web02.fireside.fm Fri, 01 May 2026 22:58:51 -0500 Fireside (https://fireside.fm) Hybrid Ministry - Episodes Tagged with “Student Leadership” https://www.hybridministry.xyz/tags/student%20leadership Thu, 09 Apr 2026 05:00:00 -0500 Hybrid Ministry is complicated and hard. Or is it? How do pastors and youth pastors create a vibrant extension, not replacement, of what's already happening during their weekly church services? To cater in a digital ministry way to an online focused ministry audience. Reaching Millennials, Gen Z and even Gen Alpha is going to require us to rethink some of the ways we do church. Follow along on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick en-us episodic Digital Discipleship made easy Nick Clason Hybrid Ministry is complicated and hard. Or is it? How do pastors and youth pastors create a vibrant extension, not replacement, of what's already happening during their weekly church services? To cater in a digital ministry way to an online focused ministry audience. Reaching Millennials, Gen Z and even Gen Alpha is going to require us to rethink some of the ways we do church. Follow along on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick no Digital, Online Church, Hybrid Ministry, Church, Meta, Gen Z, Millennials, Digital Marketing, Church Marketing, Youth Ministry, Student Ministry, Nick Clason, Digital Ministry, Church Social Media, Youth Ministry Social Media, YouTube for Church, YouTube for Youth Ministry, TikTok for Churches, TikTok for Youth Ministry, Instagram for Churches, Instagram for Youth Ministry, Facebook for Church, Facebook for Youth Ministry, Cell Phone Usage at Church Nick Clason nickclason@hybridministry.xyz Episode 196: Lock-Ins: Ministry Gold or Total Disaster? https://www.hybridministry.xyz/196 f5e38c94-7322-4aa4-b0d6-311b9d51f619 Thu, 09 Apr 2026 05:00:00 -0500 Nick Clason 196 Lock-Ins: Ministry Gold or Total Disaster? full Nick Clason Lock-ins... is there a more polarizing youth ministry topic? Should you do them? Are they valuable? Or are they the worst idea ever? In this episode, two youth pastors go head to head, and you get to decide! 20:08 no Lock-ins... is there a more polarizing youth ministry topic? Should you do them? Are they valuable? Or are they the worst idea ever? In this episode, two youth pastors go head to head, and you get to decide! Take Advantage of Andrew's FREE Lock-in Planning Session: https://www.hybridministry.xyz/contact [FREE] HYBRID STRATEGY GUIDE https://www.patreon.com/posts/complete-guide-142500019?utmmedium=clipboardcopy&utmsource=copyLink&utmcampaign=postsharecreator&utmcontent=join_link 🌸 SPRING SEASONAL SOCIAL PACK https://www.patreon.com/posts/spring-seasonal-151263940?utmmedium=clipboardcopy&utmsource=copyLink&utmcampaign=postsharecreator&utmcontent=join_link SHOW NOTES Shownotes & Transcripts https://www.hybridministry.xyz/196 //Lock-In Survival Guide https://www.patreon.com/posts/10-year-veterans-146449370?utmmedium=clipboardcopy&utmsource=copyLink&utmcampaign=postsharecreator&utmcontent=join_link 👉 STAY CONNECTED WITH NICK YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HybridMinistry Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz -------------- 🎉 FREE STUFF 🎉 We have all kinds of FREE Things that you can use in your context! The best way to pay us back is a review or a YouTube Subscribe! https://www.linktr.ee/clasonnick -------------- 🛠️TOOLS I USE THAT CAN HELP YOU! Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products //VIDIQ https://vidiq.com/hybrid //BEST DYM RESOURCES https://www.patreon.com/posts/9-amazing-dym-142425755 //OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361 //HYBRID MINISTRY MEGA GUIDE Everything I've ever learned in one blog post [FOR FREE!] https://www.patreon.com/posts/hybrid-ministry-151264417?utmmedium=clipboardcopy&utmsource=copyLink&utmcampaign=postsharecreator&utmcontent=join_link -------------- 🕰️TIMECODES 00:00 Pro or Anti Lock-in? 02:16 The Argument Against Lock-ins 05:14 The Busy Youth Worker’s Guide to Social Media 06:12 The Argument For Lock-ins 09:11 What Do You do if Kids don’t like boardgames? 10:56 Are Lock-ins only effective for Middle Schoolers? 12:16 What are the “risks” vs the “rewards” of a lock-in? 14:29 Do Lock-ins affect your Sunday morning attendance? 16:43 The Final Argument FOR Lock-ins 18:00 The Final Argument AGAINST Lock-ins 19:09 You decide - who won? -------------- TRANSCRIPT Nick Clason (00:01.102) Well, what is up everybody? Here I am this morning with Andrew and my new friend Ellen. Good morning everyone. How are we doing this morning? Ellen Partridge (00:10.995) Doing good. Nick Clason (00:12.802) Hey, are you guys, do you have coffee yet in your systems or is that long gone? All right, okay. They're doing pretty good, right, Michigan State? Andrew Jansen (00:12.964) Doing fantastic. Ellen Partridge (00:16.771) We're on the first cut. Go Spartans. Yeah, not as good as Michigan, which is a bummer, but... Andrew Jansen (00:23.46) They're doing good. Nick Clason (00:25.73) Mm, yeah. And this will drop after March Madness, so we'll all know. Comment down below, like how Michigan did. know, Michigan State, not Michigan. But I'm excited because today we are debating pro lock-in versus anti lock-in. And based on the two people that you see on your screen here, you can probably already tell who's pro lock-in. Andrew Jansen (00:33.591) it. Nick Clason (00:50.9) and who's anti-lock-in. And so I'm just so excited for you guys to get to, not only get to know these two amazing people, but also hear their positions on this. And so by random draw that happened off screen that you're gonna have to trust me because I'm a pastor and I get paid to tell the truth. Ellen, you get to go first. So one minute on the clock for you. Just introduce yourself, help the people understand your context, where you're at, how long you've been in ministry, all these types of things. Ellen, are you ready? Ellen Partridge (01:18.751) Absolutely. I'm ready. Nick Clason (01:21.58) Alright, take it away. Ellen Partridge (01:23.455) All right, everyone, my name is Ellen Partridge. I serve as the central pastor of students at Thornton Apple Valley Church. We are centralized out of Hastings at Michigan, southwest Michigan. And we are a multi-site church, but I've been in ministry for very close to two decades now. And we're in a rural context and a multi-site context. So things are a little bit different for us versus just the single site. And when I think about lock-ins, the thing that always comes to mind is the Halt analogy. If you're hungry, if you're angry, if you're tired, what are the things you shouldn't do, which is make decisions. And so we're gonna put students in a room where they are locked in together. You got the ones who, I have a kid in my youth ministry who at camp asked me if I could move our bedtime up to 9 p.m. I let him know that wasn't a thing, but you've got those kind of kids, and then you've got the kids who have snuck in. all their energy drinks and are going to be up till four in the morning. And those kids that are up are going to be picking on the kids that don't want to be up, that want to be sleeping. And then you've got a lot of that interpersonal conflict that is going on within that. And you're putting that all into a giant space where you're having to entertain them and or keep track of them as they are, you know, coming up with all of these grand ideas of how they're going to use their time. And I remember back to my youth group days, our youth ministry actually met in a old YMCA building, and for some reason, they did not lock the doors to the locker rooms, and then that locker room led to a empty pool. And I can't confirm or deny if there were children conceived in that pool, but there probably were. And it was coming from opportunities where we did lock-ins and they let us all throughout this building with lots of classrooms, lots of spaces that should have been locked that were not. And so from that perspective of hungry, angry, tired, lack of ability to, you know, keep an eye on all the students and all the places, I am very anti-lock-in. Nick Clason (03:43.896) Well, there you go. Andrew, she blew past introductions just straight into arguments. Brother, she's coming for you, right? Like she is coming in hot. So, Ellen, great argument. Man, I hope no students, babies were conceived in that pool. I don't ever want to swim there. Andrew. Andrew Jansen (03:49.24) yeah, just right past it. Yeah, she went right past it and that's okay. She's coming in hot, yeah, for sure. It's okay. Ellen Partridge (04:10.12) Me too. Andrew Jansen (04:12.365) Yeah, it's gross. Nick Clason (04:13.838) Tell us why Ellen's wrong and why lock-ins are a great idea. But first, give us a little bit of intro as you go. Are you ready, my friend? Let's go, take it away. Andrew Jansen (04:28.345) ready. Yeah, hit it. My name is Andrew Janssen. I am a middle school pastor in Manhattan, Kansas. Sorry, a couple years ago, we did play Michigan State and I know you probably knew that but we have nothing to talk about sports wise, hardly at all right now. So that's okay. But I love K State. I love serving in Manhattan. I am 36 years old. I've been a youth pastor for 10 years and I really love getting to be in Manhattan, getting to work with college students that invest in middle schoolers. That's kind of my passion. And man, I love lock-ins. just, it works within the context of our church is about 1900 people and we work with multi buildings on our campus, but not multi-site, but. It is just set up in a really easy way to execute and make lock-ins happen. And especially in our season right now where we have, and it changes, we have college students that graduate, but we have like 17, 18 youth coaches right now. And a lot of them enjoy staying up super late. And so it just really worked in this season to be able to have enough people there for a safe lock-in to happen. Middle schoolers are crazy and love staying up all night, love getting to be like, you can be at the church besides Sunday and Wednesday. And just, it was just really, really awesome. We did a New Year's Eve lock in and they just have so much fun. There's opportunities for fellowship, board games, long extended times that maybe you don't get that opportunity to play through an entire game of exploding kittens or taco cat. Mahomes cheese pizza, not taco cat goat cheese pizza. We all know Mahomes is the goat. But we play taco cat Mahomes cheese pizza and you get through two rounds and it's time for youth group to start. So we get to play through those games, have those conversations and invest in the students moving forward. Nick Clason (06:40.494) Great. All right, well there you have it. Like there's, each of you have laid down the gauntlet with your position, right? Andrews is based upon board