How can UGC products achieve operational differentiation?

In recent years, more and more product forms have introduced UGC. Community-based products are of course the only ones to do so. A large number of non-community products are also following this trend, especially tools (low stickiness, short usage time) and e-commerce (low frequency, non-urgent need) products. For example, when you open Moji Weather, you see topics about solar terms and real-life UGC; or when you open NetEase Kaola, you see a community that attracts your attention. You will be tempted to write down your beauty reviews under the guidance of beauty experts.

1. The added value of UGC to products

The reason why all kinds of products attach unprecedented importance to UGC is nothing more than the added value of UGC to the products:

From the core goal of the product, UGC is a way to increase user activity and product stickiness.

First of all, users who have engaged in UGC behavior generally have a high retention rate. This retention comes from natural user retention on the one hand, and from product recall (through likes, replies, praise, being added to the selection system notifications, etc.) on the other hand. For products with low-frequency application scenarios and lack of user loyalty, UGC is a good way to increase stickiness and stimulate activity.

There are several quantifiable data indicators for the value of this layer of UGC:

• Primary indicators: user retention and daily activity
• Secondary indicator: User stay time
• Level 3 indicators: UGC quantity, quality, and interaction volume

The users here are not only those who produce content, but also those who participate in UGC interactive behaviors and consume UGC. The data shows that the retention rate of the latter two users is also higher than that of ordinary users without any related behavior.

From the perspective of content production, UGC has several significant advantages over PGC:

• In addition to PGC, form more efficient and low-cost content supplements to make the product look more complete;
• Satisfy the user's desire for a sense of participation in the process of using the product, and transform from a consumer (or user) of product information (or function) to a producer and participant. This sense of participation design brings the user closer to the product and makes the product more humane.
• For e-commerce products, UGC is more reliable for consumer decision-making. We usually trust product reviews more than product detail pages, even if they may be the result of fake orders.
• In addition, UGC is also a good channel for products and users to interact and collect user needs . Users, especially core users, can contribute a lot of valuable suggestions and ideas. Sometimes, with a little guidance, they can uncover good product needs and operational inspirations.

Based on the above values, it is not difficult to understand why UGC has gradually become a standard feature of products. UGC content includes text, pictures, music, audio, video, etc., and the product forms are as follows in order of production cost from lightest to heaviest:

• Comments: article comments, product reviews, course comments, video comments
• Topics: Hot topics, theme essays, topic plaza
• Q&A: Q&A community, one-to-one consultation, one-to-many Q&A live broadcast
• Community: A user cluster formed based on common interests and hobbies, such as Douban groups, Baidu Tieba, and celebrity circles. Communities usually include the above three product forms.

Products can "learn" from each other and make UGC a standard feature, but operations have their own invisible efforts at the bottom level. Therefore, these large numbers of product + UGC have some successful examples, but most of them operate mediocrely and are unremarkable.

The community function launched in version 9.9 of Alipay seems to be an attempt to force social interaction on the basis of payment tools, which has attracted constant complaints. It can be seen that not all products are suitable for UGC. The premise is that the core needs are combined with the attributes of UGC, interaction, and sociality, which will not destroy the tonality of the product itself, and at the same time can help improve the user experience. Users have the willingness and ability to participate, and the positioning and cold start of UGC must be particularly carefully planned and operated, rather than hastily launched on a whim.

It is unnecessary for e-commerce to create a community on its own. A typical example is the Xianyu fish pond. The original intention was to use the form of a community to cultivate an environment of trust in second-hand transactions. Most fish ponds are either dominated by micro-businesses or stagnant.

Taobao version 5.2 also had a community, and version 6.2 was upgraded to a question-and-answer experience community. Currently, the community entrance has been changed to messages.

To borrow the words of a certain hero:

“They are all plug-ins + plug-ins. Community/social is just a plug-in. We might as well change the previous concept of plug-in (social) + plug-in (e-commerce) a little bit and mix social and e-commerce together.”

Starting from here, product reviews/buyer shows, asking everyone, live shopping guides/buy while you watch can all be considered as Taobao’s forays into e-commerce + UGC.

