A UGC or user-generated content as the name suggests is the publicly obtainable content produced by the users on social media platforms. It can be anything ranging from product reviews to real-life user experience to a random social media post.
You need to be very careful with respect to the lawful rights associated with UGC. Consider all the user-generated content legal issues in mind when you are going to repurpose the UGC for your marketing.
Whether you are launching your app where clients can make and share content or planning to use UGC in your social media campaign, it becomes important to take consent from the original content creator.
What are the Legal Risks Associated with UGC
Leveraging user-generated content for commercial purposes arises a number of significant legal risks.
It is essential for the brands to keep an eye on the varied user-generated content legal issues. Also, it is vital to manage the risks to make your product stand out from others.
Here are a few of the legal risks that you must be aware of when considering utilizing user-generated content.
- User-Generated Content Copyright Infringement
A huge bulk of UGC content shared using social media is protected by copyright. The UGC can be anything from images, videos, text, and sound. As per the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 i.e. CDPA 1988, It reserves all the rights for copyrighted work.
Therefore, It is not legit to share or upload a copyrighted work by a consumer and successive use by a brand on a website or social media. This confined act involves communicating a copyrighted work to the public or copying it.
- Malicious Falsehood
If the user-generated content comprises any of them:
- An untrue statement
- Hostile and ill-natured content, and
- Monetary losses to the party to which the user-generated content is affiliated
The shoppers that create it as well as the brand using it might be subject to the malefaction of malicious falsehood. This claim can only be made in cases where the claims for defamation and trademark breach cannot be carried on.
- Ownership and Licensing
This tends to the issue of whether a brand abuses content copyright law by sharing user-generated content. The answer? It relies upon things like explicit consent, implied consent, hashtag, licensing, and so on.
Basically, in light of the fact that someone tags your brand in a photo, you don't have the authorization to use that photo.
- Consumer Imitation
It is critical to comprehend that there is no way that brand owners do not post comments while making themselves believe as consumers.
Under the Consumer Protection, a business will be liable for a criminal offense from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008. If in its collaboration with social media, it makes a false impression that it is: Business, or trade purposes, or a consumer.
Ways to Manage User-Generated Content Legal Issues
Brands take a number of steps before considering using user-generated content for marketing purposes. This, as a result, will limit the risks that are listed above. Thus, here are the vital steps to manage the risk-
Asking for Permission
The brands can ask for permission from the users by sending them a friendly message request with the help of a UGC rights management tool such as Taggbox.
Another vital way of asking for permission is by running your brand hashtag campaign or a photo contest. By using the hashtag users are requested to create and share the content, which automatically infers that consumers grant the right for using the content.
Notice and Takedown Policy
The brands need to implement a clear notice and bring down policy to possibly unlawful UGC can be accounted for by the platform users and rights holders can demand the withdrawal of explicit content effortlessly.
As you may have noticed on several social media platforms such as Facebook it appears as a 'report' facility.
For any UGC material complaint made, the brands should promptly remove it. After that, it should be determined that there is a lawful reason for forever eliminating that content or whether it can be restored.
Terms and Conditions
The brands can also impose some important terms and conditions for the shoppers for utilizing user-generated content. This, in addition, will help in preventing the risk of using UGC.
The terms and conditions are explained in plain English which makes sure that it is understandable by every consumer.
Consumers are required to explicitly agree to all the terms and conditions via a tick box to ensure the listed terms and conditions are fair.
Final Words
Each social media platform has its own rules and policies, therefore given the UGC campaigns will face unavoidable alterations along the way. Thus, user-generated content can sometimes become a daunting task.
To produce high-quality, impressionable, and original UGC, brands need to follow rightful practices to avoid user-generated content legal issues.