Tips | 3 principles and 4 strategies for community topic UGC operations

Community content production is generally divided into two types: PGC and UGC .

Generally speaking, a UGC community with high user activity conforms to the "80/20 rule", that is, nearly 20% of users are content producers and nearly 80% of users are content consumers.

However, the 80/20 rule only reflects the average of the overall data. The better the community, the higher the proportion of users who generate content, and the more active and richer the UGC. If a community does not have a stable cycle of "content production-content feedback incentive", then the community will easily die.

Therefore, community operation is a great test of the operator's ability. In this article, we will talk about what kind of community topics should be created for topic communities, picture communities, SNS products, etc. to make it easier for users to participate in content production and interaction.

1. What are the shortcomings of your company?
2. One sentence proves that you are a product manager .
3. What do you find most annoying about your boss?
4. What disappointing interview experiences have you had?
5. How do you explain operations to your family?

………………

This type of topic will generate a high degree of resonance and desire to talk. Users will talk endlessly about their experiences and complaints as if they had found a confidant, and then discover that everyone is like this. Then the "oppressed people" will sympathize with each other and become more willing to continue the discussion. This scene is just like an old lady meeting another old lady and discussing how disobedient her own children are. Because of the extremely high resonance, a "sense of connection" is created.

Therefore, the best strategy for topic operation is to firmly grasp topics that target users may resonate with. If the main user group of your community is college students who have not yet graduated, then the topics you choose should be inclined towards themes such as "campus", "love", "graduation season", etc.; if your community is for pregnant women, then the topics you choose should be inclined towards "prenatal knowledge", "parenting knowledge", "parent-child relationship", "mother-in-law and daughter-in-law relationship", etc.

The most typical example of topic marketing is an event once held by Xin Shixiang that was popular in the ticket circle - " Escape from Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou in 4 Hours ", which conveyed people's values ​​​​on "freedom".

However, this problem will not occur with "low-threshold" topics because they reduce the cost for people to participate in content production. Most of these topics are generated in the "moderately prosperous stage" and "food and clothing stage". They are extended discussions on people's four needs of " physiological ", " safety ", " social " and " respect ". The threshold for everyone to participate is lowered, and the possibility of everyone creating content becomes greater.

(1) Knowledge threshold

The former relies on serious "science" to solve problems, while the latter relies more on "personal experience". Take Zhihu as an example. Usually, when comparing a "more professional topic" with a "popular topic", the "popular topic" far outperforms the "professional topic" in terms of indicators such as "number of followers" and "number of answers".

Question 1: When you see this topic, do you have a strong urge to express your thoughts?

Question 2: If you were to participate in the discussion of this topic, would you have a lot to say?

Question 3: If you are going to provide discussion opinions to your internet army, can you provide them with enough angles and preset content?

If your answer to any of the above three questions is "no", then don't use that topic. This means that the threshold for operation is not low. You may even have internet trolls but you don't know what to let them promote. Then the risk of the topic itself will be very high.

Therefore, when choosing a topic, you should pay attention to the operating threshold. A topic that is difficult to operate is definitely not a good UGC topic, but it does not rule out being a good PGC topic.

A user's decision to participate in a discussion of a content also depends on the quality of the "question". The worst question setting is one that has " closed answers " and " politically correct answers ."

If your topic is: "In the equation, 1+1=?", you might as well ask: "1+1=?". Everyone knows that the former is "2", not because it is simple enough, but because its answer is closed and has a standard answer; for the latter, it may trigger everyone's thinking and thus answer some creative content.

What does it mean to avoid “ having politically correct answers ”? For example, if the topic is: "I have just been in the company for 5 days and I feel very uncomfortable. Should I resign?" The politically correct answer to this topic is: Of course not. You are too impetuous to leave after only 5 days. You should find ways to adapt to wherever you go. You should consider changing jobs only if you have tried your best and it doesn't work.

At this point the topic has a clear bias. Users have no discussion space and cannot form two-way interactive discussions. There are many such topics. For example, “Do you think you can still ask your parents for money when you grow up and get a job? (Answer: Try not to. If you really can’t bear it, it’s okay to ask your parents for money during the transition period)”; “Is it shameful to be a parasite? (Answer: Yes)”; “Should teachers use violence when educating students? (Answer: No)”; “Do you think we should buy a house? (Answer: First of all, I have to be able to afford it)”; “What do you think of homosexuality? (Answer: We should respect them, give them space, and should not discriminate against them)”……………………

Therefore, when setting topics, we should try our best to avoid " closed answers " and " politically correct answers ".

