What is UGC?

UGC — user-generated content — is video or photo a brand pays a creator to produce for the brand's own channels: its ad account, its product page, its email flow. Unlike a sponsored post, nothing is posted to the creator's own audience, which means follower count plays no part in the price. A 900-follower account that films clean, high-converting product video can reasonably charge more than a 200,000-follower account that films badly, because the brand is buying ad performance, not reach.

Because there is no audience being rented, UGC prices like a production and licensing service rather than a media buy: a rate for the filming and editing, plus a separate fee for how the brand is allowed to use the finished file. A standard rate covers one video with organic-only usage on the brand's own channels for up to 90 days — everything past that, especially paid ad usage, is priced as an add-on, and it is often worth more than the base video fee itself.

What to watch for: a brief that describes UGC but actually asks for a posting date, ownership of raw footage, or 12 months of paid ad usage folded into a "simple video" rate. Any of those turns a modest production job into a much larger licensing deal, and it should be quoted as one.