Everything you need at http://www.hybridministry.xyz
Follow Along on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9pjecCnd8FVFCenWharf2g
Or on TikTok at: http://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick
Hybrid Ministry Discussion on the Barna E-Book Episode: https://www.hybridministry.xyz/006

TIMECODES
00:00-01:31 Intro
01:31-08:03 Assumption: Social Media isn't relational
08:03-15:13 Let's define Hybrid Ministry
15:13-17:24 How are real relationships hybrid?
17:24-20:00 The Best Hybrid versions in our culture
20:00-31:48 The Best Hybrid Ideas for Churches in 2023
31:48-33:00 Outro

TRANSCRIPT
Nick Clason (00:03):
Well, what is up everybody? Welcome to another episode of the Hybrid Ministry podcast, and now on YouTube. Excited to be with you all. We're gonna test out a couple of video options here. See how these go. I know it'll go fine. Mostly I'm testing to see how much extra work it's gonna be. But, um, would love to have you join us over there if you want to check out for video stream as well. Something that is just another option. So we have audio, we have video but everything, the home base for it is http://hybridministry.xyz of course, cuz hybrid ministry.com was taken. So I'm your host, Nick Clason, excited to be with you. And in today's episode, what I actually wanted to discuss was this idea of why should churches even care about digital and hybrid ministry? Like what is the purpose?

Nick Clason (01:03):
We all saw the pitfalls downfalls and the reasons why digital ministry was not a good example. It was not a good thing during Covid. And so we are now past Covid. We're able to live in a more semi-normal world. Why in the world should churches even care about digital? So let's go ahead and let's get this episode underway. So let's talk about some assumptions, right? Like, I think that there are some general social media specific assumptions that say that social media is void of relationship, right? Like, the point of it is, I, I I don't know, right? Like the point of it is maybe to post some announcements and try and drum up some external, some marketing, so to speak, uh, examples of people who might not go to our church and we want to get them connected to our church.

Nick Clason (02:08):
But there's an assumption that like the real, the main thing that's gonna work is gonna be relationships of people to people inviting one another. Let me just say that, um, I've been doing student ministry social media now for 12 years, and never once has anyone of the accounts that I've ever run really gone viral, so to speak. Like we've never had more than like an inordinate amount of followers, never had more like a thousand followers. I have had a couple Instagram accounts with more than a thousand followers, but honestly like, that was not from anything that I, or we were doing. That was more an inherited thing where the Instagram account already had a high level of followers and we were just sort of like the beneficiaries of that account already having a lot of followers. So my point is nothing we did really drummed up a lot of outside interest.

Nick Clason (03:03):
Okay. And so this assumption that social media is not relationship based and you know, the purpose of it is to, you know, get people from the outside looking in. Yeah, I mean, yeah, that is, I think that's, I think that's a benefit. I think that, um, like we said in the last episode, the church is in a unique intersection where what you post can be both discovered by the people that go to your church, but also because of the new discovery algorithms, which this is probably why in my 12 years we haven't seen this, because these new algorithms that are being made famous by TikTok and then adopted by Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube on reels and shorts are, um, new. Like this is a new territory for churches because previously your people followed your pages and your accounts, and if you wanted more people to follow it, you had to pay for it.

Nick Clason (03:52):
And I've, I have never done that. And so my accounts never really did that, where there were like a lot of people coming to discover our accounts. And so now we are in a unique intersection where people might actually discover your church. And what's more interesting is that all of these algorithms, there's a uniqueness where they start out geographically local. So first the algorithm from what we've learned is they're pumped out to your followers, which are then pumped out to their followers, which are then pumped out to the, uh, like your geographical region, which is why a lot of times you can geotag your posts on Instagram, on TikTok, and so you can put your city, and so the people in your city might be exposed to your information first, and then beyond that it'll, you know, go to the state and viral and whatever the case might be.

Nick Clason (04:44):
But, but the reality is, the, the closer that you are, the more likely that the people around you are gonna find it. And so therefore, if people in your geographical region are discovering your videos, there is an actual chance that they might hear the message of Jesus from you and then take a step to become a visitor or a first timer at your church. I mean, wouldn't that be amazing? Wouldn't that, wouldn't that be one of the goals that we're looking for here? Um, and again, like I said, I haven't experienced that in a lot of cases, and I think that's because that really wasn't an option up here until very recently. Um, however, there's still the argument that like, no one's gonna come to our church based off of that. And that might be true. And I think that it depends on your style of church, if you're, um, a more of an outreach centric church that you want that.

Nick Clason (05:34):
And so you're gonna be more gung-ho about this idea. And if you're more of a discipleship centric church, which tends to be a little more inward facing, um, not because you believe that that's more valuable and more important, but that just tends to be the vibe, um, that comes with it, then you are gonna prioritize some of those relationships more over, um, like, like cold leads or, or, you know, top of a funnel marketing type of terminology to borrow from the secular world. So, um, all that to be said, there's this assumption, there's this notion that social media, um, and social ministry is void of real relationships. And I would just, I would debunk that and say that I think that that's not entirely true. Um, I agree to a point that it can be done that way and, um, that, that this ministry, that this focus in your church needs some very particular and very, um, deliberate attention.

Nick Clason (06:34):
Like it cannot just, in my personal opinion, it cannot be put on autopilot anymore. It cannot be put on the back burner. There needs to be a person more than a volunteer and more than someone's like, uh, section of their full-time hours devoted to social media. Like you probably need a full-on person, um, not someone to do double duty. Like, like even right now, um, I am a youth pastor, but I'm like on a team of three and of the three, I'm the one tasked with digital and video and social media, website, whatever, right? Like that in and of itself is a full-time job. And sometimes my youth ministry duties have actually, like, you know, this week I had to make calls to interview students about baptism, um, and we're onboarding a bunch of new students to volunteer. Like sometimes those things feel like they're in the way of my digital stuff and that, that's out of balance for me personally.

Nick Clason (07:34):
Um, but that's my point in saying that this digital of it's all consuming, it just takes up such a gigantic portion and it it is vast and it is huge. And, um, and there's a lot of opportunity and there's a lot of potential. And so to just dump it on someone as like a, hey, 10 hours of your week, like it's, that is so hard. It's gonna be very difficult for that person to be able to, you know, to make, to make, uh, that 10 hours work for them the way that you're probably hoping that it would work. So in Covid, right, we learned that we're not built to be completely isolated. And so just social, um, and that's, that's the whole, that's the whole origin of this podcast is I felt like we were debating, um, when I started this podcast in late 2022, I guess mid 2022, um, we were debating between in-person ministry and digital ministry, especially where I was, we had, we were still working and operating out of a lot of the rules that we had built for C O V with the show that we had made for C O V D.

Nick Clason (08:38):
Like, we hadn't let that go. We were still producing it weekly. Um, and we had found a way to pivot from strictly online to a more in-person model where groups watched it in host homes. Um, and then they discussed the, the message afterwards. And I thought it was incredibly ingenious and innovative. Um, but there were a lot of people in our church that that didn't, and they were ready to just quote unquote go back. And, you know, we had a, a marketing guy, and if you listen to some of our first, I think like seven episodes, um, Matt was actually the co-host of this podcast. Uh, we both made cross-country moves. And, um, I, I don't know what happened to him. I never got him back, really. I mean, we still talk, but he would keep saying like, yeah, yeah, I just gotta get my computer set up, gotta get my computer set up.