Different types of products are suitable for different UGC content forms and product forms, and UGC is not necessarily equal to community.

2. The core operating driving force of UGC products

There are three indicators to measure the health of UGC products: content update frequency, content quality, and deep interaction between users . These three points together form the atmosphere foundation of a successful UGC product. Moreover, the importance of content quality must be higher than the other two points, because it will establish the core barrier of UGC and help the product realize more value.

1. Content update frequency

The frequency of content updates refers to the quantity and production capacity of content. A high frequency of content updates means that users can see different new content every time they come in, and feel that the small ecological community built by UGC is active and popular. This can be achieved by adjusting the logic of product distribution to fully mobilize the display of existing content, but it mainly depends on whether users are willing to continue to produce new content .

(1) On the product:

Lower the threshold for content production and reduce content operation costs : Himalaya uses technical means to simulate the anchor's workbench, allowing ordinary users to become anchors; second-hand trading websites set up text templates such as purchase channels and reasons for transfer in product descriptions to guide users to fill in content.

Decentralized traffic distribution and weighted distribution to new users : Kuaishou implements equal traffic distribution. Content distribution and recommendation mainly depend on the content itself and the popularity of the platform, rather than the publisher himself (number of fans or privileges). A large number of amateurs also have the opportunity to be recommended and continue to output high levels of activity. Kuaishou founder and CEO Su Hua once publicly stated that the core and tone of Kuaishou is "universal benefit", and everyone can record their own lives.

Instant user feedback : standard interactive designs and message notification mechanisms such as likes, comments, follows, shares, and favorites. In fact, the feedback of many products lacks the closed loop of user recall and reminders.

Kuaishou’s original “Double-click 666” is an upgrade to the like button in terms of interaction and animation. It has become a Kuaishou culture and has been reused by competing products. According to online data, content on the Kuaishou platform received more than 70 billion likes in 2017 alone. Kuaishou has also set June 6 as the Interactive Like Day.

(2) Operationally:

Topic operation : Taking full advantage of hot traffic, creating topics, and guiding users to participate in UGC have become regular operating methods for various products. Every song on NetEase Cloud Music is a topic and a scene. With its unique "memory-killing" and "nostalgic" commentary style, it has successfully broken through the pressure of AT's music copyright and become unique.

Event operation : Use creative activities with prize incentives to stimulate user participation, which is often seen in cross-border brand cooperation, multi-channel communication to create buzz, and at the same time have the effect of attracting new customers; in 2016, Jianshu and Meizu Mobile jointly held the "Magical Turning Point Essay Contest", and in 2018, Kuaishou Short Video and Hedgehog Commune launched the Spring Festival "Homecoming Notes" non-fiction story contest, which are all included.

Introducing new users : Through the above-mentioned large-scale cross-border activities or content marketing methods, we can explore the creative selling points of UGC, conduct secondary packaging and amplification, and achieve the purpose of brand communication and product acquisition. In May 2018, Duozhaoyu (a second-hand book trading platform) held the "Book Creature Exhibition" in Beijing, turning the "inclusions" (a kind of alternative UGC) that the booksellers unintentionally left in the books into a story exhibition, which helped Duozhaoyu gain a lot of goodwill and user word-of-mouth communication at a low cost.

2. Quality of content

The quality of content reflects the tone of a UGC product. Explicit content determinism ( by Pure Silver) believes that explicit content will establish the image and temperament of the product, and then affect the user's creation and interactive behavior, which is called "herd mentality." In addition to setting up prominent promotional positions such as "public display" and "strongly recommended" for your products, and filling the promotional positions with high-quality users and high-quality content, you should also help users improve their content creation capabilities so that the "quality" of users can grow.

(1) Define content standards and provide user education

Define what content is in line with the product and user positioning, what is high-quality content that can be recommended, and inform users when they register or publish content for the first time. It is best if the standards are discussed jointly by the product and operations, and dynamically optimized based on data and user feedback. Meipai short video’s “Newbie’s Guide” provides a great user education through the use of strategies + excellent examples.

