If ministries want to attract involvement from volunteers and donors, they should utilize social media. These platforms aren’t just great places for individual people to connect up, they can also be strong marketing tools for ministries and other nonprofits. Social media is a platform for reaching your audience, but don’t just use it to tell people about your upcoming fundraising event. With social media, you can do so much more.
Here are a few ways you can utilize social media to engage people:
Share relevant news
One way to engage the people you’ve connected with on social media is to share relevant news content. Anything pertaining to your ministry should be shared. According to Nonprofit Technology Network, updates, accomplishments or any other changes should make an appearance on you social media accounts. Any news about causes that you want to support are good items to share as well. When you share news content, be sure to respond to comments, status updates or any other reaction you get to what you’ve posted. This allows you to engage people one-on-one and continue the conversation.
Tell stories
According to Nonprofit Hub, telling stories is important for your ministry or nonprofit. People identify with heartfelt stories this can engage people on social media and spur them into action. The stories should be real, so ask those who are close to your organization and try to find some interesting stories. Consider writing a blog post about a person or conducting an interview via video. Then post that content to the blog and then share it on social media. When telling these stories pay special attention to how they are told. You need to grab people early on and then keep their attention. Nonprofit Hub suggested trying to pique their interest in the first few seconds because if there isn’t something interesting early on, people are going to move on to something else. Don’t forget about your organization’s own story. Every ministry has an interesting narrative and it’s is worth telling just as much as individual people’s tales are.
Call people to action
Remember the Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis ice bucket challenge? That wasn’t possible before social media. Not only did plenty of people dump buckets of ice on their heads, but it also raised millions of dollars. Don’t start an ice bucket challenge, but do think about adding a call to action to some of your social media posts. Interesting or humorous calls to action are going to be your best bet, according to Manoverboard, a nonprofit marketing company. Also, if possible, try to create some urgency behind your call to action to get people acting quickly.
Focus on thought leadership
To get people to trust your ministry or nonprofit, it’s best to share and post content that shows you’re one of the leaders in the industry. Posting original content is the best way to do this. Find a few topics and issues that are important to your organization and express your specific stance on them. Topics can range from anything specific to your industry, to ways of managing donations and useful ministry software.