If you’ve been online in the last year, you’ve probably seen hundreds of videos of people talking about their days, using products, and sharing their experiences. This kind of content is called user-generated content or UGC, and the people who make it are UGC creators. UGC content is an umbrella term. It refers to content created by individuals rather than companies for commercial or promotional purposes. If you’ve ever seen someone unboxing a new backpack on YouTube or someone vlogging about their new tennis shoes for vacation, you’ve seen UGC content by a UGC creator.
Today, UGC creators play a strategic role in modern marketing by helping brands produce authentic, high-performing content at scale.
Anyone can become a UGC creator because all it requires is creating content that’s not made by the brand itself. However, a UGC creator devotes significant time to producing original videos, images, reviews, comments, or other media. Many are also paid for this work. Let’s dive into more about UGC creators and why they’re so sought after.
How Does a UGC Creator Differ from an Influencer?
A UGC creator can technically be anyone creating their own promotional content for a company, while an influencer will have a contract to work with a particular brand. However, the distinction can get muddy. Some UGC creators also have contracts with brands and are paid to create content. The main difference between those types of UGC creators and influencers is that brands love the authenticity of a UGC creator and the audience of an influencer. Influencers typically have a large following. Brands often partner with them primarily to reach that audience and not just for the content itself. This is why UGC creators are often seen as sitting at the forefront of the new era of influencer marketing.
A brand will partner with a UGC creator more to get the unique benefits of UGC content, rather than to reach a particular audience.
Why Brands Want to Work with UGC Creators
UGC creators are in high demand for a few reasons:
- People trust them. Consumers are going to trust their peers more than companies when it comes to product recommendations. In fact, 88% say they take recommendations from people they trust more seriously than any other kind of marketing material. UGC creators can become trusted sources in people’s lives, and that makes their content more trustworthy and reliable to your potential customers.
- They’re relatable. In an age of lo-fi content where low quality and high relatability are crucial, UGC creators make content people want. That relatability and authenticity people crave can then help them trust and be more likely to convert to the products and brands the creators showcase.
- It’s more cost-effective. It’s much more expensive to spend all the time and money creating branded content or shelling out to hire a big-name celebrity. In reality, a brand’s potential buyers can often be converted by relatable content from a regular person. That approach saves businesses significant time and marketing spend.
- Cross-platform content is easy. UGC creators are on social media like Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube, as well as blogs and forums. Because they’re already creating content for nearly every platform, brands can easily create extensive content strategies and collaborate with multiple creators to cover all their bases.
- They produce high-conversion content (that can go viral). Over 50% of marketers believe that UGC videos yield a higher return on investment than professionally made videos. These creators are making content that helps companies get more while spending less. And the content has much more potential to go viral than professionally curated content.
How UGC Creators Typically Get Started. What Brands should know
UGC creators don’t begin as “UGC creators.” Most start as everyday consumers who naturally create and share content about products they genuinely enjoy. Over time, some of these individuals refine their skills, build simple portfolios, and begin collaborating with brands more intentionally.
If someone wants to become a UGC creator, how do they do it? Brands often find that strong UGC creators follow a natural progression:
- They focus on a niche: Most successful UGC creators build around a specific category they genuinely understand. It can be beauty, fitness, tech, parenting, or home improvement, rather than trying to create for everyone.
- Reach out to brands. They begin reaching out to brands or responding to brand opportunities. Many start by creating sample content around products they already use. Over time, they build lightweight portfolios that demonstrate their style and authenticity.
- They stay consistent: Even when UGC creation is not their full-time job, consistency builds skill, confidence, and credibility. These are the qualities brands value when selecting partners.
Red Flags Brands Should Watch For
However, marketers should also watch for red flags. Creators who produce overly polished, ad-like content can lose the authenticity that makes UGC effective. Those who jump between unrelated niches or rely heavily on scripted brand messaging may struggle to connect with real audiences. When content feels transactional or is driven mainly by free products, performance often suffers. The strongest UGC creators feel like real customers first and content producers second.
Understanding how UGC creators get started helps brands identify authentic partners and set realistic expectations. Structured systems then ensure that this authenticity scales without losing brand control.
Make Filming UGC Content Easy with BrandLens
Whether you’re a company looking to partner with UGC creators or an individual ready to become a creator, you’re going to need video tools that make content creation easy. BrandLens can help you with videos. It’s essentially like Canva but for videos—tons of customizable templates that make it easy to set up a niche or apply brand guidelines. Plus, you don’t have to download an app to use it. It’s guided, easy, intuitive, and powerful.
Explore how structured capture can simplify working with UGC creators at scale.
