User-generated content (UGC) is today’s version of word of mouth, and it’s one of the most powerful tools your brand can use to build trust and drive growth.
Instead of only relying on professional reviews, people now check customer product reviews, scroll through tagged photos, or watch someone unbox your product on social media. It’s fast, authentic, and it plays a big role in what customers decide to buy.
That’s why UGC should play a crucial part in your marketing campaigns. It helps your brand feel more relatable, fills your marketing with real voices, and creates the kind of connection that keeps customers coming back.
In this blog, you’ll find UGC strategies you can start using today, from product launches and ad campaigns to seasonal promotions and email flows. Each one is designed to help you build brand awareness, develop stronger relationships, and turn everyday customers into lifelong fans.
What Is User-Generated Content (UGC)?
User-generated content, or UGC, is any content created by your customers instead of your marketing team. That includes things like product reviews, social media posts, testimonials, unboxing videos, and even podcast mentions. If a customer made it and it’s tied to your brand, it counts.
This type of content marketing works because it feels real. It’s not scripted or polished. It shows your product in the hands of real people, in real-life situations. And that makes it easier for others to trust what they’re seeing.
In ecommerce, trust is a big deal. Shoppers don’t just want to hear what your brand has to say. They want to hear from people like them. That’s where UGC shines.
For example, a tagged Instagram Story from a customer using your product can often say more than a high-quality ad. A short TikTok video that follows a trend can quickly grab attention and spark curiosity. Even a single product review that talks about sizing or quality can help someone feel confident enough to click “buy now.”
Beyond building trust, UGC helps create a sense of belonging. When customers see others using your product, they feel a sense of community, and that connection keeps them coming back.
Here are a few common types of UGC you’ll often see in ecommerce:
- Written reviews that offer honest feedback and insights
- Photo and video reviews that help customers visualize the product in action
- Mentions on social media platforms that act as peer-to-peer recommendations
- Social media videos that tap into creativity and trends, often with huge reach
Examples of Effective User-Generated Content (UGC) Strategies In Ecommerce
UGC is valuable and versatile. When integrated thoughtfully, it can elevate nearly every stage of the customer journey. From awareness to retention, smart UGC strategies can help marketers build trust, drive conversions, and strengthen long-term brand loyalty.
Let’s look at some of the most effective ways ecommerce brands are putting UGC to work.
Use UGC for Product Launches
Product launches are a prime opportunity to bring your customers into the spotlight. By incorporating UGC from the start, you can generate buzz and give potential buyers a more authentic look at what’s coming.
One of the simplest ways to do this is through product gifting. Send early access samples to loyal customers, superfans, or micro-influencers and content creators, and encourage them to share their honest experiences. This type of content creation can show up as unboxing videos, Instagram Reels, or in-the-moment TikTok reviews, each offering social proof before the product even hits your site.
For the best results, create a branded hashtag for the launch, provide clear prompts, and make it easy for recipients to share. You’re not just promoting a product. You’re building momentum through community.
Incorporate UGC Into Paid Ads
Your paid ads don’t have to feel like ads. In fact, some of the highest-performing campaigns today look more like content customers would see from their peers. That’s the power of UGC in action.
Using user-generated content in paid advertising, especially on the more visual-first social media channels (e.g., Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook), can boost performance across the board. UGC feels relatable, which helps cut through ad fatigue and encourages users to engage.
Start by sourcing UGC that aligns with your messaging and audience. Look for content that highlights your product’s benefits in a natural way. Then test different formats — like photos, reviews, and short videos — and track performance over time.
Try UGC for Seasonal Campaigns
Seasonal campaigns give you a built-in reason to connect with your audience, and UGC can help make those connections feel more personal and meaningful.
Whether it’s summer travel, back-to-school, or the holiday season, inviting your customers to share how they use your product during key moments creates content that’s timely, authentic, and highly engaging.
UGC helps seasonal campaigns feel more like shared celebrations than sales pushes. When customers see people like them enjoying your product, they don’t just engage — they relate.
