The Complete Guide to TikTok UGC

Published by NoGoo.io

The social media landscape is quickly changing as we move away from a social-based model to a content-based model. Audiences crave content that makes them feel something, favoring content that aligns with their interests over connecting with friends and family. We’ve seen this with the rise of TikTok’s interest-based algorithm and Instagram’s move to incorporate more “recommended” accounts on a user’s feed. Gen Z users especially drive the sentiment of interest-based content as they value authentic, mission-driven brands that they can trust. When brands utilize UGC in their social media marketing, they authentically connect with users while establishing community at every stage of the funnel.

The concept of brands using UGC as a means of promotion is nothing new. Public social users have been contributing to UGC far before the name was ever coined. Today, brands use UGC or user-generated content sourced from the public, employees, or content creators as a way to show what a product looks like, how it is used, build consumer loyalty, trust, and garner social proof. This type of content-driven advertising was made famous by celebrity influencers as they displayed aspirational lifestyles while endorsing products for their followers to latch onto. With the rise of TikTok and short-form video, the age of the traditional influencer has taken a backseat to content creators as mega influencers have been replaced by niche, nano- and micro-influencers.

The nature of social advertising has changed as today’s consumers would rather hear about a product from another consumer than directly from a brand. Now, they are turning to social media to learn about new products. 84% of Gen Z users have reported purchasing a product after seeing it on social media and 37% of users trust content creators over brands when discovering new products. These statistics emphasize the need for UGC in a brand’s social media strategy to gain and maintain user trust. What’s more, ads served with UGC have a 4x higher click-through rate, receive a 28% lift in engagement, and a 29% increase in web conversions. UGC can be sourced and used in so many ways, and one of our favorites has been TikTok UGC. 

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TikTok is swimming with UGC. When a brand posts UGC on TikTok, it performs 22% higher than branded content. Due to its short duration, fullscreen real estate, entertaining delivery, and overall authenticity, TikTok is the perfect platform to source and share UGC.

UGC makes it possible for creators and brands to genuinely connect with users and TikTok’s full-funnel ad potential makes it the perfect pairing for a winning marketing strategy that resonates with today’s consumers.

What is User-Generated Content?

User-generated content (UGC) is creative, brand-specific social media content created by users for users that brands can display on their social profiles or use in social ad campaigns to connect with consumers in an authentic and genuine way. UGC takes the form of photos, videos, testimonials, reviews, and more. This type of content displays social proof and builds trust among consumers throughout the entire marketing funnel.

How to Build a TikTok UGC Machine

93% of marketers agree that consumers trust content created by customers over content created by brands. Moreso, brands that utilize UGC are 2.4x more likely to be viewed by consumers in comparison to brand-produced content – so if your brand isn’t utilizing UGC, you are losing the opportunity to build a trusting relationship with your audience and could be missing out on authentic content from users who already know and love your brand.

With a TikTok UGC growth machine, your ultimate goal is to build a network of reliable content creators that will create high-quality content that aligns with your brand goals and target audience. The pattern of sourcing and utilizing UGC in social ads creates a growth loop that will replenish your content bucket and create loyal brand advocates to maximize your brand awareness and reach. By encouraging UGC, brands allow consumers to enter this self-sustaining loop that inspires sharing, brand loyalty, and community while being relatively low-lift for marketers.

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So how does one go about building this TikTok UGC growth machine? We’ll take you through our exact process of how we create content growth loops using TikTok UGC.

1. Building Your Social Ads Audience

Posting ad content on social media must be done strategically and methodically. Leverage top-performing ad groups from your other ad platforms and collect all historical data from your consumer data platform. This will take out the guesswork when building your TikTok audience. 

First-party data will be highly valuable as we move into a cookie-free world.  In Google Analytics, leverage your Cohort Analysis, Audience Insights, Demographics, Interests, and Affinity Categories to discover new audiences, their interests, and more. This analysis allows you to get into the mindset of your consumer so you can build more effective and tailored audience targeting and creative assets once you’re in TikTok Ads Manager.

