We live in the 21st century, but not very many churches communicate like it. Most churches are still dedicating the majority of their communication budget to print advertising and fail to dedicate any of those resources to social media. Yes - most churches have a Facebook account. But so many of these social media accounts reak of poor and outdated design, which gives potential visitors the impression that their church is outdated and irrelevant, or perhaps worse... that they don't care about them!
In order to be faithful to the message of the Gospel we possess, we must reevaluate our efforts on social media. Here is the #1 way to level up your social media efforts and actually reach people - it's less of a tactic, and more of a mindset change. Here it is:
Stop asking. Start giving.
This is the #1 reason why churches fail at social media. Almost every single post churches make is promotional. They are essentially asking people to join them at their Bible study or service. The reason why this doesn't work is that no one is listening! In fact, Facebook's algorithm purposefully blocks the reach of promotional posts because they're generic and aren't valuable to others. Why? Because these kind of posts are all about you as an organization. They're not making your audience think, laugh, or cry. They're simply promoting an event. And you and I both know - our society is over saturated with promotions. We don't get special treatment in the attention span of our potential guests just because we're a church. It's not until we earn our audience's trust and attention until we can deliver a successfully invitation.
Here are 3 ways you can put this into practice:
1. Repurpose your pastor's sermons.
Here's an example. We made a short video recap of our pastor's sermon, then we posted it on our Facebook account. We already record the services, so the only work required was editing the video! No video camera? No problem. You could simply post a picture of your pastor and overlay a quote on it using something like Canva. It's really easy, I promise!
2. Post a picture of Sunday worship.
Notice - we used a smartphone camera, and weren't even at a great angle! This post was valuable because it gave potential visitors an authentic look into how services feel on Sunday mornings at our church.
3. Celebrate people.
You should always be looking for ways to honor the people in your church. In this example, we told the story of our oldest usher, C.R., thanking him for his service in the army air force. People responded well to this post because they already love C.R. This was valuable to our people because it gave them a chance to thank C.R. and celebrate His humble service to both our country and to our church. This post was valuable to potential guests because it showed them how much we care about those in our church.