Nick Clason (09:22):
And eventually I was like, all right, Matt's not getting his computer set up. I'm just, I I got a produce weekly episode, so I can't wait on him anymore, right? So, uh, here we are and I'm just kinda doing this thing. Anyway, besides point Matt marketing, honestly, genius guru in my opinion. He said, the world we live in is now hybrid. In fact, Barna did a study, we did a couple episodes on it, I'll link to them in the show notes, um, did a couple episodes on the findings that we found from Barna study, and they, they titled it the, the state of hybrid church or something like that. And what it said, what it found was that especially the younger generations, the generations that are going to be filling our pews and churches here in the next couple years, gen Z and millennials said a hybrid, um, version of church is going to suit them very well.

Nick Clason (10:11):
What that often scares us with on two fronts is, number one, it feels like we're shifting away from in person. And I think a lot of times in person, and I've talked about this multiple times, I think a lot of times in person, room or moment or feeling is for the, the vanity of the pastor, and not even in like a sinful or bad way, but just like, man, getting up in front of a room full of people feels really good and you feel like you feel like you've done something and you've been somewhere and there's, there's a shot of like adrenaline into your like arm every time you get up there to preach. Even I, I find myself like finding more value from preaching to a live room of, of humans with interaction, um, like just, you know, face-to-face interaction. Um, then I, then I do from a, a TikTok video that goes viral wave over like 3000 something views.

Nick Clason (11:02):
Like, it just, it doesn't feel the same. And I get it. And you know what? I don't know that it is the same. I think you have a much more captive audience, even in a room of a few hundred than you do, um, with a, a short form under 62nd video that that has over a thousand something views, right? All that to be said, I'm not proposing that, that you throw one quote unquote baby out with a bathwater. We live in a hybrid world, right? So I found this stat incredibly fascinating. 76% of American surveyed ha uh, have a friend that they've met online only they've never met in person. Right? Now, you might be thinking, how is that possible? Again, if you're older, think younger generations gaming and, and you know, chat rooms and whatever and whatnot. Like of course in the nineties chat rooms were pedophiles want to hang out, and they probably still do, right?

Nick Clason (11:55):
But, but 76% of Americans have a friend in some way, shape or form gaming social media that they've never met in person. Like I have an anecdotal real example. I have a friend named Dan that, um, for the first three to six months of our life, or not life of our relationship life, , uh, it was strictly online. Uh, many of you know I've told this story, but I started at my last church on day one of Covid and went immediately into lockdown. So the number of real live human beings at my church that I met was very, very small. The number of real life human beings that I met on Zoom after that was very, very large. And, um, you know, I had met a decent number of the staff, at least from my interview or on my first day on the job, but then to meet other people.

Nick Clason (12:49):
And Dan was a, just a regular church attender volunteer who led a, a hybrid, not hybrid, actually strictly online small group. I had a relationship with Dan. Um, and, and he even said, he's like, you are like the poster child for me, or the poster example of what it looks like for somebody who, uh, says like, you can't make friends with someone online. He's like, we totally made friends, you know, with each other online. And so these are examples, both empirical data. 76% of Americans say, I have a friend with someone who's completely online. And even in my own life, like I would say I had a real relationship with him, um, it would've been great to be sitting in the same living room or whatever, but at the same time, you know what, every Tuesday night, I just got my laptop out in the comfort of my own home brew, a cup of my own coffee that I personally enjoyed more than like a cake cup that someone was gonna gimme at their house.

Nick Clason (13:49):
And we sat down for small group. And you know, what was funny was like our church would do this thing where like you'd watch the live stream on YouTube, and this was the archetype for our student ministry. The group's team of course, stole it, but we'd watch the video on YouTube, and then everyone would log in to their campus specific zooms via a link in the description, and then a moderator there would break everyone out into breakout rooms. So they would sort of have control over the entire call, and then they would give a warning after like an hour or so that all the groups would, uh, be, be closing down by the moderator who's just literally sitting there out in the waiting room, just kinda waiting for people to be kicked out of their breakout rooms and reassign them or whatever. Super boring job I've done a million times youth ministry.

Nick Clason (14:33):
Uh, so a couple times those ended and we, our entire small group just jumped off and got into our very own room, and had group until like 11 or 12. We weren't, you know, at that point we weren't talking about spiritual stuff. We were just joking around, goofing off, having fun, whatever, right? My point is, relationships can exist in an online space. You just have to be deliberate. You just have to be intentional, and you have to be able, willing, willing to massage those relationships. So let's talk about, um, some hybrid ways that relationships can exist.

Nick Clason (15:14):
So some of you might know this, um, but a couple weeks ago, my, my wife's mom, my mother-in-law, uh, passed away from a two plus year long battle with cancer. It was, it was rough, man, like, not gonna lie, but, um, the thing I wanna kind of extract or highlight is the moment that the day that she passed away and that it became more public because of social media. Again, another example, um, my phone was flooded with text messages. My wife's phone was flooded like threefold, tenfold with text messages. Um, every single one of those people were people that we had met in person at one moment in time or another, whether they be a family member, whether they'd be a friend, whether they'd be a former colleague or work associate from another job that we'd been at. They'd all been people we'd met in real life person before.

Nick Clason (16:12):
However, the relationship at that moment existed in a hybrid space. Very few people in that exact moment were with us. I mean, I, I had to drive from Texas all the way back to Ohio, so the only people with me were me and my two kids. Um, and her, she was with her sister and with some family friends, and then everybody else reached out and provided love and care and support via text message that that is an example of a hybrid relationship. You know what I mean? Um, and, and some people were people that I work with now at the church I'm at at now. Other people were people I worked, worked with in the past that reached out either way, right? Like they're all people I knew, but they're all showing up for me in a hybrid way. So, uh, I wanna talk about a few, uh, examples of like other businesses that we might interact with in the world in with hybrid sort of interactions.

Nick Clason (17:22):
Let's dive in examples of real life hybrid interactions. My favorite of this is Home Depot, right? I interact with Home Depot at the store level. I drive up, I go into the store, I grab 98 cents of plumbing tape, right? Uh, that's an example of me interacting with Home Depot at a physical level. Okay? All right. So another example of course is me interacting with Home Depot at an online level. I might go on the website and I might see how much of a certain item is in stock that, but I'm not in the store. I'm completely in my house. I'm looking at all my computer on the app, but the, the app actually is my favorite feature. When I'm in the store. I almost never, like, if I walk around in the store for like more than two minutes and I can't figure out where an item might be, I immediately pull up the app, which often I've uninstalled from my phone, so I reinstall it.

Nick Clason (18:25):
Then I like, almost, the first thing I do when I walk into Home Depot is begin to reinstall the Home Depot app, find my local Home Depot, the one I'm physically standing in, and then I look that item up, whatever it is, to try and find it, and then it'll tell me exactly where it is, what aisle, what bay, and how many more they have in stock. I love that feature. That's hybrid. I'm in person, I'm in the store, but I'm interacting with a digital piece of technology, uh, you know, for my relationship with Home Depot. Another o another example is a dentist office, right? You go to a physical visit. But I love when a service like this has a great website, especially for being able to book appointments or being able to reach out. This last week, I brought my car to an auto mechanic shop.

Nick Clason (19:13):
I called them, not there, called them, right? That's an example of me from my house calling them. That's old school technology. You get it right? Then I show up, I'm in their office. But then when I was done, you know what they did? They sent me a text message to let me know that my car was ready. You see all these things, and I, I think like in a lot of ways, like when we talk about digitization or hybridization of church and of ministry, we don't even know what that looks like. So right now, in a lot of ways that's social media, that's video content, but the reality is like, some of this is uncharted territory. So for 2023, for right now, for someone just starting out, what are some examples? What are some ways that your church can live and exist in hybrid ministry?

