SodaStream has stirred things up with a user-generated ad campaign! It’s no secret that the line between consumers and marketers has become increasingly blurred in our social media dominant age. One interesting example of this tricky dynamic is the recent marketing push from SodaStream, a company that sells do-it-yourself soda making machines for home use. In a quest for greater market penetration, the company has started a campaign to feature user-generated advertisements – and the results have been pretty m/sodastream-pours-on-the-user-generated-content/article/324550/”>surprising.
SodaStream started by asking fans to upload their own photographs of the product onto the company’s Facebook page. SodaStream then selected a number of these photos to appear in their ad banners, alongside traditional paid content. So far, the metrics show that the public is far more responsive to the user-generated content than the traditional creative work. User-generated ads scored a 76% higher click-through rate, as well as a 136% increase in the engagement rate (which includes post likes, page likes, and overall photo views). The photos themselves scored a whopping 313% increase in viewing rate over the conventional content on social media.
As paradoxical as it may seem, there are plenty of strong arguments for getting consumers to, effectively, advertise to themselves. A representative for SodaStream touted the results as proof that people increasingly want to feel some sort of ownership over the products they buy – no doubt, it’s implied, because many people increasingly define themselves by what they purchase. In the case of SodaStream customers, creating ads for the company simply reinforces the scrappy DiY spirit of making your own soda at home, and it’s yet more evidence that self-expression sells.
How interesting! I know that people like to be able to relate to the products that they buy, and by seeing other real people using the product they feel more comfortable purchasing the product for themselves. I do not believe that the traditional content that businesses use the promote their products are effective in this day and age and user-generated content may be the way of the future.
Especially on social media user-generated content will always outperform the more “conventional” style of content for advertisements. I think that businesses are beginning to get the idea that social media is all about real people and real content rather than paid content.
I must agree with Jack on this one. User-generated content is seemingly far more effective than the typical way of going about advertising campaigns. People are now too used to how companies try to convince people to purchase their products, and hence it is time for some more innovation when it comes to ad-campaigns. I hope that these results will help more companies in the future with their campaigns, and maybe it will aid companies who are using social medias to promote their products too.
Personally, I have seen more advertisements on Facebook and Twitter with user-generated content instead of the usual style of content, and I must admit that I was far more inclined to make a purchase. With the user-generated content I felt far more confident that I was making a worthwhile purchase, and not simply buying into something that I knew little about. Maybe this is the way forward for advertising campaigns.
As someone who frequently promotes products online using social media sites, and other web platforms I can say with confidence that the traditional way of going about ad campaigns is no longer effective. Progressively I am noticing that overtime my conversion rate when using standard content is lowering at a meteoric rate, and as a result I am finding that my investment is no longer worthwhile. I think it is time that I began using user-generated content for my own campaigns, and see if my situation improves.