(2) Content review

Content review is divided into machine review and manual review; machine review is to identify illegal information in the content through technical means, and it is not displayed on the front end; text content has a common keyword library, and image, audio and video recognition technology is also becoming more mature.

For example, Kuaishou's image recognition technology has leading applications in the labeling of video content and the identification of pornographic and violent content, thus improving review efficiency.

However, machine review cannot completely replace manual review, especially under the policy pressure from online information supervision. Various UGC short video platforms are widely advertising the recruitment of content reviewers, which has become a new profession that coexists with the Internet.

(3) Recommended distribution

The tone of the community is largely determined by distribution. The content you see depends on what the product and operations want you to see, and it also conveys the platform's attitude towards content. Recommendations include both algorithmic and manual ones.

Algorithmic recommendation : On the one hand, it limits the exposure rate of low-quality content; on the other hand, it weights the distribution of high-quality content; the definition of high-quality content in data, such as user feedback data such as likes, favorites, shares, comments and replies, as well as the amount of information and richness of the content itself, such as the number of words, whether there are pictures, video length, etc., and some non-quantifiable elements require the assistance of manual judgment and recommendation.

Manual recommendation : Operation staff manages the exposure of content in core traffic recommendation positions through subjective judgment of good content. One method is to adjust the recommendation weight of content that is misjudged by the algorithm, demote low-quality content (lower the ranking/cancel the recommendation), and enhance the weight of high-quality content (add recommendation/improve the ranking). The other method is to improve the exposure of targeted content based on operational needs. Recommendation positions usually include homepage information flow, banners, lists, special topics, etc.

(4) Incentives for high-quality content producers

UGC users have a strong need to be noticed and recognized. Therefore, there are two ways to motivate UGC users: traffic incentives and honor incentives:

Traffic incentives are easy to understand. They are the usual manual recommendation method mentioned above, which gives top UGC content greater traffic exposure and more fans' attention. Usually, traffic incentives are also assisted by low-cost material rewards (such as product peripherals, small phone bill red envelopes, etc.).

With the purpose of improving the learning outcomes of users who subscribe to the column, the Get APP encourages users to write learning notes in the comment section. By pinning posts, reposting on official accounts, compiling “hot comments of the week”, and giving gifts, the column has 150,000 subscribers and 3,000 to 4,000 people leaving comments every day.

Honor incentives refer to game operations such as electronic certificates, official certification marks, level medals, user privileges, and rankings. They are rewards for high-quality users. They are old hat, but they work time and time again. The basic human nature of vanity, love of showing off, and desire for affirmation has never changed.

Xiaohongshu uses different "little sweet potato" images to replace the levels of the growth system. Each level comes with corresponding privilege rewards (personalized watermarks, emoticons), and upgrades depend on the number of high-quality notes.

(5) Operational bonus points

① High-quality content guidance:

From light ones like tutorials to heavy ones like user training, it helps to inform the standards, give suggestions (topic selection, layout, title creation, shooting techniques, etc.), emphasize incentives, and establish a one-stop service.

In the early days, Toutiao Academy chose to cooperate with universities, held new media training camps, and provided bonuses and internship opportunities to encourage college students to operate Toutiao accounts, thereby acquiring a wave of high-quality content at a low cost. In the early days of the popularity of short videos, Meipai University and Baidu Short Video Training Camp also empowered content producers by inviting KOLs to record teaching videos.

② Introduce external high-quality content producers to set an example:

High-quality users with a certain degree of fame can serve as role models and generate a fan economy. In addition to exhausting all personal resources to connect with people, operators can also demonstrate the influence related to "TA" to high-quality users, including discussion popularity, appeal, etc., as a favorable "inducement" condition for inviting content creators to join.

Of course, for this group of users, there should be dedicated people to do targeted daily maintenance, communication and motivation work. This can also be attributed to the work content of user operations.

③Content integration and secondary distribution:

UGC is not just about producing content on the user side. The operation side must also ensure 20%-30% PUGC, select high-quality UGC content, integrate and distribute it through multiple channels. This can not only incentivize relevant output users, but also extend the life cycle of high-quality content and expand the influence of content.