games. Ellen's is based upon pools being present. And so with those two things in mind, plus everything else, do either of you have a question for the other that we can debate in a little bit more of an open forum? Andrew Jansen (06:55.097) You Ellen Partridge (07:10.974) All Andrea, I got one for you. So what do you do with the kids who are not your board game kids? What are your other activities that you're able to do? Because it sounds like you're pretty board game heavy. So how are you keeping the other kids occupied that are not interested in your board games? Andrew Jansen (07:27.929) Absolutely. I have, I try to make sure that every single second is accounted for at a lock-in. We have intentional time where it's like, they get to choose. We have our youth building has like carpet ball, foosball, ping pong. We have not a Nintendo switch too, but two Nintendo switches, which is kind of confusing, definitely. But so we have like Mario Kart and Smash Bros going. Nick Clason (07:49.902) That could be confusing, Andrew Jansen (07:56.882) I really try to get them away from screens as much as I can because we all know that battle. yeah, trying to have every single second with like some sort of activity, some sort of competition tournament. The last time I was on with Nick, we talked about the Assassin's like meta ongoing game that happens throughout the evening and having things like that where there isn't an opportunity to be bored. really, really is effective with middle schoolers. Because once you were right, once they're bored and exploring and they find a pool and we know what happens next, like there's just something about an empty pool. So, but with middle schoolers, that's not so much like the sneaking off and having that happen. I think that's more of a high school situation, but I just try to make sure every single second is accounted for. And that kind of helps with, you know, not having that boredom. board game time for the students that don't like board games. Ellen Partridge (08:57.362) And notice you keep saying middle school. You're not mentioning high school. So are you saying that lock-ins are only good for middle school or would you do one with high school? Nick Clason (09:06.072) Good question. Andrew Jansen (09:06.325) I would, that is a great question. I would do a, I would do a high school lock in for sure. I think that you do run that risk. They are a little bit more like, I can kind of put on the dad voice like the, Hey, what are you doing? And they'll just like freeze as a middle schooler. They still, you know, we'll listen to authority when it yells at them. So with high school, they're kind of a little bit more independent, a little bit more calloused and a little bit more. Like on their own I consider I always use this analogy of like middle schoolers are like dogs and high schoolers are like cats Like dogs are just happy that you're there and happy that you see them high schoolers. You kind of have to earn that relational like equity and I would say yes have a lock-in with high schoolers, but only do it if you have the resources and the adult volunteers and also if you're like this group is just like, this is a crazy group of high schoolers. It's not always a green light for that specific group of high schoolers if you just feel like that wouldn't be good. Does that make sense? Ellen Partridge (10:16.934) Yeah, it's good argument. Nick Clason (10:18.464) Andrew, you got a question for Ellen? Andrew Jansen (10:22.763) Yes, what do you feel is, like, I want you to tell me what is the, like, risk reward trade off where you feel like, hey, this is too risky to have a lock in for this type of reward. Ellen Partridge (10:35.422) Mmm. Ellen Partridge (10:45.35) Yeah, it's a great question. I would just say I'm a big fan of like doing late night activities, hanging out super late. The thing that gets me and where I feel like the risk comes in is once you hit that one, two, three, four a.m. that even, and you mentioned that you've got college leaders. I don't live in a college town and so I mostly have adult leaders. And so for me, I know my adult leaders are not gonna be on their A game coming into that situation. And so for me, the risk in my context is a lot higher that my leaders are gonna start maybe losing their minds or going stir crazy or sleep deprivation is gonna kick in. And it's gonna lead to students, because they're curious, ending up doing things that they don't need to do. And so for me, I would rather do a thing where it's like, hey, we're hanging out till midnight. Your parents are picking you up. and then maybe we do something again the next morning because then I know they're getting sleep, my leaders are getting sleep, and it also means that I'm not putting them at risk, I'm not putting my leaders at risk. And so for me, there doesn't seem to be necessarily, yes, there's the connection reward, but I wonder if that's always overshadowed by the sleep deprivation, the angry, hangry situations that can come up and also, I worry for my adult leaders that they're gonna say something out of their own sleep deprivation or frustration after telling the same kid eight times not to do something, that it may end up ultimately hurting a relationship that was good, and then they make a good relationship with someone that they had a bad relationship with, and so you're kind of at a net zero, is kind of how I look at Nick Clason (12:32.078) I just feel like the ultimate fact that like, I would rather sleep in my bed at two o'clock in the morning. Like that's my strongest argument for anti-lock-in. Just shooting straight. Plus I enjoy Saturdays and if I am doing a lock-in, I don't know. Also, Andrew, question for you. Do you ever notice that your Sunday morning attendance is affected post a lock-in weekend? Andrew Jansen (12:32.345) Definitely fair. Andrew Jansen (13:02.165) for sure. I mean, I tell my youth coaches, like, hey, you were just at church for 15 hours. It's OK for you to sleep in. I'll be there because I work there. And students, a lot of times parents will bring them and they might fall asleep or something during a message. Nick Clason (13:04.027) hahahaha Nick Clason (13:13.787) Yeah Yeah. Yeah. Nick Clason (13:28.622) Yeah. Andrew Jansen (13:29.079) Yeah, think it happens. There are definitely repercussions to having a lock-in, but I just think that there's just a lot of... I've seen so many good things and good conversations and relationships start at lock-ins, and it's just with a certain unchurched group of students, it's just an easy invite. It's just an easy win to get them there. Nick Clason (13:45.091) Yeah. Nick Clason (13:50.382) Yeah, which and I hear you like Sunday morning, it's like, okay, like, yeah, they didn't come on Sunday morning, which is like the senior pastor's goal. But like we had a lot more effective and fruitful time than like them sitting through a sermon or whatever, like through the lock-in and you know, the times I have done lock-ins, like it's almost always one of the number one most attended events from friends. Like we get, we would have some of our biggest. Ellen Partridge (14:12.242) Mm-hmm. Nick Clason (14:16.75) numbers and biggest reach, you know, as far as outreach is concerned. So I definitely do see like both sides for sure. So those of you listening, you're about to get your opportunity to vote. Ellen, you went first last time. Andrew, we're gonna put a minute on the clock now for you. Give us your final one minute strongest argument why Y lock-ins. Are you ready, my friend? Take it away. Ellen Partridge (14:30.173) All right. Andrew Jansen (14:42.008) I'm ready. Lock-ins are definitely the easiest first step in the door with a church. If you have the right resources, if you have the right volunteers, and you have a solid game plan going into it, you know your group of students. I think middle school or high school, it is an easy invite for the unchurched students. And that is kind of the lens in which I plan a lock-in. I don't have the whole bait and switch. Like we're going to talk to them about Jesus Christ, their Lord and savior first thing, and then just have the rest of the lock in. It is, hey, building connections, being intentional and teaching the students. That's why we're doing this. Like, Hey, we're doing this so you can bring that friend, start that relationship. And so that they associate church with fun, with safe, with They feel welcome and feel like they belong. There's something different happening here. And our hope is that continues on. Nick Clason (15:47.81) Great, almost a buzzer beater, but not quite. All right, Ellen, you get the final word, final say, anti-lock-in. Go ahead, take it away. Andrew Jansen (15:50.839) Almost. Ellen Partridge (16:00.572) All right, as fun as lock-ins can be in the memories that are made, the risk of students having bad memories, whether it's a leader who loses their cool, it's another student who says something they wouldn't have said because they're sleep deprived or because they're overtired, to me just doesn't equate to the reward. I am much more on the side of let's do a long. evening event where maybe we can start at six or seven and parents are picking up at midnight. So we're still getting that opportunity to connect with them, to have those great conversations, to have an opportunity for them to invite their friends. But at the same time, when it hits two, three in the morning, our leaders and our students are home in their beds, getting the sleep and the rest that they need. And hopefully, because they had a great time. We're gonna be able to see them on Sunday morning and they're able to stay plugged into that larger church community opposed from being just separate from the youth ministry. Nick Clason (17:05.023) Nice, nice. Another almost buzzer beater. Well, there you have it, my friends. You have your pro lock-in versus your anti lock-in debate. And so you guys get to be the decision makers. Those of you watching, let us know, comment down below. But without any further ado, we're gonna get out of here. For Andrew and for Ellen, I'm Nick. Thanks for watching everyone. See you next time. youth ministry, youth pastor, church leadership, student ministry, lock-in debate, church events, youth group games, ministry strategy, church growth, outreach ideas, student engagement, youth ministry podcast, church programming, middle school ministry, high school ministry, church safety, volunteer leadership, youth events, church culture, discipleship, student leadership, ministry burnout, church innovation, youth group ideas, Christian leadership, church community, ministry risks, church events planning, youth outreach, faith conversations Lock-ins... is there a more polarizing youth ministry topic?
Should you do them?
Are they valuable?
Or are they the worst idea ever?

