Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 In today's episode, we discussed six social media, risks, churches face, and why your website is still more important than your social presence. Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter can be useful channels for church communication, but you're taking a massive risk. If you put all your eggs in the social media basket, join us as we talk through how your church can navigate those risks and reach people.
Speaker 1 00:00:37 You're listening to the reach, right podcast, the show dedicated to helping pastors and church leaders reach people the right way, hosted by me, Thomas Costello, and with me as always is my cohost Ian Hyatt. We're here to help your church see more visitors and grow.
Speaker 0 00:01:04 Hey guys, welcome to the <inaudible> podcast episode. Number 21. I am your host Thomas Costello. And with me as always is my cohost
Speaker 2 00:01:14 Ian Hyatt. Hey Thomas, how's it going, man? Going goodie. And how you doing? I'm doing well doing another sunny day in November in Austin, Texas. So yeah.
Speaker 0 00:01:24 Yeah. Awesome. Glad to hear it. Glad to hear it. It's actually November, but I think this isn't going live until, uh, right after, uh, Robbie December. Uh, so here we are in recording in November,
Speaker 2 00:01:35 It would probably still be sunny and warm then for us too. So
Speaker 0 00:01:38 Yeah, you're probably right. You know, that it certainly is sunny and warm here in Honolulu, but let's see, we'll dive into our topic here today. We've got a good one. I think, uh, we'll be talking today about how about six social media risks. Every church needs to manage six social media risks. Every church needs to manage, uh, and really we want to get into why social media is valuable to churches, but it should never replace your church website. And that's something that we hear from churches, right? I mean, you, you hear that from pastors thinking that maybe that's a strategy that could work. Tell me what you hear.
Speaker 2 00:02:14 Yeah. You know, I pleased to hear this, I think a few years back, uh, when, when churches started jumping on the social media bandwagon and not just that taking advantage of it would probably be a better way to put it. Um, but at that time you never went thought, you know, cause everyone's, you know, I guess it's a cultural thing that everyone likes to jump from. One thing to the next day there at a time, there was a point in time where pastors thought, Oh, well, you know, we're on Facebook now. We don't need a website. And we had to be no, no, we'd put a pump, the brakes, they both have different, uh, uses and advantages to each and they both should tie together and all of that. So I don't hear that as much now, but I do still hear from time to time, not as much, but, uh, that, Oh yeah. You know, we're on Facebook. So we don't use our website that much. And um, you know, and, and it's, it's almost kind of, uh, something that some pastors and ministry leaders assume if they're on Facebook or using social media, that they're good. That's all they need online.
Speaker 0 00:03:08 Yeah, sure. Yeah. And I think it's, there's some heightened awareness around this topic right now, and this is probably why we're talking about it. And as we're recording this, uh, some of the, uh, social media and tech industry CEOs are sitting in front of Congress right now, and they're being interviewed and talking about some of those challenges. So it's got to this, we don't want to, we never want to get too political in these conversations, but there are obvious political conversations that are happening around this and that bleeds over into how it affects churches. Because I think some of those political concerns have to do with, um, freedom of communication, freedom of religion, some of those kinds of things. So we'll get into that a little bit in this conversation here today. But yeah, I, I have seen a lot of churches if they haven't outright rejected having a website for social media, I have heard a lot of them put a lot more of their focus in that.
Speaker 0 00:03:59 And to some degree it works like there's, there's a lot of, uh, like social media influencer pastors out there nowadays, right? So I have friends that are Instagram famous and lead churches and, uh, they really do a good job using that, but even they would tell you those that do really well on. So on Instagram is that you need to have your own platform. You need to have your own place, your own website, where that's still the, the, the launching off point. Uh, and I remember this one of the mistakes that a lot of churches used to make, and we probably helped them make that as we were, as we were designing websites a few years back, is that they would put a lot of focus on their church website to pushing people off, to connecting with them on social media channels. And we found that that's actually counterproductive. Am I right?
