UGC Rights and Briefs: Using Customer Content Legally and Well

A repost is not a licence

The most common UGC mistake UK businesses make is assuming that a tag, a mention or a public post equals permission. It does not. Under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, the person who takes a photo or films a video owns the copyright the moment they create it. Posting it publicly on Instagram grants Instagram a licence to display it. It grants you nothing.

Resharing to a Story with credit is generally low-risk custom the platforms are built around, but downloading a customer's photo and putting it on your website, in a brochure or in paid ads without permission is copyright infringement, and 'we credited them' is not a defence. Add the fact that a photo of an identifiable person is personal data under UK GDPR, and a proper permissions process stops being legal pedantry and becomes basic hygiene.

Sourcing UGC people are happy to give

Good UGC programmes generate content deliberately rather than waiting for it to appear.

• Ask at the peak moment: the delivery unboxing, the finished haircut, the completed job. A card in the parcel or a follow-up message asking for a tagged photo works well.
• Run a branded hashtag and mention it in bios, receipts and packaging so content is findable later.
• Offer a fair exchange: feature credits, discount codes or entry into a monthly draw. UK prize promotions carry CAP Code obligations on terms and entry, so keep the mechanics simple and publish the rules.
• Make the request specific: 'a 15-second clip of your first impression' produces far more usable content than 'tag us!'.

Volume solves quality. If ten customers post, one clip will be genuinely good, and that hit rate is entirely normal.

Getting permission that stands up

When you find content you want, ask explicitly and keep the record. The standard mechanic is a rights request: a comment or DM asking the creator to reply with an agreed hashtag or a simple yes.

Workable wording for a DM: 'We love this and would like to feature it on our website, social channels and possibly our ads. If you're happy with that, reply YES and we'll always credit your handle. Full terms here: [link].' The link goes to a short UGC terms page on your site setting out the detail.

• Keep screenshots of the request and the reply in a rights register: a spreadsheet with creator handle, content link, date and scope granted.
• If the content shows other identifiable people, check they are happy to be featured too; children require a parent's consent.
• Never edit someone's words or crop content in ways that change its meaning. Beyond courtesy, false endorsement claims are a real risk.

The licence terms that matter

Whether the permission sits on a terms page or in a signed agreement for bigger campaigns, cover six points.

• Scope: which channels, meaning organic social, website, email, paid ads and print. Paid usage should always be named explicitly; a yes given for a Story reshare does not cover a Facebook ad.
• Duration: perpetual is common for organic use; paid usage is better licensed for a fixed window of three, six or twelve months so costs and consent stay current.
• Edits: the right to crop, subtitle, colour-correct and cut for format, but not to alter meaning.
• Credit: whether and how the creator is credited in each placement.
• Exclusivity: usually none for customer content, sometimes needed for paid creator work so the same clip does not appear in a competitor's ads.
• Withdrawal: a plain-English promise that they can email you to have content removed from organic channels, and how ads already in flight are handled.

Paid UGC creators: the brief that gets usable content

Paid UGC, meaning content made by creators to look native and usually destined for your ads rather than their audience, is now a standard part of social advertising. The output is only ever as good as the brief.

• Deliverables: exact count and formats, for example three 20-to-30-second vertical videos plus five photos, shot 9:16.
• Hooks: write three first-line options yourself and ask the creator to improvise two more. The hook is the highest-value part of the asset.
• Structure: hook, problem, product in use, one benefit, call to action. Ask for raw footage as well as the edit so you can recut later.
• Usage: state the licence in the brief itself, covering channels, paid rights, duration and whether you will run partnership ads from their handle on Instagram or Spark Ads on TikTok, both of which need the creator's authorisation.
• Honesty: creators must not claim to be ordinary customers if they were paid, and any product claims must be ones you can substantiate.

Pay fairly and promptly. The UGC creator market is small and word travels.

UK disclosure rules and repurposing across channels

The ASA's position is settled: if you paid for content, or gave a free product with conditions attached, and you hold any editorial control, it is an ad and must be obviously identifiable, with #ad upfront rather than buried in hashtags. That applies when creators post to their own audiences, and the CMA expects the same transparency under consumer protection law. Genuine, unprompted customer posts you reshare are not ads, but the moment you commission, incentivise or script, the label is needed.

For repurposing, work from your rights register. Before any asset moves from organic to paid, check the licence covers paid, check the window has not lapsed, and re-confirm if in doubt. A two-line DM is cheaper than a takedown mid-campaign. Keep original files, keep credits consistent, and diarise licence expiry dates for anything running in always-on ads.

Handled properly, UGC is the most trusted content a small business can run, precisely because it does not look like marketing. If you want the sourcing, briefs and rights process set up once and done correctly, our team can help.