In this episode, two youth pastors go head to head, and you get to decide!

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SHOW NOTES
Shownotes & Transcripts
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/196

//Lock-In Survival Guide
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🕰️TIMECODES
00:00 Pro or Anti Lock-in?
02:16 The Argument Against Lock-ins
05:14 The Busy Youth Worker’s Guide to Social Media
06:12 The Argument For Lock-ins
09:11 What Do You do if Kids don’t like boardgames?
10:56 Are Lock-ins only effective for Middle Schoolers?
12:16 What are the “risks” vs the “rewards” of a lock-in?
14:29 Do Lock-ins affect your Sunday morning attendance?
16:43 The Final Argument FOR Lock-ins
18:00 The Final Argument AGAINST Lock-ins
19:09 You decide - who won?

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TRANSCRIPT
Nick Clason (00:01.102)
Well, what is up everybody? Here I am this morning with Andrew and my new friend Ellen. Good morning everyone. How are we doing this morning?

Ellen Partridge (00:10.995)
Doing good.

Nick Clason (00:12.802)
Hey, are you guys, do you have coffee yet in your systems or is that long gone? All right, okay. They're doing pretty good, right, Michigan State?

Andrew Jansen (00:12.964)
Doing fantastic.

Ellen Partridge (00:16.771)
We're on the first cut. Go Spartans.

Yeah, not as good as Michigan, which is a bummer, but...

Andrew Jansen (00:23.46)
They're doing good.

Nick Clason (00:25.73)
Mm, yeah. And this will drop after March Madness, so we'll all know. Comment down below, like how Michigan did. know, Michigan State, not Michigan. But I'm excited because today we are debating pro lock-in versus anti lock-in. And based on the two people that you see on your screen here, you can probably already tell who's pro lock-in.

Andrew Jansen (00:33.591)
it.

Nick Clason (00:50.9)
and who's anti-lock-in. And so I'm just so excited for you guys to get to, not only get to know these two amazing people, but also hear their positions on this. And so by random draw that happened off screen that you're gonna have to trust me because I'm a pastor and I get paid to tell the truth. Ellen, you get to go first. So one minute on the clock for you. Just introduce yourself, help the people understand your context, where you're at, how long you've been in ministry, all these types of things. Ellen, are you ready?

Ellen Partridge (01:18.751)
Absolutely. I'm ready.

Nick Clason (01:21.58)
Alright, take it away.

Ellen Partridge (01:23.455)
All right, everyone, my name is Ellen Partridge. I serve as the central pastor of students at Thornton Apple Valley Church. We are centralized out of Hastings at Michigan, southwest Michigan. And we are a multi-site church, but I've been in ministry for very close to two decades now. And we're in a rural context and a multi-site context. So things are a little bit different for us versus just the single site.

And when I think about lock-ins, the thing that always comes to mind is the Halt analogy. If you're hungry, if you're angry, if you're tired, what are the things you shouldn't do, which is make decisions. And so we're gonna put students in a room where they are locked in together. You got the ones who, I have a kid in my youth ministry who at camp asked me if I could move our bedtime up to 9 p.m. I let him know that wasn't a thing, but you've got those kind of kids, and then you've got the kids who have snuck in.

all their energy drinks and are going to be up till four in the morning. And those kids that are up are going to be picking on the kids that don't want to be up, that want to be sleeping. And then you've got a lot of that interpersonal conflict that is going on within that. And you're putting that all into a giant space where you're having to entertain them and or keep track of them as they are, you know,

coming up with all of these grand ideas of how they're going to use their time. And I remember back to my youth group days, our youth ministry actually met in a old YMCA building, and for some reason, they did not lock the doors to the locker rooms, and then that locker room led to a empty pool. And I can't confirm or deny if there were children conceived in that pool, but there probably were.

And it was coming from opportunities where we did lock-ins and they let us all throughout this building with lots of classrooms, lots of spaces that should have been locked that were not. And so from that perspective of hungry, angry, tired, lack of ability to, you know, keep an eye on all the students and all the places, I am very anti-lock-in.

Nick Clason (03:43.896)
Well, there you go. Andrew, she blew past introductions just straight into arguments. Brother, she's coming for you, right? Like she is coming in hot. So, Ellen, great argument. Man, I hope no students, babies were conceived in that pool. I don't ever want to swim there. Andrew.

Andrew Jansen (03:49.24)
yeah, just right past it. Yeah, she went right past it and that's okay.

She's coming in hot, yeah, for sure. It's okay.

Ellen Partridge (04:10.12)
Me too.

Andrew Jansen (04:12.365)
Yeah, it's gross.

Nick Clason (04:13.838)
Tell us why Ellen's wrong and why lock-ins are a great idea. But first, give us a little bit of intro as you go. Are you ready, my friend? Let's go, take it away.

Andrew Jansen (04:28.345)
ready. Yeah, hit it. My name is Andrew Janssen. I am a middle school pastor in Manhattan, Kansas. Sorry, a couple years ago, we did play Michigan State and I know you probably knew that but we have nothing to talk about sports wise, hardly at all right now. So that's okay. But I love K State. I love serving in Manhattan. I am 36 years old. I've been a youth pastor for 10 years and

I really love getting to be in Manhattan, getting to work with college students that invest in middle schoolers. That's kind of my passion. And man, I love lock-ins. just, it works within the context of our church is about 1900 people and we work with multi buildings on our campus, but not multi-site, but.

It is just set up in a really easy way to execute and make lock-ins happen. And especially in our season right now where we have, and it changes, we have college students that graduate, but we have like 17, 18 youth coaches right now. And a lot of them enjoy staying up super late. And so it just really worked in this season to be able to have enough people there for a safe lock-in to happen.

Middle schoolers are crazy and love staying up all night, love getting to be like, you can be at the church besides Sunday and Wednesday. And just, it was just really, really awesome. We did a New Year's Eve lock in and they just have so much fun. There's opportunities for fellowship, board games, long extended times that maybe you don't get that opportunity to play through an entire game of exploding kittens or taco cat.

Mahomes cheese pizza, not taco cat goat cheese pizza. We all know Mahomes is the goat. But we play taco cat Mahomes cheese pizza and you get through two rounds and it's time for youth group to start. So we get to play through those games, have those conversations and invest in the students moving forward.

Nick Clason (06:40.494)
Great. All right, well there you have it. Like there's, each of you have laid down the gauntlet with your position, right? Andrews is based upon board games. Ellen's is based upon pools being present. And so with those two things in mind, plus everything else, do either of you have a question for the other that we can debate in a little bit more of an open forum?

Andrew Jansen (06:55.097)
You

Ellen Partridge (07:10.974)
All Andrea, I got one for you. So what do you do with the kids who are not your board game kids? What are your other activities that you're able to do? Because it sounds like you're pretty board game heavy. So how are you keeping the other kids occupied that are not interested in your board games?

Andrew Jansen (07:27.929)
Absolutely. I have, I try to make sure that every single second is accounted for at a lock-in. We have intentional time where it's like, they get to choose. We have our youth building has like carpet ball, foosball, ping pong. We have not a Nintendo switch too, but two Nintendo switches, which is kind of confusing, definitely. But so we have like Mario Kart and Smash Bros going.

Nick Clason (07:49.902)
That could be confusing,

Andrew Jansen (07:56.882)
I really try to get them away from screens as much as I can because we all know that battle. yeah, trying to have every single second with like some sort of activity, some sort of competition tournament. The last time I was on with Nick, we talked about the Assassin's like meta ongoing game that happens throughout the evening and having things like that where there isn't an opportunity to be bored.

really, really is effective with middle schoolers. Because once you were right, once they're bored and exploring and they find a pool and we know what happens next, like there's just something about an empty pool. So, but with middle schoolers, that's not so much like the sneaking off and having that happen. I think that's more of a high school situation, but I just try to make sure every single second is accounted for. And that kind of helps with, you know, not having that boredom.

board game time for the students that don't like board games.

Ellen Partridge (08:57.362)
And notice you keep saying middle school. You're not mentioning high school. So are you saying that lock-ins are only good for middle school or would you do one with high school?

Nick Clason (09:06.072)
Good question.

Andrew Jansen (09:06.325)
I would, that is a great question. I would do a, I would do a high school lock in for sure. I think that you do run that risk. They are a little bit more like, I can kind of put on the dad voice like the, Hey, what are you doing? And they'll just like freeze as a middle schooler. They still, you know, we'll listen to authority when it yells at them. So with high school, they're kind of a little bit more independent, a little bit more calloused and a little bit more.

Like on their own I consider I always use this analogy of like middle schoolers are like dogs and high schoolers are like cats Like dogs are just happy that you're there and happy that you see them high schoolers. You kind of have to earn that relational like equity and I would say yes have a lock-in with high schoolers, but only do it if you have the resources and the adult volunteers and also if you're like

this group is just like, this is a crazy group of high schoolers. It's not always a green light for that specific group of high schoolers if you just feel like that wouldn't be good. Does that make sense?

Ellen Partridge (10:16.934)
Yeah, it's good argument.

Nick Clason (10:18.464)
Andrew, you got a question for Ellen?

Andrew Jansen (10:22.763)
Yes, what do you feel is, like, I want you to tell me what is the, like, risk reward trade off where you feel like, hey, this is too risky to have a lock in for this type of reward.

Ellen Partridge (10:35.422)
Mmm.

Ellen Partridge (10:45.35)
Yeah, it's a great question. I would just say I'm a big fan of like doing late night activities, hanging out super late. The thing that gets me and where I feel like the risk comes in is once you hit that one, two, three, four a.m. that even, and you mentioned that you've got college leaders. I don't live in a college town and so I mostly have adult leaders. And so for me,

I know my adult leaders are not gonna be on their A game coming into that situation. And so for me, the risk in my context is a lot higher that my leaders are gonna start maybe losing their minds or going stir crazy or sleep deprivation is gonna kick in. And it's gonna lead to students, because they're curious, ending up doing things that they don't need to do. And so for me, I would rather do a thing where it's like, hey, we're hanging out till midnight. Your parents are picking you up.

and then maybe we do something again the next morning because then I know they're getting sleep, my leaders are getting sleep, and it also means that I'm not putting them at risk, I'm not putting my leaders at risk. And so for me, there doesn't seem to be necessarily, yes, there's the connection reward, but I wonder if that's always overshadowed by the sleep deprivation, the angry, hangry situations that can come up and also,

I worry for my adult leaders that they're gonna say something out of their own sleep deprivation or frustration after telling the same kid eight times not to do something, that it may end up ultimately hurting a relationship that was good, and then they make a good relationship with someone that they had a bad relationship with, and so you're kind of at a net zero, is kind of how I look at

Nick Clason (12:32.078)
I just feel like the ultimate fact that like, I would rather sleep in my bed at two o'clock in the morning. Like that's my strongest argument for anti-lock-in. Just shooting straight. Plus I enjoy Saturdays and if I am doing a lock-in, I don't know. Also, Andrew, question for you. Do you ever notice that your Sunday morning attendance is affected post a lock-in weekend?