Speaker 2 00:04:47 Exactly right. Yeah. For several reasons. Yeah, go for it. Well, you know, the first thing that comes to mind is, is Google is still looking when, when people are doing searches for, you know, churches or anything, church related Google, uh, and this would be the case for a business to, if someone's looking for anything out there, restaurant or whatever, Google still is giving priority and preference to directing someone search to a website instead of social media. So a website still gets precedent. Google's looking for that first. And also when you send people out of your website to social media, the way Google and the search engines will view that, is that okay, this website's not really an authority for content or, or it's, it's, you know, it's being viewed as less important. And, and this, this website, or this church website is they're sending people off of it. So therefore it actually demote you in the search engine ranking. So that's the first thing that comes to mind. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:05:46 And there's a variety. And I think a lot of them actually come up in our list of six risks that come with social media here. So we can kind of just dive into the list here. We'll kind of tackle one of them or a couple of them at a here and we'll go through, but why don't you hit number one
Speaker 2 00:05:59 For us? Yeah. I think number one's a great one. It's a content ownership is one of the risks too, because first of all, if all of your content on Facebook, well, Facebook basically owns that. And as we're seeing right now, there's been some shifts in political things happening to where, you know, a lot of churches are becoming concerned with, you know, if they put all their eggs in the Facebook or even Twitter basket or Instagram basket, you know, they, you know, Facebook could just decide, Hey, we don't like what this church is communicating. And, uh, and therefore the, you know, they can, they can not only stop it. It just belongs to them. You know? So, and I think that for sermon content, we've seen, of course, since the pandemic, that obviously it's a, it's a good thing, by the way, if you're using Facebook live, continue to do that, uh, and putting your sermons there. But again, it's on their website, not yours. So it belongs to them and that's valuable content, um, that you want to keep, uh, your messages and you want to be able to get those out to people and have control over that. So that's, uh, that's, that's, those are a couple of reasons why it's, uh, content, ownership's a big deal.
Speaker 0 00:07:08 Yeah. I see this mistake a lot with church sermons. Uh, so there's such a simple platform to do live broadcasting, to upload sermons, and there's unlimited storage. That's just, it seems like a nice, easy, free way to do it. And it is all those things are true. And I think every church should upload their content onto those channels. So for instance, a lot of our audience is watching this on Facebook right now, and they're watching us on social media channels. So we're not in any way against that, but I think the mistake that churches make a lot of times as they put it exclusively on those platforms and then they don't have access to it anymore. And here's the problem is that with Facebook, it doesn't have the same longevity. It's not, as in the industry, we call it evergreen as if it's on your own website.
Speaker 0 00:07:53 So with a sermon you put onto Facebook, well, in the first day, it might reach, um, you know, maybe 10% of your likes on Facebook, 10% of your audience. So if you have a thousand people that follow you, your church on Facebook, maybe a hundred of them might see the sermon on the Facebook live organically. But the problem is on Monday, when that sermons a day old, well, you might only see two or three people reaching it. And by a week it's not being pushed anywhere anymore at all, unless people are actually getting on there and actively sharing the message. Now, contrast that with what's happening on your website is you have something that is on your own property. It's something that you have full control over. And the nice thing is you can go onto social channels and share it from there into the future.
Speaker 0 00:08:39 So it really serves as something that's much more evergreen and like that's a term that's like, it stays green all the time. It's always useful, always valuable. And so I think that's a really important reason that churches should make a point of putting things onto social media, but absolutely make sure you have full control over really every sermon you've done. I think that's one of the most valuable resources that churches have too, is they have these huge libraries of content that pastors have recorded over the years that is able to be there and is still just as valuable today as it was five years ago. You know, the book of Mark hasn't changed. And if you preached a series on, on Mark chances are that, that content is just as valuable today as it was when it was recorded. So yeah, keeping that front and center, it is evergreen. So keeping it front and center on your website is really important
Speaker 2 00:09:29 And not just sermon content. That's, that's obviously very valuable and that's, uh, that's on the top of everyone's mind, of course, during this whole pandemic year in 2020, because everyone's getting their, a lot of their sermons online. Um, but I think also I've, we've, I've been personally hearing from a lot of pastors now that this content ownership thing is a big deal. And a lot of it has to do with what we've seen in the news with the social media giants going before Congress and such, but then in churches are realizing, Hey, I want my own hub. This belongs to our church. We can control, you know, our content there and it belongs to us. Um, so, um, so I, you know, a lot of pastors and ministry leaders that are, they're really wising up to that right now.
