Unlocking the secrets of successful Direct-to-Consumer businesses
- 3 brand examples to boost your online sales
- 2 actionable tips for quicker results
- 1 special surprise
Logistics
The Step-by-Step Guide to Switching 3PLs to Increase LTV
In today's e-commerce landscape, third-party logistics (3PL) providers play a crucial role in the success of e-commerce and omnichannel brands.
As the e-commerce market continues to evolve and competition intensifies, working with the right 3PL provider can make a difference based on the post-purchase experience.
Why are 3PLs so important? They handle the storage, transportation, delivery of goods and product returns, allowing companies to focus on their core competencies and grow their customer base.
One of the key reasons for switching to 3PLs is to take advantage of new technologies and services that can improve fulfilment and shipping processes.
For example, using a 3PL with advanced tracking and reporting capabilities can help businesses better understand their customers' purchasing behaviour and make more informed decisions about inventory management.
A recent survey found that nearly 80% of customers are willing to pay more for faster delivery. Bigblue clients using Fast Tags (rapid and free delivery badges) in the product pages observed a 26%+ conversion increase.
Source: Retail Touchpoints and Bigblue
Following the steps outlined in this guide, businesses can smoothly transition to a new 3PL and see a significant increase in their e-commerce Lifetime Value (LTV).
This increased revenue can be reinvested into marketing and other growth initiatives, leading to even greater success in e-commerce.
What you will discover in this guide:
- When is the right time to change your fulfilment partner
- Choosing the right partner
- Getting ready for the switch
- Start shipping with Bigblue in 2 weeks
Part 1. When is the right time to change your fulfilment partner?
The right time to change your fulfilment partner depends on various factors. You can ask yourself these questions:
- Is your current logistics partner meeting your needs?
- Does your partner help you achieve your business goals?
- Can your 3PL help you expand to new markets easily?
- Can your partner be flexible and have the capabilities to support your brand’s growth?
The right time to change your fulfilment partner is when your current partner is no longer meeting your needs and hindering your business growth. By switching to a new partner, you can improve customer satisfaction, reduce costs, and achieve your business goals.
If you are experiencing any of the following issues, it may be time to consider switching to a new fulfilment partner:
1. Your brand is growing, and they cannot keep up the pace
61% of businesses cited the inability to scale as a reason for switching fulfilment partners.
Source: Survey by Practical E-commerce
As your brand grows and expands, your fulfilment partner must be able to keep up with the increased demand. If your current 3PL cannot handle the volume of orders or the pace of growth, it may be time to consider switching.
For example, suppose you are experiencing a surge in sales during a holiday season or due to a successful marketing campaign. Your fulfilment partner should be able to handle the increased volume without any issues. If they can’t do so, it could lead to shipment delays, inaccurate orders, and frustrated customers.
On the other hand, if you have a fulfilment partner that can scale with you, they can help you efficiently manage the growth of your business. This could include adding warehouse space, hiring more staff, and implementing new technology to streamline operations.
2. You’re experiencing performance issues
❌ 63% of consumers will unlikely return to a retailer after a negative fulfilment experience.
Source: eMarketer
If your fulfilment partner frequently makes mistakes with orders and consistently fails to meet your service level agreements (SLAs), it can lead to unhappy customers and lost revenue.
Some common performance issues that may indicate a need to switch 3PLs include:
- Inaccurate order treatment: If the 3PL consistently sends incorrect items, quantities, or shipping information, it can result in frustrated customers and expensive returns.
🔁 25% of consumers have returned an online purchase due to receiving the wrong item.
Source: survey by Forrester.
- Slow deliveries: If the 3PL regularly misses shipping deadlines, it can cause delays in receiving products and disappoint customers.
⏰ 90% of consumers expect to receive their orders within 5 days or less.
Source: Invesp
- Unreliable operations: If the 3PL is frequently experiencing issues such as lost or damaged orders, warehouse errors, or inadequate inventory management, it can disrupt your supply chain and impact your ability to meet customer demand.
💸 29% of consumers have abandoned an online purchase due to a problem with the delivery process.
Source: eMarketer
According to a survey by Logistics Management, 59% of businesses cited poor performance as a reason for switching to 3PLs. If you are experiencing any of the issues listed above or are simply not satisfied with the performance of your current 3PL, consider a change.
3. You are launching your brand in a new market
35% of businesses cited the need for a 3PL with local expertise as a reason for switching providers.
Source: survey by eMarketer
If you are launching your brand in a new market, consider partnering with a 3PL familiar with the market's specific requirements and regulations. Here are some examples of how a 3PL with experience in your target market can benefit your business:
- They can help you navigate any local regulations or compliance issues. For example, if you are launching in a market with strict customs laws, a 3PL with experience in that market can help you properly classify and label your products to ensure they clear customs smoothly.
- They can help you choose the most cost-effective and efficient shipping methods. For example, if you are launching in a market with high demand for next-day delivery, your 3PL can leverage local partnerships with carriers and negotiate prices to meet that demand.
In fact, 57% of companies that have outsourced their logistics functions to a 3PL have experienced cost savings as a result. (Source: DHL.) - They can provide local customer support and help you address any issues swiftly.
- Provide faster delivery times. A study by the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals found that brands using a 3PL for their international shipping experience faster delivery times than those handling logistics in-house.
Bigblue Tips
At Bigblue, we use Royal Mail and UPS, the UK's two preferred carriers, for orders shipped from our Kûehne+Nagel warehouse in the UK.
If you work with Bigblue, you can also leverage our fulfilment centre across Europe, we have six warehouses in France and one in Spain!
Use Bigblue to quickly start selling in new countries and expand your potential customer base.
👉 Discover Bigblue’s international warehouse network
4. Their technology is slowing you down
Companies that use advanced analytics to track and optimise their supply chain operations experience an average of 28% higher profit margins than those that do not.
Source: Accenture
Is your 3PL supporting your growth or hindering it? Does their technology help you make strategic decisions to increase savings and turnover?
- A robust Transportation Management System (TMS) or Warehouse Management System (WMS) will improve efficiency. A 3PL with more advanced technology can streamline and automate order tracking, inventory management, and shipping processes, saving time and reducing errors.
Bigblue Tips
Bigblue’s TMS provides real-time updates on the status of shipments and proactively communicates in the event of delays or disruptions.
👉 Discover Bigblue’s TMS
- A 3PL will enhance your visibility with real-time tracking and analytics tools. You can get a better understanding of your entire supply chain, helping in identifying bottlenecks and inefficiencies for more informed decision-making.
- A 3PL with the right tools will increase your competitiveness. In today's fast-paced e-commerce market, it is important to offer customers a seamless and efficient shopping experience.
- A 3PL with advanced technology will help you reduce costs in the long run. For example, identify and propose the most cost-effective routes and carriers, resulting in lower transportation costs.
Bigblue Tips
Unlock efficient logistics with Bigblue's smart carrier offer. Leveraging AI-powered delivery options, we ensure the best shipping method is chosen to boost conversions and optimise pricing. In 2023, they outperformed standard carriers' on-time delivery by 9%.
👉 Discover Bigblue’s smart carrier offer
5. They don’t have the necessary processes for your products
In 23% of cases, damaged packaging will hurt customer perception. And to make matters worse, there is a more than 70% chance that the customer will not order from you again.
Source: Raja
Products such as perfumes, food, and fashion need specific storage and shipping processes, as well as compliance with regulations. A knowledgeable 3PL can manage these efficiently.
If your current logistics provider lacks these processes, switching to a new fulfilment centre can bring the following improvements:
- A 3PL can ensure proper care and protection during storage and transportation to minimise damaged or defective items reaching customers.
- Enhanced processes for packing and shipping enable faster turnaround times and superior customer service.
- Significantly decrease your overall costs by having fewer returns and more repeat purchases from happy customers.
Marketing
The guide to sell £1M on BFCM 2024: Build your win-big strategy
Intro
Are you looking forward to making big sales this Black Friday and Cyber Monday? Matter of fact, both small and big online businesses have the opportunity to make thousands of sales within a few days, and attract a staggering number of new customers… granted that they are well prepared for an exponential orders surge!
In fact, you may be surprised to learn that Shopify merchants sold $6.3 billion globally between Black Friday and Cyber Monday in 2021, and that BFCM sales can easily account for more than 20% of annual sales volume.
If you want a piece of that pie and look forward to reaping the benefits of selling at one of the busiest times of the year, you’re in luck.
In this guide, we're covering the necessary daily steps you can take to position yourself and your business for success throughout the Black Friday and Cyber Monday surge.
Preparing for one of the biggest sales times of the year can help you bring in more traffic, double, triple, or even quadruple the sales you'd typically make, and cater to the needs of the consumers without worry.
What you will discover in this guide:
- How to optimise and prepare your logistics for an exponential surge in sales
- How to develop a fully optimised BFCM marketing campaign
- How to optimise your e-commerce website to maximise conversions.
What to expect in BFCM 2023?
49% of shoppers have stated free shipping gives them more of an incentive to purchase during Black Friday sales
Source: National Retail Federation
$472 is the average amount consumers will spend on Black Friday, with most spending an average of $415 on Cyber Monday.
Source: Moosend
The pros and cons of Black Friday-Cyber Monday sales
Consumers are more inclined to buy from brands that align with their system of values and beliefs, and recently, the Black Friday sales have won the spotlight of the clash between purpose-driven and business-as-usual brand approaches. But let’s be honest, everyone loves a good discount!
We hosted the Clash Friday event in early October 2023 and we asked merchants the main arguments pro and against the Black Friday Cyber Monday sales.
The founders of Unbottled, Kipli, PandaTea and Les Secrets de Loly, and Tim from Bigblue animated a heated debate around this topic! We’ve summarised them in the table below.
Part 1. 📦 Get ready to ship thousands of packages
Brace yourselves, Black Friday is coming…
A Bigblue study of 300+ merchants revealed that brands working with us registered a surge in online purchases between 4X and 10X their average monthly order volume during the peak period (starting on Black Friday weekend and up to 1 week prior to Christmas) in 2021.
Source: Bigblue
Prepare your business to ship thousands of orders within a short timeframe. There are a few simple ways to get your operations and logistics ready for the potential surge you can experience during the BFCM rush.
✅ 1. Check your inventory forecasts
During BFCM in 2021, over 47 million consumers across the globe chose to buy from independent brands powered by Shopify. Make sure you have enough inventory to meet the demands of these consumers!
Source: Shopify
Did you know that before becoming a shopping holiday to find great deals for basically anything you want to buy, Black Friday sales were inaugurated by electronics marketplaces to get rid of excess inventories?
Well, Black Friday has become so much more! While it still is an occasion to sell the inventory of your previous collections, it is the perfect opportunity to get new clients.
To ensure you can keep up with demand, keep track of your inventory more than usual leading up to the BFCM sale. You may have people putting in orders before the surge because they want to ensure they get their hands on whatever it is you're offering them.
Conduct stock forecasts to determine how much inventory you have and whether you may need to add to your inventory before the official sale date to keep up with the demand for products.
Bigblue tips
Use the Bigblue App to check your stock coverage
Bigblue allows merchants to track and centralise their inventory dashboards. It fully integrates with your CMS (Shopify, Magento, WooCommerce) and each purchase on your shop is synced in real-time to the Bigblue App.
Have a glance at your main inventory dashboard to discover the units sold and your stock coverage.
👉👉 Discover Bigblue’s Dashboard and analytics
✅ 2. Identify your Best-selling products
70% of consumers will buy from a competitor if the product they need is out of stock in your shop. Don’t let that happen!
Source: Shopify
Demand forecasting within the supply chain is an absolute must to help you keep an accurate estimate to stock up on the essentials and anticipate the sales revenue you can bring in from the BFCM sales event.
Which products have become best sellers?
Of course, you want more than enough inventory to keep up with customers' demands for BFCM.
Why is this information essential for you to know?
But knowing your best sellers also helps you decide which products to start offering deals and discounts on to get consumers excited about any sale you plan to host during this period.
It is also a good opportunity to convince new clients to buy! Consumers are more likely to look forward to a special sale if it means getting something they want or need at a discounted price!
Bigblue tips
Use the Bigblue App to identify your best sellers easily
Discover your best-sellers, your inventory history, and other insightful inventory metrics.Look at your main inventory dashboard to discover the units sold and your stock coverage.
👉👉 Discover Bigblue’s Dashboard and analytics
✅ 3. Choose your logistics partner
Remember that 84% of buyers say they are unlikely to buy from a company again after a bad delivery experience.
Source: Baymard
With orders surge reaching up to 10x the monthly volume for some merchants in just one day… Make sure your logistics partner can keep the pace of your Black Friday sales.
Consider choosing a fast, reliable, efficient, and eco-friendly logistics partner for your products.
