Tactics for eliciting experiences, not just reviews, from your users

Context

Using User Generated Content (UGC) for marketing at scale is a trend that is yet to take off. Also one that I was lucky to have worked on at lastminute.com as a Content Strategist, helping build a product made with and fuelled by UGC. This is Part 2 of the series on Content Strategy for using UGC at scale for marketing automation.

• Part 1: Reflections on the unexplored power of User Generated Content

• Part 3: Tactics for moderating User Generated Content  

Make your users share more

The purpose of a review is to certify, for which a review submission form would suffice. But the objective of collecting UGC for marketing at scale, is not to validate the reputation of a place, establishment, product, or service. It is to inspire.

The UGC must trigger intrigue and interest in the subject being discussed. It must reveal something different than SEO driven web results. Ideally, this should be the unique perspective of the user, so that it stirs something within that 'audience of one' i.e. the individual who receives the content and happens to be a lot like the user.

Also, quality in this case should not be confused with grammar and spellings. Most users are likely to share their experiences using handheld devices while on the move. Wrong grammar and misspelling (often generated through autocorrect!) are, in fact, anticipated. Such issues can be fixed algorithmically with a certain level of manual supervision. The quality of UGC is measured against factors that will help inspire and assist the audience:

• Volume: A longer experience is likely to contain more information

• Sentiment: An experience where the user expresses their feelings is likely to be evocative, and hence inspirational 

• Subjects: An experience with a higher number of subjects is likely to possess more variety and nuances 

To elicit an in-depth experience, nothing less than a conversation would do. The questionnaire, therefore, will need to be efficient as well as human.

What makes a UGC quiz form efficient?

An efficient quiz form respects the user's time and attention while meeting business needs. The user should feel happy sharing their experiences through the quiz form. If the user needs are met, the business receives high quality user generated content. The following best practices help meet both the objectives: 

• Craft questions in line with the product strategy: The objective is to elicit responses that are relevant to the product. For instance, for a restaurant review platform, questions about the weather or politics, while conversational, would be irrelevant to the organization's marketing strategy. Unless you have the technology to interpret the answer and respond appropriately, you risk wasting the user's time and attention.

• Collect and assign Metadata: For the machine to interpret UGC in line with the product framework, it needs to be categorized. Some of the metadata, such as name, would already be available through the user's historical usage of the product/service. The remaining metadata – especially the axes of experience that define the product – can be self-identified by the user through multiple choice questions in the quiz form. For instance, a traveller could self-identify their traveller type (solo/couple/family/etc.), and the holiday type(weekend/special occasion/etc.), tagging that particular experience as relevant to users with the same attributes.  

• Use open ended questions: To elicit long and descriptive responses, the questions should be open ended. 

  • Avoid questions beginning with "Did you..." to avoid yes/no responses

  • Avoid questions beginning with "Was the..." to avoid leading the user

  • The following phrases could be useful in eliciting descriptive and unbiased responses:

    • "How was..."

    • "How did you..."

    • "Share your views..."

    • "Describe the..."

    • "What all..."

How to humanize the process of collecting UGC?

I'm yet to interact with a truly human chatbot. But at lastminute.com, we mimicked certain aspects of human-to-human conversation: 

• Be mindful of the context: Use the last interaction with the user as a peg to begin the conversation. For example, for a restaurant review platform, it will be natural to begin the conversation by asking the user about their last restaurant visit. Likewise, for a travel booking platform, asking about the trip for which the user booked tickets through the platform, would be the natural opener.

• Base the quiz form on Decision Tree logic: Once you identify the metadata of a certain experience, map the flow of questions for each combination. Also known as Decision Tree approach, this tactic ensures that the user is presented with relevant questions in line with their previous answers. 

• Practice empathy: Experiences are not always associated with positive triggers. A restaurant-goer may have decided to eat out because of domestic strife. A traveller may have made a trip to attend a funeral. Users are free to share the reasons – whether positive or negative – for choosing a product or service. It demonstrates their trust in the brand. But it is up to us, as Content Strategists, to understand that it would be insensitive to grill such users about their experience. In such cases, terminating the conversation respectfully is probably the best approach.

• Provide encouragement: In a linear form, it is easy to demonstrate a user's progress through a visual cue such as the length of a bar at the top of the screen. But in a Decision Tree based quiz form, progress is in ratio to the flow chosen and modified by the user at every interaction. This is tricky to demonstrate visually. That's why, it might be helpful to incorporate messages of encouragement instead, at certain points in the quiz flow. 

• Be respectful: We design forms to encourage users to share as much as possible to help us fuel the product. But there is something as too much of a good thing. Users occasionally share a little too much in the form of intimate details about their relationships and experiences. It is up to us, as Content Strategists and Product Designers, to set in place checks and processes to exclude such details from public consumption. 

Reflection

Designing a quiz form to encourage users to share more by writing more, is an interesting challenge – for a Content Strategist to align the initiative with the business needs, and for a Content Designer to use research and AB Testing data to identify the right questions and their wording. What is your opinion? Do share your thoughts by commenting on the post.