Nick Clason (20:01):
All right, so like I said, I think a little bit of this is like pioneering uncharted territory, pilgrim's progress. Like, we don't know some of these answers, but, um, what are some examples of ways that your church can, uh, live and and be hybrid? So the first one is probably the most obvious one, and probably the easiest one, I would say is your Sunday sermon. Okay? So what are ways that your Sunday sermon can exist in a hybrid space? Well, first and foremost, right? You can, while someone is sitting in the auditorium, they can interact with and engage with your sermon notes, or they can interact and engage with, um, some self-guided like outlines or ways for them to take notes. So, like in my church, my pastor puts his notes on our church app. Um, it's honestly, it's essentially probably the manuscript that he's up there preaching with as I've looked at it.

Nick Clason (20:58):
Like, it's very thorough. Um, and my guess is that that's like a, that's a workload decision, right? Like he already built this. So if he just copy, if, if they or someone just copy and paste and put this into the app, uh, that's not that much more work for him. My personal favorite example is the you version events feature. So in everyone's you version Bible app that most people have downloaded on their phones, if not, definitely recommend it. Cause again, it's another way to interact with people in a hybrid way. Um, there's an events tab that you can create, like a self-guided sort of outline, and then people can, can take and add notes to certain headers or certain bible verses, um, that, that are related to or interact with the passage. And then they can also link out to like videos or other, like further discussions.

Nick Clason (21:51):
One of the things I try to do is I try to challenge myself to add one option of a, a link out from a u version event for deeper study or for more information, or for a longer YouTube video that I didn't, you know, didn't have time to show or didn't have time to look like fully, you know, unpack. I try to challenge myself to do that every week. Again, to just think hybrid, right? Brady Shearer has made this phrase famous, but the other, the additional 167 hours of somebody's week. So then beyond that moment, beyond that Sunday service, um, you can of course rip out the audio. Um, if you're already live streaming, um, you can have live stream, you can post those videos to YouTube. You can, uh, long form podcast content on a podcast feed. That's a way for it to be hybrid.

Nick Clason (22:45):
And then finally, ways for that to live on and, and find its way into that, that intersection of your church, people being reminded of the message and people from outside your church may be discovering and stumbling upon your message are short form Instagram reels, TikTok videos, YouTube shorts. Um, if you're already live streaming your content, you're sitting on a goldmine of social media content. You don't have to, uh, come up with as much social media content as you did in the past. You already have it. You have the short, or you have the long form video. Clip it up into minute segments. Find a good hook, get a good editor. And, uh, hey, if you don't have a good editor, but you're interested in it, reach out. Um, I'm interested in, uh, starting something, you know, kind on the side for myself to be doing this and serving churches in that, that way.

Nick Clason (23:38):
Um, I don't exactly have a framework for that or what that looks like. Hit me up on dms, on TikTok, or, you know, reach out to me via YouTube, all those links in the show notes@hybridministry.xyz. What about groups? What about relationships? How do you hybridize relationships, right? Because that's sort of the basis for this whole thing, is that social isn't, isn't built on relationships. And I would agree with that in the nitty gritty. Like when, you know, when my mother-in-law passes away, I want someone to really show up for me or really call me or really, you know, text me, um, not just, you know, interact with them at a, at a digital or social social media type level, right? But for a lot of people, the discovering of groups or finding their place or finding their people, that's half of the battle. And so if your church does not have some sort of group finder, I, I would highly recommend doing that.

Nick Clason (24:36):
If your church is about groups in some way, shape, or form that are open that people opt themselves into, then get yourself a group finder, a catalog, if you will, of the options available at your church for people to find and discover real authentic community. Because you and I know that community is really what changes things. It's what takes a church from their church to my church. So get on a group finder of some way, shape, or form. And then once you're in those groups, here are other ways that, that those groups exist and live in a hybrid sort of sense. You might use a infrastructure like Facebook group, you might use a GroupMe, you might use a group chat, or you might use some other tool feature that someone's gonna develop down the road. Maybe I'll do it and get rich, I don't know.

Nick Clason (25:23):
But, um, for the groups to have some sort of calendar of events, a place for them to have message boards with announcements, um, text messages to interact back and forth, prayer requests, all kinds of different stuff, but a place for the group to live beyond when the group meets, right? Again, the other 167 hours of that group's relationship. When is that? Where is that? When does that take place? The last area, so we talked about sermons, we talked about relationships. Now let's talk about information. You know, uh, churches more than just information people are distilled down to more than just the information that they, uh, put into their brains, okay? But like another example of ways that, that things can exist in a hybrid sort of way is some classes. So you already have your Sunday morning service. You probably already have groups. People probably can't devote too many more hours to the church, but maybe they do want to grow.

Nick Clason (26:24):
Maybe they want to grow in their knowledge of theology, or maybe they want to grow in, in a specific topic. Um, a dating marriage, right? Whatever the case might be. Your church with the 40 hours a week in your office can film some content and, and put up a catalog or a library of courses, like on a website or on an app, six week course, eight week course, something like that. So again, if someone's really committed, they may not have the time to drive back over to your church and sit through a class, find childcare, all the things. But once the kids go to bed, if they wanna pull up in their laptop and learn more, grow more in the area of theology, love, dating, marriage, spiritual gifts, right? Like you name it, you can offer a library of some of those content. I mean, products already sort of exist for that right now for churches, right now.

Nick Clason (27:14):
Media is an example of it. Um, but again, I've found that to be more small groupy content. So you can create something, you, if there's a need, you can scratch that itch, a leadership type academy. And you might even have like a leadership academy for high level leaders in your, in your, um, organization in your church that come together every so often in person. But then after they come together, if the primary goal of it is, is information and knowledge, um, and then, and information transfer, you can accomplish that for sure. You can accomplish that in a hybrid sort of way. Um, more than just short form video sermon content. You can provide short form, social media, TikTok, YouTube type content. Um, like about any topic right now, I'm doing like a little bit of a theology 1 0 1, like a deep dive into like certain areas and elements.

Nick Clason (28:06):
Um, and I'm putting posting on TikTok two times a week. It's a little mini-series that people probably just like randomly scrolling through, aren't gonna notice that they're all like interwoven and connected together. But in my mind they are. And so anyone who sees it, they're, they're gonna learn something more about God or about Jesus, or about creation or about salvation, or about the Holy Spirit or whatever the case might be. Um, because I don't have time to always get into all that, right? Like whatever our series is that's sort of driving and dictating, um, what's, what's being taught from the platform. But there are other necessary things that I think people, my students need to know that I don't have time for it, but this is a way that I can create time for it in the other hours of the week. Um, there are also examples and ways to do longform, you know, uh, styles not just short form.

Nick Clason (28:57):
So audio podcasts are huge. A lot of adults, something like 80 something percent of adults listen to three hours of podcasts a week. So, um, I think, um, Mariners, like Eric Geiger out of Mariners is doing a phenomenal job because the thing I love about him is he's conservative theologically for sure. Um, and so he's not just like out there trying to like get vanity metrics or whatever, right? But the thing he's doing is he's, he's finding ways to use the technology to teach deeper, more robust, you know, truth. And so he's doing a thing like, uh, a podcast called like the, the things that didn't make it into the sermon. Basically, if you're a pastor and you've done this before, you know that you, you prepare a load of content, but then you have to start cutting to get it down to a certain minute mark, right?

Nick Clason (29:46):
So he's doing a podcast on all the things he had to cut from his sermon, um, once a week to just dive deeper into more information. Um, and I, I think that that's brilliant. You know, I think that's a brilliant way, uh, to just add more value to the, the people in your church's, you know, life. Um, and if they're interested in it, that's great. A couple years ago, we, back when Facebook Live was a really big thing, me and another pastor on my staff, we sat, sat down for a thing called Tuesdays at two, and we just, uh, unpacked the sermon from sort of our eyes and our, our vantage point, you know? Um, and we would just have a conversation, um, as sort of interview style. And I mean, he was a licensed biblical counselor, so, uh, he was just a wealth of knowledge.

