Commandment #5 – Use social media for fellowship and outreach

MAIN POINTS

  1. Post headlines to Facebook / Twitter with a link to more details on the website
  2. Encourage  your members to re-share Facebook invites to events
  3. Train your members how to use Facebook to invite their “network”

USE YOUR WEBSITE TO SUPPORT FACEBOOK

Your website should be your main anchor point for all content.  So as mentioned in Commandment #3, make sure to put your blogs, articles, announcements of current events on your website and then post a Facebook status update which includes a teaser with a link to the website content.  This will ensure your Facebook posts are not too long (people don’t read long pieces of text unless they are truly interested) and will encourage and train people to use the website as a resource.

Facebook is always changing and adding new features.  Make sure to keep up with these updates and decide how to best leverage these in your online strategies.

Bonus: If you do use a “blog” on your website, you can attach your blog to your MailChimp email marketing account and have your blog updates automatically emailed to your congregation!

ENCOURAGE SHARING

Facebook becomes powerful when we post really good content and then get people to Like, Comment or Share that content.  When this happens, the content the Church puts out there is now shared with each persons network which could be others in the same community – that could be searching for a church.

There are a number of ways to help encourage sharing:

  • Have a training session at your church on “How to use Facebook” and include training on how to Like, Comment on and Share content that the Church is posting on Facebook
  • Cultivate a core team of people that understand this and will often Like, Comment, Share on Church Status Updates

SOME DON’TS…

Please make sure you do NOT use Facebook to make a financial plea to your congregation!  You can certainly promote events and such that require payment, etc, but do not “air” your laundry via Facebook!

Excellent video on what “Social Media” is and how we can use it to help talk about Jesus.

 

Ok, let’s move on to Commandment #6