Episode 101 - User Generated vs Employee Generated Content for your Financial Institution

Authenticity is the new currency in social media. In our latest blog episode, CEO Meredith Olmstead sits down with Sophie Bawany to break down the difference between User-Generated Content (UGC) and Employee-Generated Content (EGC). Learn why both matter, how to integrate them into your content strategy, and how they can help your credit union or bank stay relatable, trustworthy, and top of mind—without breaking the budget.

Key Takeaways:

• UGC builds trust from the outside.  Real content from members creates authentic word-of-mouth marketing.

• EGC builds trust from the inside. Employees sharing their perspective humanizes your brand.

• Use both for better engagement. Plan for EGC, encourage UGC. Together, they stretch your reach and your budget.
  

Transcription:

Meredith Olmsted:
Hi there. I'm Meredith Olmsted, CEO and founder of FIGROW Solutions. We are a digital marketing and sales and service consulting agency. We work exclusively with credit unions and community banks. And I am here with our social media/keep it young and fresh guru. I don't even know what Sophie's actual title is anymore because she does so many different things, but she is really, really are expert on keeping things fresh and for a younger audience. So Sophie Bawany, say hi.

Sophie Bawany:
Hi.

Meredith Olmsted:
So Sophie and I were talking about, or she was talking a little earlier today with another team member and they were talking about UGC versus EGC and I was like, "What are you talking about?" And so then I was like, "Hold on all these acronyms and jargon. I hate this stuff. I'm too old for this." So I was like, "Let's hit record and talk about this because we're talking about something new when it comes to content and social media for banks and credit unions, credit union, that's our big thing, so I want to understand it."

So EGC versus UGC, and I've heard of user generated content, that's a big one, but this new one is new. So let's define the terms first, Sophie. So can you tell us what both of these things are? What do I mean when I say UGC, which is user generated content? And then what is EGC?

Sophie Bawany:
Yeah, so user generated content is exactly what it sounds like. It is content that is created by your users. It's something unprovoked normally. So for example, in the world of credit unions, if you have a member come in and they have a fantastic experience, they go home, they hop on their social and they're like, "Hey, guys, just got back from X, Y, Z credit union. And I just want to tell you, I had a fantastic experience at X, Y, Z branch." That's user generated content. They went, they had a great experience and they self-appointed themselves as maybe an influencer and they decided they're going to share their experience.

Now, the other side of user generated content, sometimes you can pay for somebody to create user generated content, and that's where that influencer marketing comes in. But it just depends on the type of member profile and you want to make sure that it's still authentic.

Meredith Olmsted:
Gotcha. So really user generated content tends to be organic, not paid from your customers or potential customers, or members or potential members. And it usually is very authentic and comes across in an organic manner, like reviews. It could be a post, a shout-out, participating in a contest of some kind, could be possibly a user-generated content or like, "Hey, check me out with my new house or my new car, or whatever that might be. Could be some great user-generated content." And then what's interesting is what do you do with that type of content? But before we get there, okay, so what's EGC?

Sophie Bawany:
So it's funny, EGC has been around for a while, but finally social media strategists caught up and labeled it's employee-generated content. And what's funny is your social media has already flooded with it, you've already consumed it, you've enjoyed it, every time that you see those fun office videos of people doing funny things or corporate work humor, that's actually employee-generated content. And what's important about it and what's really exciting is we're seeing a shift in trust that followers and viewers are seeing where they're actually preferring employee-generated content versus necessarily just having user-generated. Because the mindset is if somebody is taking the time within an organization to create content about the organization, they must like the company. So it helps both internal trust and internal authenticity.

Meredith Olmsted:
Oh, interesting. Okay, interesting. So they figured that that person knows how the sausage is made, basically. They know what's going on behind the scenes, and if they are still willing to put themselves out there in a public manner to promote the brand or the product or the service, it must be that they feel pretty good about it.

Sophie Bawany:
100%.

Meredith Olmsted:
Okay, cool. And obviously employees can also be customers or users or whatever, however you want to refer to them. So employee-generated content is also user-generated content, but it's just a different group or a subset of those potential customers or existing customers that you might have. So are you supposed to do one or the other?