Speaker 0 00:10:09 Let me say this too, is that I think one of the, I think you're right to say it's not just the sermon side of things. I think it's also, uh, it's tied to the, the text content that you put onto social media too. So I've seen a lot of pastors and church leaders do really well with what you'd call like a long form post on social. And I don't know, I'm sure you've read those before. It usually it's, um, tied to some kind of major issue or something that's trending in our society, but I think there's a lot of value instead of writing out those long two, three, five, 600 word posts on social media, which can be valuable and get a lot of reach. I think putting it onto your own blog just gives it that evergreen value. And it's something that can be shared.
Speaker 0 00:10:51 It has a better chance of just being something that has more of a lifespan. And I think it's valuable to churches that way. So there's a couple of reasons why I think content ownership is something that it's a risk that you're just need to really take a look at when they put things on social media. Second thing is censorship concerns. That's another risk that we have to talk about. This is something that's becoming more and more, um, more and more apparent. And I think it's, it's obvious that these kinds of things happen. Um, I, I, we are neither conservative nor liberal here at retry. We're not, we're not a partisan organization, but the truth is, is that you can take a look and see that there is censorship that is taking place on social platforms right now. Uh, and it's something that needs to, that churches need to be aware of.
Speaker 0 00:11:36 And I think the thing we miss is that censorship has changed its, its meaning. So it used to be when I was a kid, the way you think of censorship is when someone says a bad word on TV, it gets cut off and you can't hear it. Right? Like, so they, they sensor language that not supposed to say the FCC did those kinds of things. Um, I think what censorship looks like now is not that they don't allow you to say it, but they there's like this invisible hand that reduces the number of people that hear the things you have to say based on the content of what you're actually saying. So we've seen this like, so for instance, we're, again, we're not political. I don't know if I told you this yet or not, but some of our podcasts that we put out there, like we did one that was called six ways to build unity, um, in a contentious post-election world.
Speaker 0 00:12:30 Right. So it was about, it mentioned election in it, right. It wasn't political at all that, that podcast or the conversation, but it was about how to build unity. Right. But because our title had the word election in it, we weren't able to promote it at all. They wouldn't let us put it out there and then it really reduced our reach on that particular post. I wish we had named it differently. I understood that. But a lot of this is kind of trial and error and you figure this stuff out as you go. So that's just one example of things. Um, but yeah, I think that's something that churches should really be concerned about. What do you think?
Speaker 2 00:13:02 Yeah. And also just based upon what, uh, what we believe, uh, as far as, uh, the church and as you know, as Christians, uh, you know, that, that if for some reason, Facebook and the leadership of Facebook, uh, has a problem with you with what you believe in you just simply voicing that. Well, that's, you know, they, they can control that and sensor that, and that's not political. That's just, if you're, if you're basically voicing your beliefs and they disagree with it based upon whatever cultural issues or whatever's going on. So I think that that's a good point too, for sure.
Speaker 0 00:13:37 For sure. Yeah. I think the primary way that churches are going to experience this as of today is when it comes to issues of biblical definitions of marriage and Biba whole ideas on gender and some of those kinds of things and, uh, Twitter specifically, and some on Facebook and other channels are, um, are actually doing, uh, doing censorship actively for people that take biblical views or traditional biblical views of marriage, traditional biblical views, especially on gender identity issues. Uh, so there is some limitation that's happening there right now. So all that to say is if your primary method of communication is in someone else's control, it's on these social platforms, it's not on your own domain on your own website. There is a, there is a danger that your message will be more and more diminished. And that's why it's so important that churches take full advantage of the, the channels that they have at their disposal. Uh, and they're using, you know, they're using their own platforms whenever they possibly can, in addition to the social media channels that they can use to
Speaker 2 00:14:43 That's, uh, that's good. And that, uh, that's a good segue to our next point. Well, it has somewhat to do with it at least, but, um, number three would be it diminishes your reach. Um, so when you fully rely upon social media and there's, there's several, there's several reasons why, uh, but basically it, you know, they've changed a lot with their algorithms, right? You could speak to this a lot too, just that, that you know, you on Facebook now, particularly, and I've seen this just through my own personal usage of Facebook, that it's, when you're posting something specifically, it finds other like-minded people, uh, that did post similarly. So for churches, we obviously want to reach people that, that don't believe the same way as us, or think the same way as us. So that's the first thing that comes to mind, as far as the diminishing your reach. We want to reach the lost, we're going to reach people that need Jesus. Uh, and so that's where it can get, uh, I think, you know, if you're only reaching pastors and believers, well, you know, and not every in most churches are not just looking for transfer growth either, right? So they seem course,
Speaker 0 00:15:49 Yeah, I think what this is, this one's not, uh, when I think of diminishing reach, this is not some of it's church specific. I think this is something that every organization is really struggling with. Um, you know, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, uh, all of them started in a, with a model where they just basically had a service. And I don't know if you even remember this, but there was a time when there were no ads on Facebook. Like when it first started, they had this, I know, right. There was no advertising. It was not yet the term they would use is it's not yet monetized. So they weren't trying to, what they were trying to do is build a really big audience. So this is the way a lot of businesses work now is build a really large user base. You have a large network effect of lots of people interacting with one another, and then you figure out how to monetize it.
