# What is UGC?

Canonical: https://postmesh.app/glossary/ugc

By PostMesh team. Published 2026-10-31; updated 2026-10-31.

UGC stands for User-generated content. UGC stands for user-generated content: photos, videos, reviews and posts about a brand made by its customers rather than the brand. In creator marketing it also means ad-style content that UGC creators are paid to make for a brand to post or run as ads.

## What UGC means

UGC is short for user-generated content. In its original sense it's anything people make and post themselves rather than a company: a customer's unboxing video, a review on a product page, a photo of a meal tagged with the restaurant, a forum thread comparing two cameras. The user is the person posting, and the brand had no hand in making it.

Over the last few years a second sense has taken over a lot of marketing talk. A UGC creator is someone a brand pays to make content that looks and sounds like a customer made it: a selfie-style review, a get-ready-with-me video, a talking-head testimonial. The brand then posts it on its own accounts or runs it as an ad. The creator doesn't need a big following, because the video usually never appears on their profile.

So when someone says UGC, check which one they mean. A social media manager asking for UGC usually wants customer posts to reshare. A job ad for a UGC creator wants someone to film product videos to order. Both are real uses of the term, and they come with different rules about permission and disclosure.

**Customer UGC**
- Made by a real customer on their own
- Posted on the customer's account first
- Brand needs permission to reuse it
- Disclosure needed if the customer got something in return

**Paid UGC creator content**
- Made to a brief, for a fee or free product
- Usually posted by the brand or run as an ad
- Usage rights set in the creator's contract
- The paid relationship has to be clear to viewers

*The same three letters cover two different arrangements.*

## Where the term UGC comes from

User-generated content is older than social media marketing. It was a way to describe websites built on what visitors contributed, such as reviews, wikis, forums and video sites, as opposed to sites that published only their own material. None of the dictionaries we could open give a date for the first use of the phrase, so its exact origin isn't well documented.

The paid sense is easier to see in the platforms themselves. Meta's help center, for example, now describes partnership ads, which used to be called branded content ads, as a way for advertisers to run ads with creators, and lists videos and text-only testimonials among the things creators can produce for them. That's the commercial arrangement most people mean by UGC creator work today.

## How UGC shows up on each network

UGC looks a little different depending on where it lives:

- Instagram: customers tag a brand in a photo or Reel, and the brand reshares it to Stories or asks to repost it. Paid creator content often runs as a partnership ad, with both accounts in the header. See [collab posts](/glossary/collab-post) for the shared-post format.
- TikTok: the home of the selfie-style product video. Paid UGC here is often filmed by creators who never post it themselves; the brand runs it from its own account.
- YouTube: long reviews, tutorials and comparison videos made by people who bought the product.
- Reddit: honest, unprompted recommendations and complaints in [subreddits](/glossary/subreddit). Brands rarely repost these, but they read them closely.
- LinkedIn: customer case studies, employee posts about their work and screenshots of praise.
- Product pages and ad libraries: star ratings, written reviews and testimonial clips.

Some examples of how the term comes up in messages:

- "Can we pull some UGC for the launch carousel? Search the tagged photos first."
- "Hiring a UGC creator: 3 vertical videos, 30 seconds each, hands and voice only."
- "Loved your post with our mug. Mind if we share it on our page? We'll credit you."
- "Our UGC ads beat the studio ads on click-through this month."
- "Is this real UGC or did the brand script it?"

## Rights and permission

A customer's photo or video belongs to the customer. The US Copyright Office explains that protection starts the moment a work is made and saved in some lasting form, and that registering it is optional. Being tagged in a post doesn't hand the brand the right to reuse it, and neither does crediting the creator.

The safe habit is to ask first and keep the answer. A short comment or DM that says where you want to use the content, followed by a clear yes, is the usual minimum for an organic reshare. For anything bigger, such as ads, a website, packaging or print, get written permission that names the uses and how long they last. This page isn't legal advice, and the rules differ by country, so a lawyer is the right person for contracts and edge cases.

Paid UGC creators work under a contract, and the contract decides what the brand can do with the videos. Points to agree before filming: which channels the content can appear on, whether it can be used in paid ads, for how long, whether the brand can edit it, and whether it can run from the creator's own account as a partnership ad.

**Before you repost a customer's content**
- [ ] You asked the person who made it, not just the account that shared it
- [ ] They said yes in writing, in a comment, DM or email you can find later
- [ ] They know where it will appear: feed, Stories, ads or your website
- [ ] You credit them the way they asked
- [ ] Nobody else appears in it without agreeing too
- [ ] If they got anything in return, the post says so

## Disclosure: what the FTC says

In the US, the Federal Trade Commission's Endorsement Guides decide when a post needs to say it's sponsored. The FTC revised the Guides in 2023. Its [question-and-answer page](https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/ftcs-endorsement-guides-what-people-are-asking) and its [Disclosures 101 guide for influencers](https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/disclosures-101-social-media-influencers) cover the points that matter for UGC:

- A material connection, such as payment, free products, or a family or work relationship, should be disclosed when viewers wouldn't expect it.
- The disclosure belongs in the post itself and should be hard to miss. The FTC says a line in a profile, at the end of a caption or buried in a pile of hashtags is easy to overlook.
- Clear wording works: ad, sponsored, or a plain statement that the brand paid or sent the product. Vague tags such as sp, collab or ambassador on their own don't.
- In video, the FTC suggests saying the disclosure and showing it on screen, not only putting it in the description.
- A platform's built-in label doesn't settle it on its own. The FTC treats the brand and the creator as responsible, not the platform.
- Brands shouldn't ask only happy customers for reviews, offer discounts in exchange for positive ones, or hold back negative reviews.

