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User-Generated Content for Amazon Sellers: Authenticity Trumps Advertising
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More traffic, more sales. But when Amazon is a thoroughfare as overcrowded as a Manhattan street during lunch on a Wednesday, how can you get your 15 minutes of consumer attention?
The answer, to be concise, is that there are many ways to skin a cat. Yes, we know that’s extremely vague and rather unhelpful, but it’s the truth. Amazon sellers have a bunch of tools to drive traffic to their product listings, like external marketing, social media, email campaigns, PPC, optimization through professionally-created images and copywriting, and so on. The list is as long as Long Island.
By the way, did you know a great way to get new customers is through global expansion? Naturally, this tactic only works if you do it well, which is why Jana Krekic of YLT Translations is joining us today to talk about user generated content (UGC), and how it’s a valuable way to drive traffic to your product listing – anywhere in the world.
In other words, you might have Neiman Marcus on your right and some hip upstart Gen Z boutique to your left, but if everyone in Central Park is talking about you, you’ll get traffic.
And yes, this analogy applies to the Champs-Elysees, the Potsdamer Platz, the Campo de’ Fiori, and even the Shibuya District.
Let’s see what Jana thinks about UGC, and how it can help boost visibility wherever you may be selling.
Interested in influencer marketing, and its impact on global expansion?
Check out YLT’s blog on influencer marketing strategies for global success!
In the First Place, What is UGC?
To be concise, user generated content, or UGC for short, is brand-specific content that’s created by people. So, non-brands. It’s important because many people know when they’re being sold to, so any brand-centric content can feel a lot like advertising. UGC is a lot more organic. It’s the vox populi, and showcases how people really feel about a brand. It also can’t be controlled by the brand, so anything that’s published or released is pretty much the cold hard truth.
Sometimes, the content is even unflattering. UGC calls out errors in manufacturing, shipping and logistics, size, durability, and so on. But like it or not, customers use UGC a lot when making purchase decisions, because they trust what their peers think about a product. Put it this way; you’re more likely to trust your next door neighbor or rabbi about which dish to order at the new restaurant down the road, than the restaurant’s reviews.
Back to our NYC analogy: imagine that irate customer yelling at the maitre d’, “I’ll leave you a bad review on Yelp!” Though this is comedic fodder for a lot of sitcoms out there, it bears a modicum of truth. People trust people, so they’re likely to check review sites like Trust Advisor and Yelp – or even social media – to see if they should give a place a shot or not.
Now, user created content comes in different forms. On Amazon, you see these as customer reviews, either in videos or text. You might get them from the Amazon Vine program, or from your customers themselves (a balance is nice). You also see them in customer Q&As, which can give you a pretty good idea of where your product listing needs better optimization.
Incidentally, those customer FAQs are crucial to your success. Consider employing a chatbot to answer the common ones in real time, so your customers get immediate answers no matter when they shop (or where in the world, for that matter!). In fact, you should have a customer service chatbot in every country you sell in, to help smoothen out the customer experience.
Don’t worry, YLT Translations can translate a chatbot for you.
In other words, UGC is a powerful tool that helps convert new customers, apprise them of a product’s strengths and weaknesses, and inform a seller of areas for improvement. It’s a powerful tool in the seller’s tool kit. Let’s go a little further to see how you can leverage UGC for your own listing.
UGC: The Hunt for Authenticity
Here’s why UGC matters.
- 79% of people say UGC influences their purchasing decisions; in fact, 40% of shoppers say that UGC is “extremely” or “very” important when thinking of what to buy
- Any social media that incorporates UGC gets 50% more engagement
- UGC campaigns have shown an uptick of 29% conversion vs. campaigns without user created content
- 74% of consumers depend on social media to guide purchasing decisions
- 81% of eCommerce marketers think that visual UGC (photos and videos) is more successful in reaching customers than professionally shot photos or influencer content
- 55% of shoppers hesitate to buy a product that doesn’t have any UGC!
- The most important types of UGC ranked by shoppers:
- Reviews (78%)
- Q&As (77%)
- Photos taken by other shoppers (69%)
- Ads using UGC experience 4x higher click through than ads without UGC. They also get a 50% drop in cost-per-click!
In other words, you really truly 100% need customer created content in your listing. Not only does it drive traffic to your listing, it generates trust and relatability. When your product is good enough to entice customers to leave honest reviews (assuming your product isn’t completely defective and your positive UGC outweighs your negative UGC, that is), it makes other customers think you’re definitely doing something right.
Jana says, “It’s crucial to find local influencers. Sellers need to place their products in a new marketplace. Influencers can help show your product to a local audience.” This is a huge help when you’re selling in a new country, whose language you may not even speak. The idea is to employ local influencers in your marketing campaign as you launch in a new country – and then hope their followers buy, have a good experience, and are compelled to leave a review of their own. In other words, UGC.
