The purpose of Social Media is not to jam information down people’s throats, but to deepen and strengthen relationships, a concept that is often too easily overlooked, especially by the church. Many church leaders think that Social Media is a great tool to inform people about ministries and ministry events, and it is. But if that’s all it is to your church, then you have missed a huge opportunity to connect with your audience.
So how do you use Social Media to deepen and strengthen relationships? You do that by giving them inspiring content that starts conversations and moves them in the direction of the vision of your church. The problem is that creating inspiring content is difficult.
One of the best ways to create consistent content is by developing a content map. These are the Five C’s of a Social Media Content Map -
Categories
First, identify the universal purpose of your content. The universal purpose will serve as the main category of content. The main category will be supported by subcategories of content. These categories shape the content you’ll share.
For example, with TimPeters.org, the main category is Church Communications, and the subcategories are the 12 Essentials. In your church this could be vision, values, mission, campaigns, seasonal big ideas, campaigns, etc.
Content
Secondly, identify what forms of content your categories will produce.
Examples:
- Blog Posts
- Photos
- Scriptures
- Questions
- eBooks
- Online Newsletters
- Etc.
Community
You have to know who your target audience is because they will determine how you will distribute your content. Your community for the purpose of Social Media is your online community. What is their target age, gender, socio-economic status? All of these things determine the way you connect with them.
Channels
A channel is way you distribute content to your audience. Obviously there are plenty of channels you can select. Social Media has much to choose from in the way of channels. The best practice is to choose 3-5 channels that are approproiate for your community and master those before adding others.
Examples:
- YouTube
- Etc.
Call
You’ve done a great job of identifying your category, your forms of content, your community and channels but all of that is null and void if you’re not calling them to action. Tell your audience what you want them to do. (Get baptized, trust Christ, comment, sign up for an event, tell their story, etc.)
You have such a great opportunity to connect with the people of your church throughout the week. Seizing that opportunity to build relationships is critical and requires an organized, well thought out content creation and distribution map. If you’d like more details about how to formulate a content map, let us know. We’d love to help.
Social Media is just one of the 12 Essentials at Sayge Resources. A complete How to Create a Content Map guide along with a Content Map Template is available in the Social Media Bundle with Sayge Resources.