Nick Clason (30:31):
And so I, I almost operated more like as the host, and I would just toss him questions and let him sort of like unpack and untangle, you know, take the, the theology or the, the preaching and, and bring it down to more of like a boots on the ground level. At least. At least that was the goal. So all kinds of like ideas out there of ways that you can service and serve your congregation in a hybrid sort of way that is not void of relationship, that is meaningful and that people in your church will take advantage of. You just have to think hybrid. So I'd encourage you lean into it. Like I said, we're on the, a little bit the pioneering front because we had solutions for digital pre covid. It was mostly live streaming your service. Then in C O V I D, we all went full bore into it, and it was uncomfortable and unfamiliar.

Nick Clason (31:24):
Um, and so once restrictions lifted, we went back to what was familiar. Many of us went back to what was familiar, and I'll just encourage you to not abandon some of those things, but, but listen for and look for ways that you can show up in the other hours of your church members weeks. Those are gonna be what's important and valuable to them. Well, hey everyone, if you found this, uh, podcast helpful, please share it with a friend. Help us get the word out, http://hybridministry.xyz. We provide complete full show transcripts for every single episode that we've ever produced. Also, head to the blog section of that and you can grab our free social media checklist, what to do every time you post a social media, and our free complete guide to posting a TikTok from scratch, from start to finish. That is on there. And again, we are on YouTube now at this episode being the first one. Hey, to everyone on YouTube, check that out if you will get a link for that as in the show notes. And until next time, talk to y'all later. Stay hybrid.

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TIMECODES
00:00-00:32 Intro
00:32-03:23 The Church has the Advantage on Social Media in 2023
03:23-05:50 The History of Social Media
05:50-06:50 The Stars have aligned in 2023 for churches on social media
06:50-09:53 - Advantage #1: Content Creation is at the Core of a Church's Weekly Work Routine
09:53-12:51 - Advantage #2: Content Creation is at the Core of the Senior Leader's weekly job
12:51-19:05 - Advantage #3: Content Creation, and the sharing of it, hits at a preferred intersection for churches
19:05-20:52 - Outro

TRANSCRIPT
Nick Clason (00:01):
What is up, everybody? Welcome back to another episode of the Hybrid Ministry podcast. I, as always, am your host, Nick Clason. Excited to be with you wherever you are. Listen, I was gonna stay excited to be with you on this morning. I just got done with a little morning run, drinking a little morning coffee. Uh, but you might be listening to me in the evening. You might be listening to me while you're doing dishes. You, you also might be listening to me on run, wherever you are listening, said to have you with us, uh, this morning. Today, I wanted to talk about the three distinct advantages that churches have on social media in 2023. If you are anything like me, uh, the people that you follow, the algorithms that you're in especially if you've listened to the Pro Church tools or anything that Brady Shearer produces.

Nick Clason (00:52):
You have heard this before but in the event that you're not and I have some unique twists to it as well. I just think that wherever, wherever you are, wherever your role is, whether if you're like a ministry leader, a, a student pastor, a senior pastor, a church marketing person, a church communications person, whatever your role is, I think it's important to note that the church today in 2023 has a distinct advantage on social media, an advantage that they haven't had in, I would say, years. Um, in all my entire time as, um, a church leader, a pastor, youth pastor, I've never experienced or noticed an advantage much like what we have today. So, um, I'm excited to share that with you Before we dive in. Um, anything that you need show wise, you can head to hybrid ministry.xyz. Um, if you click on the, uh, articles or the blog section there of the website, that is where you can access our completely 100% free ebook and our 100% free checklist signing up for either one of those will get both of those resources into your inbox automatically for free.

Nick Clason (02:03):
So go check those out. We would love to have you there. And if you didn't know this, every single episode that we have, uh, has transcripts and is, um, put on, on the website into every episode's archive. And so that is a just completely 100% free resource that we make available to you so that you can go back and not have to listen back through, but you can read through. Um, and let me just warn you that because, uh, this podcast is still, you know, I'm still not making money on it. It's something that I am paying for out of my pocket. I have not, I have not paid Rev, who I use rev.com. I've not paid them to do the human transcription. Yep. So I'm still doing ai. Uh, so even sometimes I go back to my own archives to look for things, but, uh, sometimes it's a little bit hard to muddle through because it's AI transcribed.

Nick Clason (02:53):
So sorry for that. If you're out there, sponsor us, and, um, maybe we'll start springing for the human transcription so it's got a little bit more level of accuracy. Um, but hey, uh, head to the show notes for anything that we mentioned today. Um, like I said, grab our free ebook on, have I already ruined my TikTok account? A complete Guide to Posting a TikTok from Scratch. 100%. All that being said, let's dive in the three distinct advantages that churches have on social media in 2023. Let's go. All right, so 2023 social media. Here we are. Let's think about it. The church has a distinct advantage, one that they have not seen in a lifetime. I think of a lot of social media. So, um, social media historically has been a social platform, right? That's where the, the term social comes from, because humans are connecting one-on-one with other people on the other side of the screen.

Nick Clason (03:45):
So think Facebook started as a college, uh, on a college campus so that people could get to know one another, that they maybe haven't met people that they recognize by face. So it's very, uh, it was very built as a, uh, human to human connection sort of portal. But over time, it's evolved and it's become sort of like an, an online photo album. Different social platforms have taken on different life forms, Twitter, sort of like a micro blogging, uh, place to kind of like listen and look at things live. Like I, I use Twitter a lot for sports. Instagram was a photo sharing app. Um, and you could, you know, at its inception, you could only share one photo and it could only be Square. And so, um, part of the problem was that Facebook would, would really recommend you creating like, full online albums, like share your entire trip to Brazil with us, where Instagram is like, share the best photo from your trip to Brazil.

Nick Clason (04:36):
And then Twitter was like, while you're there, live tweet, right? So all of those had u had unique and completely different, um, purposes. Then throw in YouTube, which is the second largest search engine in the world. Some would say three behind Google images, but either way, they're all under the Google umbrella. So, um, Instagram, or I'm sorry, YouTube being a search engine, um, and long form video, that's a completely separate piece and style of content that is needed from Facebook, from Instagram, from Twitter. And then, oh, by the way, here, bursting on the scene is this brand new thing called TikTok, short form video, where people just do dances and goofy silly stuff. So what are we supposed to do with that? So you got photo albums, you got groups and pages over on Facebook. You got micro blogging and live tweeting things. You got Instagram, single photo sharing apps, eventually stories added in.

Nick Clason (05:31):
And then you got YouTube long form video, and they're all different. And so if you're a church leader, and if you're like the senior pastor and you're also keeping your social media afloat, you're just doing whatever it takes to like serve each of the platforms at its bare minimum. But now in this weird aligning of stars in 2023, I would say, because of the, um, prominence and popularity of TikTok, churches have a unique and distinct advantage that they have not had in years. And that is this short form vertical video content is now being pushed across all of the major platforms. Yes, Facebook, yes, Instagram, yes, YouTube, and obviously yes, TikTok. So your core four, your main four players that I would recommend that you as a church be active on, on social media. You can have all four accounts, and better yet, you can post to all four accounts, the exact same piece of content across all four accounts.