For a customer post you reshare without paying anything, there's normally no connection to disclose. Once you offer a discount, a gift or a contest entry for posting, there is one. The FTC's guidance also says brands should train and monitor the people they pay, so a creator forgetting to label a post is still the brand's problem. Built-in branded content labels on each network help, but the FTC says to use them alongside your own clear wording.

**Does this UGC post need a disclosure?**
- A customer posted on their own and got nothing → No connection to disclose. You still need their permission to reuse it.
- They got a discount, gift or entry for posting → Yes. The incentive should be clear in the post.
- A UGC creator was paid to make it → Yes, wherever it could read as an independent opinion. Agree on the wording in the contract.

*Based on the FTC's Endorsement Guides and its Disclosures 101 guide.*

## How to get more UGC

1. **Give people a reason to post**: Packaging worth filming, a moment worth sharing, or a simple prompt in your caption. Tie it to one of your [content pillars](/glossary/content-pillars) so it fits what you already post.
2. **Make it easy to find**: Ask customers to tag your account or use one branded [hashtag](/glossary/hashtag), and check both every week.
3. **Ask before you share**: Reply or DM with where you want to use it, and keep the yes.
4. **Credit properly**: Tag the creator in the first line, not at the end of a long caption.
5. **Track how it does**: Compare reshared posts with your own using the same [engagement rate](/glossary/engagement-rate) formula, so the comparison is fair.

If you plan reshares alongside your own posts, put them on your [content calendar](/glossary/content-calendar) like anything else. PostMesh can schedule them to several networks at once and checks each network's caption limits before it sends.

## UGC vs influencer content vs brand content

|  | Customer UGC | UGC creator content | Influencer post | Brand content |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Who makes it | A customer | A paid creator | A paid creator | The brand or its agency |
| Whose account it's on | The customer's | Usually the brand's, or an ad | The creator's | The brand's |
| Does follower count matter | No | Rarely | Yes | Not applicable |
| Disclosure | Only if they got something | Yes, where it reads as an opinion | Yes | It's already clearly the brand |

Influencer marketing pays for a creator's audience. UGC creator work pays for the content itself. Plenty of creators do both, and [micro-influencers](/glossary/micro-influencer) and [nano-influencers](/glossary/nano-influencer) often sell UGC videos alongside their own [sponsored posts](/glossary/sponsored-post).

## When not to call it UGC

Don't call scripted, paid content UGC in anything your audience sees. The term is fine inside a team or in a creator's rate card, but presenting a paid video as a spontaneous customer review is the kind of thing the FTC's guidance is written to stop. And in a post for a general audience, spell it out the first time: plenty of people outside marketing don't know the abbreviation.

## Questions

### What does UGC stand for?

User-generated content. It means content made by people outside a company, usually customers, rather than by the company itself.

### What is a UGC creator?

Someone who's paid to film or photograph content for a brand in a natural, customer-style way. The brand usually posts it or runs it as an ad, so the creator's own follower count matters less than the quality of the videos.

### Can I repost a customer's photo if they tagged my brand?

Ask first. A tag isn't permission, and the photo belongs to the person who took it. Get a clear yes in writing and say where you plan to use it.

### Is UGC the same as influencer marketing?

No. Influencer marketing pays for a creator to post to their own audience. UGC is either unpaid content from customers or paid content the brand posts itself.

### Does UGC need #ad?

Only if there's a material connection, such as payment, a free product or a discount for posting. Unpaid customer posts don't, but incentivized and paid ones do, clearly and near the start.

### What does UGC mean on TikTok?

Usually the paid sense: short, selfie-style product videos made by creators for brands. You'll also see it used for genuine customer reviews.

## Related terms

- [Micro-influencer](https://postmesh.app/glossary/micro-influencer)

- [Nano-influencer](https://postmesh.app/glossary/nano-influencer)

- [Sponsored post](https://postmesh.app/glossary/sponsored-post)

- [Collab post](https://postmesh.app/glossary/collab-post)

- [KOL](https://postmesh.app/glossary/kol)

- [Engagement rate](https://postmesh.app/glossary/engagement-rate)

## Sources

- [FTC: FTC's Endorsement Guides: What People Are Asking](https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/ftcs-endorsement-guides-what-people-are-asking)

- [FTC: Disclosures 101 for Social Media Influencers](https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/disclosures-101-social-media-influencers)

- [US Copyright Office: Copyright in General FAQ](https://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-general.html)

- [Instagram Help: Partnership ads on Facebook and Instagram](https://help.instagram.com/116947042301556)