Bridging the Gap: Consumer Vs. Marketer Content Preferences in the Digital Age

The way you package your marketing content can make or break your deal with consumers. And, it doesn’t matter whether you choose digital media or traditional media like TV or radio. You must impress your customers to consider your marketing campaign a success. 

As things stand, most marketers think their marketing content resonates well with their customers. Surprisingly, consumers think otherwise.

If we go with the facts, user-generated content (UGC) impresses prospective customers better than the stuff your brand creates, making it more effective in marketing. 

But don’t take our word for it. Let the rest of this post show it to you with the facts and numbers.

 

What Marketing Channels Do Consumers Trust Most

We’ve already said that the goal of any marketing campaign is to impress consumers and win their trust. That’s true regardless of the marketing channel. 

It could be traditional channels like the TV, radio, and newspaper or newer digital channels like your brand’s website, social media platforms, and other mobile and online media.

Data suggests that today’s consumers have more trust in marketing messages than they did in the past. 

Regardless, every brand marketer must know one thing: Consumer trust in brand content can vary from channel to channel, depending on their demographics.

For example, older generations may have more trust in traditional marketing mediums. A survey in 2021/22 by Marketing Charts found that 46% of US adults trusted marketing messages from TV and Print. Only 19% trusted social media marketing content.

Instead, a 2023 survey by Power Reviews involving all generation groups from Gen Z to Millennials, Gen X, and Baby Boomers found that 90% of consumers trusted customer ratings and reviews the most. They considered the reviews to make their purchasing decisions. 

Similarly, 73% had great trust in customer photos and videos and recommendations from friends and family. Only a mere 13% had trust in traditional TV commercials.

From our research rounds, authenticity in content marketing seems to be the key reason consumers will trust one type of marketing content over another.

Despite this, businesses and brand owners seem to have an idea of marketing content authenticity that’s different in many aspects from that of consumers.

 

The Diverging Consumer Vs Marketer Idea of Authentic Marketing Content

If you’ve been marketing your brand or product for a while, you’ve probably seen surveys showing a glaring disconnect between consumer and marketer ideas on authentic content.  

For example, you might remember the 2019 study by Stackla, the visual content marketing platform that’s now part of Nosto. 

Their study showed most consumers and marketers agree that content authenticity is key for consumers’ purchasing decisions. 

However, there’s a disconnect between what the marketers think is authentic content and consumer content expectations. 

In fact, while 92% of marketers believe the content they create is judged authentic by consumers, 51% of consumers think less than half of brands create authentic content.

In our digital age, consumer purchase behavior changes frequently, compelling marketers to match up. So, one might be tempted to think that the idea and value of authentic content among consumers have changed. Not in the least!

On the contrary, content authenticity continues to be extremely important for consumers, and so does personalization and a few other aspects we will discuss in this post.

So, what is the most authentic marketing content for consumers, and do marketers concur?

 

The Most Authentic Content For Consumers Is User-Generated

No marketer will argue against the fact that the marketing content their brand creates must resonate as credible to consumers. Credibility is at the heart of content marketing effectiveness. 

Regardless, many brand owners have yet to fully adopt the idea that the most effective marketing content is not the one they create. It’s the one consumers generate.

User-generated content, sometimes called “earned media” or “social proof”, takes the form of:

• Product reviews.

• Social media posts on platforms like X (Twitter), Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook. 

• Customer testimonials in visuals (Photos and videos).

• Direct recommendations from family and friends

• Blog posts.

Let me now show you how user-generated content impact wins over brand-generated content with some numbers and how that has withstood the test of time.

In the 2019 Stackla study mentioned earlier, 58% of consumers, against 15% of marketers, indicated they consider user-generated content to be the most authentic. 

Instead, 32% of brand owners, against 24% of consumers, thought brand-created content was the most authentic.

Recent surveys have upheld customer preference for consumer-generated content. 

For example, a 2021 global survey found that around 90% of consumers considered personal recommendations from family and friends the most trusted advertising medium. Brand websites came second.

While the influence of user-generated content on consumer purchasing decisions may vary across industries, it generally remains unmatched by other advertising media in our digital age.

And, if you ask consumers, marketers are also not hitting the target when it comes to personalization in content marketing.

 

Consumers Think Marketers Are Not Hitting the Target with Content Personalization

Another success indicator in marketing is the personalization of content.

