So you might have noticed a little thing called the ALS ice bucket challenge … ok you probably can’t escape it. Love it or loath it though the ice bucket challenge highlights several important points.
- It further confirms video as the preferred medium, especially on social.
- It proves content doesn’t need to be expensive and complex.
- It shows that user generated content is successful.
Your social feeds are probably full like ours right now with thousands of videos of your friends, family and celebrities dumping ice water on their heads. Most are around 10 seconds long and in Facebook's case auto play when you scroll past. How has that resulted in the ice bucket challenge going viral? Well watching Victoria Beckham, your best mate and your mum chuck water over their heads is entertaining, easy to do and provides a challenge. The desire to get involved, peer pressure of nominations and simplicity of participation has lead to thousands of people completing the ice bucket challenge, hearing about ALS and has raised millions for the cause.
How does this relate to me and business?
Well according to the Content Marketing Institute, 60% of businesses plan to spend more on content marketing this year. As our appetites for content seem to be growing more and more insatiable, user generated content such as user generated video is a viable option to add to your strategy. There are several ways you could use UGV:
- Testimonials
- Product Reviews
- Support and Customer Care
- HR and Recruiting
- Events
- Video Contests
- Ideas and Improvement Suggestions
But most importantly remember when devising your strategies to consider how your campaign is going to make people want to get involved, what they get from doing it and how simple it is to participate. For example running a video contest to create a new advert? Give a long enough entry period for people to produce quality content and offer prizes (which don’t have to be monetary; free stuff, meeting a celebrity, exclusive tickets or that advert going on TV can be even more desirable). Asking for ideas and improvement suggestions? Maybe the winner gets the new product free of charge and before anyone else?
As always comments and questions are welcome!
I’ll leave you with the MWS Media Ice Bucket Challenge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlYUehxcp0Q
Hayley
