Whether you want to increase your following, reach potential attendees or simply spread the word about the awesome work your church does, Twitter can help. Here are five millennial-approved Twitter “hacks” for your church:
1. Follow Buttons
Having more followers on Twitter means there are more opportunities to extend your reach and share information about your church and its activities. Assuming your church has a website, putting a Follow Button on your webpages is a fantastic way to easily drive visitors from a webpage to your Twitter account.
Provided by Twitter, the Follow Button encourages your website visitors to follow you on Twitter. When someone clicks this button on your webpage, they will instantly connect to your church on Twitter and begin to receive all of the updates you post. Simple as that.
2. Tweetable Content
Does your church website post weekly sermons, event updates or maintain a blog? If so, a great way to share this content is by using a Share Button that gives readers the option to tweet out your content directly from the page. When the Share Button is clicked, a tweet will auto-generate for the user with a link to the original post. While this may seem like only a small change, it makes a huge difference. You’d be surprised how often your content would be shared if you just made it easy to do!
3. Website Cards
Website Cards on Twitter are new and very effective. It is said that tweets with rich media get +313 percent engagement compared to a simple text body alone. Simply speaking, tweets with pictures generate a lot of activity. Website Cards provide this rich media and also add a call-to-action for the viewer, directing them to click through to your church’s website.
Website Cards can be used for event awareness, advertisements or even sharing some big news your church has. They can generate interest in your church’s Twitter account and website, and they are completely free to create and share. It’s a small step that results in a big impact!
4. Tweet Campaigns
Twitter provides the opportunity for users to promote their tweets to a tailored audience in the form of a “campaign.” Just as any advertisement, this one “hack” does cost money, but it will charge only as it also generates activity to your page.
Campaigns are useful for churches looking to extend awareness to a certain audience, demographic or even location through tweets or Website Cards. For example, if you wanted to broadcast your new church plant to potential attendees in that area, you could create promotional tweets and specifically target them to users in your area. Twitter also provides an analytics option that will track your campaign’s progress as it runs.
5. 140 Characters of Runway
The simplest function of Twitter is just being able to tweet, so start by doing exactly that. If nothing else, you will instantly increase awareness of your church by tweeting frequently to your pre-existing followers. Use those 140 characters, include pictures and have fun!
—Vanderbloemen Search Group
Tweet Stats
- While the average religious leader can expect one retweet for every 500 followers, the average musician only sees one retweet for every 30,000 followers.
- 50 percent of Twitter users are using the social network via mobile.
- 69 percent of follows on Twitter are suggested by friends.
—AdWeek.com