in return visitors and up to a 90% increase on the time spent on the site.
22. 41% of consumers only need to see between 1 and 4 UGC reviews in order to be influenced to purchase.
23. One case study found that brands can see up to a 26% increase in traffic when they share customer reviews on Twitter, and a 6% increase from Facebook.
24. 25% of search results for the world’s 20 largest brands are links to user created content.
There are multiple ways we can help you display UGC on your site, whether you want to create a social feed or display product-centered UGC by specific items (or both!).
EGC (Employee Generated Content)
25. Employee-shared content gets 8x more engagement than content shared by brands.
26. Brand messages are reshared up to 24x more when distributed by your employees instead of your brand.
27. One study found that employee advocacy programs with 1,000 participants can generate up to $1,900,000 in advertising value.
28. Employees may have up to 10x more followers than a brand’s corporate account, and they may get more organic social engagement.
29. 53% of decision makers have eliminated a brand or vendor from consideration because of something they “did or did not” find out from an employee online.
UGC & Brands
30. One study found that only 9% of the top 250 B2C brands placed UGC on their product pages.
31. The consumer demand for UGC in the live gaming industry grows 122% year over year.
32. 57% of brands not using UGC were avoiding it because of potential copyright issues (see how to avoid this here).
33.Only 27% of brands (including marketing agencies) have a system in place to find, manage, and utilize user content.
34. 78% of B2C companies incorporated UGC in 2015.
Carefully selected UGC can be placed on your site to help shape your brand and it’s reputation; for brands that are struggling with this, we can help you!
User Generated Content Case Studies
35. In a case study run by Chobani, UGC shared across websites, billboards, and social media resulted in a 225.9% increase in revenue between 2009 and 2010.
36. A UGC-centered campaign from Burberry saw a 50% increase in ecommerce sales year-over-year.
37. Tourism Queensland ran a campaign encouraging users to apply for the “best job in the world” and be a caretaker for a tropical island, with their goal being to increase social activity and exposure. More than 35,000 people created video applications, and their results also included an estimated $368 million worth of media coverage, 8.4 million unique website visits, and 55 million page views.
38. Using social media channels as their main voting platforms in a campaign focused on UGC, Lays got more than 22 million visits a week to the campaign’s competition Page during the voting phase. Sales increased by 12% for that year.
Final Thoughts
The value of UGC is undeniable; not a single statistic I came by had anything negative to show for using user generated content as part of a brand’s marketing strategy. Every case study, survey, and report showed that UGC has positive impacts on a brand’s reputation, social engagement, website traffic, and sales. That’s huge. And it’s clear that the more places you post UGC—both online and offline (and TINT can help with both!)—, the better.
Want to learn more about how you can reap the benefits of User Generated Content? Drop us a line for a free strategy session!