And the best part is, seasonal UGC doesn’t have to disappear after the moment passes. You can repurpose top-performing content into evergreen assets for future campaigns, helping you save time while keeping your marketing efforts fresh.
Feature UGC in Product Descriptions
Your product pages are where decisions happen. It’s where shoppers look for reassurance, validation, and proof that what they’re about to buy is worth it. This makes it the perfect place to integrate user-generated content.
By adding real customer photos, reviews, and quotes directly into product descriptions, you help potential customers visualize the product in everyday use. It’s a simple way to build trust, reduce uncertainty, and increase conversions without changing the product itself.
For example, you could encourage customers to upload a photo on product pages that don’t yet have UGC. Or, you could embed customer images, Instagram posts, or short videos directly below the main product shots on a product page. These real-world visuals provide context and help reduce return rates by setting accurate expectations.
The key is to make UGC feel native to your site, not like an afterthought. When done right, it makes customers feel seen, builds confidence in the buying journey, and turns your product pages into conversion engines.
Create UGC Email Drip Campaigns
Email marketing remains one of the most effective tools for driving conversions and building customer relationships. But it works even better when it doesn’t sound like a brand talking at your audience. Instead, it should feel like a conversation that includes your customers.
That’s where user-generated content comes in.
By incorporating real customer photos, reviews, and stories into a drip campaign, you can make your emails feel more personal, more trustworthy, and far more engaging. And because you’re sharing actual experiences, each message adds credibility and helps move customers closer to their next purchase.
Each email you create can feature different customer voices and visuals, creating a natural rhythm that keeps your brand top of mind. And by showing what real people think and do with your product, you reduce hesitation and build brand loyalty over time.
Collaborate With Micro-Influencers
User-generated content doesn’t always have to happen organically. Sometimes, the most strategic move is to partner with the right people to help get the ball rolling, especially when launching a new product or entering a new market.
Influencer marketing — especially on a smaller scale — is a great fit for this. With smaller but highly engaged audiences, micro-influencers are often more trusted, more responsive, and more cost-effective than larger influencers. Plus, because their content feels natural and personal, it blends seamlessly with other types of UGC.
Once their content is live, you can amplify it through your owned and paid channels, turning a single post into a high-performing asset across email, social media, and even product pages.
Tips for Integrating UGC Into Your Overall Marketing Strategy
User-generated content becomes even more powerful when it’s embedded across your entire customer journey. The key is to move beyond one-off campaigns and treat user-generated content as an always-on asset, something you can strategically surface across touchpoints to drive engagement and loyalty.
Here are a few simple, scalable ways to do just that:
Feature UGC on High-Traffic Pages
Place customer reviews, photos, or videos on your homepage, product listing pages, and landing pages. These areas are often the first point of contact, so including real customer voices can build trust quickly and encourage deeper browsing.
Create a Dedicated UGC Gallery
Consider adding a section to your site that curates top customer content. Whether it’s organized by product, season, or campaign, a gallery not only celebrates your customers but also inspires others to join in.
Personalize UGC Across Segments
Use customer behavior or lifecycle stage to guide which content to show. For example, show first-time buyers relatable content from other new customers, while loyal shoppers might respond better to community spotlights or advanced product use cases.
Use UGC in Product Recommendations
Incorporate customer images or quotes in upsell and cross-sell modules. A photo of someone styling two complementary products together can often outperform generic suggestions.
Reshare UGC Across Social Channels
Keep your social media marketing fresh by spotlighting user-generated content regularly. Share photos, repost videos, or create themed roundups that align with current campaigns or product drops.
Highlight UGC in Customer Support Flows
Turn support into an opportunity for brand-building. For example, include UGC in order confirmation emails, tracking updates, or FAQs to reinforce buyer confidence and reduce return-related anxiety.
Incentivize Ongoing Participation
Make it easy and rewarding for customers to share. Whether through a branded hashtag, a chance to be featured, or a loyalty program tie-in, the more value you give back, the more content you’ll receive.