If you manage your logistics in-house, prepare to pack a high number of parcels. You’ll need to bring your whole team on board and ready to prepare and ship the parcels for your clients fast and without errors.
Bigblue’s cheatsheet to optimise your logistics during peak periods
🎙 Communicate your expected sales to your logistics partner
Communication is key to a successful outcome when working with a logistics partner. By providing your expected BFCM sales to your logistics partner, they can give you the most accurate estimated delivery date for customers in each of your international markets, ensuring you can relay that information to your customers when making their purchases.
🏭 Send your stock to the warehouse
If you already have your stock ready to go, send it to the warehouse as soon as possible to ensure your 3PL will have enough time to process your inventory and have everything ready to pack and ship faster. Not shipping items to the warehouse in advance could cause significant delays, and consumers want to get the items they've purchased during the BFCM sale at record speed.
👉👉 Discover how you can use Bigblue to run your logistics effortlessly
✅ 4. Select your shipping method to ensure consumers get their goods quickly
22% of shoppers will abandon their carts when the items they’re purchasing will take too long to get to them. Don’t miss out on making the sale because of SLOW shipping times.
Soucre: Baymard
It's time to consider the carriers you wish to work with and the specific shipping speeds you'll offer your customers. Keep in mind - people want to get their items as quickly as possible.
In the digital world that we're living in today, most are used to two-day shipping speed because of Amazon Prime.
Gymshark lets their clients know that shipping delays for BFCM sales can take up to 10 days.
Communicate them clearly on your product pages and tracking emails to avoid frustration from your clients.
Bigblue tips
Lashilé Beauty uses Bigblue for an ultra-fast delivery during BFCM!
Lashilé Beauty's Black Friday marketing campaigns are the benchmark in the market. Their success found their match in Bigblue, a logistics partner capable of keeping the pace with them during peak periods. Last year, Bigblue prepared and dispatched over 15K Black Friday packages record time.
👉👉 Discover Lashilé Beauty’s success story
✅ 5. Prepare for international shipping
During BFCM 2021, 15% of all orders globally were cross-border. The ability to ship globally can supercharge your business.
Source: Shopify
Are you expecting to receive orders from customers across the globe?
If so, you need to prepare for international shipping, which includes looking into logistics options, determining the cost of shipping products outside the country, and getting a better idea of the overall time these items will spend in transit before being delivered to the recipients.
Bigblue tips
Lashilé is a worldwide hit! Discover how they use Bigblue to deliver vitamin gummies
Lashilé Beauty has found in Bigblue the ideal partner to ship its thousands of orders daily and to support its international development strategically: in Spain, Italy, the UK, and soon in new markets.
"Bigblue allows us to ensure a very high quality delivery experience for all our customers in France and internationally.”
Yoann Assouline, founder Lashilé Beauty.
✅ 6. Deliver a unique experience with every order
Did you know that over 53% of shoppers buy gifts for their loved ones, and for themselves during BFCM?
Treat your clients with unforgettable unboxings and grasp the opportunity to get User Generated Content for free… Unboxing videos have grown by a shocking 57% in one year alone.
Choose your packaging for the sale
♻️ Sustainable packaging is on the rise. The Global Green Packaging Market is estimated to exceed USD 353 Billion within the next six years.
Decide on the type of packaging you plan to use for products that will get shipped out during the BFCM sale. It's important to consider the following things when choosing your packaging:
Is it creative? Does your packaging stand out? If not, what can you do to improve its aesthetic and enhance the unboxing experience for the customers who buy from your business?
Is it eco-friendly? Consumers often appreciate business owners' efforts to use eco-friendly or recyclable materials to ship products instead of using wasteful materials that contribute to pollution and climate change.
Get ready for Black Friday unboxing hauls
Dermalogica’s unique unboxing made possible by Bigblue has revealed 155 million views on TikTok!Bigblue allows brands to offer a premium unboxing experience by using custom packaging with your brand's unique style and wrapping paper to enhance the unboxing experience. On top of that, you can add flyers with promo codes, thank you letters, invitations to share their unboxing on social media with a hashtag, instructions for using the product, and free product samples to help customers discover new products.
👉👉 Discover how Bigblue enables Dermalogica’s viral unboxing hauls
Build excitement with real-time delivery tracking
The total customer ticket volume increase during BFCM 2021 was 50% And over 32.7% of opened tickets are related to shipping and logistics questions.
Source: Zoho desk and Gorgias
Enhance buying experience from your business by building excitement with real-time delivery tracking.
Be sure to set clear shipping expectations to avoid possible disappointment if and when packages don’t get delivered within the first few days of ordering.
Reassure clients and let them know when their order is prepared, shipped and delivered!
Bigblue Tips
Use your order tracking emails to increase the LTV of clients acquired during BFCM
Using branded delivery tracking e-mails has many advantages:
1. They have an open rate of 75% vs 20 to 30% for marketing e-mails.
2. Each email is opened up to 4 times during the delivery.
3. Buyers that receive an email have a better repeat rate (+4%) than buyers that didn’t receive an email
4. And reduce bad ratings by -60%: they reassure clients, and overall increase their delivery experience. They are also a great opportunity to help you get more UGC!
👉 Discover Bigblue’s tracking emails
✅ 7. Offer free shipping for your BFCM orders
53% of consumers abandon their shopping carts because of excessive shipping costs.
Know how to get FREE shipping right
Providing customers with FREE shipping is a fantastic way to meet their needs and expectations while providing the best experience.
Offering free shipping on orders that reach a certain threshold is an effective way to make additional sales and improve the customer experience.
Dermalogica offers free shipping for purchases above 80€ and even more…Once their clients reach the 80€ mark, they automatically get a free giftAnd if they order at least 120€ in products, they will get a second article for free.
Bigblue Tips
CAVAL worked with Bigblue to implement a Prime-like delivery experience in their shop. By displaying multiple delivery methods (express, green, pick-up points, and free delivery), and providing precise delivery times, 92% of CAVAL’s clients are satisfied with their delivery experience!
Like Caval, allow your clients to rate their experience with shipping with their email thanks to their Bigblue app. A good way to boost engagement (and avoid bad surprises on Google or Trustpilot).
👉 Discover how CAVAL uses Bigblue
✅ 8. Use your return policy for the holiday sales
92% of buyers declared that they will buy again from a merchant if the returns process was simple.
Knowing that 53% of shoppers benefit from BFCM sales to lock in holiday gifts, adjust your return policy for the holiday sales.
It helps reduce pressure on your support team while providing consumers with an option to return items.
Bigblue Tips
Extend your returns and exchanges date to mid-January
You can add a banner on your product pages to reassure the clients about their purchase. There is no risk if you allow your clients and their loved ones to try their gifts on!
Caval extended returns from 14 days to January 15th. They use Bigblue’s returns portal and Store Credit to keep their customers happy, and retain revenue with frictionless returns!
👉 Discover how CAVAL uses Bigblue’s returns portal
Part 2. 🤑 The €1M BFCM Ad strategy
During Black Friday week, the average website conversion rate was 2.72% — this jumped to 4.09% on Black Friday and 3.11% on Cyber Monday.
Meanwhile traffic was up 37% on Black Friday and 21% on Cyber Monday compared to the average number of daily sessions across the rest of November.
Source: Wayflyer
After iOS14's release last year, e-commerce businesses saw a decline in ROAS from 3.8 to 3.3 across Meta and Google Ads.
However, on Black Friday, with customers primed and ready to buy, merchants saw a jump in ROAS to 4.2. On Cyber Monday, ROAS was just above the post-iOS14 average at 3.4.
✅ 1. Get your audience segmentation right
During the week of BFCM 2021, 55% of purchases came from new customers, and on Black Friday and Cyber Monday, specifically, the percentage of purchases attributed to new customers were 55% and 54%, respectively.
Source : Wayflyer
Provide personalised messages to different people within your audience by taking the time to segment the audience.
When you take this step, you can send out specific messages to different groups of people based on their likes, interests, and particular demographics.
The 5 basic audience segments for BFCM
🛍 Buyers: Identify the people who are more than likely willing to purchase from your business.
💌 Subscribers: Connect with your subscribers by sending out promotional messages on your BFCM sales. Let them be the first to know of discounts and deals you plan to provide.
🤩 Fans: Share content with fans via social media platforms, such as Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.
👍 Remarketing: Detail new ways to bring in traffic and target new people for the BFCM sale.
🔥 Top-Line / New Customers: Think about what you can offer to new customers to reel them in and get them to make their first purchase during this exciting sale period.
Bigblue Tips
Expert tips from marketing expert Ezra Firestone
Ezra Firestone ran the BFCM campaigns for his cosmetics brand BOOM and got the following results in 14 days before launching his BFCM campaign:
🔥 461K Reach
🔥 1,3M impressions
🔥 2.86 frequency (each person saw his brand almost 3 times)
🔥 0.02$ for 15 seconds of video views
During BFCM 2021, he used this same audience to show SALES AD with promo codes.
👉👉 Discover Ezra’s strategy for BFCM
✅ 2. Warm your audiences up and get them ready to buy
Create a pre-buzz for your BFCM sales
Gymshark generates 20% of its total annual revenue in the 14 days surrounding the holidays, and 40% of that is in the first six hours of Black Friday!
Learn from the best… In this section we’ll give you a full break-down of Gymshark’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday strategy.
🦈 Gymshark excels at BFCM!$
They created an amazing video where they explain their sales FAQS covering: Payment Methods, Shipping Information, Discounts, and Returns.
Social media hype
Instagram has 800 million MAUS. It's the perfect platform for advertising your brand and business to make sales, especially during the BFCM period.
Like Gymshark, post a teaser a day on Instagram
Instagram Reels have become an increasingly popular way for businesses of all sizes to advertise to targeted audiences, gaining more attention surrounding their businesses. Don't sleep on the potential to make more sales during the BFCM sales period by promoting deals and discounts through Instagram Reels.
87% of online shoppers use social media while making shopping decisions
Source: Statista
Create a BFCM shopping page on social media
Make it possible for consumers to shop directly on social media instead of going to your website. It's another way to bring in more sales and increase your earnings during the BFCM event.
For example, if you have a business page on Facebook, you can create a virtual shopping option for consumers who can view products you sell directly from the social media platform, add different items to their cart, and complete the buying process within minutes. It's the kind of convenience that consumers LOVE.
About 11% of social media users make immediate purchases and 44% do more research before buying.
Source: Earthweb
Prepare a gift guide for consumers to review
Want to increase your chances of making that sale? Create a gift guide. Your gift guide can include phrases like this:
For the fashionista in your life, you can't go wrong with getting the [product]!
We all know someone special who needs [product] in their lives!
Looking for that special something to get for your sweetheart this holiday season? Look no further than [product]. They're sure to love it!
Live Streams Influence 70% of Social Media Users in Buying Decisions.
Source: Earthweb
Connect with social media influencers
On top of promoting client reviews on their product pages. Gymshark added a special section on their Instagram account “GS Family”, every Friday, a bunch of lucky customers get featured on Gymshark’s stories.
Instead of attempting to reach those with millions of followers who are often harder to connect with, you're better off connecting with micro-influencers. Work with them to get them to post about your BFCM sales event.
✅ 3. Develop your winner Ad strategy
In 2021 e-commerce businesses spent 5% more on average on Facebook ads on Black Friday week than the previous year, and the average Facebook ad spend was up 90% the week of Black Friday, versus year-to-date pre-Black Friday week.
Source: Wayflyer
Video wins all on BFCM
80% of customers start the “customer journey” by watching branded videos on Social Media
Source: ThriveHive
Prepare your best VIDEO campaigns:
Video content should include customer testimonials, product demos, behind-the-scenes footage, and more.
Give consumers greater insights into your brand and business.
And run it with VIDEO VIEWS GOAL:
Set a goal for cold and warm audiences. The objective? Build huge audiences that will be ready to convert during Black Friday for cheap.
You can convert newcomers into customers who will order from your business again and again, even after the BCFM sale is over.
Bigblue tips
Matthieu from Stride-Up recommends keeping it short. The 15 to 20-second mark is the sweet spot for these kinds of ads.
Cabaïa, the famous backpack brand, masters video Ads! This Ad alone has generated over 30K likes in the last 30 days and has been shared over a thousand times.
We’re pretty sure we’ll be seeing this ad on BFCM!
Advertise special bundles for the occasion
Most business owners will create special bundle deals for customers, allowing them to get more products at a discounted rate. What types of bundles would you be willing to offer to the consumers? This is something to think about and focus on creating to give shoppers something even more exciting to look forward to, which will help you bring in more business in return.
Create high-quality graphics depicting images of everything included in these bundled goods for customers to purchase. If the photos are compelling enough, people will want to buy those bundles, which means they will spend more with your business compared to others, including big corporations such as Amazon.
