User-Generated Content (UGC) is on-trend nowadays in the eLearning industry. This emerging concept puts special emphasis on the well-known phrase, content is the king. With knowledge sharing among the users, constructive feedback and effective learning tools, user experiences in the market of digital learning are getting more personalised. So what’s this User Generated Content all about? What are its advantages or disadvantages for this generation? Let’s find it out.

What is User-Generated Content?

User-Generated Content or UGC refers to the content shared and published by the users themselves. Here, users are the learners as well as the content creators. It is more like an open platform that allows users to share their content and contribute to the learning experiences of other users.

Let’s take an example. In a company, customer service team members receive training on basic and advanced aspects of customer service and management. Alongside taking the relevant training courses, they can record and publish their personal experiences of interacting with customers on the eLearning platform. This will help others to get a better idea of how things actually work and learn from these experiences. This will further help the users to build a learning community for better outcomes.

User-generated content can be in any form in which users share their content and publish them on an open platform for others to access. Several social media platforms are known to be producing user-generated content that millions of audiences can access from anywhere. Here is a list of types of UGC.
 

• Discussion forums
• Blogs
• Videos
• Images
• Customer reviews
• Opinions
• Social media feeds

Your social media feeds are a type of user generated content

User-Generated Content is a component of social learning as it gives users a chance to learn from each other. In a typical product or service-based business, applications and experiences matter more than theoretical knowledge. In such a scenario, incorporating User-Generated Content into your LMS adds more value to it.

Why should businesses adopt User Generated Content?

Here is a list of 7 reasons why businesses should adopt user generated content.

Time saving

Creating your usual eLearning courses can be pretty time-consuming. Designing a curriculum, hiring subject matter experts to create content, organising the content online, etc. takes both time and effort. Instead, you can allow your users to share their own content on the LMS portal to save time.

Knowledge retention

Gaining knowledge is fruitful only when you can retain it for long. By embracing User-Generated Content, you can allow your employees to document and share what they learn. This helps them capture their knowledge and revisit it anytime for better retention.

Teach and learn

There is an old saying, “when one teaches, two learn”. Documenting what they have learnt helps users to revise their own experiences and organise their thoughts. This further boosts their confidence and improves learning efficiency and workforce productivity.

Trust building

To trust each other, your employees first need to know each other. LMS with user-generated content allows your employees to learn about others’ experiences and opinions. This plays a huge role in trust building and employee engagement.

Acceptability

Studies say that users trust information shared by their friends and colleagues more than they believe in traditional courses. Learners also find user-generated content more relevant to their jobs and skills. This makes user generated content more acceptable and effective.

Customer retention

The majority of customers prioritise reviews and recommendations over formal descriptions when they buy a new product. User-generated content can help you draw the attention of new potential buyers and retain the existing customers through consistent engagement and trust building. 

User-friendly

User-generated content is more user-friendly as the users themselves create it. When compared with traditional courses created by experts, UGC is simpler, easier to comprehend and more relevant to the subject.

Limitations to adopt User-Generated Content

User-generated content, when implemented wisely, is very beneficial for businesses and learners. But it has certain limitations as well. 

• User generated content might be inaccurate as there is no guarantee that the users posting the content have the best knowledge of the subject.
• With more people sharing their content on a single platform, it might get challenging to organise and manage all the data.
• UGC is user-dependent. There are chances that few users try to push their content forward while others miss it out.
• Users tend to publish the content according to their choice. Possibilities are there that the uploaded content is not a part of a well-defined curriculum.

To overcome these limitations, businesses should introduce proper guidelines and content management practices. All users must follow these guidelines while posting their content online to ensure good content quality and relevance.

Conclusion

User generated content is the core of social learning. If managed perfectly, it can bring many benefits to businesses and online education. To get the best out of this informal learning approach, buy the right LMS for your business that incorporates user generated content and helps your learners with collaborative learning practices.

If you need some technical advice on how to integrate UGC with a customised LMS, contact our technical support team here.