Andrew Jansen (12:32.345)
Definitely fair.

Andrew Jansen (13:02.165)
for sure. I mean, I tell my youth coaches, like, hey, you were just at church for 15 hours. It's OK for you to sleep in. I'll be there because I work there. And students, a lot of times parents will bring them and they might fall asleep or something during a message.

Nick Clason (13:04.027)
hahahaha

Nick Clason (13:13.787)
Yeah

Yeah.

Yeah.

Nick Clason (13:28.622)
Yeah.

Andrew Jansen (13:29.079)
Yeah, think it happens. There are definitely repercussions to having a lock-in, but I just think that there's just a lot of... I've seen so many good things and good conversations and relationships start at lock-ins, and it's just with a certain unchurched group of students, it's just an easy invite. It's just an easy win to get them there.

Nick Clason (13:45.091)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (13:50.382)
Yeah, which and I hear you like Sunday morning, it's like, okay, like, yeah, they didn't come on Sunday morning, which is like the senior pastor's goal. But like we had a lot more effective and fruitful time than like them sitting through a sermon or whatever, like through the lock-in and you know, the times I have done lock-ins, like it's almost always one of the number one most attended events from friends. Like we get, we would have some of our biggest.

Ellen Partridge (14:12.242)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason (14:16.75)
numbers and biggest reach, you know, as far as outreach is concerned. So I definitely do see like both sides for sure. So those of you listening, you're about to get your opportunity to vote. Ellen, you went first last time. Andrew, we're gonna put a minute on the clock now for you. Give us your final one minute strongest argument why Y lock-ins. Are you ready, my friend? Take it away.

Ellen Partridge (14:30.173)
All right.

Andrew Jansen (14:42.008)
I'm ready.

Lock-ins are definitely the easiest first step in the door with a church. If you have the right resources, if you have the right volunteers, and you have a solid game plan going into it, you know your group of students. I think middle school or high school, it is an easy invite for the unchurched students. And that is kind of the lens in which I plan a lock-in.

I don't have the whole bait and switch. Like we're going to talk to them about Jesus Christ, their Lord and savior first thing, and then just have the rest of the lock in. It is, hey, building connections, being intentional and teaching the students. That's why we're doing this. Like, Hey, we're doing this so you can bring that friend, start that relationship. And so that they associate church with fun, with safe, with

They feel welcome and feel like they belong. There's something different happening here. And our hope is that continues on.

Nick Clason (15:47.81)
Great, almost a buzzer beater, but not quite. All right, Ellen, you get the final word, final say, anti-lock-in. Go ahead, take it away.

Andrew Jansen (15:50.839)
Almost.

Ellen Partridge (16:00.572)
All right, as fun as lock-ins can be in the memories that are made, the risk of students having bad memories, whether it's a leader who loses their cool, it's another student who says something they wouldn't have said because they're sleep deprived or because they're overtired, to me just doesn't equate to the reward. I am much more on the side of let's do a long.

evening event where maybe we can start at six or seven and parents are picking up at midnight. So we're still getting that opportunity to connect with them, to have those great conversations, to have an opportunity for them to invite their friends. But at the same time, when it hits two, three in the morning, our leaders and our students are home in their beds, getting the sleep and the rest that they need. And hopefully, because they had a great time.

We're gonna be able to see them on Sunday morning and they're able to stay plugged into that larger church community opposed from being just separate from the youth ministry.

Nick Clason (17:05.023)
Nice, nice. Another almost buzzer beater. Well, there you have it, my friends. You have your pro lock-in versus your anti lock-in debate. And so you guys get to be the decision makers. Those of you watching, let us know, comment down below. But without any further ado, we're gonna get out of here. For Andrew and for Ellen, I'm Nick. Thanks for watching everyone. See you next time.

]]> Lock-ins... is there a more polarizing youth ministry topic?
Should you do them?
Are they valuable?
Or are they the worst idea ever?

In this episode, two youth pastors go head to head, and you get to decide!

Take Advantage of Andrew's FREE Lock-in Planning Session:
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--------------
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00 Pro or Anti Lock-in?
02:16 The Argument Against Lock-ins
05:14 The Busy Youth Worker’s Guide to Social Media
06:12 The Argument For Lock-ins
09:11 What Do You do if Kids don’t like boardgames?
10:56 Are Lock-ins only effective for Middle Schoolers?
12:16 What are the “risks” vs the “rewards” of a lock-in?
14:29 Do Lock-ins affect your Sunday morning attendance?
16:43 The Final Argument FOR Lock-ins
18:00 The Final Argument AGAINST Lock-ins
19:09 You decide - who won?

--------------
TRANSCRIPT
Nick Clason (00:01.102)
Well, what is up everybody? Here I am this morning with Andrew and my new friend Ellen. Good morning everyone. How are we doing this morning?

Ellen Partridge (00:10.995)
Doing good.

Nick Clason (00:12.802)
Hey, are you guys, do you have coffee yet in your systems or is that long gone? All right, okay. They're doing pretty good, right, Michigan State?

Andrew Jansen (00:12.964)
Doing fantastic.

Ellen Partridge (00:16.771)
We're on the first cut. Go Spartans.

Yeah, not as good as Michigan, which is a bummer, but...

Andrew Jansen (00:23.46)
They're doing good.

Nick Clason (00:25.73)
Mm, yeah. And this will drop after March Madness, so we'll all know. Comment down below, like how Michigan did. know, Michigan State, not Michigan. But I'm excited because today we are debating pro lock-in versus anti lock-in. And based on the two people that you see on your screen here, you can probably already tell who's pro lock-in.

Andrew Jansen (00:33.591)
it.

Nick Clason (00:50.9)
and who's anti-lock-in. And so I'm just so excited for you guys to get to, not only get to know these two amazing people, but also hear their positions on this. And so by random draw that happened off screen that you're gonna have to trust me because I'm a pastor and I get paid to tell the truth. Ellen, you get to go first. So one minute on the clock for you. Just introduce yourself, help the people understand your context, where you're at, how long you've been in ministry, all these types of things. Ellen, are you ready?

Ellen Partridge (01:18.751)
Absolutely. I'm ready.

Nick Clason (01:21.58)
Alright, take it away.

Ellen Partridge (01:23.455)
All right, everyone, my name is Ellen Partridge. I serve as the central pastor of students at Thornton Apple Valley Church. We are centralized out of Hastings at Michigan, southwest Michigan. And we are a multi-site church, but I've been in ministry for very close to two decades now. And we're in a rural context and a multi-site context. So things are a little bit different for us versus just the single site.

And when I think about lock-ins, the thing that always comes to mind is the Halt analogy. If you're hungry, if you're angry, if you're tired, what are the things you shouldn't do, which is make decisions. And so we're gonna put students in a room where they are locked in together. You got the ones who, I have a kid in my youth ministry who at camp asked me if I could move our bedtime up to 9 p.m. I let him know that wasn't a thing, but you've got those kind of kids, and then you've got the kids who have snuck in.

all their energy drinks and are going to be up till four in the morning. And those kids that are up are going to be picking on the kids that don't want to be up, that want to be sleeping. And then you've got a lot of that interpersonal conflict that is going on within that. And you're putting that all into a giant space where you're having to entertain them and or keep track of them as they are, you know,

coming up with all of these grand ideas of how they're going to use their time. And I remember back to my youth group days, our youth ministry actually met in a old YMCA building, and for some reason, they did not lock the doors to the locker rooms, and then that locker room led to a empty pool. And I can't confirm or deny if there were children conceived in that pool, but there probably were.

And it was coming from opportunities where we did lock-ins and they let us all throughout this building with lots of classrooms, lots of spaces that should have been locked that were not. And so from that perspective of hungry, angry, tired, lack of ability to, you know, keep an eye on all the students and all the places, I am very anti-lock-in.

Nick Clason (03:43.896)
Well, there you go. Andrew, she blew past introductions just straight into arguments. Brother, she's coming for you, right? Like she is coming in hot. So, Ellen, great argument. Man, I hope no students, babies were conceived in that pool. I don't ever want to swim there. Andrew.

Andrew Jansen (03:49.24)
yeah, just right past it. Yeah, she went right past it and that's okay.

She's coming in hot, yeah, for sure. It's okay.

Ellen Partridge (04:10.12)
Me too.

Andrew Jansen (04:12.365)
Yeah, it's gross.

Nick Clason (04:13.838)
Tell us why Ellen's wrong and why lock-ins are a great idea. But first, give us a little bit of intro as you go. Are you ready, my friend? Let's go, take it away.

Andrew Jansen (04:28.345)
ready. Yeah, hit it. My name is Andrew Janssen. I am a middle school pastor in Manhattan, Kansas. Sorry, a couple years ago, we did play Michigan State and I know you probably knew that but we have nothing to talk about sports wise, hardly at all right now. So that's okay. But I love K State. I love serving in Manhattan. I am 36 years old. I've been a youth pastor for 10 years and

I really love getting to be in Manhattan, getting to work with college students that invest in middle schoolers. That's kind of my passion. And man, I love lock-ins. just, it works within the context of our church is about 1900 people and we work with multi buildings on our campus, but not multi-site, but.

It is just set up in a really easy way to execute and make lock-ins happen. And especially in our season right now where we have, and it changes, we have college students that graduate, but we have like 17, 18 youth coaches right now. And a lot of them enjoy staying up super late. And so it just really worked in this season to be able to have enough people there for a safe lock-in to happen.

Middle schoolers are crazy and love staying up all night, love getting to be like, you can be at the church besides Sunday and Wednesday. And just, it was just really, really awesome. We did a New Year's Eve lock in and they just have so much fun. There's opportunities for fellowship, board games, long extended times that maybe you don't get that opportunity to play through an entire game of exploding kittens or taco cat.