Bigblue tips
Unbottled and Meuf partnered and launched a bundled offer for their clients on their newsletter "We are pleased to offer you a pair of Meuf Paris menstrual panties”
👉 Discover Bigblue’s logistics solutions
Don’t forget about promoting your discount strategy
Ezra Firestone revealed the discount strategy to promote on your Ads for BFCM.
You can create a four-week plan for your promotion:
During the first week, offer a 10% discount
Give small gift cards during the second week
On the third week, offer 20% off certain products
On BFCM offer 30% to 40% discount
✅ 4. Set your email & SMS strategy
Companies that use phrases such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday in their subject lines can increase click-through rates by a staggering 64%.
Source: Dot Digital
Start building suspense for the BFCM sale with a series of emails sent throughout the week. No, this doesn't mean sending multiple messages per day. Instead, send up to three weekly messages, each including a little more information than the previous one. The idea behind this is to build that sense of urgency and suspense that makes people want to know what kinds of deals and discounts they can snag when visiting your site throughout the BFCM event.
Ezra Firestone set up an email flow for the early bird to warm them up to their sales!
50% of BOOMs yearly sales come from this campaign flow
1M people on their list
37K of them produce 50% of their sales, and they are repeat loyal customers
Bigblue tips
Use branded tracking emails to continue selling… post-BFCM
Encourage your subscribers to register for the pre-sale to receive early access to discounts and promotional offers exclusively available to the mailing list. It entices consumers to engage, provides access to an incredibly active group of people, and enables you to increase conversion rates.
Unbottled systematically ads a banner with a 10€ discount on each of their tracking emails!
👉👉 Discover Bigblue’s Tracking experience
Part 3. 🔥 Optimise your website for BFCM
🐌 41% of shoppers will leave a site if it loads too slowly and then visit Amazon to search for the same item!
Source: Retail Dive
Keep website speeds from hindering your progress in making countless sales during the BFCM event. Test your speeds weeks in advance to ensure visitors to your website will have a speedy, smooth experience when browsing through pages, sorting through available products, and completing their purchases.
If your website runs too slowly, most consumers will get frustrated enough to leave the site and never return, meaning someone else will make that sale, such as your competition.
Put your website speed to the test! Use Google’s Page speed insights to spot optimisation opportunities!
✅ 1. Optimise your website for mobile conversion
In 2021, 71% of BFCM purchases were made from mobile devices, compared to 29% on desktops
Source: Shopify
Clients will see your ads on social media.
Make sure you’ve optimised the mobile experience to enable them to shop easily from their phones or tablets rather than a desktop computer or laptop.
BOOM drove traffic from their ads to simple landing pages optimised with a simple structure, with one option for mobile users and another option for desktop users!
Want to achieve the same level of success while bringing in more business during the BFCM sales event? Follow this approach:
Headline: Create a captivating headline that intrigues consumers. The goal is to reel them in with something interesting.
Sub-Headline: Include additional details with a sub-headline that provides a bit of extra information consumers can use to their advantage to learn more about your brand & products.
Image: Use a high-resolution, high-quality image of one of your best-sellers or something else related to your business for those who prefer visuals. The content you post can make or break the experience for consumers.
CTA: Never forget the call-to-action. Let consumers know what you want them to do, such as buy now to save big.
Thank You Page: Include a thank you page to show appreciation and gratitude to consumers for choosing your business. It shows you care about your customers and are grateful for them!
✅ 2. Understand the impact of the delivery experience in sales
Create a banner announcing delivery time estimates for BFCM purchases
The transparency on delivery dates is something your customers will appreciate tremendously. Be sure to create a large banner that clearly announces delivery time estimates so your customers will know exactly when they should start receiving their packages. While these delivery times are just estimates, customers can receive packages before or by these dates!
+ 34% CRO with Bigblue’s Fast-Tags
Using A/B test, we have observed that buyers seeing a Fast Tag convert +26% more and are encouraged to spend more (+4% cart value).
⚡️ Oma&Me displays precise delivery dates on their product pages using Bigblue’s Fast-Tags.
👉 Discover Bigblue’s Fast-Tags
Create a banner announcing your Christmas cutoffs
Creating a banner like this helps you develop a sense of urgency. It lets consumers know when to put in their orders to ensure delivery before or by Christmas. Most people want to get those orders in before then to have the items ready to give as gifts to loved ones.
✅ 3. Facilitate payments at checkout
+30% to 45%increase in the average order value for purchases paid for with Klarna
💰 Accept different payment methods to cater to more consumers:
Again, don't alienate shoppers by only accepting one or two payment methods. Instead, accept as many payment methods as possible to ensure that you can cater to a broader audience, receiving payments for the products you provide in countless ways.
💳 Add the BNPL (buy now, pay later) feature to the checkout:
Marketing
Product Seeding: The Key to Becoming an 8-figure Brand with Influencer Marketing
Intro
Influencer marketing has quickly become one of the most effective ways to reach a targeted audience. And while it's not always easy, there are a series of actionable steps you can take to use this marketing method and benefit from it. Companies that have experienced tremendous success with influencer marketing have typically taken an approach known as "product seeding."
Fashion Nova has used product seeding to their advantage, essentially building its brand around some of the most prominent influencers, each of whom has a massive following.
The company has currently enlisted the help of around 5K mega influencers who will post Fashion Nova content here and there that appears more like a casual conversation between friends than it does an advertisement.
This marketing method has worked in favour of the fast fashion brand. The company's founder, Richard Saghian, is believed to be worth roughly $1.4 billion, selling around $500 million worth of merchandise in 2021 alone.
The influencer marketing industry is expected to reach a staggering $16.4B by the end of 2022.
Dozens of companies are starting to follow Fashion Nova's lead, using product seeding to connect with their audience on a deeper, more personal level.
1. SUGAR Cosmetics, founded in 2015 with only TWO products to its name at the time, is now worth $30 billion. Despite the company's humble beginnings, the founder's decision to utilise influencer marketing paid off, with social media marketing and viral videos helping the brand flourish!
2. Gymshark became a billion-dollar DTC fitness brand by utilising the power of influencer campaigns.
3. Another company exceeding initial expectations because of influencer marketing, PrettyLittleThing has experienced astronomical growth. Working with celebrities like Miley Cyrus and Nicki Minaj, to name a few, the brand has become the fastest-growing e-commerce fashion company.
If you want to increase your brand's visibility and make more sales, ultimately leading to a significant profit earned each day, product seeding and influencer-generated content are necessary. There are endless possibilities for this type of content, including web content, product reviews, tutorials, and much more. Before you know it, you will begin noticing an increased interest in your brand and what you offer.
If you're ready to master marketing and resonate with your audience, consider taking two approaches – influencer-generated content and user-generated content, both of which can make a difference in your marketing strategy.
The Impact of Influencer Marketing on E-Commerce Conversion Rates and Sales
The global influencer marketing industry will reach $24.1 billion by 2025.
87% of e-commerce shoppers depend on social media reviews to help them decide where to make a purchase or not.
49% of customers rely on the recommendations of influencers before ordering online
Source: Plytix
With numbers like these, it's not hard to see why more companies rely on influencer marketing and user-generated content to sell their products and services to the masses. In fact, many leading brands in the industry have already taken the initiative to rely on this marketing method to increase brand awareness and boost sales.
What you will discover in this guide:
- Influencer Generated Content vs User Generated Content
- How to use product seeding to drive sales
- Product seeding done right: whitelisting vs influencer darkposting
🤳 Part 1. Influencer Generated Content vs User Generated Content
Most consumers will spend more than 5 hours per day watching user-generated content.
📱 70% of consumers will consider user-generated content reviews before spending money on something specific.
🙌 93% of customers agree that user-generated content is valuable in helping them decide whether to make a purchase.
Source: Everyone Social
The statistics speak for themselves, making understanding user-generated and influencer-generated content's overall value easier.
1. What is the difference between user-generated content and influencer content?
The influencer marketing market proliferated between 2016 and 2020, increasing from $1.7 billion to $9.7 billion four years later.
Source: Influencer Marketing Hub
The first step to getting started is understanding the differences between user-generated content and influencer content.
When relying on user-generated content, you depend on any customers, whether they have a following or not, to discuss your products in the content they've created.
Influencer-generated content is any content created by someone with a following of a minimum of 5K people, but usually much more than that.
In most cases, content produced by influencers is sponsored, but content created by everyday users isn't sponsored, meaning it's more honest and open to the public.
2. Influencer-Generated Content
61% of consumers trust influencers' recommendations, giving your brand more credibility than ever.
Source: Shopify
With influencer-generated content, you essentially have influencers with thousands of followers producing content on your brand, which means they will talk positively about the products you provide.
It's an excellent way to get more people interested in your brand and the products you sell because those who follow these influencers will feel more inclined to make the purchases.
While this content is occasionally sponsored, it's not always sponsored, and sometimes influencers make the content themselves because they love what the product does for them. s someone with a following, most would consider the influencer a trusted and reliable source who wouldn't steer them in the wrong direction. As a result, consumers who follow that influencer are more likely to purchase the products that the individual mentions in photos and videos posted to social media.
The Additional Ongoing Benefits of Influencer Marketing
✅ Benefit 1. Brand Credibility
Many big and small companies are using influencer marketing to gain credibility. While small businesses benefit the most from this, larger corporations, including Nike, Dunkin' Donuts, and Chipotle are taking advantage of the opportunity to reach new audiences and make more sales.
1. American Eagle
The brand has been around since 1977 but has had its fair share of highs and lows. Even as things may have been dying out for the brand within the last five years, the brand decided to partner with the famous social media influencer Addison Rae.
Addison Rae, a TikTok influencer with more than 70 million TikTok followers, generated $4.26 million in Media Impact Value for American Eagle over six months.
Source: Women’s wear daily
The partnership helped American Eagle advertise its new line of "Mom Jeans." Because of Addison Rae, the brand is making a name for itself again.
So, not only did the partnership enable them to gain more credibility, but it also made it possible for the brand to receive more user-generated content than it had before.
2. Sun Peaks Resort
An incredible ski resort situated in British Columbia, wanted to bring more attention to consumers and showcase what it had to offer.
With engaging content posted by influencers on different platforms, including Instagram and Facebook, consumers were getting what appeared to be a "sneak peek" at what Sun Peaks Resort is like, ultimately leading to more reservations!
Stunning images, daily Instagram stories, and short Facebook videos drove 200,000+ article views of three minutes or more, creating massive interest in Sun Peaks’ target market.
Source: Travelmindset
✅ Benefit 2. Lower Costs Compared to In-House Content Creation
Influencer content allows brands to reduce advertising expenses, saving them more money in the long run. Not so sure?
1. Ruggable
Known for its two-piece machine washable rug system, spent 25% less on influencer marketing while receiving a 32% higher return on the investment.
The famous dog influencers Asher and Ashby have an Instagram account featuring the mischiefs of two corgis with about 30K followers.
Rugglable got more than 100 high-quality pieces of content from Asher and Ashby that they reused on their website, paid ads, emails and social media campaigns.
Source: Aspire
2. Aura Frames
Leverages influencer marketing and saves roughly 50% of its monthly content budget.
The company needed an efficient way to scale its content strategy without breaking the bank. According to Christine Zalocha, their VP of Marketing, the burn rate on digital marketing content falls from four to seven days.
20% of Aura Frames’ sales are attributed to Influencer Generated Content, or paid ads featuring influencer content
Source: Aspire
Influencer Generated Content allowed them to get over 650 pieces of content that they repurposed in over 13K custom videos to test and understand the content that truly works for the brand.
✅ Benefit 3. Authenticity
60% of marketers say influencer-generated content performs better and increases engagement over traditional branded posts.
Source: The social sheperd
1. Benefit Cosmetics
Increased awareness of its brand, with more consumers recognising its authenticity due to powerful influencer marketing strategies on social platforms such as TikTok.
By taking an omnichannel approach, the brand connected with a larger group of people, increasing organic impressions and gaining more sales.
The global beauty brand partnered with a diverse group of creators via Instagram and TikTok, to promote their new Brow Microfilling Pen. This approach achieved 2.3M organic impressions
Take a closer look at the results of Benefit’s campaign:
- On Tiktok: 1.4M impressions, 1.18% engagement rate, 3.5K hours of total viewing time.
- On Instagram: 955K impressions, 3.65% engagement rate, 102.6k engagements.
2. Levi's
Doubled views on its products by working with popular TikTok influencers. The company has also enlisted the help of some of today's leading Gen Z influencers, including Jaden Smith, to help showcase the products they sell. This approach has helped the brand appear to be more authentic to the average consumer.
Levi’s digital business accounts for over 15% of its total revenue, a 2X increase in just 3 years.
Source: Ion
Levis’s combined the power of their Future Finish 3D technology to customise denim products and influencer marketing to create authentic campaigns.