Controversial

Controversial topics have the property of "harvesting attention", often attracting the attention of many people, and they have a long lifespan.

For example, the topic of "Han Han vs. Fang Zhouzi" a long time ago attracted a lot of attention on major social media platforms at the time, and netizens who "love to join in the fun" even "took sides" online to support one side. It has been a long time since then, but communities such as Tianya Forum and Baidu Tieba are still discussing this topic, which shows that controversial content has a strong vitality.

Controversy is always the strongest driving force behind a topic. For example, the changes in the figure below.

The aforementioned topics can be transformed into controversial topics with a little modification and will take on new life.

Can be social

I would like to take a game as an example. The “stealing vegetables” game that was popular all over the country around 2009 implanted “sociality” into this simple little game. The game involves gameplay such as "stealing vegetables", "raising wolfhounds", and "helping with watering". Its purpose is to increase interactivity and fun among users, thereby achieving social interaction.

Let me give you an example to illustrate this. For example, if you post a message in the community, after a period of time someone will leave a message in the comment area. You can then select the wonderful messages and comment on them. If you want to continue to amplify the topic effect, you can even ask someone to comment on your comment.

The advantage of doing this is that a topic is extended infinitely, just like branches on a tree trunk, it can spread and grow unrestrainedly and eventually become a towering tree.

Originally the discussion was just between you and the original poster, but now it has become between you, the original poster, and the commenter, so the resulting clash is naturally greater.

The specific approach is as follows: At the beginning, guide all "Type A" answers to appear under a topic, and these answers to some extent represent support for "Type A values." Then, the more "Type A" answers appear, the more controversial the topic becomes. Naturally, someone will "jump out" and put forward "Type B" opinions. Then the manager will release answers about "Type B values" and continue to create controversy.

You can observe that the hype of a hot social event basically follows this pattern. On the first day, a lot of opinion A appears on Weibo and WeChat Moments. On the second day, opinion B attacks opinion A. On the third day, opinion A comes out to counterattack. After a few rounds of discussion, the topic was successfully fermented.

I once wrote an article about "How to survive in Shanghai with 5,000 yuan". In the article, I specifically buried an "obvious mistake" in that I assumed the housing budget to be 500 yuan. After the article was published, it immediately received many comments from netizens, and most of the messages were about the "500 yuan". Comments like "How could the OP only have 500? Can you give me 500 and rent one for me to try?" exploded in the message section.

This is the significance of “pre-embedded hot spots”, using the controversy caused by “errors” to promote user discussions. This is also a unique strategy for producing UGC content.

Regarding “ Let me give you reasons ”, I would like to mention Maimai again, which is still very exemplary in this regard. Maimai has several heavyweight topics, such as "How can working women build their own fashion sense" and "What is the difference between you in life and you at work?" These topics have attracted a lot of high-quality selfie content. The girls have found very reasonable reasons to compete with each other, and the men are enjoying the content so much that they don't have time to like it.

Then, regarding " Let me start with what you really think ", Xin Shi Xiang made a typical case. The online article titled "The First Batch of Post-90s Generation Have Already Become Monks" went viral on WeChat Moments. Its content was about the attitudes and values ​​reflected by the "post-90s generation" in all aspects of life and work.

The article invited 9 people born in the 1990s as representatives, and each of them told a story about himself. Any person born in the 1990s can more or less find his or her own "shadow" in the 9 stories.

As a result, the article sparked heated discussions, with various interesting "personal stories" and "complaints" appearing in the comment section, including long passages of "self-reflection". This set of "borrowing the opponent's force" boxing skills has inspired users to participate in content creation. They spontaneously express their true feelings and write sincere and real words.

The above is all about the 3 principles and 4 strategies for community UGC content operations. Although the methodology is simple, it is not easy to put into practice.

A good community will inevitably form a stable closed loop in "content production" and "content consumption". The effective application of principles and strategies is to make the community's virtuous cycle of content operation more stable.