Sophie Bawany:
I think you should do both. I think when you have a product or you have a genuine circumstance where somebody has had a great experience, if that user is willing or that member is willing to come on and give a testimonial, that's fantastic. It definitely builds credibility on the member side. You definitely, the thing is you can control your employee-generated content more because you're doing it in-house. It's a little harder to control user-generated content because you are relying on a member or a third person. So if you don't have a lot of user-generated content, supplement your content strategy with employee-generated content. Make it meaningful, make it authentic, make it valuable for your members and eventually, slowly that will lead to more user-generated content.

Meredith Olmsted:
So really, you need to have a strategy and a plan for promoting and facilitating both of these kinds of content? You may not necessarily be able to pay people to do it all the time, but you can run contests, you can provide incentives, you can help facilitate these conversations and remove roadblocks to make it easier to create content, like in a branch, or at a pass and repeat in a branch where you get people to put on something silly. Or we have a customer now who has an actual physical counter that counts their Instagram likes in real time in the office, that's great employee-generated content. You're showing your interactions, you're showing your audience growing right there in front of you, not even just on your smartphone.

So what else would you like to see financial institutions doing with their employee-generated content? What's a few other benefits?

Sophie Bawany:
Branch out. Get out of your comfort zone. It's not just a marketing initiative. If you have a lending team that really wants to get more loans, if you have a team that needs a little more love, bring them to the forefront. Every person within your department has value, has a unique story, has a perspective. Finding a way to make that into a story and humanize that person takes the fear away from the big bad financial institution image that we have that we need to break through. Bring them into the forefront, find a way to incorporate all of your departments. Break those silos and you will get content gold.

Meredith Olmsted:
Yeah, it's funny too because some of the funniest content can be from IT or from HR, or departments where they're not typically going to be public facing so much but they're hilarious. They could be really funny and you can make some really fun trending little Reels or videos that can go on Instagram or Facebook or even TikTok. So can be a lot of fun with your employees and really show off who you are as a regional financial institution and why that's different from these big national and international banks.

And then in terms of user-generated content, I know it's really about word of mouth. So getting people to tag themselves, getting people to like or share your content can be great because it's basically word of mouth amplified. Getting back to some of the basics of social media and can be cheap. That's the funny thing about it is people spend so much money on traditional marketing, radio spots, TV, OTT, digital ads, billboards. But really you can get, if you can provide some fun ways for people to make silly but interactive content, it's getting your brand in front of people and keeping it top of mind.

Anything else you can think of in terms of user-generated content? The other thing I want to say about this is don't be afraid to leverage that content on another channel. So we sometimes will say you take a review from Google, put it in an email or put it on your website. You take a video that was posted on Facebook and send it out in an email to people, or use it as a testimonial on a landing page or a website. So don't be afraid to move some of that user-generated content from its original channel where the user generated it to an owned asset of your institution. Obviously, you're going to want to have permission from the individual, but if they gave you the content, they'll probably sign a waiver or no problem.

Sophie Bawany:
I think the biggest thing that we've learned is the real currency in this entire social media content strategy is trust. That's the main currency. Employee-generated content shows people that you're trustworthy from the inside because you're willing to vouch for your credit union or bank. User-generated content, proves it through actions and make sure that the members are feeling it as well. So if you use that currency the right way, you can go and really stretch it without having to actually physically pay for this content.

Meredith Olmsted:
Yeah. Awesome. Great, great conversation. Thank you so much, Sophie. This is awesome information to understand this nuance in this shift during this AI influential time in consumer behavior, really shifting back to the human side of your brand. And I think that that is going to be key in coming through with institutions coming through these changes and all that's happening with search and online behavior. So thank you so much for sharing the differences between these two.
If you're interested in learning more about digital marketing or sales consulting for your credit union or community bank, please visit us at FIGROW.com. We have lots of other great blogs, we have other podcasts, case studies, so please come check us out and otherwise let's just all get out there and make it happen.