✅ Benefit 4. Increased Social Content
The number of global social media users continues to increase from 4.2 billion to 4.62 billion between January 2021 and January 2022.
Increasing social content is a fantastic way for brands to gain attention from millions of users daily because of the growing number of people who use social media daily.
1. Starbucks
The coffee brand has learned how to use the power of social media and influencer marketing to its advantage.
The platform has increased the amount of social content pushed out to its 35 million Facebook followers and 18 million Instagram followers, creating fun hashtags and other ways to interact with individuals that support the business.
A Grande Cloud Machiatto for Ari!
Starbucks partnered with Ariana Grande to launch her own drink, the Cloud Machiatto. A single post from the artist generated nearly 3M likes.
2. Nike
Is another major company with a massive following of over 150 million people on Instagram and 35 million on Facebook. The company uses this to its advantage, regularly posting engaging and relatable content to consumers that resonate with them instead of coming off as too salesy.
✅ Benefit 5. Connection with Engaged Consumers (Brand Followers, Brand Communities, etc.)
85% of business owners agree that branded communities have positively impacted business.
Source: Views for Change
1. Lego
It has built its brand around community members. Groups of people with a passion for LEGOs can connect, share insights, find collectable pieces, and so much more, which means more business for the company.
2. Sephora
Popular cosmetics store Sephora has built a solid following with its Beauty INSIDER community. People of all ages can join the community for inspiration, helpful tips, product reviews, general beauty advice, and more. And what does this mean for Sephora? More sales!
Sephora’s Squad influencer campaign launched in 2019 with 70 influencers, including Iyana and yayayayoung.
The community has grown to over 5.7M members, who’ve created over 2.8M posts for Sephora.
Source: Fast Company
✅ Benefit 6. Informed customers and more conversions
81% of retail shoppers will spend time researching a product online before they decide to buy it. Retail shoppers who do research beforehand are considered informed customers.
Studies show many of the best well-informed shoppers are buying store brand products instead of the name brand, higher priced items in the stores. So, what does this mean? It means brands of all sizes can get ahead, even relatively new, by offering lower prices on high-quality products.
Some companies are experiencing a drastic increase in conversion rates and gaining consumer loyalty after relying on influencer marketing.
1. Windsor saw a 29% increase in web conversions after relying heavily on social media marketing, highlighting user-generated content on their accounts.
2. DMC has relied on user-generated content and influencer marketing, helping them increase consumer engagement. The valuable content allows the needlework material company to breathe new life into its marketing strategy while connecting with more consumers than ever before and boosting conversion rates.
3. With its #TravelforReal campaign, Loews Hotels increased engagement rates, getting more people to make reservations for a stay at one of their many hotels!
Bigblue tips
How Unbottled used product seeding to inaugurate its flagship store in Paris
Unbottled gave away 100 solid-shampoo products to the first 100 visitors of their shop!
The plastic-free personal care company, recently opened its flagship store in Paris… accompanied by no other than former Miss France and influencer, Alexandra Rosenfeld.
People lined up for more than an hour to discover Unbottled’s products and take selfies with Alexandra and the company founders.
👉👉 Discover Unbottled’s success story with Bigblue
Product seeding
22% of shoppers will abandon their carts when purchasing items will take too long to get to them. Don’t miss out on making the sale because of SLOW shipping times.
Source: Baymard
If you want your business to succeed, the best way to get it to do so is to facilitate long-term relationships with the types of influencers with core values that align with your brand's values. In addition, it's best to give rather than ask these influencers to do something for you. This is a technique best known as product seeding.
So, what does this mean? Instead of asking an influencer to support your business, you send them free products without expecting anything from them. It doesn't guarantee that they will make a post about your business, but there is a relatively good chance they will. Most influencers will genuinely appreciate receiving the free merchandise and will likely post about it, whether in pictures or videos.
Bigblue Tips
Dermalogica uses Bigblue for their product seeding strategy
Dermalogica uses Bigblue’s gift-App feature to offer free products to their client’s orders. How does it work? Dermalogica can either establish conditions to add gifts (promo codes, purchase amount) or launch seasonal marketing campaigns to automatically offer a gift to each order on a given period.
See how Dermalogica’s product seeding strategy makes influencers jump straight to TikTok to share their unboxing experience.
👉 Discover Dermalogica’s success story
3. User-Generated Content
80% of consumers prefer to see photos from real customers or UGC rather than stock images.
Source: Loyoli
While influencer-generated content is a big deal because it can help brands of all sizes reach their targeted audience, boost engagement, and drastically increase conversion rates, it's not the only type of content working wonders. User-generated content is becoming an increasingly effective way for companies to increase visibility online, which leads to more web traffic and sales.
What is UGC
User-generated content (UGC) is content created by the average consumer. Rather than paying these individuals to make content about your brand, you're exceeding their expectations enough to make them want to create content independently. From the quality of the products to the unboxing experience you provide, these are the things that leave a lasting impression and get people to post pictures and videos of them using a product or talking about what they like most about it.
Impact of UGC on CRO
+48% of consumers agree that UGC helps them discover brands and products.
Source: SimilarWeb
User-generated content greatly impacts CRO because most consumers conduct extensive research before buying products. In addition, the internet has become a valuable tool, making it easier for consumers to find reviews, tutorials, and so much more before they've even invested their funds into these products. With that in mind, the consumers searching for information on products may come across different types of user-generated content that encourages them to buy a product because of how good it works.
1. Calvin Kelin
Created the in #MyCalvins campaign, working with mega influencers and celebrities such as Justin Bieber and Kendrick Lamar. It's helped the brand gain visibility, increase sales, and connect with new audiences like never before.
2. Aerie
The famous loungewear brand, started mastering the art of user-generated content as early as 2014 when it announced it would no longer retouch its models' bodies, providing authentic images of women in its clothing and accessories.
The hashtag #AerieReal went viral and helped the brand gain more attention than ever. The brand is now valued at over $5 billion.
Bigblue Tips
Use your unboxing experience to generate more UGC
Cabaia’s unique unboxing, made possible by Bigblue has revealed 50 million views on TikTok!
To discover your brand’s unboxing virality potential go to TikTok Discover and look up your brand’s name + unboxing.
👉 Discover Bigblue’s unboxing experience
What makes UGC so impactful?
1. People like watching tutorials and product reviews created by random people because they provide a greater sense of authenticity.
2. Most consumers find UGC incredibly relatable because it's often created by people who look like them, act like them, or even have similar interests.
3. There are so many ways to find user-generated content across different platforms. The most common platforms used include Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.
Bigblue Tips
FROM FUTURE teamed up with Bigblue to deliver the most extraordinary experience to customers with custom packaging provided.
As a result, buyer satisfaction increased by 89% within the short span of four months.
👉 Discover From Future’s success story
4. IGC or UGC: Which will drive your brand's best results?
49% of TikTok users find products through videos created by brands, creators, and other social media users. Roughly 37% of those individuals bought the TikTok products after learning about them on the platform.
Source: TikTok’s Path to Purchase Report
You're probably asking yourself, "Which is better - user-generated or influencer-generated content?" The truth is that both are incredibly powerful, but it's all about knowing how to use them. It's also about working with what you can afford based on your budget for marketing-related expenses.
User-generated content is likely best for you if you're:
- Looking to save money on marketing expenses while increasing brand visibility.
- Offering additional features, such as ETAs and other conveniences, that consumers will love and want to brag about to others.
- Trying to build a community of consumers who can support one another while using your products.
- Wanting to come off as authentic as possible to your audience.
However, influencer-generated content may be the best option if you're:
- Willing to spend a budget on either sending products for free to influencers or paying them to post about your brand in their posts, stories, and reels.
- Trying to cater to a specific audience that would be more likely to buy from your business if they saw one of their favourite influencers advertising your products.
- Interested in reaching an entirely new audience of people based on different demographics.
- Looking for high-quality content created by influencers that you can use across different platforms, such as TikTok and Instagram.
But this doesn't mean you can't use a little bit of both. Some brands combine the two to supercharge their marketing efforts, and you can do the same. Check out this list of some of the pros and cons of each type of content.
🎁 Part 2. How to Use Product Seeding to Boost Sales
61% of consumers prefer recommendations from influencers over branded social media content.
50.7% of brands that work with influencers for product seeding purposes own an e-commerce shop.
The influencer marketing industry has a value of over $13 billion.
Source: Shopify
1. Benefits of Product Seeding
Before using product seeding, it helps to know the many benefits you can expect to reap when you use it as a valuable marketing tool. With product seeding, you will have the opportunity to:
- Align with different types of influencers based on your personal preferences. You can connect with people who share similar values. These are great people to select to represent your brand.
- Save money while building one of your brand's most effective marketing strategies.
- Conveniently highlight some of your favourite products or new releases to boost sales for those items, which will help you earn more profit and garner more attention.
- Strengthen your brand's authenticity and become a trusted, reliable source of whatever it is that you currently sell to consumers.
- Build more awareness for your brand without spending nearly as much as you would in the past.
💜 Some companies you may know and love best use product seeding as a strategy, such as LUSH, Zaful, and Graze.
If these are the benefits you want to experience, follow the actionable steps below to get started.
2. Use It on Your Website
If you send free products to influencers and customers, and some of them create content surrounding your brand and its products, include that content on your website! There are many ways to do this, such as:
- Having a section on your site of consumers who've used a specific hashtag relating to your business and a product it sells.
- Including a "See What Others Have to Say" section on your site with short-form video content from creators who've mentioned your brand or shown others how to use some of your products.
- Creating a section on your site that shows the faces of influencers using your product will often entice the average consumer to buy from you.
Bigblue Tips
Create an Influencer-Friendly Website
Add a sign-up page for brand ambassadors (influencers willing to represent your brand)
Always create landing pages for any promotional offer, special deal, or event taking place
Include different types of influencer content throughout your website to gain attention and build trust with the consumers
✅ Step 1. Master the Top Types of Influencer-Generated Content to Use on Your Website
56% of online shoppers have bought a product after seeing a post from an influencer they trust.
Source: Hubspot
Most marketers envision carefully curated social media posts when they think of influencer-generated content that gets consumers' attention. Although most of the different types of influencer-generated content are readily available on social media platforms, such as TikTok, marketers can add more value to this content by integrating some of the posts from influencers into their web content.
Product seeding is the way to go if you want how-to and FAQ content. Send influencers these products, and if you think they might struggle with using them, include a nice little note with instructions in the packaging. Once they see the magic unfold in front of them, they will want to share that with their followers, which means they're more likely to create how-to content.
Bigblue Tips
Discover what type of influencers you should partner with
Kolsquare shared with us this useful table with the engagement rates you should look for nano, micro and macro influencers on each platform.
👉 Contact the Kolsquare team
✅ Step 2. How-To Maximise the Performance of your FAQ content
Work on collecting how-to and FAQ content. Why? It shows consumers how to use the product AND answers many questions they might have before buying.
Need an example? KISS, the famous cosmetic brand, made waves on social media with Falscara, an at-home eyelash extension kit that uses segmented lashes instead of strip lashes or individual lashes. And what caused such a stir? Posts from consumers on social media.
Once consumers started creating short-form videos on how to apply the under-lash system, these lash kits began selling out in stores.
In addition, major beauty influencers decided to try them, including Mikayla Nogueria, the 24-year-old makeup guru with a massive TikTok following of 13.6 million.
Can you imagine how many people learned about Falscara and decided to buy it because of her post showing how to use it?
Bigblue Tips
How to Get the Content You Need
After posting the first video to platforms like TikTok, consumers will likely have questions. The great thing about this is that the influencers can reply to these questions with video content, essentially answering FAQs for your brand so that you don't have to do it. It's an effective marketing strategy that saves you time and money!
See how Si Si La Paillette uses its FAQs to produce viral content on TikTok
👉 See how Eco-friendly beauty brands use Bigblue
✅ Step 3. Use Product Reviews from Influencers to boost your sales
Nearly 79% of consumers will trust reviews from influencers.
Source: Council Post: How Revenue Can Increase Through Reviews
Go above and beyond to exceed expectations, and you can increase your chances of having influencers create product reviews for the items you sell. How exactly can you go above and beyond? Follow these steps:
- Create an incredible unboxing experience using customised packaging that sets your brand apart from others.
- Include some of your BEST products that will WOW anyone who receives them.
- Use the right logistics company to ensure products arrive on time and in excellent condition. You don't want influencers receiving damaged products that they can't use.
- Add a special note in the package with the products you're giving to influencers. Tell them about your brand and what it stands for, which may resonate with them!
If you're providing an extraordinary experience, influencers will get excited about unboxing your products, making them want to pull out the phone to start recording. Once they've created content surrounding your brand, it's easier to reel in an entirely new audience.
