Church Marketing Sucks

This is part 5 of a 5-part series on using Facebook for churches.

We’ve talked about getting your staff to embrace Facebook, how my church uses Facebook, how our pastors use Facebook and offered a wealth of resources. Now it’s time to dive in yourself. Challenge the members of your staff to leverage the power of social media for ministry.

Here are a few tips to get you started:

• Don’t force it: Model and celebrate it. It truly isn’t for everyone, but most people will realize the value and jump in.
• Circulate this blog series to the people on your team and set up a time to discuss everyone’s thoughts/ideas.
• Find someone who is passionate about social media to be a resource to staff members just dipping their toes in the water.
• Set up some guidelines. For best results: Don’t be militant. A good example of a Facebook guideline is something like, “Don’t talk bad about other Christian ministries/churches. We don’t play that game.”
• Be vigilant about capturing positive stories and circulating them among the staff.

These might seem like simple steps, but they worked for me. I’d encourage you to at least try. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work—at least you know! Don’t let fear of the unknown paralyze your church’s potential for amazing ministry.

I’m here to say that the battle is worth fighting, and not so your church can look cool. It’s worth it because there are real people with real lives and real pain out there just waiting for someone to reach out. Don’t force them to come to you. Meet them where they are.