In the video, we talked about a radical shift in your communication. Instead of just talking about your church and making announcements, use your online presence (like Facebook and other social media) to share what’s happening in your community. Here’s an article about this. And, here are 16 real life examples of Facebook posts from churches that do a great job.
You should also consider putting together a volunteer engagement team to post and interact on social media. You may not have time to learn Facebook ads, but someone in your church does. You might not have time to promote your church online, but someone in your congregation would consider it an honor.
Keep in mind…you don't have to pay for Facebook ads to engage people on Facebook. You can start by posting helpful content and engaging people. But when you're ready, Facebook advertising is an extremely effective way to reach people and invite them to church. It's worth it! There are three kinds of ads you can run on Facebook.
- Promoted post featuring something helpful. The best way to do this is a boosted post or a newsfeed ad. This isn’t an announcement or a church event…it’s an article or a video or something inspirational. In other words, it’s about THEM, not about YOUR CHURCH.
- Retargeted post inviting people to church. You can run an ad for your weekend service and show it to people in your zip code. But with one little tweak, you can only pay to show that ad to people who have visited your church website. This is called retargeting and it’s very powerful.
- Next Step ad for your regular attenders or members. You can upload your church email list to Facebook and show something exclusively to those people. Don’t worry…Facebook doesn’t send them anything…they just use the list to create an audience of specific people on Facebook that YOU can speak to. Why would you do this? You could promote a post reminding people to invite, give or serve. You could target your communication to your congregation and reach them when they are online. It’s powerful.
We’re just scratching the surface of what’s possible, but we have an entire course to show you exactly how to do this. It’s got coaching, resources, volunteer job descriptions and everything you need to take action here. Because you’re a course alumni, you’re entitled to a enroll at a discount. Here's a private link to sign up and get the discount.