Nick Clason (06:37):
And for the first time ever, you're not dinged. In fact, you're encouraged to do that. So let's take a look at reason number one, why the church has a distinct advantage on social media in 2023. So, advantage number one is that content creation is at the core of what a church's weekly work rhythm is. So think about this, your church every single week hosts a gathering where a piece of content is delivered to a group of people. Um, think like, and that is an, that is an amazing advantage that most people don't have, because most, if you're a plumber or if you're an auto mechanic, or if you are a big box store retailer, right? You also want to be on social media. It's part of marketing, it's a part of driving up business and getting clientele and people discovering you. But what in the heck is a plumber or what is a big box store retailer?

Nick Clason (07:39):
Or what is a, um, auto mechanic? What are they doing every single day? They're fixing leaky drains. They're selling things to people as cashiers at Walmart. They're, they're, they're, uh, they're fixing people's cars, timing belts, right? That's what the primary like, focus of their work is. And so if an auto mechanic wants to be active and vibrant and relevant on social media, that auto mechanic is going to probably either a, take his phone with him under the car and do some tutorial videos or something like that. But if that auto mechanic is any good, he's probably really busy and he has, doesn't have time to be posting, editing, putting captions over, you know, screens. So then what does an auto mechanic do? He hires his young Gen z uh, nephew to come in and run social media, but that nephew has never touched a car before.

Nick Clason (08:30):
And so that nephew is just trying to like, keep their Instagram feed posted, um, and keep it active and with like, graphics and things like that, okay? The point is, an auto mechanic is not in the business of content creation. Neither is a plumber, neither is a store. Now, the really good ones are, right? And those are the ones that you probably watch. You have a leaky drain, you go on YouTube or you go on YouTube shorts, you're gonna find a plumber who's done a tutorial that's a really good plumber who's creating some content. But the reality is not a hundred percent of plumbers are doing that. Not a hundred percent of businesses are doing that. Not a hundred percent of auto mechanics are doing that. The church weekly 52, sometimes 51 weeks a year. Cause some churches take that week between Christmas and New Year's and doing online only service, but even still, they're creating content.

Nick Clason (09:16):
So go, I digress back to 52, 52 weeks a year, 52 times in a year, you are creating content to be delivered to somebody that is age old, that has been a part of what the church has done for decades, centuries. Um, the, so the reality is this, right? The reality is that, um, short form video content loves content, loves created, custom curated content, and the church has a unique advantage because it already is creating that content within the rhythm of what it does. Okay? Advantage number two. So not only is content creation at the core of the church's weekly work rhythm, but content creation is at the core of what the senior leadership does within the organization. Let's go back to our plumber or automechanic mechanic analogy. Usually the head, the CEO of the business is not the content creator. So if you as a plumber wanna have a popin TikTok account, you probably have to hire somebody who's good at marketing to create a Popin TikTok account.

Nick Clason (10:27):
If you as a auto mechanic wanna have a Popin TikTok account, you gotta bring in your nephew, okay? Now, maybe your senior pastor isn't very tech savvy. Maybe your senior pastor isn't even very active on social media. But what your senior pastor does is your senior pastor sits down and weekly writes up content. And so the head, the most, um, the, the best figurehead of your entire organization is standing up and presenting a prepared piece of content weekly. We already, we already talked about that, right? But it comes from the very tippy top of your organization. So if you were to bring in your nephew and an auto mechanic shop, the nephew's like, Hey, you should do some tutorial videos. I would imagine the auto mechanics like, bro, I don't have time for that. I get outta here with your newf fangled social media, TikTok video, things like, I, I can't go under the hood with a phone.

Nick Clason (11:26):
I, I don't even know how to work this thing, right? That's the difference. The senior pastor gets up weekly to prepare or to present prepared content to a group of people, to a room full of people. So that bodes well for you. Why does that bode well for you? Because your, your, uh, social media accounts on your, on, um, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, whatever, people probably follow your church because they go to your church. And so therefore, when they see your senior pastor on a video, that's a very recognizable face that's much more recognizable than your church communications person. No offense, that's you watching this, or your digital marketing specialist. Again, no offense if that's you watching this, or even your youth pastor who you handed your phone to and said, Hey, please keep us relevant on social media. They may see the youth pastor preach 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 times a year, but they see the senior pastor preach almost weekly.

Nick Clason (12:21):
And so when they're scrolling through a feed and they see the senior pastor on your social media, he is going to be a very recognizable person. He's also probably your most skilled communicator. So also you can use that to your advantage. Put your most skilled, uh, oral, um, person, oral, uh, presenter out there for the, for both your church people to see, but also for other people to see, which leads us to our third distinct advantage for churches advantage. Number three is that content creation and the sharing of that created content hits at a unique intersection of what most churches are looking to do. So what are most churches looking to do? Well, you can go back to Matthew chapter 28, verse 18 through 20. Jesus says, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you.

Nick Clason (13:23):
And surely I am with you always, even to the very end of the age, baked within the great commission, we find something that comes from the greatest commandment. Matthew chapter 22, where Jesus says you are to number one, love the Lord your God with your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And second, love your neighbor as yourself. What is the church meant to do? The church is meant to help people learn the ways, the methods, the mission, the the content, the character, the competencies of Jesus to adopt those things. So for believers to grow more and more into the image and likeness of Jesus. And also the church is meant to go to make disciples, to reach out beyond our walls, to share and show the love of Jesus. And short form, vertical video content hits at the intersection where both your church people are, and people outside of your walls are living.

Nick Clason (14:19):
And so both are scrolling through social media, both are scrolling through some sort of discovery algorithm on one of the four core social media platforms, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, or TikTok. And boom, they're stopped with an inspirational message because it's a weekly thing curated by your senior leadership. And now they are stopping, scrolling and looking at a video and being encouraged, equipped, and discipled. All right, so now what? So with these three distinct advantages, now, what does this mean for you? Well, you might be watching this and you might be, um, a church leader who doesn't have any time to really do anything about that. You might be a, uh, marketing manager and you can't get your senior pastor to let you onto these platforms. So the first thing you need to do is you need to, uh, use a little bit of persuasion maybe, and show some analytics about the popularity of these discovery algorithm, um, apps, and the fact that every single social media platform is pushing and highlighting and promoting this type of content.

Nick Clason (15:21):
The other thing, if you're already live streaming your service, which Covid brought most people into that, um, then take clips, then watch through your sermon and, and take some clips and watch through them. If you are interested in, um, looking through some examples of ones that I have done in my own ministry and for other ministries of places that I am in partnership with, uh, hit me up, reach out to me. Um, you can DM me on Instagram at Clason nick or on TikTok at Clason nick to see some of those examples. Uh, but be looking through your live stream messages to, um, find two or three different clips that you can post and promote a week. Now, what if you're not live streaming? What do you do? Well, you can go back to another episode. I'll drop the, the episode link in the show notes.

Nick Clason (16:08):
But I gave my complete custom setup for it, creating YouTube content for churches on a budget. And the primary thing that I, I recommend is that I recommend that you, uh, pre film your talks. So I'll give you an example. I'm a youth pastor in a, a church with a fairly large auditorium, but we, the auditorium that I'm in is not the main auditorium. So we don't have all the bells and whistles to do a live stream. And so instead of us trying to jimmy rig a phone in the back or figure out a way to like drop $50,000 to retrofit our auditorium, uh, to do a good live stream, I take my camera on my phone, prop it up on a tripod and fill myself or any one of the other people on our team before we deliver the message live on a Wednesday.

