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Owned Media v/s Earned Media: How UGC is Placed

As per the research from Altimeter, 70% of marketers lack definite and consistent content strategy. There can be many reasons to it, however, the most common being the lack of resource or expertise. This is the area where small companies fail to compete with the larger brands in content marketing department. This inability to create integrated content strategy pressurizes the whole content creation approach the business has. Most likely, it impacts content creation, understanding buyer personas and overall marketing strategy.

The report also highlights the inability of the marketers to align their actions with the definite strategy. Although, they are aware of their top needs, lack of resources or expertise hinder them to invest in those areas, specially audience identification and targeting.

In a way, content marketing seems to be one of the major challenges that brands face today. When it comes to creating content, different types of media can be utilized to generate value. One is Owned Media, such as official website, company blog, company-owned social media presence, eBooks, white papers and etc. And the other being the Earned Media, such as reviews, feedback, recommendations, articles or press coverage. Compared to the latter, the brand exercises complete control over the former. In terms of brand building and trust factor, Owned Media lacks behind, whereas Earned Media finishes with style. 

As the name depicts, Earned Media is earned and helps build brand community through different channels. Most importantly, it earns brands the much-needed trust factor through user-generated content. User-generated content (UGC) is a crucial piece of strong brand building. Through product reviews, social content or feedback, users always try to generate content that express their views or opinions, leaving brand with no control on the content. 


As there is no control of the brand over user-generated content (UGC), it holds the great value for other peers. In no way brand can alter or influence UGC, making it unique and real for other users. Hence, it holds the great value for the brands. 

UGC is a great opportunity to the brands who lack integrated content strategy. Rather focusing on in-house inadequacy, they should focus on encouraging UGC for better brand value and trust creation. 

UGC can help brands with:

1) UGC is the great way to know your target audience. This enables brands come up with precise strategies.

2) In terms of customer engagement, UGC encourages brands to come up with new avenues or opportunities

3) The basic rule of content marketing drives from conversation and conversions. Hence, UGC helps driving better customer satisfaction for consistent conversation opportunities.

4) Most importantly, UGC helps in building strong brand loyalty through concentrated and gated community efforts.

5) When users are creating content for the brand, it automatically becomes authentic and trusted. Thus, it helps the brand in improving overall online presence and visibility.

6) Last but not the least, it makes the brand more trust-worthy and authentic.

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