Social Media Guide for Churches:

In the last ten years, social media has become imperative for churches and ministries to connect with their community and spread awareness. The average person in North America spends 2 hrs and 6 min on social media, so your churchs’ social media presence is crucial to engage with members and reach new audiences. We have identified the TOP keys to your church social media success. It’s time for these platforms to be filled with the Good News, and for Christian content to go viral! Keep reading to find out how.  

In this guide, we'll offer some tips and best practices for church social media growth. If you are looking for increased following, engagement, and a stronger sense of community in your congregation, you’re in the right place.

How You Can Up Your Churchs’ Social Media Game

1. Define Your Goals and Audience

As cliche as it sounds, this is critical. The first step in any successful church social media strategy is to define your goals and audience.  Are you hoping to grow your young adults department? Do you find your church most resonates with an older generation, and you want to reach more people in that age group? Answering these questions is critical in determining which platforms to put the most effort into, and how you format content. Once you have a clear understanding of your goals, you can start to develop a social media strategy that will help you achieve them.

More good questions to consider to identify your goals and audience:

• Who are your current followers and members, and who are you trying to reach?
• What types of content will resonate with them and keep them engaged?
• How can we create more content like that?

Pro Tip: Use high-quality photos and videos in your posts to make them more engaging and shareable!

By understanding your audience, you can create content that is more likely to be shared and that will help you achieve your goals!

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2. Choose the Right Platforms

There are many social media platforms out there, but only a few you really need to know about. The last thing you need is your church social media team wasting time posting content on apps that will never reach your target audience. Here are the platforms you want to make sure you have content on:

• Facebook: Facebook is the obvious go to for most churches. With over 2 billion active users, it’s a great way to connect with members and reach new people looking for community. Facebook's Groups feature is particularly useful for building a sense of community among members. However, Facebook is notorious for censoring Christian content and is inundated with ads.  
• Instagram: Instagram is great for photo and video content (from service, events, etc). However, it is very algorithm heavy so it can be difficult to be heard and seen by your followers. There is not always a guarantee that 100% of your followers will see your posts. To best optimize Instagram, stay up to date with the algorithms and use trending audio in your reels and posts. Additionally, it is not as easy to link out to other platforms as Facebook or TUVU, but if you are trying to reach younger people and have a lot of captivating content, this is a great platform for you.
• Twitter: Twitter is where you can share encouraging text posts like Bible verses, quotes from service and church updates.
• YouTube: YouTube is the world's largest video sharing platform and is a great place to share longer form content. To build a following, you would want to post 1-3x per week with videos between 8-12 minutes long. This makes it a great platform to share snippets from sermons, worship music, and other snags from Sunday.
• TUVU: TUVU is built for sharing photos, short form video content, text posts, and allows you to link out of the platform (for giving capabilities, etc).There are no algorithms to figure out or compete with; platforms like TUVU are giving churches unprecedented access to their congregations. Your followers see your content when you post. With groups functionality, no ads, and a commitment to data security, it is an incredible platform for churches to connect and build community. It is growing quickly, and presents a great opportunity for churches to get in on the ground floor of a new and exciting social media platform!

3. Post Regularly and Consistently

Consistency is building a strong church social media presence on any platform. Regular posting helps your followers stay engaged and encourages the algorithm to promote your content so it is seen by as many people as possible. Content calendars help ensure you stay on top of your goals and are a great way to maximize your social media strategy. Content calendars can also help you plan content and assets around church events. For example, if your church is having a special event for couples for Valentine’s Day, knowing that a month in advance is optimal for your team to make graphics for the social media. You can build entire social media campaigns with a content calendar (it makes life easier - trust us).

Pro Tip: Remember as you create content, variety is important. You want to implement a variety of formats including text, images, videos, and links. Not all platforms (except TUVU and Facebook) can host all these formats, but diversify as much as possible. This will help keep your content fresh and engaging and will ensure that it appeals to a wide range of followers.

4. Encourage Engagement and Interaction

Interaction is the key to community building, but it’s also key in building engagement and interaction. Post content that encourages your followers to comment, and remind them to like and share your posts. Some ways to do this are to ask questions or run giveaways. Sometimes, you will want to sprinkle in shareable content that is funny or just has high entertainment value to encourage reposting (on TUVU or Twitter), or sharing on stories for example (Instagram).

When people do comment or message you, be sure to respond in a timely manner. This lets your followers (and the algorithm) know you are engaged and interested in your communities’ thoughts and opinions.

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5. Use analytics

Use analytics to track the performance of your posts and adjust your strategy accordingly. You can use external or internal analytics that will provide feedback on how your content is performing and better your church social media’s presence. This includes data that will help you hone your time of posting and decipher what types of content drive the most engagement from your audience.

Pro Tip: Avoid being shadowbanned. As sad as it is, mainstream platforms censor Biblically true content that moderation flags as offensive or “against community guidelines”. You can use a platform like TUVU as your catch all safety net assured your Christian content will never be suppressed. So be intentional about what you post on the mainstream traditional platforms, and use TUVU for content you know your congregation can handle (but the mainstream platforms cannot).

Social media is clearly an essential tool for churches to stay connected, build community, and spread the Good News. If you can define your goals, identify the right  audiences, select the right platforms, post consistently and encourage interaction on posts, you are sure to increase your following, increase engagement and build a stronger sense of community. TUVU is an excellent platform for churches to consider, as it is built specifically for sharing photos, short-form video content, and text posts without invasive algorithms, ads, or fake accounts. We encourage churches to start using TUVU and implement the tips and best practices outlined in this guide to enhance their social media game and spread the message of faith to an even wider audience.

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