Nick Clason (16:53):
So we use that to post on YouTube, and then we go back to that content to edit and, and clip out the things. So the other things that you need to be doing, um, as you're listening to sermons, is you wanna be listening to things that are good hooks. Uh, so yesterday I was sitting in a sermon, I was sitting in my, my church's sermon, um, and I heard my pastor give this analogy, this five finger analogy of how to learn and, and know and memorize God's word better. And I thought, boom, that's an amazing reel. So I'm gonna go find it and I'm gonna clip it up. Um, and so if you're interested in that, head to my TikTok or head to, uh, my Instagram to check out example of that or just DM me for the link, I'll show it to you Again, that's Instagram, TikTok.

Nick Clason (17:33):
Um, and my handle is at Clason, c l a s o n, Nick, n i c k. So, um, and then, uh, hone your editing skills. Here's the beautiful thing. If you don't have the, the best software to do it on a computer, you can do most of it on the TikTok app. So you can bring clips into your TikTok app and use the studio, uh, feature to edit that. Again, if you don't know how to do it. If you've never opened TikTok before and you're like, what in the world am I looking at? Head to the link in my show notes and grab our free ebook on how to edit and post a TikTok completely from start to finish. It will show you how to use the studio feature in TikTok, how to edit and how to, um, create clips that matter, that grab people's attention.

Nick Clason (18:22):
Um, and that stop the scroll. The biggest thing you're looking for when you're clipping things up is not just to put little clips of your pastor out there, but you're looking to find a good hook. And either your pastor says a hook creates a good hook in his talking, or if he doesn't, you can use that, that famous voiceover feature and say, um, you know, using like the AI auto sound thing, this is like five ways to memorize and learn scripture. Cuz I don't know that my pastor gave a good hook for that. So I'll do that, probably voiceover effect and then boom, I'll clip his thing up and I mean, he took probably five minutes on it and I'm gonna clip it down into under 60 seconds. So I'm just gonna make it quick, quick cuts fast, uh, memorable, and boom, it's gonna be out there.

Nick Clason (19:05):
So if you found this helpful, glad you're here. Thanks for jumping in. Listen, you have the message and hope that is available to the entire world. So don't be afraid or ashamed or shy to share it. Use social media. Um, lean in to hybrid to get the message of God's people out there, both to remind and remember, um, or to remind your disciples, the people in your congregation about the message from Sunday to be encouraged throughout the week, to continue to take steps more and more in their faith, to look more and more like Jesus and to reach those around us who maybe have not yet found the hope of Jesus, but can find that through the body and work of a local church. And you are directly in the intersection of that. Whatever your role is, pastor, youth pastor, digital specialist, church communications person, excited to have you with us on the journey.

Nick Clason (20:02):
We clip up little, uh, clips of these every single episode and drop 'em onto my personal TikTok at Cliff and Nicki can grab the link there in the show notes. Uh, we will have transcripts for this episode at http://hybridministry.xyz wherever you listen to this on whatever podcast platform catcher. Glad to have you with us. Glad you're listening in your ear holes. If you found this helpful, would you rate it, leave a comment, and maybe share with the, so that they also can, uh, learn about the importance people around. And we will talk to you next time. Stay Hybrid.

Follow along at http://hybridministry.xyz
Or come hang out on Twitter at http://twitter.com/hybridministry

TIMECODES
00:00-04:34 - Intro
04:34-13:07 - Why Email and Social may not satisfy the on demand world we live in.
13:07-18:39 - Is Social Media worth it in your church?
18:39-27:09 - Big Events are for the Ego of the Pastor, not the People
27:09-27:50 - Outro

SHOWNOTES
http://Nucleus.Church

TRANSCRIPT
Nick Clason (00:00):
What up everybody? And welcome to another episode of the Hybrid Ministry podcast. I am your host, Nick Clason, this morning solo pod from my new house in Dallas, Texas, and my guest bedroom closet because, uh, none of my stuff is in the house yet. And so every single place I go is gonna be echoy and the least echoy place is the guest bedroom closet. As best as I can tell, you'll have to let me know, cuz honestly, you're on the hearing side of this. I'm on the talking side of this. And so, uh, this is my best attempt. Um, I've mentioned it in previous episodes, Uh, gonna be a solo pod today. Uh, both me and Matt are actually in the middle of moves. Uh, we, my wife and I, uh, we got a little bit of a jumpstart on him and his wife, and so they, I believe his truck is maybe coming today.

Nick Clason (01:07):
Um, and so anyway, so today on this episode, I wanted to just chat about a couple of hot takes. Um, three in particular. I wanted to do three hot takes. And number one, I wanted to talk about how we now live in a more on demand world and how social media, um, or email marketing may not be the best way to approach some of that on demand world. Wanted just chat through and brainstorm some stuff with you guys. The second hot take was, um, social media might not actually be worth it, um, in your churches, uh, if you do some of these things I'm gonna talk about. And then number three, I think that big large scale events are actually more for the pastor's ego than for the actual people who are going to be consuming them. So we'll dive into those a little bit, um, here in just a second.

Nick Clason (02:04):
But like I said, uh, just a quick like, update. So when, when we got this sucker up, up and rolling off the ground, I, uh, recorded, uh, pre-recorded five podcasts. And so I had five in the queue before we ever even launched episode one. With all the hustle and bustle moving and just the absolute impossibility has seemed for Matt and I to be able to coordinate our schedules. Um, I am now recording this episode one day before it will release tomorrow, Thursday morning, October 6th. And so, um, I to keep things rolling, to remain consistent, my goal is to give you something every single Thursday morning. Um, it's, it, you know, I'm just letting you know like that. That's sort of why, like, I could wait and Matt and I could get on the same page, but we're gonna miss a couple posts. Um, and so I'm gonna keep bringing you guys some stuff.

Nick Clason (03:02):
Um, and when life settles down for the both of us, we will make this happen. But like I said, I'm on the tail end of a move. Um, my family and I rolled into town last Friday, closed on a house here in, uh, Fort Worth, Texas, uh, to start a new job at church in the DFW metroplex area. Love it. Super excited working with, um, former boss of mine who, uh, so it's, you know, it's a great ex experience, um, and also feels incredibly familiar even though I'm in a new church. I'm in a similar youth ministry environment, so that's really exciting. Um, and then Matt's actually gonna be stepping into a different role as well, and I'll let him talk a little bit more about that. But his first, uh, day on the job is actually gonna be in Spain. And so, uh, who knows, you know, how soon we'll be able to be together on the podcast again.

Nick Clason (03:56):
But our goal is to continue to bring something to y'all, um, and continue to bring both of our voices. I I'm not a gigantic fan of these solo pods. It feels like just a lot of rambling into an empty microphone with very little feedback, pushback, conversation. Um, but I'm gonna do my best in learning and I'm trying to make it something that is gonna be worth everybody's while. So without any anymore explanation for all that, um, I'm just trying to give you a little quick update, some housekeeping stuff. Uh, I wanted to dive into a couple of ideas. So let's go, let's make this happen. All right. Idea number one, we live in an on demand world. So is social media and is email marketing the most effective way to communicate? Think about this. Uh, we live in a Netflix as opposed to a cable TV centric world.

Nick Clason (04:54):
10 years ago, maybe even 15 years ago, the only way to consume your favorite TV show, if you wanted to watch Seinfeld, you had to tune in on Thursday evenings at 8:00 PM I'm not actually sure if that's true or not. Actually, what I do know is true is the Office, right? Every Thursday night, sometime between eight or 9:00 PM I remember, cause I was in college and we didn't, we weren't, um, allowed, We were at a Christian university. We were not allowed to have, uh, televisions in our room. And streaming, um, was available, but it wasn't available until the next day. And so the only way to watch the office at my Christian university was to go find a lounge with a tv. The lounges were allowed to have TVs and cable, uh, or satellite, but none of the rooms were. And so Thursday night was on demand viewing opportunities.