Mahomes cheese pizza, not taco cat goat cheese pizza. We all know Mahomes is the goat. But we play taco cat Mahomes cheese pizza and you get through two rounds and it's time for youth group to start. So we get to play through those games, have those conversations and invest in the students moving forward.

Nick Clason (06:40.494)
Great. All right, well there you have it. Like there's, each of you have laid down the gauntlet with your position, right? Andrews is based upon board games. Ellen's is based upon pools being present. And so with those two things in mind, plus everything else, do either of you have a question for the other that we can debate in a little bit more of an open forum?

Andrew Jansen (06:55.097)
You

Ellen Partridge (07:10.974)
All Andrea, I got one for you. So what do you do with the kids who are not your board game kids? What are your other activities that you're able to do? Because it sounds like you're pretty board game heavy. So how are you keeping the other kids occupied that are not interested in your board games?

Andrew Jansen (07:27.929)
Absolutely. I have, I try to make sure that every single second is accounted for at a lock-in. We have intentional time where it's like, they get to choose. We have our youth building has like carpet ball, foosball, ping pong. We have not a Nintendo switch too, but two Nintendo switches, which is kind of confusing, definitely. But so we have like Mario Kart and Smash Bros going.

Nick Clason (07:49.902)
That could be confusing,

Andrew Jansen (07:56.882)
I really try to get them away from screens as much as I can because we all know that battle. yeah, trying to have every single second with like some sort of activity, some sort of competition tournament. The last time I was on with Nick, we talked about the Assassin's like meta ongoing game that happens throughout the evening and having things like that where there isn't an opportunity to be bored.

really, really is effective with middle schoolers. Because once you were right, once they're bored and exploring and they find a pool and we know what happens next, like there's just something about an empty pool. So, but with middle schoolers, that's not so much like the sneaking off and having that happen. I think that's more of a high school situation, but I just try to make sure every single second is accounted for. And that kind of helps with, you know, not having that boredom.

board game time for the students that don't like board games.

Ellen Partridge (08:57.362)
And notice you keep saying middle school. You're not mentioning high school. So are you saying that lock-ins are only good for middle school or would you do one with high school?

Nick Clason (09:06.072)
Good question.

Andrew Jansen (09:06.325)
I would, that is a great question. I would do a, I would do a high school lock in for sure. I think that you do run that risk. They are a little bit more like, I can kind of put on the dad voice like the, Hey, what are you doing? And they'll just like freeze as a middle schooler. They still, you know, we'll listen to authority when it yells at them. So with high school, they're kind of a little bit more independent, a little bit more calloused and a little bit more.

Like on their own I consider I always use this analogy of like middle schoolers are like dogs and high schoolers are like cats Like dogs are just happy that you're there and happy that you see them high schoolers. You kind of have to earn that relational like equity and I would say yes have a lock-in with high schoolers, but only do it if you have the resources and the adult volunteers and also if you're like

this group is just like, this is a crazy group of high schoolers. It's not always a green light for that specific group of high schoolers if you just feel like that wouldn't be good. Does that make sense?

Ellen Partridge (10:16.934)
Yeah, it's good argument.

Nick Clason (10:18.464)
Andrew, you got a question for Ellen?

Andrew Jansen (10:22.763)
Yes, what do you feel is, like, I want you to tell me what is the, like, risk reward trade off where you feel like, hey, this is too risky to have a lock in for this type of reward.

Ellen Partridge (10:35.422)
Mmm.

Ellen Partridge (10:45.35)
Yeah, it's a great question. I would just say I'm a big fan of like doing late night activities, hanging out super late. The thing that gets me and where I feel like the risk comes in is once you hit that one, two, three, four a.m. that even, and you mentioned that you've got college leaders. I don't live in a college town and so I mostly have adult leaders. And so for me,

I know my adult leaders are not gonna be on their A game coming into that situation. And so for me, the risk in my context is a lot higher that my leaders are gonna start maybe losing their minds or going stir crazy or sleep deprivation is gonna kick in. And it's gonna lead to students, because they're curious, ending up doing things that they don't need to do. And so for me, I would rather do a thing where it's like, hey, we're hanging out till midnight. Your parents are picking you up.

and then maybe we do something again the next morning because then I know they're getting sleep, my leaders are getting sleep, and it also means that I'm not putting them at risk, I'm not putting my leaders at risk. And so for me, there doesn't seem to be necessarily, yes, there's the connection reward, but I wonder if that's always overshadowed by the sleep deprivation, the angry, hangry situations that can come up and also,

I worry for my adult leaders that they're gonna say something out of their own sleep deprivation or frustration after telling the same kid eight times not to do something, that it may end up ultimately hurting a relationship that was good, and then they make a good relationship with someone that they had a bad relationship with, and so you're kind of at a net zero, is kind of how I look at

Nick Clason (12:32.078)
I just feel like the ultimate fact that like, I would rather sleep in my bed at two o'clock in the morning. Like that's my strongest argument for anti-lock-in. Just shooting straight. Plus I enjoy Saturdays and if I am doing a lock-in, I don't know. Also, Andrew, question for you. Do you ever notice that your Sunday morning attendance is affected post a lock-in weekend?

Andrew Jansen (12:32.345)
Definitely fair.

Andrew Jansen (13:02.165)
for sure. I mean, I tell my youth coaches, like, hey, you were just at church for 15 hours. It's OK for you to sleep in. I'll be there because I work there. And students, a lot of times parents will bring them and they might fall asleep or something during a message.

Nick Clason (13:04.027)
hahahaha

Nick Clason (13:13.787)
Yeah

Yeah.

Yeah.

Nick Clason (13:28.622)
Yeah.

Andrew Jansen (13:29.079)
Yeah, think it happens. There are definitely repercussions to having a lock-in, but I just think that there's just a lot of... I've seen so many good things and good conversations and relationships start at lock-ins, and it's just with a certain unchurched group of students, it's just an easy invite. It's just an easy win to get them there.

Nick Clason (13:45.091)
Yeah.

Nick Clason (13:50.382)
Yeah, which and I hear you like Sunday morning, it's like, okay, like, yeah, they didn't come on Sunday morning, which is like the senior pastor's goal. But like we had a lot more effective and fruitful time than like them sitting through a sermon or whatever, like through the lock-in and you know, the times I have done lock-ins, like it's almost always one of the number one most attended events from friends. Like we get, we would have some of our biggest.

Ellen Partridge (14:12.242)
Mm-hmm.

Nick Clason (14:16.75)
numbers and biggest reach, you know, as far as outreach is concerned. So I definitely do see like both sides for sure. So those of you listening, you're about to get your opportunity to vote. Ellen, you went first last time. Andrew, we're gonna put a minute on the clock now for you. Give us your final one minute strongest argument why Y lock-ins. Are you ready, my friend? Take it away.

Ellen Partridge (14:30.173)
All right.

Andrew Jansen (14:42.008)
I'm ready.

Lock-ins are definitely the easiest first step in the door with a church. If you have the right resources, if you have the right volunteers, and you have a solid game plan going into it, you know your group of students. I think middle school or high school, it is an easy invite for the unchurched students. And that is kind of the lens in which I plan a lock-in.

I don't have the whole bait and switch. Like we're going to talk to them about Jesus Christ, their Lord and savior first thing, and then just have the rest of the lock in. It is, hey, building connections, being intentional and teaching the students. That's why we're doing this. Like, Hey, we're doing this so you can bring that friend, start that relationship. And so that they associate church with fun, with safe, with

They feel welcome and feel like they belong. There's something different happening here. And our hope is that continues on.

Nick Clason (15:47.81)
Great, almost a buzzer beater, but not quite. All right, Ellen, you get the final word, final say, anti-lock-in. Go ahead, take it away.

Andrew Jansen (15:50.839)
Almost.

Ellen Partridge (16:00.572)
All right, as fun as lock-ins can be in the memories that are made, the risk of students having bad memories, whether it's a leader who loses their cool, it's another student who says something they wouldn't have said because they're sleep deprived or because they're overtired, to me just doesn't equate to the reward. I am much more on the side of let's do a long.

evening event where maybe we can start at six or seven and parents are picking up at midnight. So we're still getting that opportunity to connect with them, to have those great conversations, to have an opportunity for them to invite their friends. But at the same time, when it hits two, three in the morning, our leaders and our students are home in their beds, getting the sleep and the rest that they need. And hopefully, because they had a great time.

We're gonna be able to see them on Sunday morning and they're able to stay plugged into that larger church community opposed from being just separate from the youth ministry.

Nick Clason (17:05.023)
Nice, nice. Another almost buzzer beater. Well, there you have it, my friends. You have your pro lock-in versus your anti lock-in debate. And so you guys get to be the decision makers. Those of you watching, let us know, comment down below. But without any further ado, we're gonna get out of here. For Andrew and for Ellen, I'm Nick. Thanks for watching everyone. See you next time.