Bigblue Tips
Lashilé Beauty displays customer reviews on its website to boost sales
Lashilé Beauty trusts Bigblue to delight customers with a 5-star-worthy delivery experience.
⚙️ Recommended tool: Use Loox App to add video and photo reviews to your product pages like Lashilé.
👉 Discover Lashile’s case study
✅ Step 4. Host virtual events and live shopping
The adoption of Live Shopping events has increased by a staggering 78% in the last year
Source: Acowebs
Don't underestimate the power of virtual events! Because of the pandemic, many companies had to get creative when launching new products to the masses, ultimately leading to virtual events that have become increasingly popular.
If you don't want to host in-person events, you can prepare for product launches by hyping them up and inviting a few select influencers to attend the launch. If you make it feel exclusive, you can garner more interest and get more people to attend.
Influencers will get excited about trying out these new products and sharing them with the rest of the world.
✅ Step 5. Use guest blogging and launch contests
Hashtag challenges and contests generate a 21% increase in UGC video creation.
While 50% of Hashtag Challenges drive $5 dollars of return in Ads spend
Source: TikTok
Guest blogging is another way to share product details and get consumers excited about the upcoming release of anything you may plan to offer.
Reach out to bloggers within your niche and ask if you can create a guest post on their site.
While some may turn you down, others will agree to let you create a compelling post for their blog site, meaning more exposure for your brand!
Impala Skates partnered with roller skater and influencer Marawa to launch a collection of high-heeled skates.
Their giveaways gathered over 70K posts from excited skaters ready to roll!
🎁 Part 3. Product Seeding Done Right
47.3% of influencers are considered micro-influencers, with around 20,000 followers on their social media platform.
You don't have to reach out to mega influencers to succeed at product seeding. Did you know that micro-influencers tend to have better engagement rates, which means reaching out to everyday people with thousands of followers instead of millions to achieve your marketing goals.
This content created from your product seeding efforts will enable you to dramatically boost your CRO throughout the customer journey.
1. Organic Posting
Getting organic posts from consumers is a fantastic way to gain awareness and build a positive reputation for your brand online. Try these steps to get more organic posts from consumers on your products:
- Connect with around 500 different influencers per month (16 per day)
- Keep track of the influencers who get back to you and agree to receive the products you wish to send
- Set realistic expectations. Not everyone will create content. However, of the hundreds of people you reach out to each month, several will post content to their platforms. It will cost you nothing when they do this!
Your effort in connecting with influencers and product seeding can lead to you receiving dozens of valuable user-generated content each month. Even if you’re not getting tons of content initially, have patience, keep reaching out, and allow the posts to come naturally!
2. Paid Media
Paid media is another option to consider. While organic posts can help you throughout your marketing journey, you can work with experts to help you redistribute your influencer content to other platforms, such as Facebook. It enables you to reproduce this content in multiple places to ensure that more people are finding the user-generated content created on your brand and the products you sell.
Influencer Whitelisting
Did you know influencer whitelisting is a thing? With this process, the influencer allows brands to access their social media to post advertisements here and there. It's not the most user-friendly approach compared to influencer-generated and user-generated content because most can tell that these are advertisements.
However, there are ways to use this opportunity to your advantage. You can run paid ads on platforms like Facebook, but you will need permission from the influencer beforehand.
Bigblue Tips
Bigblue client ROWSE uses Influencer Whitelisting on Facebook Ads to reduce their CAC by 30% and increase their ROAS by 5X!
👉 Contact Simon Robert and start using Influencer Whitelisting on your campaigns
Influencer Dark Posting
Dark posting is yet another option that can help you increase visibility and get more people interested in what your brand offers. With dark posting, you're placing a social media advertisement in the news feeds of your targeted audience, but this content doesn't get displayed on your timeline.
If a random person visited your company's profile page on Facebook, they wouldn't see this advertisement. However, someone following your company could come across this advertisement when scrolling through their newsfeed.
❤️🔥Use dark posting as a way to repurpose some of the influencer-generated and user-generated content you’ve collected.
New Market
One action a day to launch your e-commerce in the UK in 56 days
The UK: a unique growth opportunity
As Europe's largest e-commerce market and ranked 3rd in the world behind the US and China, the UK offers international brands that decide to launch there a unique opportunity to grow their addressable market (TAM) in less than two months, despite Brexit!
With online sales at an all-time high of $169 billion in 2021 and expected to reach $368 billion by 2024, there has never been a better time for Direct to Consumer (D2C) brands to tackle the UK market.
Although the UK market is relatively competitive and international brands have to overcome some barriers to entry, the opportunity and benefits are real, and the goals are achievable if you are ready! That's why we've compiled this guide with all the information and steps you need to take to start selling your products in the UK.
What you will discover in this guide :
- Administrative and logistics requirements
- British consumer habits
- How to adapt your e-commerce and marketing strategy to the English market
- How to fund your internationalisation
⚡️One action a day to successfully launch your e-commerce brand in the UK
📦 Administrative and logistics requirements
As an international brand (i.e. one that is foreign to the UK market), the first step to successfully establishing and selling in the UK is to understand and grasp the legal requirements.
Without completing these tasks, it will be extremely difficult - if not impossible - for you to operate correctly. As most of them depend on UK government institutions, they are relatively time-consuming to set up, so we recommend you deal with them first!
Day 1: Choose between shipping your products internationally or from the UK.
The British are very sensitive to the delivery experience:
🏦 70% of consumers are more likely to buy if it is guaranteed that they will not have to pay additional fees or taxes after checkout.
Source: E2open
💰 88% of consumers consider delivery costs critical in their purchasing decision.
Source : E2open
⏰ For 83% the delivery time is among the most influential purchase criteria.
Source : E2open
You know it now. The British are used to a fast and reliable delivery experience. To meet their expectations you can choose between international shipping or shipping locally from the UK.
🌐 Ship from abroad to the UK
Bigblue Tips
1. You will need your GB EORI numbers and GB VAT to ship to the UK from abroad. These will save you time and speed up the paperwork once you're ready to go.
2. Always ensure that the customs documents are completed correctly and enclosed with the packages to avoid unnecessary delays.
🇬🇧 Shipping from the UK
You now have a good overview of the shipping alternatives for your brand and their main pros and cons.
Given the customer's expectations, the market size and the opportunity it presents to your brand, we recommend that you opt for shipping locally from and to the UK.
Days 2 to 4: Request your EORI GB number
🚨 Applying for your EORI number is a priority: it takes 8 to 12 weeks to get it (hence the title of this playbook)
What is the GB EORI number?
EORI stands for Economic Operators Registration and Identification number. The GB EORI is a unique reference number issued by a customs authority to identify economic operators within the UK.
The GB EORI appears on all customs declarations and is required to import goods into the UK (stock transfer).
If you do not already have a Government Portal account, you can create one when you apply.
Days 5 to 8 Apply for your UK VAT number
🚨 Obtaining a UK VAT number will be essential if you decide to ship from the UK or France. It takes 8 to 12 weeks to obtain it
Get a UK VAT number from the UK Government Gateway. You will need it to submit your tax declarations to HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC). The non-established foreign trader must complete and send to the administration form VAT1 and its annexes.
Customs fees and TVA
VAT applies in certain cases:
Sales between 0 and 135£
You collect the taces and send the TVA (20%) to the British fiscal authorities.
Sales >135£
The TVA is collected on delivery to the customer.
👉 Apply for your UK VAT number
Days 9 to 12 Mastering the steps to ship from abroad to the UK
Your business can start selling once it has acquired a GB EORI number and a GB VAT (Economic Operators Registration and Identification) number, required to import goods into England.
The 4 fundamental steps
1. Create an account on the UK Government Gateway (here) to get started.
2. Get a GB VAT number from your Government Gateway account. You will need this to submit your tax declarations to HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC). The non-established foreign trader must complete and send to the administration form VAT1 and its annexes.
⚠️ Be careful to get it in advance. It takes 8 to 12 weeks to obtain it.
3. Get a GB EORI (Economic Operator Registration and Identification) number by applying here, to import goods into the UK (stock transfer). If you don't already have a government portal ID, you can create one when you apply.
⚠️ Be careful to get it in advance. It takes 8 to 12 weeks to obtain it.
4. Mandatory administrative declarations
With the UK no longer enjoying the benefits of an EU member, customs fees and delivery times will be directly affected by Brexit.
The documents attached to each order
💷 Invoice
📄 CN23 or 📄 Single Administrative Document attached instead of the CN23 to every order valued over 8 0000€
🚛 Proof of delivery
Bigblue Tips
If you ship with Bigblue, all documents are generated automatically. No additional steps to ship your orders.
Days 13 to 15 Mastering the requirements for shipping locally in the UK
By shipping locally from the UK, you can offer your customers a shopping experience that matches their expectations: fast delivery, no hidden costs, and certainly more environmentally friendly and less expensive for your brand.
The UK requirements for opening your e-commerce business have been simplified as much as possible, whether administrative, fiscal or legal.
1. Getting your GB EORI number: we emphasise the importance of this task. Without it, you will not be able to sell in the UK!
2. The registration procedure is simple. It can be done online and is effective within 24 hours if you have chosen the Private Limited Company (Ltd) status. The time to set up a company in England is 13 days, compared with an average of 32 days in Europe.
3. Once you have obtained your GB VAT number, you must send in your VAT declaration. These reports are seven lines long.
Report VAT quarterly: businesses must report the amount of output VAT and input VAT to HMRC by submitting a VAT return.
Filing a Making Tax Digital (MTD) report annually: required for annual income over £85,000. Concerned businesses must submit their tax records to HMRC digitally (versus the old method via HMRC's Government Gateway).
4. Importing or transferring your stock to the UK: we explain everything on day 17 of this guide.
Bigblue Tips
To set up your business in the UK:
If you have additional questions, we invite you to take contact Pramex. They will assist you in everything related to creating and managing your foreign subsidiaries or during acquisition operations.
📲 Book a meeting with Mr. Radia from Pramex
For your taxes declarations:
HMRC provides a list of MTD-enabled software providers.
Avalara offers cloud-based tax compliance solutions. This tool allows you to automate your VAT declarations, MTD reports and the calculation of your customs fees.
Day 16 Choosing the right carrier
📊 84% of UK shoppers say that the carriers offered influence their decision to order from a particular online shop.
Because of the high delivery fees, half of British consumers have never purchased online from an international brand. They prefer to buy from marketplaces or e-commerce brands that deliver their packages locally, free of charge and quickly.
📊 55% of UK consumers named Royal Mail their preferred carrier, an ultra-fast and convenient delivery experience.
Source: Statista
📊 UPS is the preferred carrier for express delivery in the UK.
Bigblue Tips
At Bigblue we use Royal Mail and UPS, the UK's two preferred carriers, for orders shipped from our Kûehne+Nagel warehouse in the UK.
Day 17 Importing your merchandise stock into the UK
Since Brexit, stock imports, also known as stock transfers, require customs declarations. We have prepared a checklist detailing how to export your products to the UK.
You will not have to clear customs on every order if you ship from a warehouse located in the UK.
✅ Proxy, Power of Attorney or Authorization Letter
- Details: Authorisation letter authorising the agent to act as a direct representative for completing import customs declarations in the UK and submitting shipment data to the UK customs system HMRC. This authorisation is valid for 12 months. Without this, you must provide authorisation for each individual shipment, which could potentially cause delays and incur additional costs. Click here to download the template and send the signed file by email.
✅ Exporter’s EORI Number
- Details: The EORI number is a prerequisite for customs clearance of goods in the EU and the UK.
✅ Export Declaration
- Details: If the sender independently creates the export declaration, they must provide the master reference number (MRN) of the export declaration (EAD - to be inserted into the transport order) and hand over the export accompanying document to the agent.
✅ Commercial Invoice
- Details: State the terms and conditions, value, quantity, and description of the goods. Customs duties and value-added tax are calculated based on the value of the goods and the currency.
✅ Customs Nomenclature (HS Code) of the Goods
- Details: According to the global goods classification code.
✅ Value of the Goods
- Details: Monetary value and currency of the goods to calculate customs duties and import tax.
✅ Incoterms
- Details: Agreed delivery terms with your trading partners, as they define alongside the transport organisation, who is responsible for arranging customs clearance and associated costs.
✅ Import Procedure in the UK: Full Declaration or Customs Simplified Procedure (CFSP)
- Details: Inform about the chosen import procedure. Full import declarations in the UK will be required from January 1, 2022. For this procedure, the UK entry number (ENO) must be available before departure from the EU. An exception is granted when the UK importer has their own PESC authorisation.*
- *Based on the UK government's Border Operating Model (BOM).
