Creating a UGC Machine 🤖

Voyages Bergeron, the largest travel agency in Quebec, has a rich history dating back to its family business founding in 1950. One key factor behind their success is their ability to adapt marketing and funnel strategies over time.

Breaking ties with agencies with Voyages Bergeron

Recognizing the advancements in advertising platforms and the growing importance of User Generated Content, Voyages Bergeron seized the opportunity to bring their online ads in-house and implement strategies to acquire UGC from their clients.

Long Story Short

The Challenges:

The Solutions:

The UGC Machine 🤖

The goal was to invite and encourage clients to send photos and videos from their trip so that Voyages Bergeron could use them for social media content and advertising purposes.
Since the travel agency was already active online for a long time, it was crucial to center the UGC creation strategy around the valuable assets the company already has: email lists, followers, etc.

But we needed the ideal platform/channel to allow clients to share their content easily.

The Facebook group was undoubtedly the best channel for such activity.

In less than 24H after the group creation, we already had more than 2000 members! 😱😱

This instant success can be explained by using the proper communication channels to promote the group; email marketing + social media.

But when you already have foundations (email list, followers, etc.) to start with, the real challenge is the retention of your group, keeping stable growth and engagement. And most importantly, in this case, you want the members to share traveling content in the group.

To break the ice and sparkle engagement, we have created a few contests and a series of publications inviting the member to share content.

The results:

1. A very high engagement rate from the members results in very low maintenance/work to keep engagement on the page. As a matter of fact, most of the content (posts) is published by the users first, with a stunning publishing frequency.

2. Not only the group has a strong engagement and publication frequency, but also the quality of the content is often perfect for marketing purposes.

Mission accomplished for the creation of a « UGC Machine»! ✅🙏

3. An invaluable asset for the brand 🚀❤️

The group became a hub for people to ask questions regarding hotels or destinations. Its purpose is bigger than the brand, but also for people to help each other and give recommendations and tips.

Internalizing the Paid Ads Efforts

Running ads on main online advertising platforms ain’t the rocket science it used to be. Nowadays, most of the leg work is done with algorithms, from targeting to even optimizing your creatives.

There are many options available regarding the platforms, but Meta was the one that made the most sense to start with since it’s the one that gives the lowest cost per acquisition, according to historical data.

After only a few weekly coaching sessions, the team of Voyages Bergeron was autonomous within these areas on Meta Ads:

Understanding the Ads Manager Platform and its different tools
Creating a campaign from A to Z
Doing the maintenance
Interpreting the results and making the right changes to the campaigns or creatives
Not only the team learned how to use Meta Ads with ease, but they also have fantastic results!

Mission accomplished here, too! ✅

Full Assimilation of all the new Learnings

The last challenge was to assimilate new learnings over an extended period fully. Through ongoing coaching sessions, Voyages Bergeron gradually internalized UGC creation, video editing, and Meta Ads management. This approach allowed them to revisit past learnings, evaluate progress, and make continuous improvements over time, resulting in a knowledgeable and self-reliant team.

In Conclusion

✅Encouraged clients to share trip photos and videos, leveraging existing assets, and creating a Facebook group, resulting in rapid growth and high-quality content.

✅Internalizing Paid Ads Efforts: Simplified advertising with Meta Ads for lower costs and provided weekly coaching for team autonomy.

✅Full Assimilation of New Learnings: Gradually internalized UGC creation, video editing, and Meta Ads management through ongoing coaching, leading to a knowledgeable and adaptable team.

The goal was to invite and encourage clients to send photos and videos from their trip so that Voyages Bergeron could use them for social media content and advertising purposes. Since the travel agency was already active online for a long time, it was crucial to center the UGC creation strategy around the valuable assets the company already has: email lists, followers, etc. But we needed the ideal platform/channel to allow clients to share their content easily. The Facebook group was undoubtedly the best channel for such activity.

In less than 24H after the group creation, we already had more than 2000 members! 😱😱

This instant success can be explained by using the proper communication channels to promote the group; email marketing + social media. But when you already have foundations (email list, followers, etc.) to start with, the real challenge is the retention of your group, keeping stable growth and engagement. And most importantly, in this case, you want the members to share traveling content in the group. To break the ice and sparkle engagement, we have created a few contests and a series of publications inviting the member to share content. The results: 1. A very high engagement rate from the members results in very low maintenance/work to keep engagement on the page. As a matter of fact, most of the content (posts) is published by the users first, with a stunning publishing frequency.

2. Not only the group has a strong engagement and publication frequency, but also the quality of the content is often perfect for marketing purposes. Mission accomplished for the creation of a « UGC Machine» ✅🙏

3. An invaluable asset for the brand 🚀❤️ The group became a hub for people to ask questions regarding hotels or destinations. Its purpose is bigger than the brand, but also for people to help each other and give recommendations and tips.

Running ads on main online advertising platforms ain’t the rocket science it used to be. Nowadays, most of the leg work is done with algorithms, from targeting to even optimizing your creatives. There are many options available regarding the platforms, but Meta was the one that made the most sense to start with since it’s the one that gives the lowest cost per acquisition, according to historical data. After only a few weekly coaching sessions, the team of Voyages Bergeron was autonomous within these areas on Meta Ads:

Understanding the Ads Manager Platform and its different tools
Creating a campaign from A to Z
Doing the maintenance
Interpreting the results and making the right changes to the campaigns or creatives
Not only the team learned how to use Meta Ads with ease, but they also have fantastic results!