When it comes to promotion, content is everything. This is definitely true In the world of social media too.
But is social media content everything—a deal breaker—even for the church world?
Since ministries strive to not only attract social media followers but to create levels of personal engagement, it can be easily argued that when it comes to ministry, it’s actually connection with a user that is the highest goal to which a church’s social media accounts should aspire.
The best communicators are the ones that listen to and understand their audience first, to ensure the audience gets exactly what they need and want, before just blasting out a message.
With ministry being the ultimate people business, then, social media is less about followers and impressions and more about how individual churches can create a level of connection and relationship with their social followers that can then have an impact on those people’s lives, individually.
“On socials, you are competing for attention in a never-ending stream of interesting content,” says Amanda Scott, marketing and creative operations manager of the Oklahoma megachurch, Church on the Move (COTM). “Our leading standard is to share content that meets real people where they are at in their real lives in a way that points them to Jesus.”
She continues, “We are in the space of social media to remind people that they are loved and are welcome to be part of a Jesus community where life can be different. In a space that is overwhelmingly toxic and disheartening, we feel that this is the opportunity to make the most impact: to simply share hope and the truth of the Gospel.”
So, while dynamic, engaging, and relevant content is critical, what’s even more imperative is that content isn’t being generated just for content’s sake, but that it exists to build a bridge between the church and the lives of those who click, like, or follow those posts.
To that end, fall is a natural season of change and transition, and this can also be reflected in the approach that a ministry takes with its social media content. Beyond just the standard fare of weekly service- and event-driven content, the steady approach toward the Christmas holidays also creates a natural path for adopting a different, yet still highly effective, social media trajectory.
“Rather than be bulletin boards for already bought-in people, how and what are we doing to try and connect and reach someone who has no interest in the church?”
—Matthew Dougan, Social Media Coordinator, Church by the Glades, Coral Springs, FL
Christmas-worthy social
Planning out any special holiday social media plan well in advance (around 4-6 weeks or so) can provide a longer runway to generate content that leads to a higher level of engagement. And it also ensures that the audience is given plenty of time to plan ahead for items that need to be on their calendar. In addition, having a plan to integrate video and musical clips from previous years’ events can also begin to trigger the thirst for nostalgia and “remember when” that tends to be so popular during the holidays.
So, the middle of the fall is the perfect time to ensure that an effective strategy is in place, whether that’s to give time for content to be created or to set up interviews or activities that need to be filmed and edited prior to being posted.
A ministry could consider asking questions in its posts or videos to cultivate User Generated Feedback from followers (like, “Do you remember when …,” “Have you ever …,” “What’s your favorite …,” etc.). Doing this over time will lead to a clearer picture not only of who is an engaged follower, but what types of content resonate the most with those people and how that can be implemented down the road.
For instance, asking followers if they remember their first Christmas attending your particular church could lead to the church ultimately using those stories in videos on socials that encourage current attendees to invite their friends and family in hopes of creating a similar impact in their lives. A ministry could also collect videos of their attendees singing Christmas carols and create a mash-up video to help promote a special Christmas service.
This takes the social channels from simply generating content to now creating a personal connection between the ministry and the followers.
Holiday cheer and genuine engagement
The holiday season is often noted for the feelings of generosity and kindness it engenders, so any content that can draw a clear path between a person and their potential impact, with a clear call to action (such as an onsite video interview with a community member being served at an outreach event), has the potential of being more impactful than content that lacks a direct “next step” for the audience.
“We are in the space of social media to remind people that they are loved and are welcome to be part of a Jesus community where life can be different.”
—Amanda Scott, Marketing and Creative Operations Manager, Church on the Move (COTM), Tulsa, OK
The best communicators are the ones that listen to and understand their audience first, to ensure the audience gets exactly what they need and want, before just blasting out a message. So, a church’s social media strategy should be like this, as well, but it has to be done in a way that’s genuine and consistent with the ministry’s core values and identity—and not feeling like it’s grasping for straws with trends that continually emerge as attention-grabbing tools.
This has been a critical component for COTM’s Scott and the social media team there. Historically, their ministry has been at the national forefront of creative arts and dynamic weekend services. But again, for them, a social media content strategy is less about entertainment and faceless followers and more about the individual people that it reaches.
“[A church has to] identify [its] values and voice as an organization and let those guide the content,” she shares when asked what advice she’d give other churches. “Don’t use social media as a communication platform; it’s for presenting your values so that people will want to connect in person to what your church has to offer.”
In fact, during the 2021 Christmas season, of all the holiday-related content the church posted on Instagram, the post with the most views was a reel sharing how people could take practical steps during the Advent season to slow their lives down, limit distractions, and focus more on their family and personal spiritual health. And ironically, the reel touched on how this could best be achieved by limiting social media intake during the season.
Far beyond entertainment
Like COTM, Church by the Glades, a large multisite church based in South Florida, also tends to focus on highly creative service elements (like building an onstage battleship out of an LED wall) to create attractional environments and build an engaging and entertaining social media identity. But it all has a clear purpose beyond just entertainment value.
Matthew Dougan, social media coordinator for the last three years at Church by the Glades, notes the importance of not just consistently putting out churchy content that creates an echo chamber of feel-good “bulletin board” material that is nice to look at but eventually becomes glossed over.
If done effectively, creative content can whet the whistle of the audience and fuel a sense of curiosity about what might be coming next.
“What matters more than the quality of the video or the graphic is the story you are trying to tell,” Dougan says. “Rather than be bulletin boards for already bought-in people, how and what are we doing to try and connect and reach someone who has no interest in the church?”
"We know we have 1.5 seconds to engage someone on social media before they scroll past our post,” says Fred Uhl, the worship experience pastor at Church by the Glades. “We attempt to open all our videos and/or picture collages with something eye-catching that will keep them around past [that mark].”
And this is where the never-ending stream of social media trends can come to play. Maybe having pastors or staff members do different songs or dances on a TikTok can create some newfound energy and engagement, or an Instagram story that goes “behind the scenes” of a Christmas cookie decorating contest helps catch the eye of someone scrolling on their timeline.
So, every post—whether it’s an event-reminder post on Facebook aimed at existing church members or an Instagram testimonial or TikTok Christmas carol lip-sync designed to stand out to people thumbing through a timeline looking for something that catches their eye—has to have a purpose: who is it aimed at, and what do we want them to do next?
Plus, if done effectively, creative content can whet the whistle of the audience and fuel a sense of curiosity about what might be coming next.
Says CBG’s Dougan, “Just like Christmas can be the season of ‘You know what to expect but still want to be surprised,’ the same goes for us. Our audience knows we will bring forth something they can expect for the upcoming season, but at the same time, we don’t give everything away.”
And he adds, “You want to keep them coming back for more.”