When integrated thoughtfully, user-generated content doesn’t just add social proof — it becomes a key part of your brand’s identity. And with the right structure in place, it scales effortlessly across campaigns, channels, and customer segments.
How Bloomreach Helps You Maximize UGC Impact for Customer Loyalty
User-generated content is powerful. But to make it truly drive growth, you need the right tools to identify, scale, and optimize it. That’s where Bloomreach comes in.
At Bloomreach, our goal is to provide a platform that allows personalization at scale to help ecommerce marketers like you surface the most impactful UGC, distribute it across the right channels, and continuously measure its performance. This can help with stronger customer connections, better campaign efficiency, and long-term loyalty that compounds over time.
Here’s how Bloomreach makes that happen.
AI-Driven Insights To Identify High-Impact UGC
Not all user-generated content performs the same. Some pieces drive conversions, others generate shares or save rates, and a select few quietly build long-term trust. Bloomreach uses AI-powered insights to help you identify the UGC that’s doing the heavy lifting, so you can amplify what works and move faster with confidence.
For example, let’s say a particular product review video has a 25% higher click-through rate when shown to returning customers versus new ones. With Bloomreach’s AI insights, you can identify that performance quickly and serve that specific piece of UGC to the right group, turning a single video into a high-impact loyalty asset.
This type of insight helps you avoid guesswork and maximize results. Instead of manually testing dozens of content combinations, you can let the platform surface what’s already resonating with your audience and use it to build deeper connections that scale.
Automating UGC Campaigns Across Channels
In ecommerce, a customer’s journey rarely happens in just one place. That’s why the most effective UGC strategies are omnichannel by design, showing up consistently across email, product pages, social media, ads, and beyond.
Bloomreach makes this seamless. With built-in automation, you can take your most impactful UGC and deploy it across all key channels without manual work or fragmentation.
Unlike traditional tools that treat each channel in isolation, Bloomreach connects your UGC strategy across the entire customer experience. Whether a shopper is browsing your website, opening an email, or scrolling Instagram, they see a consistent brand story shaped by real customers.
Personalizing UGC With Segmentation
Not all customer stories speak to all customers. That’s why personalization matters, especially when you’re working with user-generated content. The more relevant the content feels, the more likely it is to inspire trust, engagement, and action.
Bloomreach makes this easy with AutoSegments. Instead of manually creating audience segments, you can use Loomi AI to autonomously create segments for you. From there, you can deliver different content to first-time buyers versus returning customers, or match specific types of user feedback to shoppers based on purchase history, behavior, or lifecycle stage.
Advanced Analytics To Measure Effectiveness
User-generated content adds authenticity, but for enterprise marketers, performance still needs to be measured. With Bloomreach, you get deep analytics that track how UGC is actually impacting engagement, conversions, and customer lifetime value.
With Bloomreach, you can monitor UGC performance across every channel and touchpoint. This includes:
- Engagement metrics like click-through rates, time on page, and content shares
- Conversion insights to see how UGC influences purchase decisions
- ROI analysis that ties specific pieces of content to revenue outcomes
- Retention metrics that show how UGC supports customer loyalty over time
The goal is to offer actionable insights. You can use this data to test different formats, identify high-performing contributors, and decide where to allocate resources for maximum impact.
Use Bloomreach To Earn Better Results With UGC Strategies
User-generated content is one of the most effective ways to build trust, inspire engagement, and strengthen customer loyalty. But to make it work at scale, ecommerce marketers need more than great content — they need the tools to surface the right stories, deliver them across every channel, and measure their true impact.
That’s where Bloomreach’s agentic personalization platform comes in.
Our autonomous marketing capabilities allow you to turn customer content into a revenue-driving asset across the entire lifecycle. It’s a smarter, more scalable way to deepen relationships and keep your brand top of mind, no matter how fast you’re growing.
For even more strategies on driving lasting customer loyalty, be sure to check out our playbook.