]]> Episode 165: How to Build a Youth Social Media Team That You Don’t Have to Run https://www.hybridministry.xyz/165 28a4394c-2a71-4874-9684-4fd1e147edbb Thu, 04 Sep 2025 05:00:00 -0500 Nick Clason 165 How to Build a Youth Social Media Team That You Don’t Have to Run full Nick Clason Struggling to keep up with your youth group’s social media? In this episode, I’ll show you how to build a student-led social media team for your youth ministry—from recruiting Gen Z content creators to assigning creative roles like studio recruiter, sermon recap editors, and “man on the street” interviewers. Plus, I’ll show you how my Fall Social Media Pack (available on Patreon) gives you 3 months of done-for-you content your students can run without you lifting a finger. 21:56 no Struggling to keep up with your youth group’s social media? In this episode, I’ll show you how to build a student-led social media team for your youth ministry—from recruiting Gen Z content creators to assigning creative roles like studio recruiter, sermon recap editors, and “man on the street” interviewers. Plus, I’ll show you how my Fall Social Media Pack (available on Patreon) gives you 3 months of done-for-you content your students can run without you lifting a finger. //Social Team Checklist https://www.patreon.com/posts/social-media-138081327?utmmedium=clipboardcopy&utmsource=copyLink&utmcampaign=postsharecreator&utmcontent=join_link 🍂 FALL SOCIAL MEDIA PACK https://www.patreon.com/posts/fall-seasonal-137477671?utmmedium=clipboardcopy&utmsource=copyLink&utmcampaign=postsharecreator&utmcontent=join_link SHOW NOTES Shownotes & Transcripts https://www.hybridministry.xyz/165 *🦸 HYBRID HEROS GET THE PACK FOR FREE! * https://www.patreon.com/hybridministry FALL MASTERCLASS PLAYLIST https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fsa_fgbYCE&list=PLngXlSr64YaLfP12NPWmpBzXoCcEsAyBF //Fully Built out Studio https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVT1xvh9-5k //TRY OPUS https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361 //100 BONUS IDEAS & TEMPLATE https://share.hsforms.com/1JOHqd4XOTbC5ZgfXB85BCwnumis ✅ CHURCH COMMS DONE FOR YOU Hire me to run your church website, social media or communications! https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/comms 📊 [FREE] HYBRID STRATEGY GUIDE https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book 📋 "PICK NICK'S BRAIN" Coaching Call https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/coaching 👉 STAY CONNECTED WITH NICK YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hybridministry/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@clasonnick Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HybridMinistry Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz -------------- 🎉 FREE STUFF 🎉 We have all kinds of FREE Things that you can use in your context! The best way to pay us back is a review or a YouTube Subscribe! https://www.linktr.ee/clasonnick -------------- 🛠️TOOLS I USE THAT CAN HELP YOU! Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products //VIDIQ https://vidiq.com/hybrid //BEST DYM RESOURCES https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/dym //OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361 //YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100 https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit -------------- 🕰️TIMECODES 00:00 Student Social Team Framework 01:08 Why Students? 6:30 What we post 08:23 Studio Roles 11:43 On the Street Roles 13:46 The Power of the Social team 14:53 How I do no work 20:05 How you can do no work -------------- TRANSCRIPT 00:00:00:00 - 00:00:01:28 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry You're tired. Apparently, your 00:00:01:28 - 00:00:02:10 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry weekly 00:00:02:10 - 00:00:02:22 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry message 00:00:02:22 - 00:00:03:29 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry isn't writing itself. 00:00:03:29 - 00:00:04:13 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Senior 00:00:04:13 - 00:00:04:23 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry pastors, 00:00:04:23 - 00:00:08:18 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry who used to be youth pastors, continue to pitch you mid-tier 00:00:08:18 - 00:00:09:00 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry ideas, and 00:00:09:00 - 00:00:09:12 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry the finance 00:00:09:12 - 00:00:13:03 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry team, they just won't get off your back for that missing pizza receipt. 00:00:13:03 - 00:00:20:13 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry What in the world would you possibly have time to draft and dream up a fully student led social media team? 00:00:20:13 - 00:00:26:05 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Because of all of that and because of all these commitments, that's why your feed looks like this. 00:00:26:08 - 00:00:28:26 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry What if the answer isn't more of you? But what 00:00:28:26 - 00:00:38:09 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry if the answer is actually more then, because you, as a youth pastor are surrounded by the world's most capable content creator, they're called 00:00:38:09 - 00:00:49:07 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry teenagers. I have, in my context, built, student led, and student completely run social media teams. And in this episode, I'm going to share with you 00:00:49:07 - 00:00:53:11 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry how you can do that mistakes and means and all. 00:00:53:16 - 00:01:14:12 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And they're going to post things that are not only going to make your feed come to life, but also they'll never post something that's going to result in getting you fired, probably. Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry show. Well, hey everybody, welcome to the Hybrid Ministry show. If you and I haven't had a chance to meet you. My name is Nick Claussen. 00:01:14:13 - 00:01:39:20 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry I am a 15 year youth ministry veteran who's been passionate about social media and digital and ushered into that an absolutely expedited pace in Covid and through Covid. And now, since Covid, I have built social media teams and social media, platforms that completely are self-sustainable. Now at this point, and in this episode, I am going to fully outline in detail for you all of that. 00:01:39:20 - 00:02:04:17 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Because here's the thing. In this, episode and on this podcast, I talk a lot about my hybrid ministry strategy. In fact, my entire hybrid strategy is linked down below. You can download it, you can use it, you can take it in that e-book. I recommend posting ten times per week. And I'm going to share with you the ten posts that I post per week in my current student ministry on social media. 00:02:04:17 - 00:02:31:02 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry However, if you download my student or my fast seasonal social media pack, which is over on Patreon, the getting started version of that, social media strategy is actually only posting three times per week because I get it. Like youth ministries and youth pastors, they're busy. And so in this episode, what I want to outline for you is how to do that completely through your student volunteers. 00:02:31:02 - 00:02:51:28 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And so we're going to explain, the reason behind why you should pick students as part of your social media team. Also, what are some roles that you can recruit them into as you are creating and building a social media team? We'll talk about some roles for, students. If you're shooting in like a studio, we can talk about roles for students. 00:02:51:28 - 00:03:14:29 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry If you are shooting some stuff on the street or like out and about in your space. Also, student ministry editors, which are honestly, in my opinion, the biggest life savers and time savers for me. And then finally, I'm going to give you, the opportunity to go grab a checklist of everything that you're going to need for these, for these roles and to build these teams. 00:03:14:29 - 00:03:31:03 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry But first of all, let's take just a quick step back before we get into the nitty gritty. And then once again, there are chapters always listed down below in these episodes. So if you want to jump ahead, you can. But why students you got to understand their digital natives like this is their world. This is what they speak. 00:03:31:06 - 00:03:55:04 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry I like this concept called hybrid, where we go from our in-person moment and we take our online presence and we find a way to blend the two. In fact, the entire playlist linked right here that we just went through for the fall kickoff event idea is all about leaning into your hybrid, from your event to the ongoing donut voting bracket, to the welcome guest, to creating and building a social team like the students. 00:03:55:04 - 00:04:15:15 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Blend that all the time. And while for adults, especially during Covid and us in ministry, we didn't love it, we were even maybe annoyed by it. But like, this is their world. This is their life. YouTube is huge right now. Students spend hours online on YouTube looking at and creating and consuming content. This is just a part of their world. 00:04:15:15 - 00:04:40:17 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And so, as we're trying to position ourselves as youth ministries and youth pastors to help spread the the news and message of Jesus, like we should use students to help give us that ability and help give us that chance to help spread and reach and make that message of Jesus known on the social media channels. Also, students are used to this like they're used to having an authentic social media voice. 00:04:40:17 - 00:05:07:03 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Like this is this is just like I said, they're digital natives. This is who they are. They value authenticity. Like, this is them. This is what they do. Right? There's also on your social media teams, there's a deep well of opportunities. For example, we had a student join last year and, the person who is overseeing the team, just like from a scheduling aspect of it, he looked at me and he's like, Nick, I don't have anywhere to put this person. 00:05:07:03 - 00:05:35:29 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And I was like, sure you do. And he goes, wait, what do you mean? I said, I don't know those like given those clapperboard, she's like, no, I was like, buy one and then have that person run the clapperboard. I was like, you can always invent opportunities to help make students feel like they're a doing something. But being that there is plenty of runway and avenue to enlist students for, and I'm going to share with you even how to build a team of editors so that you even have more above and beyond opportunities to, recruit people. 00:05:36:06 - 00:06:02:06 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And then, you know, the bonus in all of this is that, like, as they get into this, like, this gives them not only, like leadership experience, but also some opportunity to, like, be a disciple in this avenue of social media. Right? It may not be the most precise, it may not be the most theologically astute. It may not, you know, be the deepest or the the most, like, precision, and, you know, tightened up version of all this stuff. 00:06:02:06 - 00:06:29:11 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry But like, they can learn how to influence their friends for and with the message of Jesus. So let's explore now, like, what exactly are some of the roles that we have instituted in our social media team? Let's take a look. So if you download my seasonal social media pack, you'll see that I recommend, two things transition videos and man on the Street videos. 00:06:29:11 - 00:06:51:19 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Those are things that are part of the custom for you section. And what the custom for you section is, is it's the section of my pack that makes it, your church specific because I do, I do give you some done for you stuff like Bible verses and, how to deal with anxiety, how to, you know, some like emoji guesses, some, some spiritual practice videos. 00:06:51:21 - 00:07:07:29 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Those are nameless, faceless. So any youth ministry can download those and use them. The custom for you section. What that does is it puts your people, your faces and your stamp on your social media, but that is going to require you to get out of camera, get out your phone, get out someone's phone and film some of these things. 00:07:07:29 - 00:07:31:18 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And so two of those are interview interview questions like man on the street style and transition style videos. Those are two staples of our social media strategy in our youth ministry. Every single Wednesday night, we are filming something and so we're but we're only filming one type of thing per week. So one week we're filming main on the street, and then maybe the next week we're filming transition style videos. 00:07:31:21 - 00:07:53:15 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry I also include For you some bonus content of like topic ideas for either dress and or may seven question style videos. And so those are the others that we have on our monthly schedule. So man, on the street transition style videos, drafts, seven questions. Any given that you come into our youth ministry, we're doing one of those four things. 00:07:53:18 - 00:08:12:16 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And so, in the bonus section, the drafts are the seven questions. If you want to start doing some of those, we film those in like a fully, built out studio. I'll link the tour episode to our studio if you want to see our studio, what we've bought, how we outfitted it so that we can have multiple different sets in one, one room, one space. 00:08:12:16 - 00:08:36:22 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry You can go check that out again. Link down below in the description. But here's some roles for for people in that, in that type of night, in that type of setting. So we record using podcast style microphones, which means we need to record into some sort of audio interface. So we plug it into like a Scarlett focus, eight eight and then that runs into like a computer, and then the computer is running like Adobe Audition. 00:08:36:22 - 00:08:57:22 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And so we have a person who sits there and runs audio. And so they literally do the thing like speeding, speeding, speeding. And so that person makes sure that the audio is actually rolling. And then they'll also put headphones on to ensure that they can hear what the people are saying and they can actually mix it. Do like a live mix using the Scarlett focus right. 00:08:57:24 - 00:09:18:01 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry We'll also have someone running camera. And so they'll literally click the record button on the camera and then they'll click, you know, stop record. And for a while there, we had them clap in front of the camera. But like I said in the intro, we actually just, bought a clapperboard. And so either they can do it or if you have enough people, you can have a whole nother person do it. 00:09:18:03 - 00:09:37:08 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And the clapperboard that we bought is a dry erase. And so you can put like, you know, you can erase it and you can write like drafts, take four and then you can write the names of the people and that way if you could get them to spell their names for you, you're going to get their names on the edit spelled exactly right, which I think is really important. 