Social Networking: Taking advantage of Facebook, Twitter and YouTube for your Church, Ministry, Organization or Business.
April, 2010: This started as an online Webinar in November, 2009, for a Christian organization called Christian Media Assocation (CMA), at www.christianmedia.org. Since then a lot has changed and been added (like Google Buzz) but I decided to add this to my blog and I've updated and added much more to make it more relevant. I will follow this up with more details about each of these awesome tools to increase your presence on the Web and hopefully to "connect" with people. Isn't that your ultimate goal? More will come in shorter spurts. After several months of research and working within these social networks I've garnered a lot of information. So, stay tuned. Also, please feel free to sign up on my Newsletter as that is becoming active again. ~ Bill
With all that is available on the Internet for your use, you can get overwhelmed with all of the articles, tutorials, books and even the paid-for advice that can bombard you with social networking. "Social Networking" is being talked about at an unbelievable buzz rate and the speed at which folks are signing up to do both Facebook and Twitter is amazing! In fact, the word "buzz" has become the new social networking answer from Google. More about that in another article.
So, let me help you get through the hype and help point you in the right direction to market your organization via the available social networking channels there are available. Over the next few weeks, I will share some basics on what to do with Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. For today, I will just provide an introduction and some basics.
First, let me share some interesting facts about Social Networking:
(from http://www.churchmarketingsucks.com/archives/2009/08/still_dont_thin.html as of August 2009 with my additions in Italics)
- It took radio 38 years to reach 50 million listeners.
- Terrestrial TV took 13 years to reach 50 million users.
- The Internet took four years to reach 50 million people...
- In less than nine months, Facebook added 100 million users.
- 77% of all active internet users regularly read blogs.
- More than 120 million users log on to Facebook at least once each day and more than 30 million users update their statuses at least once each day. Combined, more than 5 billion minutes are spent on the site on a daily basis. (Since August, 2009: more than 200 mill. users log on daily - FB has over 400 mill. active users. See stats at http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics)
- Over the past 12 months, Twitter's year-on-year growth rate has broken the 1000% barrier. (Twitter grew 1,382% year-over-year in February, 2010.)
- If Facebook were a country, it would be the fourth most populated place in the world. This means it easily beats the likes of Brazil, Russia and Japan in terms of size.
Following is some basics on each of these three social networks:
- Social Networking Web Site : www.facebook.com
- Started in 2004 for Harvard College
- Spread to other schools starting that same year.
- In 2006 opened to the public age 13 and up.
- Currently more than 400 million active users.
- Almost vital for any church, ministry or organization.
- For Organizations: Group Page, Fan Page and/or Advertising.
- Fan Page with interaction by members and others.
- Instantly share events with RSVPs available.
- In the last few months, Facebook is now searchable on the Internet and your Fan page can be found. Example: search for Bill's Web Biz, Loveland, CO on Google.
- Microblogging - l40 characters - Cell phones: www.twitter.com.
- See very good intro video on Twitter here.
- Started in 2006
- Massive growth started in 2007.
- Has over 105 million users (as of April, 2010 - According to Mashable.com)
- Reaches the more social networking crowd
- Fantastic for instant communication to your organization's members.
- Not for every church but great for geographically technical areas or churches with mainly younger memberships or even groups within your church.
YouTube
- Video sharing Web Site. www.youtube.com
- Created in February, 2005
- Has over 48 million users.
- Great for short videos.
- Limited to 10 mins per video.
- Searchable on the Internet.
- Allows you to customize your Channel Page (landing page)
- Many tools to interact with your own web site(s).
That's it for today. In my next blog entry, I will give more details of these three plus some information about Google's Buzz. Please feel free to ask questions and give me your feedback.
God Bless!
Bill
Bill