✅ Country of Origin
To limit customs fees, the following statements must appear on the invoice:
- "Value for customs only"
- "Stock transfer, no sale"
✅ Goods Complying with Preferential Origin Based on the Trade and Cooperation Agreement between the EU and the UK
- Details: Up to a value of 6,000 euros: the preferential statement on the commercial invoice is accepted. From 6,000 euros: exporters must apply for registered exporter (REX) status.
Bigblue Tips
If you work with Bigblue you have two alternatives to bring your stock to the UK:
1️. Make two separate deliveries from your supplier to our warehouse in France and our UK warehouse.
2️. Make one delivery from your supplier to our warehouse in France, then use Kuehne+Nagel to deliver your stock destined for Bigblue's UK warehouse.
In both cases, Bigblue will create a differentiated inventory for each warehouse that will allow you to track your inventory accurately.
🛍 Adapting to British consumer habits
Day 18 Understanding the UK's online shopping ritual
📊 47% of British consumers have bought online at least six times in the last three months.
Source : BCI Info
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, more than 60% of British shoppers have changed their consumption habits.
For the most part, they have favoured online shopping from brands established in the UK to benefit from same-day or next-day delivery, free delivery and easy returns policy democratised by Amazon and ASOS.
At Bigblue, we are committed to helping e-commerce brands grow internationally with a fast and custom delivery experience.
Our historical data combined with artificial intelligence allows us to accurately determine when an order will be delivered, increasing conversion rates for merchants.
Day 19 Understand the 3 reasons why UK consumers abandon their shopping cart
Half of the British shopping from non-UK brands abandon their cart because of one of these reasons:
- 🐌 Long delivery delays
- 💷 Expensive delivery fees
- 🥺 Difficult return policies
Day 20 Discover the impact of free 2-day delivery on the conversion rate
🛒 In 2022, 69% of British consumers abandoned their shopping baskets because of excessive delivery prices.
🛒 73% of Brits have already added an item to their shopping cart to benefit from free delivery.
The British are used to a reliable and efficient delivery experience. By offering free and fast delivery, you can increase the conversion rate of your product pages.
+ 34% CRO with Bigblue’s Fast-tags
Using an A/B test, we have observed that buyers seeing a Fast Tag convert +34% more and are encouraged to spend more (+4% cart value), resulting in a +37% revenue per visiting buyer.
The example of AZLI Cosmetics
⚡️Azli Cosmetics displays precise delivery dates on their product pages using Bigblue’s Fast-tags.
Days 21 to 25 Understanding UK's best practices for returns to adapt your return policy
📊 Consumers aged 18-34 are serial returners - over 33% admit to frequently returning items.
Source : Fashion Network
The British have a reputation for buying online and returning their products.
This habit has been reinforced by the growth of e-commerce fashion brands (37% report an increase in the number of returns).
Merchants normally fear returns, and they are seen as a cost centre and hard to track.
Bigblue Tips
At Bigblue, we transform returns into a growth driver. We increase the Lifetime Value (LTV) of our merchants' customers with a white-label frictionless returns portal.
Our portal encourages buyers to choose store credit instead of a cash refund. Buyers can start a return request at any time, reducing the pressure on the merchant’s support teams and providing an overall better post-purchase experience
👉 Discover Bigblue's returns portal
Day 26 Understanding the importance of customer reviews in the UK
📊 63% of online shoppers in the UK read customer opinions before making an online purchase.
Source : Statista
💬
Reviews are a primary source of information in the buying consideration stage.
5 good reviews increase the likelihood of a purchase by a staggering 270%. Companies with at least five high-quality product reviews have a tremendously high possibility of getting people to purchase their products.
That’s why getting 5-star reviews from UK clients will help you establish trust in the new market.
Bigblue Tips
At Bigblue, we enable brands to improve customer experience, measure customer satisfaction and generate positive reviews.
A poor delivery experience can shatter the customers' trust in your brand. Bigblue allows you to measure buyer satisfaction and immediately alerts you if there are any problems.
Bigblue’s average delivery satisfaction is 94,3% (vs an average of 77% for e‑commerce).
👉 Discover the Bigblue package tracking experience
Day 27 Choose the most suitable payment method for the English market
📊 In the UK, the volume of Buy Now, Pay Later purchases could grow by 50% in 2022 (vs. 2021) and reach $30 billion.
Source : BusinessWire
📊 33% of international visitors will not even consider making a purchase if their local currency is not suggested.
Source : Shopify Blog
Use "Buy Now, Pay Later" to increase your customers' shopping cart
The "Buy Now, Pay Later" trend shows no signs of slowing down in the UK. With this financing alternative, British consumers have embarked on a new mode of consumption.
🛒 +30% to 45% increase in the average order value for purchases paid for with Klarna.
Gymshark allows clients to pay for their purchases in 3X without fees.
Bigblue Tips
Three payment solutions that we recommend:
1. Shopify Payments ****the easiest way to process payments in the UK
2️. Mollie facilitates international transactions
3️. Scalapay allows you to offer your UK customers payment in 3x or 4x, without fees
🛒 How to open an e-commerce shop in the UK?
Shipping to the UK also means creating a new online shop and adapting your marketing campaigns (social media advertising strategy, email campaigns, and influencers included)!
Days 28 to 35 Create your e-commerce site for the English market
📊 73% of products purchased online by UK consumers come from local online shops.
Source : BCI
You’ll need to create a new online shop.
✨ The benefits of a UK-based shop:
- Display prices in the local currency (£)
- Marketing content tailored to the UK market
- More accurate performance tracking for each market
✨ The steps to localise your e-commerce:
- For Shopify: you can duplicate your original shop by following these steps
- For Woocommerce: you can use the duplicator plugin
- For Prestashop: you can follow this tutorial
Bigblue Tips
Bigblue integrates with leading CMS and marketplaces to automate your logistics, simplify customer support ticket management and ship packages with peace of mind. Bigblue also allows you to centralise all shipments for as many shops as you need into the same platform.
Days 36 to 38 Translate your product pages and catalogue
📊 65 % des acheteurs en ligne préfèrent un contenu dans leur langue.
Source : Shopify Plus
You can use Weglot to translate your website automatically.
Then you can hire a freelancer on Fiverr to adapt your copy to the UK market.
Days 41 to 46 Get your marketing campaigns ready for the UK
The UK is one of the most competitive e-commerce markets in the world. Get inspired by the campaigns of the best local brands, like Gymshark or Chilly's Bottles!
Bigblue Tips
To adapt your Ad campaigns on Facebook, Instagram, Google Ads and TikTok to the English market.
📲 Contact Matthieu from Stride-Up
Don’t forget your email campaigns, and your parcel tracking emails.
Bigblue Tips
Bigblue is the only European fulfilment solution integrated with Klaviyo.
We send Bigblue data to Klaviyo so merchants can use delivery-related events in their email flows. As a bonus, all your parcel tracking emails are automatically translated:
• Parcel delivered: send a product usage guide.
• Satisfaction survey with Trustpilot: only to satisfied customers.
• Returned parcel: ask for additional details, remind to use the gift card, and stop an email loop if the package is returned.
💷 Financing your internationalisation
Developing your brand globally requires more budget for both your stocks and marketing.
Days 47 to 49 Target your Total Addressable Market
If you have someone to help you with the market research or the costing of the business plan, you will have to pay a fee to the service providers.
Day 50 Evaluate the costs of developing your site for the UK
As mentioned above, adapting your website is a fundamental step. The technical development of your site, and the optimisation of the UX, without forgetting to produce new content (product categories, product pages, etc.), are costly.
Day 51 Assess your stock financing needs
You will have the necessary inventory information to develop your online business through the business plan, projected turnover, and cash flow budget.
We have prepared a list of the types of inventory you will have to deal with and finance:
- Raw materials
- Manufacturing of products
- Transportation costs
- Finished goods
- Maintenance, repair and operating (MRO) goods
With good inventory management, you can handle sales peaks, including Black Friday and Cyber Monday Sales. This will stop your business from losing money. 👋
Day 52 Assess your marketing financing needs
When you launch your brand in a new country, paid advertising will help you establish an online reach on social media.
Create a UGC and influence strategy in your new market.
Bigblue Tips
At Bigblue, we provide fulfilment services for all B2B and B2C e-commerce orders: for retailers, resellers, your own boutiques, pop-ups etc. Brands like Dermalogica, From Future and Unbottled trust us with their omnichannel deliveries.
Day 53 Choosing your financing solution
Wayflyer is an inventory and marketing expense funding solution that offers to finance your business from $10K to $20M at favourable interest rates, in less than 5 days.
Your business is screened once you register and connect your platforms, to receive the most suitable financing offers for your e-commerce:
- The higher your revenue and the better your marketing performs, the more funds you can access.
- The only cost of funding is the percentage transaction fee applied to the amount of the cash advance (this is usually between 2 and 8%).
Bigblue Tips
4 steps to integrate Wayflyer
1️. Contact Wayflyer
2️. Connect your shopping and advertising platforms to Wayflyer securely.
3️. Send confidential bank details and proof of identity.
4️. Receive funds in your account within 1-3 days of signing the contract (depending on how long it takes your bank to receive the funds).
Days 54 to 55 Waiting for your GB EORI and GB VAT numbers
You are almost ready! If you requested your EORI GB number and GB VAT number on day 1, you will receive them soon!
Day 56 You’re ready to ship your first order to the UK!
Marketing
UGC: the anatomy of a €3M campaign
Intro
User-generated content (UGC) has quickly become one of the most effective ways for D2C brands to gain more exposure while earning the trust and loyalty of consumers. It's a crucial part of any marketing strategy that converts. Better yet, it’s easy and cheap to produce! Why? The videos, product reviews, unboxings and tutorials are created by consumers who choose to support the businesses they love.
Need a few good examples of how user-generated content works? Gymshark, the popular sportswear company, has drastically increased its sales by $3BN due to user-generated posts on TikTok alone. Because of the consumers' love for Gymshark's products, the brand has brought in millions more in sales revenue than initially anticipated.
Another example is Kris Sugartan, who brought in a staggering $3M in sales from the Maine Get Lobster ad campaign.
Incredibly successful D2C brands have noticed the trends and are choosing to create more relatable campaigns. User-generated content speaks to the audience, resonates with them, and helps them make better buying decisions they’re less likely to regret. It’s naturally beneficial to businesses that want to make a name for themselves.
In this guide, we will analyse a €3M UGC campaign frame by frame, step-by-step so you can start doing it too!
All brands make promises, but some underdeliver. It's yet another reason social proof has become so telling for businesses of all sizes, big and small. If consumers see someone raving over a product, they're 90% more likely to believe the consumer over the brand itself that makes claims about what their product can do.
In a post-iOS 14 world: storytelling and trust are even more important
74% of consumers depend on the recommendations of others on social media before making a purchase.
+84% of consumers trust peer recommendations over claims from brands on different products.
+48% of consumers agree that UGC helps them discover brands and products.
What will you discover in this guide?
- How to use UGC to drive sales
- What makes a good UGC
- How to get killer UGC
- How to build a viral UGC ad
🤑 Part 1. How to use UGC to drive sales
1. Identify consumer trends and leverage your brand’s unboxing virality potential
49% of TikTok users find products through videos created by brands, creators, and other users. And at least 37% immediately bought the TikTok products soon after discovering it.
Source: TikTok’s Path to Purchase report (June 2022)
The first and perhaps one of the most critical steps in using UGC to drive sales is paying attention to and staying on top of consumer trends.
While ever-changing trends come and go, knowing what consumers like, want, and need in the current moment can help your brand stay relevant and appeal to the masses. Consumer trends change like the weather, but if you're doing enough research, you can expect to understand these behaviours and expectations from individuals who support brands like your business.
You can increase your unboxing virality potential when you utilise consumer trends. For example, a growing number of consumers prefer when businesses take an eco-friendly approach, reducing waste while producing products and minimising the negative impact on the environment.
Sustainable packaging alone can make people want to unbox their packages in front of the camera while raving over the experience with that brand. Ask yourself what can get people to tag your products while creating content surrounding what you sell.
Discover what’s trending now on TikTok
Discovering trends on TikTok is easier than you think. TikTok Creative Center allows you to find what performs well on the platform to better engage with your audience.
You can filter by country and industry then browse through:
﹟Hashtags: see the most relevant and top-performing hashtags, related creators, audience insights and interest over time for any given industry.
👉 Browse TikTok’s trend finder
🎵 Songs: find out which songs are already trending or get ahead of the competition and discover the ones that are gaining popularity.
Unfortunately, they don’t include user-created sounds. Don’t worry, we got a hack for you. Monitor the TikTok sound trend hashtag here to discover the more engaging and breaking-through sounds created by the platform’s users.
🙋♀️ Creators: filter by country and number of followers to find relevant influencers and creators to produce UGC for your brand.
🎥 And trending TikTok Videos to find inspiration for your brand’s content.
