Church social media management is becoming a more popular way for churches to engage their membership and build relationships with those people who are outside of their immediate family. Social Media is actually a new form of social communication, a form that has evolved to become here to stay.
Not to be confused with a traditional marketing campaign, social media is definitely not a traditional marketing campaign, but rather an essential element of your church’s overall church marketing plan. Because you have spent so much time planning the day-to-day services, programs and special events of your church, it can sometimes feel like there is little time left over to do something else. This is a shame, because if you look at social media as an opportunity for you to connect with your members, make announcements of special events and just generally communicate with your members, then you can do so much more. This article will discuss a few ways to go about social media management for churches.
One way to effectively manage social media for churches is by delegating a social media manager to oversee this type of media. A social media manager is someone who manages church social media and is responsible for the entire process, from setting up the website to using it to communicate with members. As a church member, you want to make sure that you know who your social media manager is and how they will be used. Here are some things to consider when delegating your social media manager:
Ask yourself if you trust your social media manager and if they understand your goals and expectations. If they do not, then you may want to reconsider whether or not they should be handling your church’s social media accounts. If they understand what you need and what you want them to accomplish, then they will do the best that they can to reach their goal. However, if they are not willing to put in the work and do the job right the first time, then you may want to take the account away from them altogether.
You want your social media to reach your members, so if your social media manager is not putting any effort into reaching out to members, then they will not be reaching out with your messages. Try to find a member who works in a different department within your church (or is a friend of a member) to ask to set up meetings with your social media manager to talk about how they plan to handle social media with your church. It may be that your social media manager does not even realize that members are involved in the decision-making process.
Look at the schedule and work out when they plan to handle social media with your church. If they have a lot of 
meetings, you may want to reconsider whether or not they should be doing this at all, as it can become overwhelming. Instead, focus on finding someone who will spend more time communicating with members of your church and then leave the scheduling up to them.
When delegating your social media manager, you also want to make sure that they are clear on exactly what is expected of them. You want to find someone who is willing to answer questions and get them to post a response time.
Finally, find someone with experience in this field and someone who is not afraid of meeting with you in person if necessary. If you are not in a very large church, then it is important that the social media manager is willing to meet in person or at the very least, have a few phone meetings. You will want to make sure that they understand the role and know exactly what you expect of them.