Personalization in marketing entails using data to target specific consumer categories with marketing messages. Personalized content is mostly built on demographic data or past buying behavior.

When strategically created, personalized marketing content makes the target customer feel like the content is personally meant for them. That can significantly upscale sales.

Luckily, most marketing leaders do believe personalization is key to achieving their marketing goals. Plus, data suggest that a majority of consumers place a high value on personalized content. 

However, most businesses don’t take complete advantage of the power of personalization. In fact, there’s a gap between how much marketers prioritize creating personalized content and what consumers expect.

For example, data by Salesforce shows that 65% of consumers expect businesses to be aware of their needs and purchasing preferences. However, 61% feel that companies treat them as a mere number in a crowd of buyers.

Also, a 2021 survey on the state of personalization by Segment.io has interesting findings. While 85% of businesses believe they deliver personalized experiences to consumers, only 60% of consumers agree with them. 

So, why the discrepancy? 

It seems companies face multiple challenges in delivering personalized content to consumers. According to a Comviva study, the top two challenges are the inability to deliver personalized experiences in real-time and the incapacity of brands to scale up personalization.

Fortunately, some measures can help counter these challenges. These include: 

• Adopting a better approach to personalization and placing it at the heart of marketing.

• Rethinking customer categorization by referencing real data.

• Adopting a data-driven content strategy that lets data inform marketing decisions.

• Incorporating AI in content marketing and making automation crucial to real-time personalization.

And with all these measures taken, marketers still have to revisit the relevance vs frequency in marketing issue and understand how well their content meets customer preferences. The current situation suggests otherwise.

 

Marketers are Producing more Content But not Meeting Customer Preferences

It seems that marketers prioritize creating more own content over meeting user preferences. 

According to the Segment.io survey mentioned earlier, marketers prioritize band-created content mainly because they think it is higher quality and easier to manage.

But, reality suggests that marketers must create a balance between increasing their brand content and responding to user preferences if they want to please and win over consumers. And, as we’ve repeated a few times, customer preferences lie in user-generated content.

According to the Power Reviews 2023 Survey, videos and photos from other consumers have a greater impact on purchase behavior. Specifically, 60% of consumers will first check user-generated images to know about a product they’ve never purchased before. 

The obvious guess is that seeing a real consumer using a product is more convincing than a simulated presentation by the manufacturer.

That also explains why 77% of consumers have greater trust in user-generated content when deciding on a purchase. In fact, finding user-generated visuals about a product of interest can make or break a purchase. And, in that regard, 53% of consumers will decide to buy a product or not based on user-generated visuals.

Unfortunately, marketers are not hitting the target when choosing the type of content that truly sells to consumers. 

For example, while it is clear that consumers respond better to user-generated content, businesses are still investing higher budgets in owned and paid media than earned media.

For consolation, though, a survey by Brightlocal also found that consumers target videos created by the brand when looking for information on products or services from local businesses. Those posted on social media by friends or known persons only come forth.

At this point, marketers will be interested to know they can get help from old customers to create effective marketing content.

 

Brands Can Engage Consumers to Create User-generated Content

As we’ve said till now, what consumers want from brands is to see user-generated content to decide on their purchases. 

It’s also clear, that consumers are already creating the content they desire from brands on their own initiative. 

Since that is the case, brands can benefit more from user-generated content if they directly engage consumers in creating user-generated content. 

 

In the 2019 Stackla survey: 

• 89% of consumers would post about travel destinations,

• 65% would post about health and beauty products, and

• 62% would post about new cars.

Plus, an overall 51% would willingly keep contact or purchase from a brand that shares their visuals on a product as a marketing strategy.  

From more recent data:

• 77% of consumers would willingly submit user-generated content for a reward. 

• 80% of Gen Z already share or would be willing to share a purchase on social media.

• 55% of Gen Z (18-29 years) would love to be featured on the social media pages of brands they purchase from, 2x more than older consumers. 

 

The Bottom Line

Any business or brand understands that marketing is an indispensable strategy for success. That’s why every brand and business owner invests time and resources to create marketing content. The expectation is that such content impresses consumers and earns their trust, translating into sales.

However, it seems that brand and business marketing leaders have yet to understand one crucial fact: Although brand-created content has its marketing power, user-generated content resonates better with consumers.

The facts and numbers in this post reflect the great trust consumers put in user-generated content. Marketers can win over new customers by creating the right balance between brand-created content and user-generated content.