Another platform to leverage is your CRM platform, such as Shopify, to pull geographic, age, gender, one-time customers, returning customers, at-risk customers, and loyal customer reports. Learnings can also be applied based to identify audience expansion opportunities based on LTV (lifetime value) and GMV (gross merchandise value) This data should line up with your previous analyses and confirm the profile of not just a unique visitor but a converting customer.

If available, tap into predictive analytics to better understand your audience and how their purchase behavior is evolving. This information will help in future decisions including content themes, assets, and messaging for you to stay ahead of the consumer and approach your social ads with the full funnel in mind.

If the above data is not available, you can utilize 3rd party data and research to inform your audience creation. To make your research more granular, find your top ten customers by name or email on your CRM or mailing list platform and perform field research. Where do they currently gather? Search for them on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. If you’re able, see what type of content they engage with, what brands they follow, and what kinds of content they post. Look for patterns across these consumer accounts and use that data to tailor your marketing strategy.

By pulling findings from these various channels, you can begin to build your ideal TikTok consumer based on data.

2. Understanding Your TikTok Consumer

Now it’s time to meet them where they are at.

You’ve built your ideal customer – now it’s time to put yourself in their shoes. To be a successful growth marketer, it is important to think from the consumer’s perspective to better understand their wants and needs.

Here are a few questions to get you started:

What is their occupation?
What are their hobbies?
Where do they shop?
How do they get their news?
Which social platforms do they spend the most time on?
What do they value?
What kind of content do they interact with?
What keeps them up at night?
What problem do they have that they are aware of or unaware of?

The more you can understand your consumer, the easier it will be to create content that speaks to them and converts. But good UGC doesn’t just happen on its own. Though good social advertising may appear like an organic post, there is much thought that goes into the production process so it can be optimized for the proper channel, audience, and campaign goals.

It is estimated that the average American encounters between 6,000 and 10,000 ads per day – most of the time without even realizing it. Consumers have become utterly numb to advertisements due to the sheer amount, but also the expertly veiled ad content that appears native to any given platform. Successful TikTok UGC has the power to be posted organically or in an ad campaign and has the potential to convert no matter what your campaign goals are.

3. Finding UGC Creators

UGC can come from brand enthusiasts, employees, influencers, or our preferred method of partnering with content creators. UGC can be sourced across various social media platforms through social listening or users that use a branded tag or hashtag. This content is great for brand awareness, but if choosing to use UGC in any paid ads, you may want to consider hiring a content creator to create UGC for you.

The NoGood TikTok Studio has an extensive roster of content creators across diverse verticals that can be paired with your brand or campaign needs. But before reaching out to anyone, it is important to solidify your ad goals before expecting UGC that is aligned with your brand and campaign goals.

Here are some questions to consider while in the planning stage:

What is the objective? (Awareness, Consideration, Conversion)
What is the ideal content format? (Filming requirements)
What is the core value prop or messaging you want to communicate? (We want audiences to purchase this product, etc.)

When it’s time to find creators, go back to your prior research where you identified your audience’s key influences. What types of creators (if any) were they following? Which accounts were they interacting with? Identify and reach out to 10-15 rising stars or micro-influencers who align with your brand category or brand adjacent category.

Take Equinox, for example. Equinox falls under the health and wellness vertical. Their audience is metropolitan, they have expendable income, are well-traveled, and care about their mental and physical wellbeing. A creator for Equinox wouldn’t necessarily have to be a buff gym rat but could be an upscale traveler, a fancy food blogger, or a Goop-like influencer. These accounts also have followers that would fall under the same category as Equinox.

But it’s okay to start small and not go for the $50K per post creators. When starting to build up your creator partnerships, look for creators with less than 100K followers who are more likely to have higher engagement rates (and lower contractual rates). These creators tend to convert higher than some of the larger accounts. Big followings do not equal high engagement or ROAS – even TikTok Creator Marketplace can tell you that.

There are, however, several influencer marketing platforms that can source creators for you, including our own TikTok Studio. These agencies source from their own roster of partner creators based on your criteria through algorithmic matching including niche, platform, and budget. Though some just provide sourcing, others offer end-to-end campaign management from finding creators and negotiating contracts to delivering assets and monitoring ad performance. If you’re looking for a creative TikTok partner, reach out to our TikTok team today.