👉 Open your Creator Marketplace account here
Bigblue Tips
Boost your unboxing virality as a sustainable brand
As an example, SMOON uses Bigblue's reusable packaging for its period-proof underwear. The highly sought-after garments are loved by women who want to experience more freedom during that time of the month. Consumers can enjoy the perks of having period-proof underwear and look forward to getting what they need in sustainable, eco-friendly packaging materials, giving them all the more reason to create content and post it to platforms like Instagram and TikTok.
👉 Discover Bigblue’s reusable packaging
Why are they tagging your products?
Consider what motivates your customers, from product launches to marketing campaigns.
56% of consumers say the types of content they most want to see from brands are user-generated photos and videos—and they’re constantly creating them!
Source: Nosto
Ask yourself, "What makes people tag products?" You may have several answers, such as their love for the product, the quality of the item, the packaging, or even other small details that mean a lot to the consumers. If you can bring that WOW factor through product launches and marketing campaigns, you can get people to tag your brand for positive reasons that yield better results.
The content they want to create following a positive experience with a brand:
- 89% want to post about their travel destination
- 85% want to post about their restaurant experience
- 65% want to post about a health or beauty product
Once you’ve identified the UGC triggers for your brand, you are ready to unlock new sales. Brands are partnering with content creators and influencers of all sizes to promote their products organically on TikTok and Instagram through referral links.
83% lift on Amazon after a viral TikTok for beauty brands like CeraVe, Aquaphor, and Paula’s Choice.
Source: SimilarWeb
Because many influencers have an Amazon storefront or a LinkTree account where that post links to their favourite products, it’s easier for social media users to find what they’re looking for after a product review.
✨ Manage TikTok campaigns from Shopify’s dashboard and measure conversions
If you use Shopify, it is quite simple to activate TikTok as a new sales channel account and deploy In-Feed shoppable video ads directly within Shopify.
More than 1M Shopify merchants have already activated the TikTok integration.
- Add TikTok’s app to your Shopify
- Install the TikTok pixel
- Select which product you would like to feature, and video ads are automatically generated to drive traffic to your Shopify for checkout.
- Use one of the ready-made templates for e-commerce and add your images and videos.
👉 See Shopify for TikTok business tutorial here
Bigblue Tips
Use your unboxing experience to generate more UGC
Dermalogica’s unique unboxing made possible by Bigblue has revealed 155 million views on TikTok! To discover your brand’s unboxing virality potential go to TikTok Discover and look up your brand’s name + unboxing.
👉 Discover Bigblue’s unboxing experience
2. Feature your customers’ photos on your website
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
5 good reviews increase the likelihood of a purchase by a staggering 270%.
Companies with at least five high-quality product reviews have a tremendously high possibility of getting people to purchase their products.
Source: Council Post: How Revenue Can Increase Through Reviews
If customers upload photos or videos and mention your brand, whether tagging your business or in a hashtag, be sure to feature them on your website. You can create a section on the site highlighting your customers with a title that says, "Check Out What Our Customers Have to Say..."
It provides the social proof that consumers are looking for before making purchases. And, if they think that person looks fantastic because of something your business sells, you can expect them to feel more inclined to purchase the product, too.
⭐️ A BrightLocal study shows that 87% of people read reviews.
🤝 Of those people, nearly 79% of them will trust the reviews from influencers and total strangers as much as they would when receiving a personal recommendation from a friend or family member.
Because of this, online retailers continue to acknowledge the value of independent reviews and how those reviews can help them protect their bottom lines.
🦈 Learn from Gymshark’s success
On top of promoting client reviews on their product pages. Gymshark added a special section on their Instagram account “GS Family”, every Friday, a bunch of lucky customers get featured on Gymshark’s stories.
Bigblue Tips
Lashilé Beauty displays customer reviews on its website to boost sales
Lashilé Beauty trusts Bigblue to delight customers with a 5-star-worthy delivery experience.
⚙️ Recommended tool:
Use Loox App to add video and photo reviews to your product pages like Lashilé.
👉 Discover Lashile’s case study
3. Design a contest
Hashtag challenges and contests generate a 21% increase in UGC video creation. While 50% of Hashtag Challenges drive $5 dollars of return in Ads spend
Don't miss out on the benefits of hosting a contest or a hashtag challenge!
Social media contests are a quick and effective way to increase engagement, create more awareness of your brand, and offer something incredible that gets people talking about your brand.
If you plan on setting up a contest, decide on the prize. Most brands will offer free products in the form of a gift basket full of items.
You can take this approach because it can improve your chances of having user-generated content created for your brand. In addition, the winner may look forward to unboxing their items, showing them off to the rest of the world, and talking about the specific things they love most.
👉 Learn how to create a successful Hashtag challenge
Bigblue Tips
Lashilé Beauty used their unboxing experience to launch a Golden Ticket contest for 4 lucky customers
Bigblue allowed the brand to integrate Golden Tickets in some packages, offering a weekend at Disney for 4 and a total of 3 900€ of vouchers.
A marketing operation that was a success.
👉 Discover Lashile’s case study
🤩 Part 2. What makes a good UGC?
1. How to create a relatable UGC?
People love user-generated content because it's relatable. Consumers want to see influencers and everyday people talking about the brands they love and the products they use while showing what makes those items so spectacular. Depending on your brand and the product that you are trying to promote, you can go for either the girl-next-door or influencer aspirational approaches.
The Relatable Approach, Girl Next Door, No Makeup, Just a Normal Person:
Seeing someone who looks like them, talks like them, or even comes from the same walk of life as they do is more likely to get their attention than someone who is out of touch with reality. Going for the relatable approach can help you garner the interest you want and need to make more sales to your targeted audience.
UGC vs branded content:
Chanel’s branded post for Les Beiges foundation on Instagram generated 147K views and 33K likes
Chanel doesn't advertise on TikTok.
Les Beiges UGC clearly overcame Chanel’s branded content:
4M views and 1.1M likes for Danielle’s honest review
Jumping on the trend, beauty influencer and girl-next-door Sol Peña generated 13M views and 1.3M likes for Chanel.
Fully Aspirational Approach with Influencers:
With this approach, you depend more on influencers who've already amassed a large following of people who trust their word and want to hear what they have to say about the products they use and love the most.
Some consumers love this content, especially if it's coming from an influencer they trust. However, this isn't always the right approach. It will depend on your brand, what you sell, and who you want to connect with, such as your targeted audience.
Hmmmm Donuts!!!!
Charli D’Amelio partnered with Dunkin’ Donuts in 2020 to challenge Starbucks’ dominance over younger audiences on social media.
They co-created The Charli, a new beverage, that went on to sell hundreds of thousands of cups within the first five days of its launch.
There was also a 57% increase in downloads of the Dunkin’ Donut app, which the brand had been trying to push. There was a 20% overall sales boost for cold brews the day the drink was released and a 45% increase the following day.
Bigblue Tips
Unbottled used Bigblue to build a conversion-oriented check-out and post-purchase delivery experience.
They enhanced their customer’s journey by adding features, such as estimated time of arrival, branded tracking emails, and super fast fulfilment, helping Unbottled boost monthly orders from 500 to 20K.
The enhanced experiences encourage consumers to speak up about brands and tell others how great they are.
👉 Discover how Unbottled uses Bigblue’s emails
2. UGC captures honest emotions
Capitalizing on a feeling means that creators aren’t doing a sales pitch. While some people may still promote products they don't believe in that aren't effective, consumers aren't turning a blind eye to this anymore and will often call it out as they see it. For that reason, brands need authentic and reliable user-generated content that consumers can believe in and trust.
Be direct and honest
1. You want to capture the raw emotions and facial expressions.
2. Reading from a script is never a good idea. It makes a person seem inauthentic.
3. Honest emotions resonate with viewers. As they're watching, they'll feel like they're talking to a friend or family member rather than watching a stranger tell them about a product.
Use real emotions
1. People can pick up on them in no time. The most important thing with user-generated content is to be as authentic as possible.
2. Use expressions such as: “Oh my gosh, I love it,” “it’s so delicious,” and “feels amazing.”
Bigblue Tips
Matthieu, Co-Founder of the agency Stride-Up, recommends sharing UGC on your organic profile, a crucial stop in the customer’s journey. If potential buyers see a video with your product in it and visit your empty profile, they lose trust.
He gave us ready-to-implement hacks to increase your brand’s social proof with organic content.
1. Duet. Find top content about your brand and add context! Try, “this is why we did this..”
2. Stitch. Stitching on TikTok allows you to incorporate 5 seconds of content from another video into your own. Find the best hooks from creators and capitalize on them!
3. Use comments in videos. Find people are asking the same thing over and over? Respond to their comment with a video. Chances are, if one person is asking, many people are wondering.
4. Capitalize on trends. There’s no shortage of trends on TikTok. Check for trending sounds, formats, and jokes.
👉 Request a free audit of your Social Ads from Stride-Up
3. The UGC that works
🎁 Unboxing
Unboxing videos have grown by a shocking 57% in one year alone…becoming an incredible phenomenon that captures and maintains a greater level of interest.
Unboxing videos are some of the simplest and most effective forms of user-generated content you can have for several reasons. Consumers see the products contained in the package within a few seconds to get a feel for what they'd receive if they made a purchase.
It also helps them get to know a bit more about the brand while seeing how the people behind the screen react to touching, smelling, opening, and applying the different items they've purchased. If you have people creating unboxing videos of your products, you want the rest of the world to see those videos.
📦 Simple unboxing:
With this simple unboxing, the person is talking about the packaging before opening it and then going through each item, usually providing a brief description of those items before opening them up, putting them on display, or even trying them.
For example, if someone orders a makeup kit with lipstick, lip liner, and blush, they might swatch these items on their arms for viewers to see the colours and the pigments firsthand.
Bigblue Tips
Cabaïa, the famous backpack brand, masters the use of UGC in their Ads strategy! This Ad alone has generated over 30K likes in the last 30 days and has been shared over a thousand times.
In fact, UGC-based ads get 4x higher click-through rates and a 50% drop in cost-per-click than average.
What they do right:
An excited customer unboxes her new Cabaïa bag. The thumb scroller “It’s here 😍” grabs the viewer's attention in the first 2 seconds. She continues building a positive experience by describing the surprises she found in her package, including a thank you note for her purchase. And finally, she clearly presents the benefits of the product, all of that in 24 seconds!
Take it one step further by adding a flyer to each parcel with a CTA for your clients: “Share your unboxing on social media, tag us and get an X% discount on your next purchase”
🎶 TikTok trend unboxing:
Another popular unboxing style is the TikTok trend style, where the client will talk about how they wish they would've discovered the website beforehand and then start talking about at least three of the products inside the box and what they love most about those products.
Bigblue Tips
And how can packaging help you get more UGC?
Bigblue allows brands to offer a premium unboxing experience by using custom packaging with your brand's unique style and wrapping paper to enhance the unboxing experience. On top of that, you can add flyers with promo codes, thank you letters, invitations to share their unboxing on social media with a hashtag, instructions for using the product, and free product samples to help customers discover new products.
🤩 Product benefit
70% of consumers will consider UGC reviews or ratings before making a purchasing decision.
Source: Social Media Today
What can the product do for the consumers? It's an important detail that needs to be discussed during the unboxing. People want to know why they should buy something before spending money on it. It helps to touch on what these benefits mean for the consumers and how they could potentially change their lives for the better, even if those changes are small and simple.
Bigblue Tips
Knowing that content shared by employees receives 8x more engagement than content shared by brand channels, and it’s re-shared up to 24 times more than classic branded content…
LePantalon’s team clearly understood the assignment and effectively uses UGC to tackle one of their main challenges: helping customers choose the right size and fit for their pants.
Their UGC Ads strategy includes staff members presenting the new collections and trying them on the shops. The goal, give customers a real idea of the fit and how to style them.
❓ Transform FAQs into an evergreen source of content and reassurance elements
Build trust with your customers and prospects from the first touchpoint. If you see that certain questions about the product are being asked over and over again, that means your product description isn’t demonstrating how well your product can solve a customer’s problem.
You've likely noticed the TikTok question bubble on the profile page of a TikTok account. It's a small bubble that says Q&A in red, bold text. Utilizing this feature is a problem and solution approach, and you're using a native TikTok format to achieve better results.
Product pages with Q&As experienced a 447% higher conversion rate compared to product pages with no Q&A, regardless of shopper engagement.
Source: The Shopper Experience Index, Bazaarvoice
Use some of the most frequently asked questions to create ads that viewers can enjoy. It enables you to elevate how you show the product to the audience, discuss the problem it can solve, and detail the specific solution based on what you sell.
Bigblue Tips
Add Q&A feature on TikTok to produce UGC
CRO expert, Carl Weische recommends brands to take their FAQs and most common customer service questions and transform them into Ads for your retargeting audiences.
