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Case Study
The GoPro Campaign
The Go Pro Campaign is very interesting to me because it focuses on user-generated content. The Go Pro Campaign was a social media campaign Go Pro ran that gave their consumers a chance to win a million dollars by filming a video with their Go Pro, and the most remarkable video filmed would be the one that won. This campaign not only gave Go Pro plenty of cool videos to use to advertise but also encouraged UGC. UGC is extremely valuable and successful on platforms like TikTok and Reels. In the case of the Go Pro campaign, UGC videos show the product in action giving the potential customer an example of what they could do with the product if they were to purchase it. When customers make UGC, it can also help them feel more involved and cared for by the brand while also advertising for the brand unknowingly. "In the brand-related UGC arena, Christodoulides, Jevons, and Blackshaw (2011) and Christodoulides, Jevons, and Bonhomme (2012) identified four motivating factors for creating UGC: co-creation (consumers producing brand value jointly with firms, thus becoming an integral part of the value-creation system); empowerment (exerting control and influence over brands and other consumers); self-concept (expressing and presenting one's self-identity); and community (interacting and developing a sense of belonging)." (Navarro, 2021). Whenever someone participated in the campaign by posting a video, they unknowingly gave GoPro free advertising and, in themselves, gained a reward which was a sense of community and belonging.
The GoPro campaign also gave customers a chance to use the GoPro product and be creative. "Unlike the sponsored advertising contests ran in printed media in earlier times, and the more recent social media-based brand contests, sponsored CGA contests request participants specifically to make video ads, a format which usually requires participants to devote a certain amount of time, creativity and effort" (Martínez-Navarro, 2021.) While the consumer was being creative, they were also showcasing what the GoPro was capable of creating for potential buyers.
GoPro Campaign Video
A brand's greatest asset is its customers, which is no exception in the GoPro campaign. Traditional forms of advertising are being replaced by new ones focusing on User-generated content due to the impact User-generated content has on online shoppers. There has been a steady increase in User Generated Content ads. "Campbell et al. (2011) noted a decade ago that ten percent of the ads on YouTube were consumer-generated (Campbell et al., 2011), and the trend seems to be increasing as new tools for video content creation (e.g., augmented reality, filters, and lenses) and a plethora of platforms built exclusively on UGC and content sharing, such as Instagram, Twitch, and TikTok, continue to emerge (IAB, 2019) and are increasingly used (IAB, 2021). In fact, 500 hours of video content was uploaded onto YouTube every minute in 2020." (Navarro, 2021). With the new advertising age, customers are creating free advertising for brands. For GoPro or other brands, this is a desirable form of advertising because it is free and often seen as more authentic than a recommendation from a paid influencer. "Sponsored video ads created in response to digital media-based advertising contests are generated by ordinary members of the public. Thus, they are perceived as more credible, trustworthy, and authentic than social media-based firm-generated content" (Lawrence, Fournier, and Brunel 2013).
Take a look at this chart that shows the Impact of UGC on online shoppers.
There are lots of motivations for consumers and creators to create User Generated Content. However, the main incentives are monetary incentives and a passion for the topic or general interest. "As Vernette and Hamdi-Kidar (2013) demonstrated, calling for advertising co-creation is not enough, in itself, to ensure consumer engagement, since co-creation behaviours in digital environments are based on multiple factors. Building on human motivation schemes we identify two dimensions that describe individuals' motives for creating sponsored CGA: (i) individual-based factors, intrinsic or extrinsic; self-determination theory (SDT) (Deci and Ryan 1985; Ryan and Deci 2000); (ii) compensation motives, rational or affective; taken from the literature that has examined as reasons to engage in brand-related UGC in social media" (Krishnamurthy and Dou 2008). Regarding the GoPro campaign, users engaged in creating brand-related user-generated content because of the compensation motive and the self-determination theory. The compensation motive is because the winner of the GoPro campaign would receive 1 million dollars, and the self-determination theory is because of the personal gain one received from creating the video with the potential of getting interaction from GoPro.