Speaker 0 00:16:38 So get users and then figure out how to make money with it. And so what Facebook has been doing is they have been, uh, just really trying to further and further monetize it to create value for their shareholders. And what that's done is that for organizations, they have limited their reach unless you're willing to pay. And so social media has become, this has all the channels has become more and more a pay to play kind of an environment where if you want to, if you want to reach people, um, outside of the few that you reach organically, you're going to have to pay ad prices and boost posts and do those kinds of things to make that happen. So I can say that for our organization, we started retried in the very end of 2015 coming up on our five-year anniversary. Uh, and I know for us that our organic reach on social platforms is down, um, Oh, about 80% from where it was when we started.
Speaker 0 00:17:39 So it really has a diminishing return. It's not that we're producing worse content, we're producing better content, I believe, and more than we ever have before. Uh, and there is a, a clear reduction in those kinds of things. So, um, that's their model. And then on top of that in 2018, Facebook came out and said, we are actively going to make some changes to our algorithm, but we're going to put more emphasis on giving you content from friends and family, uh, and less content from news organizations and businesses and churches, they fall into that category there. So, um, that there's, this, the, the tide is rising against you. Uh, I guess you could say, uh, when it comes to your returns, when it comes to social media on there. So anything else to add to that one?
Speaker 2 00:18:26 It's kind of funny when you're talking about how it's monetized now in the marketing aspect of Facebook. And it reminded me of a conversation I had just this morning with a ministry leader and he said something funny. He said, he said, well, you know, how come Tyler Perry? You know, he gets, when he posts something, you know, everyone sees it and you know, everyone and I'm of course, well, he is Tyler Perry and he's a celebrity. However, I just told the guy and, you know, he was, he, he wasn't as savvy with Facebook and that's why we love to help and have these conversations as ministry leaders. But he said, I just simply said to him, after that, I said, well, that's because he pays a lot of money to get his, to get his, to get his, his message out there in boosted, like you said, and so on. And he was like, Oh yeah, that's, that's a good point. And I was like, yes, if you were willing to pay Tyler Perry kind of money, Hey, you can be very visible on Facebook.
Speaker 0 00:19:17 Oh my goodness. Yeah, you can be visible. Now. I, there is obviously value to being, to having a very famous name or to, you know, as your, your user base. And as you continue to make good content out there, um, Facebook will know to show it more and Twitter will know to show it more to people, but you know, it's just not, it's not something that if you're, if you're starting from zero right now, uh, don't be deceived into thinking that you can do it for free, quick, uh, you know, it'll take a long time to get there and it'd be a lot of work organically, really working on things that way. So, yeah, that's the thought behind it. Um, all right, let me hit number four. And this is, you were kind of getting into this, I think before, but, um, I think we need to watch out for the risk of counter productive echo chambers.
Speaker 0 00:20:03 And this is one of those things. Echo chambers is one of those words, and I'll kind of give a little explanation for those that are unfamiliar with it. Um, what the Facebook algorithm and Twitter algorithms and Instagram algorithms, they are designed in a way that when you interact with, uh, with content, it starts to think you like that content, and it will show you more of that kind of content. And what that does for them is it helps keep you on their platform. It keeps you using them. It keeps you interacting with people and helps their bottom line because the longer you stay on Facebook, the more ads they can show you, and the more, uh, the more money they make, right? So what that, what the by-product of that and what that winds up doing is it winds up showing users content that they're most likely to engage with, which is usually produced by people that are like-minded with you.
