Written by @yctheman after working with 1000's of influencers for dozens of brands. This is only for readers of the DTC Newsletter.

Most e-commerce brands today have got their UGC playbook wrong.

But don't take my word for it, here's what the pros have to say.

Are you falling for the same trap?

There are way too many brands out here getting inauthentic videos made by paying for a UGC actor to create a sales video with talking points and a “creative brief” that the brand shares with them.

That's not UGC.

That's AGC — Actor Generated Content.

You might ask — but what's the problem with it? Why make it such a big deal?

That's because AGC is hurting your profitability and making you spend more simply because of a hype-train, not because of actual real-world effectiveness.

This is why we now see reports of static ad creatives outperforming AGC.

So if you're spending (or want to spend) $100's on getting AGC out, let me show you another way to acquire UGC that is:

1. Completely free (no need to pay for content)
2. Actually believably authentic
3. Gets you sales without running paid ads to it

If that sounds too good to be true, it is.