Stock Photos Are a Thing of the Past

With a person's attention span now shorter than a goldfish's, there has been a shift in how people process data and content.

Marketers have been trying for years to come up with the best way to attract customers. Unfortunately for them, millennials are somehow unresponsive to traditional advertisements. What this means is that the need for engaging content is more important than ever, since marketers need to capture people's attention within 8 seconds.

But how can marketers attract customers in 8 measly seconds?

Studies show that when a brand incorporates user-generated content (UGC), they see a 4x increase in click throughs. This is likely due to the fact that people are very trusting of recommendations from other people, even from people they do not know. UGC brings an authenticity to a photo that cannot be acquired from a photo created by the brand or a stock photo. For example, an eCommerce company who reposts photos from a customer is highly likely to be clicked on because it adds the personified touch of a real customer using the brand's product.

I know what you're thinking. “Okay, but using stock photos are so much easier and quicker.”

Yes and no.

While there is no doubt that using stock photos is the fastest way to upload an image, the benefits of using UGC far outweigh the speed of using pre-made images. Furthermore, curating UGC is simple and fast with an aggregator like TrueLoyal, which allows you to instantly discover and collect all of the posts that used your hashtag, location, geotag, and more. TrueLoyal also does the heavy lifting of requesting UGC rights by creating custom links that directs the account holder of your favorite posts to a legal rights page before granting you access to them. From there, you have full rights to the posts to download and use in your marketing repertoire, including ads, emails, videos, etc.

Content is a valuable asset for any marketing team and the use of UGC can enhance your brand's content. UGC boosts engagement and conversions and is incredibly easy to acquire. More importantly, the trust and credibility created between your company and your customers as a result of using UGC cannot be replicated with any other form of content, building long-term, loyal customers.

Ready to supercharge your branding? Schedule a demo with TrueLoyal today!