00:09:37:15 - 00:10:01:28 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry We also have a television screen, which sometimes for like our leader podcast, we have that on the actual camera and use it as like a presentation, if you will. But for these videos, we actually put it, off camera so that the contestants can see the slides because there's like scripts and stuff, like for example, the script that like for seven questions is, hey, the name of the game is seven questions if you want to play and close your eyes, the answer is going to be right here on the screen. 00:10:02:01 - 00:10:16:25 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry The category is fill in the blank. It's hard sometimes. The sixth grader walks in. They want to be part of the social team. They want to be on in want to do the social challenge. And you tell them the script and they can't remember it. And so that TV right there really helps them, you know what I mean? 00:10:16:25 - 00:10:36:07 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Like, see what they're supposed to do. And then we'll also after that script, we'll just make a slide that says one and that's question one. And then two, three, four. And so that that screen also helps them like keep track of the questions. And then there's always some sort of like call to action at the end of every video like hey, comment below your answer or comment below, did you get it? 00:10:36:07 - 00:11:08:11 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Or you know, whatever. And those are just kind of like prompts so that someone doesn't have to speak them. Because when someone speaks them from off camera, you have to edit them later, which is not the end of the world. But again, it helps. And so you can have someone literally sitting there running slides. It's also helpful to have people recruiting because we're in our studio, students might not know that the social challenge is going on, or they might know now, at this point in our in our context, but they might not be like aware of it or looking for it or, you know, running towards it. 00:11:08:11 - 00:11:23:10 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And so you have people who are like, hey, you want to be in social challenge today? And then they'll bring them back to our studio and then they'll help, kind of like queue up a line. And then lastly, you can have a host, a person who is out in the hallway talking to the people, waiting, explaining to them what they're going to do when they get in there. 00:11:23:15 - 00:11:44:22 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And so you're going to want someone who's got some charisma on that. But, all of those are different roles that we have tried to implement and institute for our studio based social challenge nights. Now, there are those are drafts and seven questions. So that's two out of our four social, challenge, you know, scheduling nights. The other two are when we're out and about. 00:11:44:22 - 00:12:02:21 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry So we grab a tripod, a camera and a microphone, and we hit the street and we don't go anywhere. But just like our student lobby. But we're out and about. We're more visible. So you don't quite need as many, like, hosts or anything like that. But you may need like a recruiter. You still need someone like, hey, you want to come be on social media tonight? 00:12:02:21 - 00:12:18:13 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry You want to come here to some questions. And so they'll fold people in the queue up a line. They'll get them off to the side there. So that's another option or another role. Of course you're going to have your interviewer. So the person that's on camera that's asking the questions like, hey, would you rather this, would you rather that? 00:12:18:15 - 00:12:40:19 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And listen, all of these questions are included in my social media pack. And so what I recommend is that you batch record so that you ask 4 or 5 questions, and you ask 4 or 5 people the same 4 or 5 questions, and then boom, you have 4 or 5 different men on the street style videos. And so that interviewer there's asking the same person these, you know, 4 or 5 different questions. 00:12:40:21 - 00:13:04:14 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Obviously, you're also going to have a camera person. You're also going to have an audio person. And I like to have the audio person, plug the headphones directly into the camera and listen to make sure that they can hear, and that's not too loud. And, you know, if like, anything gets cut out, that they can make them go back and reshoot it with film it, you can have someone holding up like a sheet with the questions or even times we've rolled that TV out. 00:13:04:14 - 00:13:24:18 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Right? And so we've had a person there, managing that TV or running slides for that, you know, or whatever the case may be. And so those are all different ways and things that you can use for like man on the Street transition style videos are very similar, except for all you really are doing is like, you know, you get like a video of a kid who was riding a skateboard and they fell on the floor and they fell like in this certain position. 00:13:24:19 - 00:13:40:28 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry So you tell someone, hey, lay like this, and then you give them some sort of script like, oh, that hurt. Make sure that you always have someone to help pick you up. We got that here at our church on Wednesday nights. See you at 630 or something. You know, something silly like that. Like it's kind of meant to be, you know, silly like that. 00:13:41:00 - 00:13:58:01 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Those are the two, like, on the night, jobs. And let me just tell you, like, once we started walking around with the camera, especially for, like, man on the street or, like, transition style videos, the kids came out of the woodwork in their interest level for it. We have, seven, I want to say different like serving teams for students. 00:13:58:01 - 00:14:25:27 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry We have welcome team. We have cafe, we have tech team. We have social team, we have photography. We have worship. Maybe that's it. Oh no. And then we have our table leaders. That's probably like our highest, spiritual bar of of role. The team that people want to be on the most is the social team. And so we have, like, increased our engagement around student serving because the social team exists. 00:14:25:29 - 00:14:48:12 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry But the real, in my opinion, this role right here, this next role, this is really like the role that has changed everything for me. It's the student editor. So I post ten pieces of content per week. And this is a genuine, real, true, authentic statement. I don't edit any of it okay. So let me let me walk you through, what I post. 00:14:48:14 - 00:15:07:18 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry It's some of it's going to be similar to what you might get in the fall seasonal social media pack. Some of it is a little bit different. You can sprinkle in any of these ideas because I'm asking you in the seasonal social media pack to post three times per week. So if you like any of these ideas you got, you got margin to kind of add this and make it your own and bring your own flair. 00:15:07:20 - 00:15:27:12 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry But I post like a meme Monday every single Monday morning that is just like a static carousel kind of based post. What we've done in our, our staff team is we created a Google Drive folder and we just say, hey, as you're scrolling social media, if you come across memes, save them and dump them in this folder. 00:15:27:12 - 00:15:46:18 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And so all I have to do on Monday is go grab them from that folder, pull them out. You know, I put ten out for carousel post and I post them, recently I've only started doing five because I've also started posting them over on the YouTube posts section, and they only allow five total, as opposed to Instagram, which now I believe allows like 20. 00:15:46:18 - 00:16:16:22 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry So I wasn't posting, by the way, I wasn't posting to YouTube, but I had a kid who said, are you going to do me Monday anymore? And I was like, yeah. And he's like, on YouTube. And I was like, oh, so that made me, you know, kind of start doing it, on, on YouTube there. Additionally, I post three sermon recap clips, so like, what we do is we film our messages long form posted to YouTube, and then we edit them for YouTube with edits and captions and all the things. 00:16:16:24 - 00:16:42:28 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry But before, we edit those or I'll have whoever is editing for me because I actually pay for an editor on these. I'll have them send me just a clean copy so they'll they'll compile it all together chronologically, and then they'll send me a copy without captions and without any of the, you know, B-roll or whatever. And I'll take those clean copies and I'll upload them into something like Open Source Pro, which, by the way, there's a link down below if you're interested in checking it out. 00:16:43:01 - 00:17:21:14 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry It doesn't change anything for you, but it is a small, affiliate commission link for me, which would be incredibly helpful if that's something you want to try out. It makes my job so easy. I clips those up, and then we just download three of those and store them to post on three different days in our week. If you don't pre film like a long form message, then my foster seasonal social media pack, it gives you like devotional scripts that you can hold your phone and you can speak direct to camera on those, and it'll tell you exactly what to say and how to include it and that, that, that hits the same 00:17:21:14 - 00:17:40:05 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry basic gist of what, a clip is meant to do where your Devo, clip, which isn't maybe tied to like a specific sermon or message, but it's still it's going to perform really well. I'm going to do a really good job for you on social media. So either one of those is fine, but it's some sort of spiritually charged content, right? 00:17:40:05 - 00:17:58:27 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Because some of these other things aren't spiritually charged content. And so your goal is you want to hook people, hook students, or hook your, your students friends with some of the goofy stuff so that you're showing up more and more in their algorithm. So that's why you also want to include some of these spiritual things so that they'll run across those as well. 00:17:58:27 - 00:18:17:28 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry But the way I don't edit them is I use opus clip if you want to, you know, film something on your phone, that's fine. Then what I would recommend is handing over your phone to a student editor. Or if you pay for like a service like Adobe Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro, DaVinci resolve, you can get them on a computer and they can edit that video for you. 00:18:17:28 - 00:18:36:25 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry Or even if you don't want to do it, have a student film there and let them edit it, and they can use something like on their own phone, like cap cut, or even just something simple like the TikTok or Instagram Reels editor. Our four social challenge archetypes remember seven questions drafts, man on the Street, transition style videos, all edited by students. 00:18:36:25 - 00:18:58:19 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And right now I'm actually building like a tutorial. Because, like, I've trained students and it takes a lot of my time to get them up to speed, but I'm building tutorials now, where they're watching me edit one, and then they can go back and they can watch that as reference as they edit. And so now I'm able to recruit more students without any experience, and I'm having them do that on something like Adobe Premiere Pro. 00:18:58:25 - 00:19:14:21 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry But I have had students in the past who have their own editing, kind of like chops. And I'll just send them a link from our Google Drive of like, like a seven questions and I'll say, hey, get this under a minute, add captions on the screen, add music, and send it back to me. And they do a great job and I'm fine with it being that way as well. 00:19:14:21 - 00:19:39:03 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry So it doesn't have to be exactly like I'm doing it, or exactly in like, you know, my template, which, by the way, I have, seven questions and address template link down below. It's included in the for seasonal social media pack, or just in 100 bonus ideas for free listed down below in the description. Another video that we do is like, just like our Wednesday night recap, which is a very simple collage style video. 00:19:39:05 - 00:19:57:12 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry I walk around with my phone and I get anywhere from like 5 to 7 second clips. Put that in TikTok, it does auto cut for me and boom are done. And then the last remaining of my ten is one of my four seasonal social media packs. Either a verse, a spiritual practice video, a how to carousel or an emoji phraseology guesting. 00:19:57:12 - 00:20:21:13 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry And again, all of those are going to be included in my fast seasonal social media pack, which, by the way, if you didn't know, is 1799. However, I have a bonus Patreon podcast for $4 a month where I not only give you everything in my store for free so that includes this pack, but also I, recap what we did from a creative programing standpoint and from social media. 00:20:21:13 - 00:20:48:21 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry From a social media standpoint. The previous week in student ministry. Think of it as like your weekly, debrief meeting with, like, you know, a trusted friend. And if I were you, that's $4 a month. You can charge at times $1,248 to like, professional development or your student ministries budget in that way. But what I'm going to do is I'm going to include a checklist for you of roles, of things to do, of what to film all of that. 00:20:48:21 - 00:21:16:03 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry That's over on my Patreon. Once again, that will come with a nominal fee because Patreon doesn't let me give it away for free. However, if you are a hybrid hero, you get that checklist that costs you $0 included in your $4 per month membership Hybrid Heroes tier. This is how we do it. This is how I have handed all of this off, and I don't lift a finger any more for capturing, editing, or creating any of our social media content. 00:21:16:03 - 00:21:38:08 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry You two can build a robust, student led, student driven social media team and social media feed. All you gotta do is start leaning in. Some of the students that God has gifted and and given to you in your context. I'm rooting for you. Don't ever hesitate to reach out. I got the pick my brain. Link down below in my, description. 00:21:38:08 - 00:21:50:29 Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry If there's something that can help you get this up off the ground. But until next time. And as always, my friends, don't forget. Stay hybrid. student social media team, youth ministry social media, church social media strategy, student-led ministry, youth group Instagram, how to build a church social team, social media volunteers, youth pastor tools, church marketing, digital discipleship, Gen Z social media, Canva for churches, social media content plan, hybrid ministry, student leadership, fall social media pack, social media for youth groups, patreon for youth pastors, youth ministry content, church social media tips Struggling to keep up with your youth group’s social media? In this episode, I’ll show you how to build a student-led social media team for your youth ministry—from recruiting Gen Z content creators to assigning creative roles like studio recruiter, sermon recap editors, and “man on the street” interviewers. Plus, I’ll show you how my Fall Social Media Pack (available on Patreon) gives you 3 months of done-for-you content your students can run without you lifting a finger.