Speaker 0 00:20:57 And what happens is if that's the pattern that you're in, that only continues to build on it and Facebook and all these social media platforms, they really know us better than we, they, we realize that they know us. And what it does is it kind of puts you in these, what they call echo, chambers, these things, where you only hear like-minded voices, it's like you speak, and it comes right back to you and sounds the same way. So we get into these echo chambers where all wherever really talking to the only people we're talking to are people that are very like-minded. And the challenge with this for churches specifically, is that I think that that goes against the acts one eight call that we have, where we're supposed to go into Jerusalem and into Judea and Sumeria and to the ends of the earth, uh, because it's not just about reaching people that are physically distant from us.
Speaker 0 00:21:51 We can do that on social media, but I think there's value in reaching people that are, um, that think differently from us. And I think that's part of what our calling as a churches is to reach people that aren't really like me. This is our modern day mission field is maybe, maybe we have more in common with someone that's in the Philippines, uh, than we do with someone who's in our own neighborhood and voted differently from us. Right. There's, there's, there's less, uh, common. And so I think it's something that just from a missions perspective, if we find ourselves always in these echo chambers, that is a real risk that our church will start to really hone in and become full, full of only people that are exactly like the leaders within our church and think just like us. So I don't know. What do you think about that?
Speaker 2 00:22:36 It's like putting everyone in their own little cliques, you know, so, uh, and, and we don't want that. I totally agree. It's, it's a, it's anti what scripture calls us to do. It's, uh, it's not biblical and, and boy, aren't we in a time where we need unity, uh, of, uh, you know, people of all diverse backgrounds, racially, and thought processes, political views, all of that. Um, so, um, you know, that's one of the great things about living in a America's, it's a melting pot, right? And we need to not be put into these little buckets.
Speaker 0 00:23:06 And I think that's one of the things that I think is so hard for people right now is that this, this field that we're looking for unity, I think people are deceived into thinking that there's a lot of unity online because they look at their friends and, you know, you ask people on Facebook and they say, I don't really know anybody that thinks different fairly from me or all the people that I like. They think the same way that I do. So who are all these people that are voting differently for me? I don't even know anybody like that. And so it's one of those things where we're just so we're, so there's so much disunity right now because we have this fake sense of unity on social media, but in the real world, we're just as divided as we've ever been. I think this exists within the church the same way. So yeah,
Speaker 2 00:23:49 You might be saying to yourself, you know, when you're in these counterproductive, echo chambers, you know, what's, you know, does anyone else, did they think, they think like that? And the answer is yes, they do think differently than you. There's a lot of people that think very differently than you. And so that's good. Well, we'll jump to number five here. And that's also that conversation control, and this is a big one, you know, this is the con to be able to control the conversation and is a good thing. And what I mean by that is obviously we don't want to be, we want to be open and we want to, communication's a two way street, and we don't want to be controlling, but meaning that when it comes to your online communication, you know, you want to be able to control the conversation. It's kind of funny, and this has a little bit to do with it.
Speaker 2 00:24:37 But the first thing that kind of popped in my mind is that I kind of admire people that have the, the gall to post something political or like a hot, controversial topic, because I'm unlike man, they're going to be tied to that post all day long, because what they don't have control over is whatever one is going to say and comment. And then, and then when you get 50 different comments on it, you got to learn how to respond to each one of those. So for me, you know, I have a full-time job and a family. I don't, I don't have time for that. And I know it's not all of that, but that's one little funny example that pops to my mind. It's also just being able to, like, we talked about kind of like content ownership, you have control over kind of what you can say and ground the responses a little bit more if I'm on the right track.
Speaker 0 00:25:27 Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I think you're exactly right. I think that it's, um, if you're online for any amount of time as a church, you will have people say negative things about you and that's okay. Right. I, I'm not saying that that's the end all be all. And our, our main goal as churches is to not have people say anything mean about us. That's just, that's not who we are, but it's going to happen. You know, at the church I pastored last, uh, we had, I remember we had a, an issue within our church and someone made a wild accusation that we basically, uh, encourage people to, uh, we encourage a lady who was sleeping around within our church and they made up this long story about this and put it all over Yelp and Facebook and all over the internet. They, but you Google reviews that said all this, and you know what I could do about that?
