Do Less, Spend Less, & Make More Money

You probably read that title and thought "this sounds too good to be true." If you did, I completely agree with you, it does really sound that way, but it is in fact true! If you are anything like me your next thought it "prove it." Okay, here goes!

Many marketing teams and business owners have hundreds of thousands of things that consume their energy each day, and one of the big parts of that is getting new customers through different marketing techniques. It is no easy feat, especially in the ever changing world we live in, where new technologies make things easier for many but can also leave so many behind. The first step is knowing how to reach your audience effectively, and unfortunately this is where the majority fall short. Statistics show that people of all ages are using social media and turning to social platforms when making purchasing decisions. Don't believe me? That's okay, the numbers speak for themselves: 4.76 billion people use social media, that's 59.4% of the global population. Of the 18+ population, 77.8% are using social media. On average, users spend 2.5 hours per day on various social media platforms, with "finding inspiration for things to do and buy" and  "finding products to purchase" among the top  ways they spend their time. 

So now that we have cleared up where to find the potential customers, we need to figure out how to reach them. Do we just post our brand ads on our socials? Do we use paid advertising for our brand ads on these platforms? The answer is yes and no. Traditional (often times studio filmed) brand generated content is great and you should definitely post those sorts of ads. But here's the bad news: studio advertising is just "too pretty." 90% of consumers find user generated content (UGC) useful and believe what existing customers say about the brand rather than flashy ads and promotional emails! 84% of Gen-Z trust brands that have real customers in their ad campaigns. Crazy to think about right? All that ad spend behind a beautifully orchestrated ad just to have it do the exact opposite of what is intended. On average, companies are spending $72,000 each year on studio produced advertising only to find that these ads are ineffective due to the lack of trust they instill in the customers. That goes completely against our "spend less" idea doesn't it?

The upside is that there is a simple way to balance this, and even generate trust on those flashy ads: UGC. UGC costs a fraction of the price of studio orchestrated ads (typically $1,200 to $50,000 per video) and tends to be much more successful.  Brand engagement has been seen to increase by 28% when incorporating both brand-curated marketing content and UGC. Companies using UGC in their ad campaigns have seen 29% in conversion rate as compared to companies that are not taking advantage of UGC.  UGC is trusted 50% more by consumers than traditional studio advertising. All that sounds amazing, so we know where to find our customers and how to gain their trust to increase sales with a smaller ad-spend - but where on earth do we get this UGC?

There are a few ways to answer that. 

Some companies have teamed up with influencers and micro-influencers to get content. This requires someone on your marketing team to manage the influencers by sending them product and keeping in touch so that they deliver the promised UGC. There are some downsides to this, one being that your team still is doing a lot of work (remember, this article is about "doing less"). Depending on the influencers, there can also be a disconnect in their posts and the quality of the post. Remember, influencers are posting on their own pages and their goal is to increase their following and engagement at the end of the day.  If you want to post their content on your own pages, it will include their watermark and you will then be advertising for them as well (oh, how the tables have turned!).  Another note here is influencer content can come across as less-authentic to viewers because they know that the influencers are being given the product in exchange for content. I have even seen videos where the influencer will say "X brand gave me this product for free in exchange for a video." This leaves the viewer thinking "so this isn't something they actually wanted?" and then they scroll on to the next post before your product even has a chance. Of course, not all influencers bring this nightmare, so if you have found some good ones please hold on to them and treat them with gratitude! But do ask yourself, are we opposed to a more authentic approach?

Ambassador programs have become very popular, where a member of your team will bring on current customers to create UGC for the brand in exchange for discounts and sometimes even commissions. These can be great and often are very authentic, which is good, however, the quality  and follow-through are often the downside. Additionally, this still requires a member of your team to manage and ensure delivery from the ambassadors - yes this is a full-time job for your team.  Ambassadors are real customers, but they can take months to even respond with content (if at all), and often times the content is sub-par and brings little return for the brand. Again, video editing teams don't exist for ambassadors, so your team would be left the remove watermarks and whatnot from the content.  But wait, there's more! The core of this issue is training. The ambassadors don't have the training to make successful content and more often than not their motives are 1. discounts 2. commissions 3. five seconds of fame 4. a gateway into the influencer world.  Again, you may be very lucky and have strong ambassador program that is bringing you success, and if so - good for you! But pause here: are you opposed to authentic videos that happen to have stronger elements to generate sales? Also, someone on your team is still dedicating a large amount of their time and energy to managing the ambassadors (again, not a even close to a resolution to our "do less" goal here).

So let's pause. We have figured out how to spend less: UGC. Now we face the struggle of doing less, because right now UGC probably sounds like doing the most. So here's the solution: creative agencies. 

Creative agencies are a game changer when it comes to doing and spending less (two birds with one stone as they say). It's pretty simple: you delegate the burden of getting UGC to the agency and your team can focus on things that bring greater value to your company, rather than babysitting some influencers and ambassadors. Creative agencies not only remove that headache for you, they have a group of creators that they constantly pull from for content, creators that are trained and have been shown to increase ROAS for the brands they have created for (better ads means you make more money, the last piece of our puzzle!)  These creators are creating for your brand, not to get more followers or discounts, but they share the same goal as you - to increase your sales. Because creative agencies have such a strong team within and have done all that groundwork for you, the turnaround times become lightning fast and you aren't left wondering if you are ever going to get any content in return, not to mention worrying if the content you get is going to be of good quality. A good creative agency will have its own video editing team that will make sure all content is in the format you need and watermark free! All that you need to do is plug the content into your ad account and you're home free! But hey, if you like to run around like a headless chicken all day, you probably don't want to delegate creative to an agency, so keep that in mind. 

Anyway, let's summarize: Creative agencies do all the grunt work for you, at a lesser price than traditional studio advertising, and bring about a larger return on your investment. The only question left to ask is: what are you going to do with all that new found free time and extra money?