Allow your customers and prospects to ask you anything about your products or services. They are a goldmine to easily produce content for your organic feed and ads at scale. To activate it, simply follow the next steps:
1. Go to settings
2. Select Creator tools
3. Tap Q&A
4. Tap Turn on Q&A
5. If you haven’t guessed by now, the most frequently asked question from customers is “Where is my order” (17 billion search results on Google). Upgrade their post-purchase experience with Bigblue’s tracking page and tracking emails.
6. All the delivery tracking updates are available on one page with your branding. And your customers can check at all times.
7. Then the Q&A icon will be added below your TikTok bio. So viewers can tap the Q&A section, which looks like a question mark, to ask you questions or check the questions responded.
Go one step further and continue building trust once they’ve purchased from you. Bring your tracking experience to the next level.
👉 Discover how From Future reduced customer support tickets in half by using Bigblue’s tracking
🥰 Give the viewer three reasons why they should Buy Your Product
It's the new value proposition, and it should include the following details:
- Why Is It Great? This is a question you need to answer because consumers want to know what makes a product so great in the first place. It would be best to sell them on everything the product can do for them.
- Why Should You Buy It? Now you want to go into detail on why the consumers should buy it, detailing what it does for them and why it makes a difference in their lives.
- What Will It Bring to Your Life? Lastly, you want to touch on the value it brings to their lives. How is it helping people, and what makes it worth it?
Bigblue Tips
Matthieu from Stride-Up recommends keeping it short. The 15 to 20-second mark is the sweet spot for these kinds of ads.
See how Odyssey Longboard uses UGC to promote its new line of Surfskates.
🎵 Things TikTok made me buy
Believe it or not, the #TikTokMadeMeBuy hashtag has more than 6.1 billion views. It's a great idea to get in on that opportunity to get more people to see what your brand offers by having content creators post about your products while creating these kinds of videos.
If you've watched TikTok, you've likely viewed at least one "TikTok Made Me Buy It" video. Influencers and random content creators talk about a product they decided to buy after seeing it on TikTok, raving over it and detailing what it does for them. It's become one of the trendiest ways to review products or provide testimonials.
💀💀💀💀💀
In spooky season, TikTok drove out of stock on 12-foot skeletons at Home Depot for the SECOND YEAR IN A ROW in the United States. And yes, it made it to Business Insider’s newsfeed.
Though the skeleton costs $299, if you're lucky enough to find one in a Home Depot store, the skeletons are being listed on eBay for double or triple the original price, with some sellers listing the item at as much as $1,200.
🎥 Part 3. Getting killer UGC
1. The format
It’s best to take an approach where you’re operating as much as you can around the five senses: see, hear, imagine smelling, imagine tasting, and imagine feeling. Know how to create the content consumers wish to see. These are a few simple tips that can point you in the right direction to creating high-quality user-generated content that gets views and brings in more traffic.
1. Film with an iPhone
The quality is decent enough without looking unrealistic or as if a production company filmed it.)
2. Vertical (9x16)
3. Film with natural light/daytime light
It’s the best kind of lighting because it looks less planned compared to videos with creators using a ring light.)
4. Film their face
For the framing, it’s best to get as close as you can to the person’s face and the product they’re showing. We want to see, feel, smell…
It’s how we want to experience things in our daily lives, and it’s what we want to see in the videos we’re watching.
2. Production
1. Record everything - Record at the moment and build your script later. It’s better to film everything to get authentic reactions instead of pre-planning them. Authentic reactions resonate best with consumers.
2. The experience of ordering on the website - Show what it’s like to easily and conveniently order something from the website.
3. Film the unboxing - Get viewers excited about the products through the unboxing process, starting with the unpacking of the box.
4. Demonstrate the product - Show what the product does, what it looks like, and why it’s special. The key here is to highlight the quality and what makes this product stand out amongst the competition.
5. React and show results - Get excited about opening and looking at these items and then show results based on what the products can do for the consumer.
Bigblue Tips
A good UGC in a nutshell, the checklist by Stride-Up:
☑ Your UGC clearly responds to one of the AIDA framework levels of interest: Attention, Interest, Desire, Action.
☑ The more authentic it looks, the better. This could roughly be translated in the phrase “the uglier and amateurish the content, the better it performs”.
☑ Record everything, but only use the more relevant takes.
☑ The long format works best: 30 to 40 seconds videos.
☑ Add subtitles… because most of the time, people browse TikTok and Insta at work.
3. Post-production
Although we’re information-rich, we’re also time-starved, so it’s important to make content that is detailed and informative yet gets straight to the point.
- Pacing - Your thumb scroller (more of this coming in section 3) should be normal paced
- 2X the speed - Speed up the process while demonstrating
- Back to normal pacing - Go back to normal to grab attention again with the reaction and results
Taking these simple steps will help you create watchable user-generated content that won’t get skipped over. People want to see the unboxing and learn about products. However, they don’t want to have to sit and stare at the screen for too long because then they’ll quickly lose interest.
4. Get your clients to produce UGC for you
An authentic review and a satisfied customer willing to share their experience using your product can make a difference for your business. It's a fantastic way to promote your brand without costing a fortune. There are a few simple ways to get clients to produce UGC for your brand.
Go Through Existing Photos
Sometimes, simply looking on social media for your brand's name can help you find consumers who've posted about it before. Connecting with them is a great way to increase your chances of getting user-generated content created because they already know and trust your brand. There are a few ways to search for these photos. You have the option to:
- 📍 Search by location
If you have a locally owned business, searching by location may help you find dozens of photos posted by people who’ve visited your shop and had a great experience.
- #️⃣ Search by hashtag
Of course, searching by hashtag is another option that can help you find previous customers.
Build an Effective Strategy Using Hashtags
Use strategic hashtags that can help you increase your views on platforms such as Instagram and TikTok.
If you're hosting a contest or giveaway, have consumers use the hashtag in any post they create, making it easier for you to find user-generated content surrounding your business.
A little bit of creativity goes an exceptionally long way in the marketing world, especially when it comes to hashtags that quickly gain traction, become popular, and help you build brand awareness.
SHEIN has effectively leveraged the unboxing and shopping spree trends with the popular hashtag “#SHEINhaul”.
But to easily collect UGC and encourage their customers to produce videos for free, they added the call-to-action “Get featured using #SHEIN or tag @ shein_official” on their TikTok and Instagram pages.
Bigblue Tips
Use your order tracking emails to ask your clients to create UGC
Using branded delivery tracking e-mails has many advantages:
☑ They have an open rate of 75% vs 20 to 30% of marketing e-mails.
☑ They are open up to 4 times during the delivery.
☑ Buyers that receive an email have a better repeat rate (+4%) than buyers that didn’t receive an email
☑ And reduce bad ratings by -60%: they reassure clients, and overall increase their delivery experience. They are also a great opportunity to help you get more UGC!
Bigblue’s client, Unbottled asked their clients to post their unboxing on Instagram using the hashtag #unbottled and #dropthebottle. The result: more than 1000 UGC unboxing publications for them.
👉 Discover Bigblue’s tracking emails
Connect with Influencers on Various Platforms
You can even take an approach that involves connecting with influencers in an attempt to offer products to them. Worry less about mega-influencers with millions of followers who are less likely to respond and focus more on the micro-influencers with a few thousand followers. These influencers tend to have better engagement rates and are more likely to reply to you or post a video going over your products when they receive them.
Bigblue Tips
FROM FUTURE teamed up with us to ship their products from Bigblue’s Fashion warehouse. They benefit from specialized hanging storage racks and reconditioning processes to guarantee that their clothes are in perfect condition when customers receive them.
The company benefits from features like branded tracking emails and custom packaging, which encourages its customers to want to rave over their experience, ultimately leading to more user-generated content for the business.
Buyer satisfaction boosted to 89% in less than 4 months.
👉 Discover how FROM FUTURE uses Bigblue
🦠 Part 4. The classic principles of building a viral ad
1. Choose a product that has the potential of going viral
Even if you love every product you sell, consider selecting the one that stands out the most. After selecting the product, follow these steps:
- Choose your more relatable product The relatable product gets the most attention. Consumers feel like they can use it in some way or another, which makes them more interested in buying it.
- Choose a story to put the product into context Create a story that details your reason for creating the product and how it can help.
- Do your research - Take time to check the comments on your products and your competitor's products. You need to think like your customers and use their same language. Spend time learning more about them to ensure you can see what they see and say what they say.
- Keep it simple - No one needs to make an effort to understand your ad, so don’t make it too complicated. Keep it simple and straightforward
2. The thumb or scroll stopper
A thumb stopper must set the expectation and the premise of what you will get. It should spark curiosity. Is she actually going to do this? When it comes to social media and user-generated content, attention is the highest form of currency. Position yourself in a way that makes you look native to the feed and digestible for people.
1. Look and See
Formats to test: collage vs no collage
Using a collage intensifies the viewer’s appetite for the product. Collages are an efficient way to give the viewer a sneak peek of what they will get. You have many different photos that can spark interest, so choose them wisely and put them together to create something spectacular to deliver as much context as you can in the most efficient way.
If the collage approach doesn’t appear to be working for your business model, you can try the no-collage format to see if you get better results from it.
Bigblue Tips
Kris Sugartan’s €3M Ad campaign put the collage approach to the test.
She has developed her own TikTok Ads buying methodology to amplify D2C brand’s reach and customer acquisition.
👉 Download her step-by-step video formula to generate sales and engagement
2. See Her Do, Reviews and Tutorials
Video reviews are 60.5% more effective than plain text reviews because they seem more genuine.
Source: Nealschaffer
Seeing someone do something is an excellent way to fulfil the viewer's curiosity.
The people are curious and want to know more, so show them and watch how quickly you can see results from it.
If you can explain what something does and why it’s special, it’s easier to sell to the viewers watching the videos and checking out the photos uploaded to social media.
Agency tips
AverrAglows viral ads campaign
The Americann brands sells all-natural skincare products and was struggling to increase their Ad spend to drive at least 30K in monthly sales and get a target ROAS.
UGC was the key to unlock a 6x increase in revenue and a 3.7X ROAS.
The “see someone do” UGC approach helped the brand overcome Facebook’s strict advertising rules.
Sugartan’s team tested 2 different stop scroller every 2 weeks and used copy they collected from AverrAglow’s clients!
👉 Read the full story here
3. Use Drop / Reverse / Snapping Effects on Your Thumbs Stopper
Try these different effects to captivate your audience and keep them engaged. According to Loft325.com, this technique can increase a person's attention by up to 30%.
Bigblue Tips
CAVAL worked with Bigblue to implement a Prime-like delivery experience in their shop. By displaying multiple delivery methods (express, green, pick-up points, and free delivery), and providing precise delivery times, 92% of CAVAL’s clients are satisfied with their delivery experience!
Like Caval, allow your clients to rate their experience with shipping with their email thanks to their Bigblue app. A good way to boost engagement (and avoid bad surprises on Google or Trustpilot).
👉 Discover how CAVAL uses Bigblue
4. Green Screen and Split Screen Effect
The green screen effect is native to Instagram reels and TikTok, and it's a super convenient effect to use for UGC. You can do just about anything you want with the green screen, creating custom, fun backgrounds as you'd like for the content you plan to post. The idea behind this is to make things look less like an advertisement and more like a relatable video or conversation one would have with someone close to them, such as a family member or best friend.
The split-screen content style is not uncommon on TikTok, especially when users choose to stitch one another. Having someone stitch a person reacting to the products while they do the same is a fantastic way to show how many people truly love what your brand can offer.
3. How to get thousands of viral UGC quickly ?
If you want to get thousands of viral UGCs, encourage your customers to unbox their goodies when receiving them. Put effort into consistent, high-quality packing. Host an in-person event and a giveaway contest simultaneously to get those hashtags going. When you're putting your all into the UGC strategy, you can reap the rewards that come with it.
Agency tips
Identify the most engaged users
- Anticipate a reward policy
- Define the process (ice breaker, counterpart, image rights, etc.)
- Analyse the feedback
- Create a detailed strategy for each social media platform
- Set actionable goals
- Host events
- Plan contests
The fastest and most effective way to get more UGC at a quicker pace is to host a contest/giveaway. People love to get free items, and having the chance to win without much effort makes the contest or giveaway even more exciting.
For example, you can host a competition that involves people using a specific hashtag to represent your brand. When thousands of people participate, it's a quick way to build more buzz surrounding your brand and get the user-generated content you desire.
Bigblue Tips
Our recommended tool for this task: Loyoly!
Loyoly allows you to launch challenges and rewards for your most engaged users to help you generate UGC at Scale by activating your clients and influencers, assigning them motivating marketing tasks, and automating the verification and delivery of rewards
👉 Check the Loyoly UGC platform
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