[FAQ]

G’day,

I’m a marketing coordinator for an e-commerce brand based in Brisbane, and our team is looking for new ways to make our email campaigns more authentic.

We keep coming across the acronym “UGC,” which I know stands for User-Generated Content, but I mostly hear about it in the context of social media. I’m keen to explore how it can be used in our email marketing.

What does this actually look like in an email? Could anyone give me a clear definition and maybe some examples of how brands are successfully using UGC in their newsletters or promotional emails?

Any examples or insights would be ace. Cheers.

[Jeff Bullas]

An excellent topic. UGC is one of the most powerful tools for building authenticity and social proof.

Brief Answer: User-Generated Content (UGC) in email marketing refers to any brand-relevant image, video, or text created by your customers, not by your company. It’s used in emails to showcase real customers using your products, which builds trust and increases conversions.

The strategy is to move from telling your audience how great your product is to showing them, using the authentic voices and experiences of their peers.

The most common and visually effective type is image-based UGC. This is where you feature photos from your customers directly in your email campaigns. For an e-commerce brand, this could be a gallery of different customers wearing your clothing or using your product in their own homes. This kind of authentic image is incredibly powerful social proof, but you must always get explicit permission from the creator before using their photo.

Next, you have text-based UGC, which is primarily customer reviews and testimonials. You can pull the most compelling quotes from your product reviews or social media comments and feature them in your emails. Placing a short, glowing text block from a real customer next to a product image can often be more persuasive than any professional marketing copy.

A more advanced format is video-based UGC. This could involve using snippets of customer unboxing videos, tutorials, or video testimonials. Since embedding actual video files in email is unreliable, the best practice is to create an animated GIF or a high-quality thumbnail image from the video. You then link this image to the full video on your website or social media, driving traffic while showcasing authentic user experiences.

To get a steady stream of this content, you have to ask for it. You can run social media campaigns encouraging users to post with a specific hashtag, or set up automated post-purchase emails that specifically ask for a review and a photo.

Cheers,
Jeff

[Author]

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