The integration forms include income topics, compiled articles (daily selections, weekly hot reviews, weekly selections), compiled e-books, etc., which are output through in-site recommendations, self-media platform accounts, and even independently operated apps; Zhihu has always done a good job in this regard, whether it is the Zhihu Daily APP, Zhihu Roundtable, Zhihu Weekly, Knowledge Youth, etc., they are all working hard to maximize the value of high-quality question and answer UGC.

④Help top users realize cash:

For top users who are already at the PGC level, there needs to be deeper incentives for monetization. Common product monetization mechanisms include advertising sharing, e-commerce shopping guides, knowledge payment, paid communities, etc. The purpose of operation is to create its own IP, and to achieve a win-win situation for brands and users through exclusive contracts, blending commercial activities, and full-network recommendations.

At present, many wealthy self-media platforms are spending heavily to subsidize and support PGC authors. This practice is based on seizing traffic and market share, and has achieved revenue > subsidy cost. It is difficult for small platforms to follow suit; but in the long run, when the market structure is determined, it is unknown whether subsidies can be sustained. It is still necessary to let PGC users realize their own blood-making ability, and the platform should provide tools and services.

3. Deep interaction between users

UGC is content-based, with content laying the foundation for tone and active interactive support. More interactions bring it closer to social interaction.

There are light social interaction and heavy social interaction. Likes, follows, comments, and praises are all light social interaction, while private messages, adding friends, and group chats belong to heavy social interaction. A certain amount of social interaction can allow users to have sunk costs and increase user stickiness. Light social interaction is necessary, but heavy social interaction will disturb users and weaken the content tone itself. Product functions should be carefully developed, and operations can include both depending on demand.

(1) On the product:

① Optimize the interactive experience and provide convenient operation : put interactive functions such as likes, follows, comments, and appreciation on the first-level page to reduce the user's operation steps, and adopt fixed display forms such as buttons sucking the bottom or side suspension to play a certain role in suggesting guidance;

②Highlight the interactive effect and add creative design : For example, immediately reveal the nicknames and comment content of some commentators in the information flow, and mark them with "hot comments" to encourage viewers to participate in comment interaction; NetEase's post-float, video website's bullet screen +1, and Kuaishou's "double-click 666" mentioned above are all creative evolutions of interactive forms and are worth learning from;

③ Cultivate machine " passerby A " : zombie fans, machine likes, fake live broadcast popularity, although unsustainable, but it is indeed very effective in the seed stage and growth stage, and can solve urgent problems; now there are also many platforms that use machines to pretend to be real people "rewarding", which requires certain costs. Usually the amount of a single reward will not be too much (about 0.5-1 yuan), and there will be a withdrawal threshold, but the effect is that users think they have "loyal fans", and then the UGC motivation increases greatly. Well, the product routine is really no worse than the operation.

(2) Operationally:

① Active user community operation : In addition to the website and App, Jianshu has established many WeChat groups to aggregate active users under the same topic, such as reading groups, publishing groups, writing groups, and there are also many activity groups. These users with similar interests can communicate more conveniently with the help of WeChat groups, add each other as friends to strengthen the relationship chain, and continue to contribute high activity and high-frequency interactions based on the "WeChat friends" relationship to Jianshu.

②Interactive incentive activities : To enhance interaction, organize activities such as “collecting likes”, “voting canvassing”, “friends pk”, etc., with attractive prize incentives. It is simple, crude and effective.

③ Organize offline activities : such as Weibo fan meetings, Zhihu Salt Club, and Meipai anniversary birthday parties. Operate offline activities to create real-world interactions for users, build deeper social relationships, and feed back into the intensity of interaction within the product.

Of course, many of the above products and operational strategies have basically become standard configurations that are no longer new, but the execution details and innovative methods are where the operational gaps are reflected. Although there are many methodologies, it is not necessary to copy and paste them all. The practical process must be based on the product content form and the amount of resources.

Each form of UGC content (comments, topics, Q&A, communities) also has its own operational differences, and can be discussed in more detail in a separate article, so we will leave it for later.

Source: Gao Lele