Speaker 0 00:26:17 Nothing we had to just sit there and take it. It's, it's terribly, it totally untrue. You know, we were, we, we follow biblical views of sexuality and, uh, premarital sex. We have all those same, you know, none of that's different about us. And we, we really had to sit there and, and let these accusations that we could respond and say, no, not the case, but you know, really out. We couldn't have, we didn't have no control to delete these conversations. And, you know, the fact is you never have control over that. There's going to be these social platforms. People are going to say bad things for you on Yelp. You look at any large church in your community. Maybe it's a mega church. That's local. You pull up any large church. You're going to find, if you pull up a Yelp review, uh, you get onto Google reviews.
Speaker 0 00:27:00 You'll find people saying all kinds of things. Some of them are Christians. Some of them aren't, it's just something that's going to be out there, but we don't have to really engage in those conversations. And the great thing about your own website as being your hub is that you can control the conversation much better there. If someone comments on your sermon and says, Hey, I didn't like it when you said this. And here's what it says about women in ministry. And you should have done differently, or you shouldn't be teaching this or whatever it is, you could just delete it, or you could just not even approve it. And nobody will ever have to see those kinds of things. You can have control over that conversation. Now, maybe you shouldn't, maybe you should use it as a teaching moment. That's for you to decide on each individual post, but you have just so much more control over the conversation.
Speaker 0 00:27:45 There are enough channels out there where you're not in control. I think keeping this kind of conversation control, I think it's really biblical. You look at the way Jesus led his ministry as he was. He was always engaging in conversations that moved him towards his goal. And he often ignored conversations or refuse to answer in conversations where he didn't really have any control. And they wanted him to take a stand or say things about certain issues that he wasn't interested in talking on. So I think conversation control is something that is really, really important now.
Speaker 2 00:28:17 And one thing I'll add to that too, is that, you know, one good thing about having like a blog on your website and just a blog online is that you, you can very much so control the conversation like we're saying, and you can, you can make it a healthy thing because you can write a rate post. So if someone just says something totally out of left field, that if you were to sometimes to address it, it, it wouldn't do any good. If they, if someone just curses you out or says something silly, you know, you, you dad doesn't have to show up on your, on your post and people can continue to have a healthy dialogue too. So that's a, that's another good point there. So
Speaker 0 00:28:53 Yeah, that's, it's a job for us. So we have people at retried here that have to manage all of our, our social media platforms. Cause we, we spend some money on marketing in our social media platforms and stuff. And, uh, on those, when you pay for it, they let you control the conversation, which is nice. So we have Facebook ads that we run and Instagram ads that we run and on those channels, when someone makes a comment on there, we have control over it and we can delete it and get rid of those kinds of comments that aren't productive towards what we're hoping people will do with our information there. But, um, yeah, outside of when you're paying for it, you just lose a lot of that control. And I will tell you that we get comments several a week probably, uh, that come through that we just have to say, okay, taking us off topic or worse yet just, you know, really, uh, crude and obscene things.
Speaker 0 00:29:44 So pretty funny stuff there. So anyway, um, we'll, we'll leave it at that, but yeah, last one I'll, I'll tackle this here, uh, the sixth way that we need to manage risks within social media and focus on, uh, maybe using our website more as we have a really limited audience. And I mean that in a sense that on social media platforms, each platform has, we tend to think that everybody is on there. Maybe this is one of those echo chamber effects. We tend to think everybody is on here, but really you are invisible to large portions of the population on each specific social network. So we may even think like maybe some of our pastors think that, uh, you know, that everybody's on Facebook and it's true. Most of us adults have a have a Facebook account, but I will tell you that there are a lot of people, uh, that are not actively using Facebook all the time.
Speaker 0 00:30:36 And their active daily users are actually trending down right now on Facebook. And so on every social media platform, there is a demographic that uses it much heavier than other demographics. So for instance, Facebook, our audience probably knows this already is that they are, they trend very, they trend older on Facebook now. So it is gen Xers and boomers primarily, uh, that that's their strong base. It used to be. I remember when we started in this, uh, when social media was in its infancy, I remember it was like, we had to talk people that were boomers onto Facebook. Like, why would I do that? And they were terrified of it. It was something that was a challenge. Um, so that's not the case anymore. You know, I think that a lot of conversation is happening close more than me. I'm sure most do at this point.
