Are you unsure how to start a social media policy for your church, ministerial staff, or lay leaders? This slideshow, from the communications department of the United Church of Christ, will have you ready to run your church's social media in no time.
Presented by:
Marchae Grair
United Church of Christ
Social Media Associate
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Social Media Tips for Churches, Pastors, and Lay Leaders
1. Social Media
Best Practices, Tools and Tricks
Marchae Grair
Publishing, Identity & Communication
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2. Follow Us!
United Church of Christ
https://www.facebook.com/UnitedChurchofChrist
@UnitedChurch
https://twitter.com/unitedchurch
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4. Social Media Posts are Reactionary…
Policies Are Not
• Establish a universal email address. No personal email accounts should
be the contact information for your church’s social media.
• Establish a policy for staff changes.
• Create a comments policy.
• Decide how to handle negative feedback.
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5. Clergy/Staff Policies
• Personal Disclaimers
(Opinions are my own.)
• Don’t post anything obscene,
harassing, or bigoted.
• Differentiate between
endorsements and conversation
starters.
• Set appropriate privacy settings for
your level of engagement with
church members.
• Set rules for church leadership
about “friending” the church
community.
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6. What habits create results?
Keep a current about page with keywords and phrases
that will describe the “experience” of your church.
Balancing different types of posts.
Refrain from using trends in excess. (Like memes)
Breaking news, trends, and holidays MAKE social media.
Use all three to your advantage. (And know what your
audience is discussing to engage in the conversation.)
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7. Publishing, Identity & Communication
How to Write for Social Media
Shorten links. Remove links if possible.
Write conversationally. No acronyms, long
sentences, or uncommon words.
Vary text posts by asking questions, giving
interesting questions, and providing breaking
news.
80/20 rule
8. Multimedia
Size your images correctly.
The cover photo should speak to your followers, through images or text. Use
bold, large fonts and vivid, crisp images.
Avoid using images with a lot of words or details for your profile pictures.
These images are too small for that amount of detail.
Change your cover photo 1-2 months so the page doesn’t remain stagnant.
Get release forms from the congregation, especially minors.
Pictures and videos generate more interactions. Publishing, Identity & Communication
9. What Social Media Do You Need?
Social Media Explained:
The Church Edition
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10. Facebook Setup
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All posts officially representing the church
should come from a fan page.
The name should be the church’s name
with no abbreviations.
Like other fan pages. (Best places to find
shares)
Evaluate “competitors” on Facebook’s fan
page dashboard.
Use third-party apps (like Woobox) to
incorporate tabs featuring other apps or
custom HTML.
11. Facebook Continued
Whenever possible, tag other fan pages in
your updates. It will increase your post’s
reach because of Facebook’s algorithm,
Edgerank.
If you have a special post you want to
remain at the top of your page, pin it.
Twitter has the same feature.
Use Facebook events to promote church
gatherings or events you will be sponsoring.
Facebook Ads: Finding the perfect target.
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13. Twitter. Meet the #
No more than 1-2 hashtags per post.
#This #is #distracting.
Use hashtags that are timeless.
#Christian. #Pastor.
No hashtag statements.
#GodisGoodForever.
Finding a relevant way to use a trending
hashtag is always good.
Use special hashtags for events. Promote
from planning process until event. #GS30
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14. Publishing, Identity & Communication
Twitter Continued
Twitter Lists. If you haven’t started them, start
now!
Rewrite your tweets for more content. Twitter
is such a fast-moving site that repeat content
is not negative.
Encourage people to share your posts by
starting tweets with “Retweet.”
Finding a relevant way to use a trending
hashtag is always good.
Use special hashtags for events. Promote
from planning process until event.
#GS30
Never start a tweet with @.
15. Should I start a…
+ -
SEO Reach.
Not as crowded as FB.
Still isn’t mainstream.
Amateur pics and
videos are welcome.
Requires many events
or a lot of creativity.
Sharing crafts/recipes.
Selling merchandise.
Difficult to find original
content without blog.
One of the most
popular apps w/
teens.
Disappearing videos
creates ethical
questions.
Simple way to
generate original
work.
Without regular
content, it looks
abandoned.
Great reach potential.
Good cross-over
appeal.
If you don’t have a
video team or editor,
too much to maintain.
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16. What do I post and when?
Your church should run its social media using an
editorial calendar.
A majority of your posts should be scheduled at least a
day in advance, optimizing for peak social media
traffic. Events and holiday media? Weeks in advance.
Analytics, analytics, analytics! What performs best and
when?
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17. Publishing, Identity & Communication
Content Managers
Hootsuite
Sprout Social
Tweet Deck
Combine your social media accounts for quick monitoring.
Follow specific hashtags or trends in streams.
Post the same message to multiple accounts.
ANALYTICS!
19. Publishing, Identity & Communication
Finding content, FAST
RSS Readers and Social Media Content Providers
Feedly, Flipboard, Stumbleupon, Reddit, Digg
20. Stay in the loop
SocialMediaExaminer.com
Hubspot.com/blog
SocialMediaToday.com
Mashable.com
PostPlanner.com/blog
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21. How to build your followers
Patience.
Involve existing members, who will be inclined to share.
Don’t invest in ads without having content to bring
people back.
Don’t be spammy. Would you read a newspaper with all
ads?
Interact with other pages as often as possible.
USE SOCIAL MEDIA DURING WORSHIP.
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