Now, that’s not to say that you should do away altogether with traditional content. There’s a time and place for everything; your listing photos can’t be iPhone photos or selfies of customers taking photos with your product (although you can 100% orchestrate so it looks kind of like this, if that’s your brand identity!). It’s for the same reason that a professionally-taken photo would look out of place in your customer reviews!
Perhaps the best practice in this instance is to combine traditional and customer created content. How about a professionally-taken photo, but that incorporates customer photos (don’t forget about consent!)? Or perhaps UGC videos spliced into a listing video or social media ad?
That way, you control the narrative, which is the pro of traditional content, but you still leverage on the many benefits of UGC marketing to come off as more relatable and customer-centric. Win-win!
How to Manage and Promote UGC
Let’s say you’ve just launched a new product, and in spite of the honeymoon period that Amazon gives you, you’ve made only a few sales. Enter the superpower! U! G! C! (the crowd goes wild)
Here’s how to encourage UGC for Amazon Sellers:
1. Amazon Vine Program
Amazon selects customers based on their reviewer ranking, the helpfulness of their reviews, and their reputation on Amazon. These “Vine Voices” are given products for free to review, and they offer their honest feedback.
This program is beneficial to both the seller and the customer; sellers get meaningful reviews from verified buyers, enhancing product visibility and trustworthiness. Customers benefit from accessing reliable reviews, which assists them in making well-informed purchase decisions.
2. Product inserts
If your product insert is just a simple “thank you” card, or if you don’t even have one, you’re missing out on a valuable opportunity to encourage customers to leave reviews (so, UGC).
Now, there are stringent rules for product inserts (which is a post for another day), so be sure you follow those to the letter to avoid angering the gods of Amazon, but your inserts can most definitely be worded and designed in such a way that customers are encouraged – even incentivized – to leave reviews.
Also, make it easy for them to send a review. QR code, anyone?
3. External marketing
Have you started your own Shopify site? Social media? Are you selling on TikTok Shop (if not, then you should be)?
Unboxing videos from customers, photos and selfies, even videos of them going about their day while using your product – these all lead to higher conversion.
Reach out to these people on social media and ask if they’d be willing to share their thoughts on your Amazon product listing, too, in exchange for a free product, discount, or something similar.
4. Find yourself a UGC creator
UGC creators and influencers are cousins. Influencers have a large following on social media, and often charge to post about a product. UGC creators can be customers – often regular people who enjoy your product and are happy to post about it!
Influencers increase awareness about your product by promoting it to their massive audiences; UGC creators increase reliability and trust. See which one works for your brand, and go about employing one.
It’s worth it.
5. Provide above-par customer service
Remember, customer questions also count as UGC. When a brand goes the extra mile to answer questions thoroughly, and in a friendly and professional way, it speaks a lot about your brand, and how seriously you take customer relations.
See how you can provide round-the-clock answers to often-asked questions, and connect customers with a human being to answer more specialty queries.
No, Don’t Translate UGC, and More Thoughts From YLT Translations
Anyone with a smidgeon of experience in translations and localization thinks everything, even the slogan on a POD coffee cup, should be translated. We beg to differ.
Without a doubt, expanding to new cultures is much easier when UGC marketing is involved. That air of authenticity is crucial when trying to attract new customers, especially in a language you may not speak very well.
But that doesn’t mean that you should translate American customer reviews and stick them onto an Arabic infographic. What appeals to your customers in Main Street, USA may not be what your Dubai customer wants to know. That’s why it’s so important to generate UGC for every culture you plan to expand to.
You should translate your FAQs and your chatbot, though, so customers around the globe benefit from the knowledge that your other customers have about your product, without needing to research who you are in other locations.
It also helps to have a website that’s optimized for other languages (including preferred payment methods in other countries!), and a social media campaign that’s specific to the people in each culture. Again, TikTok is your best friend and ally; in fact, influencer relations are paramount with TikTok, because you can’t use TikTok in a country unless you have a local number.
So, find someone in your target culture to partner with. You’ll improve reach, dependability and relatability, and even, SALES.
UGC: Don’t Leave Home Without It
Isn’t digital commerce a wonderful thing? Thanks to e-Commerce, country borders have lessened in importance. That’s not to say though that the local experience has lost its flavor. Your customers will always trust a peer better than a brand’s voice, because it’s an unbiased, uncolored perspective of your product – warts and all.
The numbers don’t lie. UGC has been proven by many statisticians all over the world to increase sales, click-through rate, conversion, and awareness, and it lowers advertising costs significantly.
So, hop on board the UGC bus, and start leveraging your customers’ voices to help you grow!
For inquiries on translations and localization for product listings, websites, customer FAQs, chatbots, and more, reach out to YLT Translations at ylt-translations.com and info@ylt-translations.com
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