Speaker 0 00:31:26 So yeah. Yeah. Now compare that with Instagram, that is really the millennials channel, right? So Instagram is something that is, uh, got, got younger. So people under 40, 25 to 40 that's where, uh, where they're at. Uh, and then you have this whole upcoming generation generation Z, but by the way, gen Z is turning like 24, 25 right now. So I know that always terrifies me, that they're, that they're starting families. And you know, you think of them as being younger, but as a, as a right on the line of gen X and millennial, um, there's a whole nother generation coming up. Uh, so, but they are using Snapchat. They're using tick TOK. They're using those kinds of channels, uh, predominantly, uh, not they're using Instagram even less, uh, than they probably have accounts, but like the, like Facebook with younger people, they're not on there all the time.
Speaker 0 00:32:17 So all that to say, don't be deceived into thinking that if I'm on this social media channel, I'm able to reach everybody. You're not actually able to reach everybody. And the one common denominator is that every single person is using the internet still they're using, they're getting onto websites. They're learning information. Every generation is still doing Google searches. They're looking for content, that's young, old and everything in between, and that's where your website can be found. And I think that's one of those risks that are in social media is that you're really limiting your audience to certain demographics if you're using certain channels there. So anything to add to that, or did he say
Speaker 2 00:32:56 You covered a lot there and actually your last point was on the tip of my tongue. Is that, that again, steering things back to why your website is still important. You know, I talked to a 20, 20 year old pastor today. He was in his twenties and, uh, and yeah, you know, to, for anyone that's thinking that, you know, uh, th that people, that age are not going to websites anymore, they're wrong. He goes to websites all the time. And if he, even if he catches wind on something on social media, if he's interested, he's Googling and going to the website. So that's the thing is that, you know, again, everything's going to funnel back to the website, whether or not someone finds you on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, uh, whatever. So now,
Speaker 0 00:33:35 So all that to say, I think the big takeaway for me with this is that churches, obviously you can't go all in, on social media and ignore your website. I would encourage churches that hear this, that your website is probably the place that you want to invest the most. I know that a lot of churches had a lot of time. Um, and when I say invest, I mean, your, your efforts, your volunteer time, your work time, finances to some degree. Uh, but I think your website is probably the better place to put your time, your resources, your people, uh, because I think it has that, that longevity that you have control over. Uh, and so if I were, um, if I were just starting a new church, for instance, and I had the option, I would absolutely use social media. I would use Twitter. I would use Facebook, I'd use Instagram.
Speaker 0 00:34:25 I'd probably make Tik TOK videos. I would do all of those things, but I think I would put even more effort into creating content that we control and we own on our own website, because I think that's just going to have so much more longterm value. And the big thing is that in all of this, like you were saying before, everybody's still searches. Everybody's still use Google uses Google. They may use other search engines, but they all still use search engines to find content that you're looking for. And when you put content on your website, you have more and more possibility for, for years and years to engage people with that content. And I think that's something that, uh, that our audience really needs to understand. And I hope that's something that can be helpful to them there. So any final thoughts as we wrap up today?
Speaker 2 00:35:10 No good stuff, partner. I think that's good. And hopefully this was helpful to many out there today.
Speaker 0 00:35:15 Yeah, I hope so, too. So, uh, so even closing use social media, we're not anti-social media, please don't hear this as that use all of those channels I would, and we do at retrial. They do use these channels, but your website is still your hub invest more there. I think that's where the real value is. So if this has been valuable to you, this conversation or other ones, uh, it means the world to us. When you like review, subscribe, do those things, uh, share this with your friends. Uh, that's how we're getting word out there. Uh, it's been awesome to see how many people have been listening and watching this podcast and how much it's grown in the short 21 weeks that we've been doing this, uh, was such a blast. So thanks you guys for listening again, and we'll catch you next week.
Speaker 1 00:35:59 See ya. Thanks for listening to the reach right podcast. We hope this episode will help you reach people the right way, looking for more resources for your church. Check us out online at reach, right studios.com. If this episode has been helpful to you, it would mean the world to us. If you would rate, review and subscribe on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks again for listening. And we'll see you next week. <inaudible>.
