How @BrandonACox is Planting a Church Using Social Media

What if you are a brand new church with a near zero marketing budget?  That is how Brandon A Cox started planting Grace Hills Church in Bentonville Arkansas.  Read below as he shares some of what he is doing in social media to get visitors to come to his church.

This snippet on planting a church using social media comes from Paul Stienbruck’s article at the Ourchurch.Com Blog

Planting a Church Using Social Media

In a recent blog post, Brandon wrote:

• We started with two couples (including the Cox’s). We spent $0 on traditional advertising but had 35 at our first gathering in July of 2011.
• We grew to approximately 80 within six months by word-of-mouth and while spending $0 on traditional advertising.
• We launched with 176 on our first Sunday, mostly gathered through Facebook, word-of-mouth, and search engines.

Sounds like a pretty good start.

So how did they do it?

Brandon included some great tips!

1) Start with a website

“It’s a content hub, of sorts. Sometimes your goal is to move people from social platforms to your site. Sometimes it’s the opposite. And sometimes they simply co-exist for different purposes, but having a hub on the web is essential.”

2) Use Facebook Pages Well

A few key tips:

• Understand the difference between a profile (which is for people) and a page (which is for brands, organizations, celebrities, etc.).
• Use your personal Facebook profile to connect with new people in your community, people who get in touch about your plant, etc.
• Write often. At least daily.
• Converse. Answer messages, reply to comments, and be helpful to those with questions.

3) Provide Easily Sharable Content

“You are a content-producing master! … We take our messages and break them into bite-sized pieces and share them as a daily devotional on both our website and our Facebook page… All of the content a church produces can be distributed to the volunteer army of people in the pews to equip them to share their faith, their church, and their story.”

You should really read on for their 5 things they are not doing.

– See more at the original post here.

How do you use social media to market your church?

He’s learned some great lessons.

If you are using social media in your church plant, what is a tip that you want to share?  Add it to the comments below.

Then share this post with a tweet or plus one, inviting others to share their tips as well.