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FaceBook for Pastors: Post Your Ministry Events on FaceBook
By chris | September 24, 2007
Many ministry leaders look to FaceBook as a means for easy promotion. Its true FaceBook can help you communicate your events with people who are on the network, but that’s only part of the story. You need to understand your audience and understand the medium before you can become effective using FaceBook for promotion.
FaceBook is a social medium used by people who want to connect in real relationships. They tend to suspect people and groups that come to the site using all their “promotional speak” and spamming out invitations to events and groups. Too much promotion and not enough real networking will cause people to want to drop you from their friends list. So before you begin promoting, be a good neighbor and learn what happens on FaceBook.
Also pay attention to what you are learning about people through FaceBook. People are very candid about their interests and dislikes on the network. You can get a lot of “guerrilla research” just mingling with the people you find on FaceBook. When you understand people better, you may find that you change the kinds of ministries and events you program through your church.
Create Events and Invite People
Once you have a good relationship with the people in your friends list, its time to share invitations to events offered by your ministry. An easy way to invite people is to create an event. It’s easy to do! Just click on the “Events” link on the left navigation bar of your profile. Then click on “Create an Event.”
- Step one: fill out the event details in the form provided.
- Step two: add a picture to your event profile.
- Step three: invite people from your FaceBook friends list.
People in your friends list will also be able to invite their friends. You can create an event anyone can see, or schedule private gatherings using the event tool on FaceBook.
Many young adults use FaceBook to schedule all kinds of events, everything from get-togethers, to study breaks, even time to meet online. If you use FaceBook to connect with them, it may seem new to you, but to them, it will be as natural as anything else they do.
Create Groups
Just as you can create events on FaceBook, you can also create groups. Groups work for on going gatherings like Bible studies, work groups, or age groups such as a youth or college department. Some people use groups as polling tool. A group is created that people join to show their solidarity with the cause or theme of the group. For example, you could create a group for an important cause such as AIDS awareness, or a silly group for something fun, like, “People Who are Lactose Intolerant, Yet Still Eat Nachos”
Groups are handy also because each group gets a ton of useful features you can use to facilitate communication and interaction. Each group has a prominent place for you to put a description of your group in the information section. But you also get several other handy tools. Here are a few of the features of each group:
- News
- Photos
- Videos
- Posted Items
- Discussion board
- Group Wall
As people join your group, their profiles will appear listed in the member section. It’s great every group has a built-in membership directory with contact information available and immediate access through messaging. Also, you can send messages to all the people in the group, so you have an email newsletter tool ready for your regular updates.
One-way communication is over!
I have tried to show in this series that FaceBook is a great tool for pastors. Some may see it as just a waste of time or a pleasant technological diversion. But the fact is FaceBook is a community of people who need ministry, crave real relationships, and need the influence of the gospel and ministry from pastors.
Pastors are used to preaching. They are allowed the unique privilege and responsibility of preparing a message from God’s word each week. Many ministers are used to communicating uninterrupted in a one-way fashion. Well, those days are over.
Preaching from the platform of a church may not have changed much, but there is an increasing demand from church members to have real and meaningful relationships with their ministry leaders beyond just the Sunday morning service times. Many ministers tell me they crave the same kind of contact with their church members. FaceBook can be a tool for you to cultivate closer relationships with some of the people who come to you church.
Also the network provides new ministry challenges and access to people who are not a part of any church. Some ministry leaders are so scheduled with church work they seldom have time to cultivate friendships with people who are not believers. It’s hard to evangelize people from the world, when you don’t know anyone outside your church. FaceBook could be just the tool for expanding your ministry outside the walls of your church.
Bottom line: you need to communicate with people. If you send email, you know how it has enhanced your ministry. FaceBook is like email on steroids, get to know it, and it will transform how your do your ministry work in no less dramatic ways. Pastor, consider if you should be using social media like FaceBook!
Topics: 2.0 Social Media, Facebook for Pastors |