Nick Clason (05:48):
People would come in and flood the lounges. It, there was literally not a seat in the house. If you wanted to sit and watch the office, you had to get there a couple of hours early in the anticipation of it. And you probably had to sit through the NBC Nightly news and you probably had to sit through a couple other sitcoms like community or something like that before the office ever even came on. Now, I compare that to the idea of the way that Disney Plus is releasing things. Like if I wanna watch the newest episode of She Hulk, I can get up at three o'clock in the morning the day that it releases and watch it from the comfort of my own house. But in the fact that I've been moving and traveling and I took my family to Disney World last week, two weeks ago, like, I'm not caught up on She Hulk, but I will, I'll get caught up on it or Stranger Things, right?

Nick Clason (06:38):
When Stranger Things comes out, it is a all day viewing experience. It is an on-demand, it is a binge worthy experience. Uh, so much so that Netflix has recently adjusted the way that they released it. And so they released it now in two different parts. Now, I just wanna think about how that behavior there, the Netflix versus the cable experience, how that behavior has changed the way that we as humans, um, expect to consume content, right? Like, think about it. I, in a Netflix world, I want information when I want it. How many of you in ministry have sent some sort of email newsletter and then you still get the question from a teenager or a parent, Hey, when is the deadline again? And you're like, I communicated this. Like, this has been so clear, This has been so obvious. The reason why I think is when you send it to them, you're sending it to them in a, a cable centric mentality.

Nick Clason (07:47):
Like, I will send you this email every Tuesday at 9:00 AM That's if you are even that discipline, a lot of us, we're not, we're not sending emails with that amount of consistency and regularity, and I don't know that I'm ready to abandon the whole email idea, But what I do know is that we don't live in a cable TV centric world where Thursday night at 8:30 PM is on demand, uh, must watch tv. Very few people live that way. And that's gonna be the same way with your emails. And that's gonna be the same way with your stage announcements. And that's gonna be the same way with your social media announcement posts. And so how do we switch to a more on demand way to consume content or way to find community? Again, I think another beautiful example of this is joining a small group outta church.

Nick Clason (08:44):
I think a lot of churches have the small group process basically be, Hey, if you wanna join a small group, go talk to Carl. And then Carl plays matchmaker. And I like, if I want to sign up for a small group, I wanna just go browse the available options and I wanna sign up for a small group. You may call that consumer of me, but I, I actually appreciate it in and like to anticipate the control or the ability that I have to make that happen on my own. I, I will, if I'm finding a new veterinarian or if I'm finding a new doctor, if I'm finding a new dentist, if I'm finding a new counselor, like I prefer to find those things by going to those people's websites and creating my own appointment. Like one of the things that I absolutely hated, this may be the millennial me, I don't know, but when I was looking for quotes to move, um, I would find these websites and they're like, click through here to get an instant quote.

Nick Clason (09:49):
And I was like, Oh, awesome. And so I put in on my info, you know, four bedroom house, this estimated amount of stuff, whatever. And then they would say, Awesome, your quote is ready. Call one 800, whatever, whatever, whatever, to get your quote. That's not on demand. No, it's not. No. Now I have to talk to a customer service representative. And the problem is that the, when the default is you, hey, you gotta talk to customer service representative. Yes, I'm not trying to hit away from the, uh, talking to other people the importance of that, right? We know that human connection and human conversation is important, but what I am trying to say is we can, we live in a world and we have tools, digital tools and things that can make it possible for people to find those resources and come to that on their own.

Nick Clason (10:41):
So how can we do that in churches? What are ways that we can make that happen? A couple of ideas I have, I talked about this a couple podcasts to go where I said, Hey, here's what I'm pitching for my new church. Um, create a central hub strategy. And I don't wanna take any sort of credit for this. Like Brady Sheer and the guys over at Pro Church Tools, they have been preaching this for years. And they have, they have a website tab, boot nucleus, uh, called nucleus.church, check out their product and you can build your own central hub style website where, and it's a, it's super easy to edit. It's one of my all-time favorite website editors. Uh, but b it looks so good, it's so sleek, it's mobile friendly. Like that is, that is where you can, um, send emails still and send social media things, but you can direct and drive everything back to the website where it's consistent every single time.

Nick Clason (11:33):
And you're saying, Hey, for more information, head to fill in the blank. And that creates, um, that puts the, that puts the onus back on the user. And you're saying, Hey, if you want this information, if you want it on demand, if you wanna watch it like you consume Netflix, here's where to go. And that, what that does then is that makes it the impetus beyond you or on us as the church leaders to make sure that those websites are updated. I think more often than not, the um, the, the website is one of the last things that we think to edit. And I think in this new world that we're moving into, and in this on demand world, websites almost need to be the first thing that we edit. It's interesting, like I said, I'm starting a new job, but with an old boss and just before him and I both left, um, we were both working at, at my last church, I was like, we need to, we need to tighten up the website.

Nick Clason (12:30):
And he said, Ah, I, he's like, I always think of the website as a last, last ditch effort. He's like, But you're right. We need to switch. We need to make that first. And so here we are now in our new gig and he asked me yesterday, What's your, what's your digital strategy? Do you have one? And I said, Yeah, but it's gonna be contingent independent on the website. And you know, if you're a pastor or you work in church ministry, you know how this is, right? And I said, So that, that requires us to have a conversation with communications and get them on the same page cuz we're, we're, uh, dependent upon them to kind of get some of this stuff that we want flushed out, finished out. All right, take number two. Social media is not worth it unless you're willing to try some new things.

Nick Clason (13:22):
I think a lot of churches are just doing social media as an announcement extension. And man, I would just say if that's all you're doing with social media, just keeping the ship afloat, just doing things because it's what you feel like you should do need to do. Everyone else is on social media. They're telling you to do social media, but you're really, you don't have anyone invested in it. You don't have anybody tracking it. You don't have anybody watching the metrics to see what's growing, what needs to be having port gas pour onto it, what needs to be cooled and slowed and changed. Who's watching trends? Who's listening to the Pro Church Tools podcast? Who's listening to the Hybrid Ministry podcast to stay up to date on what's going on on social media and to you, like, as a church, you have to be willing to try things that are gonna be different because social media, digital ministry is a new way to reach people.

Nick Clason (14:19):
And I think it's effective. And so I I would actually push back and say, I do think it's worth it, but I, but the reason I don't think it will be worth it is if you're, if you're just gonna stick it on autopilot. I think there are very few ways to, uh, post and, and do social media type things without, um, being willing to be a mold breaker, without being willing to take some risks, without being willing to rethink some of the old ways of doing things. A lot of the traditional methods on social media are not effective anymore, right? Like when, when right now, um, the entire focus on all of social media is discoverability, right? TikTok brought into this, brought into us this advent of finding content from people that you don't know. And so when people at your church, um, want to follow you or your account, uh, but you're posting reels or tos, things that are needing to be discovered by hopefully them, but also other people, like what are you gonna do?

Nick Clason (15:33):
Like, how, how then what's the call to action out of a real, out of a TikTok, right? Like, and so we gotta figure out as church, um, digital hybrid marketing people what our win is and what the purpose of doing it is, because it is, is just a really bad announcement extension. Like it can be that, but it's gonna be pretty lame and it's gonna be pretty ineffective. And people are really not on social media now. Um, or I, I should, I should watch what I say. I was gonna say, people are not on social media to follow people that they're friends with, and I don't think that's true. Um, but I think that the most popular form of social content right now is to consume videos, short form videos in particular of people that you're not friends with. Like when I'm on TikTok, I spend 95% of my time on the four UAB and I'm only over on the friends tab to clear that pesky red notification.

