6 Tools for Identifying Valuable User-Generated Content

Ever noticed how seeing your friends rave about a particular product can influence you to buy it?

It's not just you—around 40% of shoppers get influenced the same way. Turns out, fellow shoppers’ opinions drive more engagement than most branded ads,

That’s exactly what user-generated content (UGC) offers—a window into real-life customer experiences. Especially in visual commerce, integrating UGC enhances brand authenticity and fuels dynamic marketing campaigns with diverse, real-world content.

But how can brands identify and collect valuable UGC amidst the vast content shared across multiple social networks?

Answer? By leveraging user-generated content tools. Let’s explore six awesome tools to detect UGC.

What is UGC in visual commerce?

User-generated content refers to the content that a brand’s customers create for its products or services. It could be an Instagram photo showcasing a new purchase, a TikTok video featuring a creative product hack, or a tweet praising exceptional customer service.

This content is marketing gold—it's trustworthy and relatable as it comes directly from customers who have experienced the products or services firsthand. This reduces perceived risks and uncertainties,  fosters stronger brand loyalty, and drives sales for businesses.

For example, goPure created an engaging carousel of UGC videos on its homepage and product pages. The aim was to showcase its top products and make it easy for customers to explore products through the gallery.

The result? goPure achieved a 204x ROI with a $200k increase in revenue at a 13% average conversion rate.

Read the case study

What makes UGC valuable?

Not all user-generated content is created equal. While some UGC posts are highly influential, others may lack credibility or fail to engage audiences.

To distinguish valuable UGC from the rest, consider these four factors:

• Authenticity: UGC that showcases authentic stories and real-life experiences with a brand's offerings resonates better with audiences, fostering trust and credibility for the brand.
• Relevance: User-generated content aligned with a brand's identity and target audience’s interests engages better. For example, an image of outdoor gear on hiking trails has more potential to capture a customer’s attention than its generic shot.
• Engagement: Brands often seek UGC, which generates higher engagement in terms of likes, comments, and shares. Such content fosters conversations among users — amplifying reach and strengthening community connections.
• Quality: High-quality visuals, clear messaging, and creative execution elevate the appeal and effectiveness of UGC. Plus, brands prioritize content that aligns with their visual identity and aesthetic standards.

While 84% of eCommerce brands find it tedious to manually identify visual UGC, the right tools can make life easy for you. These UGC detection tools can analyze tons of social data to discover content mentioning your brand.

Not just that, you can maintain quality standards by filtering out irrelevant content based on specific criteria. Let’s look at our top picks for the best UGC platforms.

6 tools for identifying and collecting UGC

With dozens of UGC tools available and new ones emerging daily, it can be challenging to keep track and choose the right one.

Check out this list to find the best UGC platform for your brand.

1. Videowise: Best for finding UGC for your brand

Price: Paid plans start at $99/month (Check out pricing)

Videowise automates the process of detecting UGC posts across social media platforms, from Instagram to TikTok.

As a visual commerce platform, the tool leverages social listening to scan posts, reels, videos, and stories in real time. This allows brands to capture every mention related to their products or campaigns.

You can define and follow specific hashtags and accounts they wish to monitor. Videowise automatically collects and saves user-generated content tagged with your defined hashtags or posted by the selected accounts in the "My UGC" section.

Filter your feed using "Search Criteria" to view any of these posts.

Not only that, you can mute irrelevant profiles to prevent their content from showing up here, even if tagged with your monitored hashtags.

The result? Your UGC feed remains focused on relevant content.

Filter all your UGC based on:

• Usage rights
• Search Criteria
• Post types (reels, stories)
• Content types (images, videos)

Then, connect with content creators to obtain usage rights for their UGC. Just click “Get usage rights” located under the video, contact the creator via DM, and wait for their approval.

When approved, add it to Videowise Library and integrate it into shoppable galleries on websites, email campaigns, and mobile apps. This way, brands can enhance the shopping experience with real customer interactions.

You can also share them across various platforms outside your Shopify store, expanding your reach and attracting potential customers.

What’s more?  The “Reports” section enables you to analyze metrics like content count, total engagement by post date, and social profiles so you can see which posts are hitting the mark with your audience and fine-tune your UGC strategy accordingly.

2. TINT: Best for managing legal rights

Price: Custom pricing

TINT streamlines the process of sourcing, storing, and managing user-generated content across multiple marketing and communication networks.

TINT’s standout feature is its seamless UGC rights management system. It enables brands to secure legal rights to UGC from content creators—with a few clicks.

You can generate and post a customizable message on the author’s original content requesting permission to use their UGC. Then, you can manage incoming responses and authorizations directly within the TINT platform.