For a more personal approach, it never hurts to reach out to a creator directly by sliding into their DMs to build a personal connection. The more connected a creator feels to your brand and its mission, the more authentic and aligned their UGC will be. 62% of users say they would trust a content creator more than an A-list celebrity. When relationships are created and maintained, creators can turn into true brand ambassadors that users learn to trust.

Because relationship building is such an important aspect of this strategy, it is important not to burn any bridges. Treat your creators well and they will work to produce the best content they can. Establish a relationship with the creators that show passion and dedication for the idea, follow your guidelines, and provide authentic, thought-through content. Though building relationships one at a time can be a time-consuming process, it allows your brand and the creator to produce more meaningful content that will resonate with your target audience.

4. Provide a Content Brief for TikTok UGC Creators

Before letting your chosen creator run wild, it’s important to develop a creative brief and general guidelines to ensure the final product is worth your money.

Key questions to ask yourself when forming a content brief include:

What is your objective?
Who is your audience?
What is the ideal content format and where will it be posted?
What is the core value prop or messaging you want to communicate?
Will the creator need the product?
Do they need to shoot in a certain way?

Share your goals with your creator and challenge them to come up with a few ideas that have a single message and objective. Don’t overcomplicate things for them – there should only be one objective. Be clear and provide guidelines and examples of what a successful content collab is for your brand.

When it comes to creators, they are masters of their content domain and community. They already have their unique voice, hooks, persona, and creative style – this is what makes them successful creators. While you should clearly define success, timelines, and examples, allow them creative freedom. They have gotten this far for a reason and their loyal followers trust their unique identity and the brands they stand behind.

5. Launch, Track, Measure, & Analyze Organic Content

Once you receive your UGC, it’s time to launch your assets. You’ll want to keep track of your TikTok UGC by maintaining records of the content produced and tracking your mix of evergreen brand awareness content against viral TikTok trends to find the ratio that works best for your audience all while maintaining your consistent brand identity and voice. 

Not only is it in good practice to record post analytics, but to also have a saved copy of your content. When possible, download your video without the TikTok watermark to keep a record and have the ability to repurpose it for other platforms. Repurpose.io is a great site for downloading posted content and sharing it across other social media platforms.

For tracking analytics, use a clearly labeled spreadsheet with links, dates, sounds, and hashtags for your records. Following posting, you’ll want to keep track of the analytics including views, reach, interactions, watch-time, and follows. Though tedious at first, these stats can later give you a bird’s eye view of what is working (or not working) to better inform your future campaigns and content requests. 

Now, remember those downloaded videos? It’s time to repurpose them for your omnichannel strategy. Begin with Facebook and Instagram Reels before posting to YouTube Shorts and Snapchat Spotlight. If there is continued success, consider sharing to Twitter and Pinterest organically and as ad content.

Analyze and track the video’s performance and identify what trends and styles are working per platform. Are users gravitating toward trending skits on Pinterest or just on TikTok? Which platform has the highest CTR for your top-performing video? Look for common characteristics from platform to platform, but also consider your unique audiences per platform. By experimenting with different types of content on different platforms, you can better tailor your content for those particular audiences.

6. Sparking Your Organic TikTok UGC

Until you know what type of content will resonate with your audience, we like to test our TikTok content organically first before deciding which posts to Spark or run as dark ads. Oftentimes, top-performing organic videos will be most successful in paid campaigns as you already know they are resonating with your audience.

Currently, there are two types of ads you can run when working with UGC from creators. These are Spark Ads and Custom Identity and can be used for any of the advertising objectives and campaign types.

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Spark Ads are similar to boosting an Instagram post but way better! This native-ad format allows you to leverage your organic posts to generate even more results at any stage of the funnel. The content, pulled from the organic post, includes all the features of the original post with the addition of a CTA leading to your chosen landing page or a TikTok Instant Page (which serves as a lead generation form). The Spark Ad is pushed out to your pre-determined Ad Group audience or a new custom audience while it still runs organically. A Sparked Ad not only increases content performance but it assists in putting your content in front of your target audience with conversion results in mind. 