Nick Clason (16:43):
And then if I'm over there, I might see a video or two of some friends I follow and then I'll, or I'll see a few videos in a row of friends I follow and I'm like, Huh, this is crazy. Or friends I know like my sister and my friend Isaac. Um, and then I'm like, Oh, that's cuz I'm on the friends tab. Of course back over for you, right? Like, I don't know about you, but that's how I am behaving with it. And so I just, what I'm saying with this is, I'm not saying social media's not worth it, but I am saying you gotta be willing to take risks. And I think if you're unwilling to take risks or you don't have somebody who's willing to take risks and, and look at your individual church data, I don't know that it's gonna be worth it.

Nick Clason (17:28):
I don't know that it's gonna yield for you the results that you're looking for. Sure you can post some stuff, you can have some announcement adjacent stuff and you can just do some, you know, Facebook page type things. But, but is it really gonna be worth it? And are we really like gonna see the results that we're looking for? So get out there, break some stuff, stuff, try some stuff, be creative, be willing to take risks and don't put the breaks on your creatives or don't put the breaks on the people who are interested in this because listen, like this avenue in particular is going to be, um, the way and wave of the future and the way that you've been doing church and particularly the way that you've probably been doing social media is not gonna be what's a part of the next wave.

Nick Clason (18:18):
So let somebody who is comfortable with taking risks and comfortable with trying things, let them go fly, try and do some things, um, and don't get stuck in a rut and don't get stuck on autopilot because when you do, that's when things become far less, uh, interesting and far less effective. I take number three today in our final one. Big events are for the pastor, not the people. All right, now hear me out on this one, right? I think that a big event, filling a giant room is really a win for the person on the stage because it helps the pastor. And I'm a pastor and I would agree with this, it helps me feel successful. I look out across the landscape of the room and I say, Man, there's so many people here. Look how effective this event is. Look how many people are here.

Nick Clason (19:16):
I think the reality is though is that man, we really like, we are seeing a shift away from that like big event idea and that big event desire. Like we actually just, uh, talked to some of our juniors and seniors last week at the church I'm in. And um, you know, the church I'm in like, is, man, it is, is much different than the, the church as in before church as in before, is very, very much in a post-Christian world. Now we're in the Bible belt. Um, but what's fascinating is these students who are Gen Z are basically saying the same things. And they said like, we don't, we don't need this like, big event. It feels very, um, like almost forced, like what we want really for like our friends. Like we wanna just like invite them to like our small group and like if they're like exploring faith, like we wanna actually explore faith and give them something actually challenging, um, and have a hard conversation, not just a like Christian platitude.

Nick Clason (20:24):
And I was, I was actually, I was watching a show last night, uh, a house flipping show, um, and this couple is having a smaller wedding, um, and they're doing it in like a newly renovated and remodeled house. And so, you know, of course like the, the whole premise of the show is will these people renovate in this house, get it done in time for the wedding? And um, they were talking about like how this house, it's an old, is gonna be a renovated Victorian style house. So for those of you who are not super up on your HGTV of Victorian is, um, smaller rooms, um, and like just really ornate and elaborate kind of like decor. Um, but like not the whole open concept kind of idea. And so as these people were touring through the house, like, Oh, this would be good for our friends to have these smaller rooms, these smaller, more intimate gatherings so that people can actually stop and pause and have conversations with one another.

Nick Clason (21:37):
And that, that honestly was kind of the impetus for this hot take this morning cuz I was like, Wow, like those, I mean, they're, they're younger, right? Like they're probably in their twenties getting married, maybe thirties. Um, and they, you know, they got a little bit more of like an eclectic kind of vibe to 'em. But the reality is, is as like, I do think that that is far more what people are looking for. They're looking for intimacy, they're looking for connection over content. And so the big room gatherings were a content dump. It would get everybody in. And so that the pastor could deliver his content in the most efficient way possible, the most efficient way possible was to have a large auditorium and crams many people into that large auditorium as you can so that they all could hear what the pastor has to say.

Nick Clason (22:34):
Guys like that is, that is no longer the most efficient way possible. Is it effective still? Perhaps? Uh, but there's a greater efficiency out there, right? A pastor can talk into a microphone in his closet much like I'm doing right now and deliver that same level of content. So then if that has more efficiency, then what is the purpose of the Sunday morning gathering? And I know like, I'm a pastor, I get it theologically, Hebrews 10, 24 and 25, let us not give up meeting together as somewhere in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another and all the more as you see the day approaching and you're like, that's the, that's the reason for the church gathering. And I would agree. I honestly though, like I'm not, no offense, like I've been at this church now for a month. Um, so I've been to, uh, I think a total of three, maybe four weekends, Sunday morning services.

Nick Clason (23:34):
Like I don't, I have to work, right? So like, uh, soon as the first service is over, I'm actually, I've, I've actually never been in the service long enough to be dismissed from it. I've slipped out every single week, uh, because I need to get over to student ministry section of the building to be ready for our thing, right? I don't talk to anybody really in the service. Like that encouragement, that admonishment that spurring me on like the, the Sunday morning gathering is, is not when that is taking place. Listen, I'm also, I'll be honest with you too, I'm a traditionalist. I enjoy that. But what is, who is it for? I think in a lot of ways it might actually be for the ego of the pastor. Um, I think I've mentioned this on here before, but at our last church, um, we saw a higher, um, percentage of engagement with students when we offered a smaller gathering.

Nick Clason (24:36):
Um, and we saw a better value in conversation with students in their smaller groups as opposed to in a large, a large scale gathering. I think, you know, we still saw success in the larger scale gatherings because kids like to come together. They still like to have fun together, they still like to play games together. Um, and so that obviously that's important. That fun is a value too, right? Um, but I, I remember telling a friend of mine who said, if I want to come back together, um, and bring everyone back together in the room, like I want to do that if I'm honest, like that's a value of mine. Like I enjoy that. However, if this talking about the small group system and setting is more effective, more efficient, um, and more what students want than I need to put my ego and my pride on the alter and be willing to offer to students what's better for them, even if it's a not, not what I want.

Nick Clason (25:42):
Alright? So let's put purpose over preference and then b um, I have to be willing to level up and train my, my leaders and my volunteer team to execute this plan or this play. Um, and it's gonna take more work on my part to develop them as leaders, uh, than just bring them all back together and we preach a message at them from, from the stage, right? Again, if that's what I want and that's what's easier, but it's not. What's better then? Let's actually give our students what's best. Why not? Because we're trying to be effective grow numbers. Look at metrics because we want students to have a meaningful encounter with the God of the universe to come to a knowing, saving knowledge and relationship with Jesus Christ, who is the way back to the Father is he says in John chapter 14, He's the way, he's the truth, he's the wife.

Nick Clason (26:44):
And if big events are hindrance to that or a Gen Z eye roll, like, uh, another one of these again, then let's not give it to him. Let's give them what they're going to use for the betterment of their faith in the betterment of the, their friends' faith as their friends try to explore what it looks like and means to follow Christ. Well, hey everyone, uh, hope you enjoyed today's episode. Tried a little bit of a different format here. It's, it's tough. Hang on to alo pod, like I said. So I wanted to give a couple of kind of hot takes and just, uh, express what to my heart where I'm coming from. So if you enjoyed it, let us know. Um, rate review. You can go to hybridministry.xyz. We are also on Twitter. I'm gonna try to start, um, being a little more active on there beyond just posting when episodes drop. So come over, give us a follow, come hang out with us. It's at hybrid ministry on Twitter. And, uh, love hanging out with you guys. Uh, let us know, uh, reach out, let us know if there's anything you'd like to hear specifically. And, um, until the next time, talk soon. Bye.