TINT also offers powerful filters to sort content by keywords, dates, languages, sentiments, etc. Plus, the manual and auto-tagging enable easy accessibility by categorizing content for campaigns, seasons, and themes.

This way, you don’t just gather random content pieces but curate the most relevant UGC that aligns with your brand’s message and campaign goals.

TINT’s UGC studio feature allows brands to:

• Build a comprehensive library of user-generated content.
• Customize it to align with their brand identity.
• Repurpose it across various marketing channels.

You can choose from pre-built themes and templates or customize colors, fonts, sizes, and layouts to match your brand’s look and feel.

3. Taggbox: Best for moderating UGC

Price: Free trial available

Taggbox helps you discover and collect UGC from 20+ platforms. You can build a huge database of diverse, unfiltered content into a centralized global interface.

Taggbox’s automated moderation and advanced filtering capabilities offer real-time control. This enables you to review and selectively display visual assets that accurately represent your brand's values.

Let’s say you don’t want any particular handle, words, or tags to appear in your feed. Just mention it and choose whether you want them to be:

• Public
• Private
• Deleted

Based on these predetermined rules, the platform will automatically approve or reject the content and streamline the curation process.

You can also enable the profanity filter to remove any abusive and sexual content from your UGC collections. This is important for uplifting your brand's reputation with only the most appropriate posts.

Taggbox also offers robust customization options, such as:

• CTAs
• Themes
• Custom CSS
• Banner images

Using these, you can personalize your collections and transform UGC into branded content.

4. Tagshop: Best for creating shoppable galleries

Price: Free trial available. Paid plans start at $29/month

Tagshop is a UGC detection software designed for eCommerce brands to leverage visual content to create engaging shopping experiences. Its AI-driven content moderation helps filter and identify the most influential, relevant, and valuable UGC.

Tagshop’s core value proposition is to create visually stunning, product-specific shoppable UGC galleries. These are great for showcasing customer-created posts featuring real products or services.

You can integrate these feeds seamlessly on your brand's homepage, product pages, and other key touchpoints to inspire customers and drive them to convert.

Other than this, the tool also provides comprehensive insights into the performance of visual content and shoppable UGC galleries.

5. Yotpo: Best for automated UGC collection

Price: Paid plans start at $79/month

Yotpo uses advanced algorithms to filter out the most valuable UGC by analyzing the date, quality, sentiment, and relevance. Brands can seamlessly repurpose UGC posts across their website, shoppable galleries, and social media feeds.

Yotpo integrates with 100+ platforms to manage hard-earned UGCs, including Shopify, Slack, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok Shop, Walmart, Omnisend, etc.

Brands can also create a shoppable version of their Instagram feed by connecting their Instagram account with their online store. And selectively display high-quality, product-focused Instagram content in their shoppable gallery.

What sets Yotpo apart is its review request automation capability. It involves effortlessly sending personalized review requests to customers at the right moment — whether it's after a purchase or at specific intervals.

To automate review collection, brands can:

• Reach mobile-centric audiences via SMS requests
• Use smart, customized prompts to encourage customers
• Implement on-site widgets inviting customers to leave reviews on the website
• Send personalized, post-purchase emails prompting customers to leave feedback

This automated process ensures a steady flow of genuine reviews, providing social proof that can sway undecided buyers and instill confidence in your brand.

6. Flowbox: Best for customizing UGC

Price: Custom pricing

Flowbox offers a visual search engine to let brands link UGC to correct products, even if the content lacks textual information or descriptions.

The platform also provides unlimited, customizable widgets for integrating UGC into websites, apps, and other digital touchpoints. You can tailor these posts to match your brand's design, style, and specific campaign requirements. This ensures a consistent and on-brand experience for customers.

You can also configure these widgets to update with new UGC as it becomes available.

Flowbox provides extensive styling capabilities, enabling brands to customize colors, fonts, backgrounds, and visuals to align with the brand’s aesthetic and messaging. Plus, you can add tags, captions, and CTAs to make the UGC more engaging and relevant.

Not only that, you can:

• Edit the UGC gallery themes.
• Add custom hover text over images.
• Change the design and color of the “show more” button.

Fuel your marketing strategy with the right UGC tool

With UGC becoming crucial for brand authenticity and consumer trust, having a tool to source relevant user-generated content isn’t just helpful — it’s a must.

When exploring these tools, consider each platform's unique capabilities.

Look for features such as robust analytics, AI-driven content recommendation, advanced editing tools, or integration options with eCommerce platforms, And choose the one that aligns with your business objectives.

Ready to level up your user-generated content-sourcing efforts? Check out how industry-leading brands are achieving strong results with Videowise.