When choosing to Spark a post, you have the option to use your linked account or a custom identity. The beauty of Sparking includes the ability to run an ad from another authorized account – this is especially pertinent when working with creators and UGC. 

For example, JVN Hair’s TikTok account can Spark their own organic posts or Spark organic content from authorized accounts including Founder Jonathan Van Ness’s TikTok account or creators and influencers who produced UGC. The Spark Ad can appear to come from the creator’s account or your brand account allowing the content to appear in front of even more audiences increasing reach, awareness, and conversions.

With these options in custom identities, brands can experiment with what works best for their UGC. Do audiences trust content that appears from content creator accounts or only brand-owned channels? Play around with not only the different types of content sparked but campaign types and identities to determine the best combination for your target audience.

7. Analyze Paid Assets

Now that you have a mix of organic and paid UGC circulating, it’s time to assess what’s working. Remember that spreadsheet you created earlier? Create a separate tab with paid analytics including CR, CTR, CPC, CPA, CPR, and more. Take note of which asset was sparked and what the starting point was prior to it being sparked. This will help identify if the Spark was worth it and help inform future content decisions.

Keep a continuous watch on your direct traffic and followers. Not all campaign goals will be to increase followers but it can be a direct result of a Sparked ad. When analyzing a specific ad, compare it to how it performed against previous assets. What was the production quality? What was the identity of the Spark Ad? What was the intended result? By testing different types of UGC produced by creators and in-house, determine which assets your audience engaged with more and double down in that area working with the creator to produce more content or find similar creators to diversify your feed.

Finally, take a look at that CPA column – cost per action. This is the average amount of money you spent on a particular conversion (follow, click-thru, lead generation, etc.). The data received from TikTok Ads Manager only tells half the story. The CPA provided is just a result of the ad CPA, but additional determination must be made. Calculate your influencer’s fees and cost for goods provided in addition to platform fees. Based on these results, you can ask yourself: what is the total ROI, and could this be a worthwhile long-term process that can be duplicated and scaled? If the answer is yes, you’re well on your way to creating a TikTok UGC machine. If not, it’s time to look back at the drawing board and determine where you overspent or where you can make additional optimizations to improve your ROI.

8. Enter the TikTok UGC Flywheel

You’ve looked at your ROAS and ROI and determined that this is a sustainable ad platform – congratulations, you’ve now entered the UGC flywheel.

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This growth loop not only assists in increasing conversions but builds community along the way. By encouraging UGC through hashtags, giveaway challenges, or consumers just loving your product, brands can tap into their social community to use UGC, or work with brand-aligned creators to produce UGC that will benefit both their audience and your own.  

Identify the long-term win-win for your creators. Is it equity, larger-scale partnerships, bigger returns, or free products or services? What does the creator get out of your partnership and more so, what does their following get out of it? Are you providing a special discount code for the creator’s followers? Are you providing a larger platform for the creator to gain exposure? Determine what’s in it for your brand AND the creator and their followers. 

With a TikTok UGC growth machine, your ultimate goal is to build a network of reliable content creators that will create high-quality content that aligns with your brand goals and target audience. Content creators hold much responsibility as a representative of your brand. Be sure they are reliable, consistent, and able to deliver quality content that resonates with your audience, increases ROAS, and yields big results!

TikTok UGC is for everyone!

Based on this list alone, UGC on TikTok isn’t just for DTC brands but can be utilized in every vertical including SaaS and B2B accounts. Finding creators to work with can come from your own employee’s content, outsourced on platforms such as TikTok Creator Marketplace, discovered organically through hashtags and social listening, or by partnering with a TikTok marketing agency.

By using UGC on TikTok, brands remain native to the platform, expand their TOF reach and brand recognition, provide social proof, and build user trust and loyalty.  Whether hiring content creators to make specific UGC for ad campaigns or discovering UGC via social listening, users feel more connected discovering a product through a friendly face versus an overproduced, more traditional ad. 

No UGC is bad UGC as it reflects user sentiment, builds brand awareness, and represents advocacy and loyalty. Whether or not UGC is shared on your branded account, it helps build community and encourages social interaction and sharing.