//Social Team Checklist
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SHOW NOTES
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https://www.hybridministry.xyz/165

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🛠️TOOLS I USE THAT CAN HELP YOU!
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--------------
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00 Student Social Team Framework
01:08 Why Students?
6:30 What we post
08:23 Studio Roles
11:43 On the Street Roles
13:46 The Power of the Social team
14:53 How I do no work
20:05 How you can do no work

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TRANSCRIPT

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:01:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
You're tired. Apparently, your

00:00:01:28 - 00:00:02:10
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
weekly

00:00:02:10 - 00:00:02:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
message

00:00:02:22 - 00:00:03:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
isn't writing itself.

00:00:03:29 - 00:00:04:13
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Senior

00:00:04:13 - 00:00:04:23
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
pastors,

00:00:04:23 - 00:00:08:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
who used to be youth pastors, continue to pitch you mid-tier

00:00:08:18 - 00:00:09:00
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
ideas, and

00:00:09:00 - 00:00:09:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
the finance

00:00:09:12 - 00:00:13:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
team, they just won't get off your back for that missing pizza receipt.

00:00:13:03 - 00:00:20:13
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
What in the world would you possibly have time to draft and dream up a fully student led social media team?

00:00:20:13 - 00:00:26:05
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Because of all of that and because of all these commitments, that's why your feed looks like this.

00:00:26:08 - 00:00:28:26
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
What if the answer isn't more of you? But what

00:00:28:26 - 00:00:38:09
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
if the answer is actually more then, because you, as a youth pastor are surrounded by the world's most capable content creator, they're called

00:00:38:09 - 00:00:49:07
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
teenagers. I have, in my context, built, student led, and student completely run social media teams. And in this episode, I'm going to share with you

00:00:49:07 - 00:00:53:11
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
how you can do that mistakes and means and all.

00:00:53:16 - 00:01:14:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And they're going to post things that are not only going to make your feed come to life, but also they'll never post something that's going to result in getting you fired, probably. Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry show. Well, hey everybody, welcome to the Hybrid Ministry show. If you and I haven't had a chance to meet you. My name is Nick Claussen.

00:01:14:13 - 00:01:39:20
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
I am a 15 year youth ministry veteran who's been passionate about social media and digital and ushered into that an absolutely expedited pace in Covid and through Covid. And now, since Covid, I have built social media teams and social media, platforms that completely are self-sustainable. Now at this point, and in this episode, I am going to fully outline in detail for you all of that.

00:01:39:20 - 00:02:04:17
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Because here's the thing. In this, episode and on this podcast, I talk a lot about my hybrid ministry strategy. In fact, my entire hybrid strategy is linked down below. You can download it, you can use it, you can take it in that e-book. I recommend posting ten times per week. And I'm going to share with you the ten posts that I post per week in my current student ministry on social media.

00:02:04:17 - 00:02:31:02
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
However, if you download my student or my fast seasonal social media pack, which is over on Patreon, the getting started version of that, social media strategy is actually only posting three times per week because I get it. Like youth ministries and youth pastors, they're busy. And so in this episode, what I want to outline for you is how to do that completely through your student volunteers.

00:02:31:02 - 00:02:51:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so we're going to explain, the reason behind why you should pick students as part of your social media team. Also, what are some roles that you can recruit them into as you are creating and building a social media team? We'll talk about some roles for, students. If you're shooting in like a studio, we can talk about roles for students.

00:02:51:28 - 00:03:14:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
If you are shooting some stuff on the street or like out and about in your space. Also, student ministry editors, which are honestly, in my opinion, the biggest life savers and time savers for me. And then finally, I'm going to give you, the opportunity to go grab a checklist of everything that you're going to need for these, for these roles and to build these teams.

00:03:14:29 - 00:03:31:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But first of all, let's take just a quick step back before we get into the nitty gritty. And then once again, there are chapters always listed down below in these episodes. So if you want to jump ahead, you can. But why students you got to understand their digital natives like this is their world. This is what they speak.

00:03:31:06 - 00:03:55:04
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
I like this concept called hybrid, where we go from our in-person moment and we take our online presence and we find a way to blend the two. In fact, the entire playlist linked right here that we just went through for the fall kickoff event idea is all about leaning into your hybrid, from your event to the ongoing donut voting bracket, to the welcome guest, to creating and building a social team like the students.

00:03:55:04 - 00:04:15:15
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Blend that all the time. And while for adults, especially during Covid and us in ministry, we didn't love it, we were even maybe annoyed by it. But like, this is their world. This is their life. YouTube is huge right now. Students spend hours online on YouTube looking at and creating and consuming content. This is just a part of their world.

00:04:15:15 - 00:04:40:17
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so, as we're trying to position ourselves as youth ministries and youth pastors to help spread the the news and message of Jesus, like we should use students to help give us that ability and help give us that chance to help spread and reach and make that message of Jesus known on the social media channels. Also, students are used to this like they're used to having an authentic social media voice.

00:04:40:17 - 00:05:07:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Like this is this is just like I said, they're digital natives. This is who they are. They value authenticity. Like, this is them. This is what they do. Right? There's also on your social media teams, there's a deep well of opportunities. For example, we had a student join last year and, the person who is overseeing the team, just like from a scheduling aspect of it, he looked at me and he's like, Nick, I don't have anywhere to put this person.

00:05:07:03 - 00:05:35:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And I was like, sure you do. And he goes, wait, what do you mean? I said, I don't know those like given those clapperboard, she's like, no, I was like, buy one and then have that person run the clapperboard. I was like, you can always invent opportunities to help make students feel like they're a doing something. But being that there is plenty of runway and avenue to enlist students for, and I'm going to share with you even how to build a team of editors so that you even have more above and beyond opportunities to, recruit people.

00:05:36:06 - 00:06:02:06
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And then, you know, the bonus in all of this is that, like, as they get into this, like, this gives them not only, like leadership experience, but also some opportunity to, like, be a disciple in this avenue of social media. Right? It may not be the most precise, it may not be the most theologically astute. It may not, you know, be the deepest or the the most, like, precision, and, you know, tightened up version of all this stuff.

00:06:02:06 - 00:06:29:11
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But like, they can learn how to influence their friends for and with the message of Jesus. So let's explore now, like, what exactly are some of the roles that we have instituted in our social media team? Let's take a look. So if you download my seasonal social media pack, you'll see that I recommend, two things transition videos and man on the Street videos.

00:06:29:11 - 00:06:51:19
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Those are things that are part of the custom for you section. And what the custom for you section is, is it's the section of my pack that makes it, your church specific because I do, I do give you some done for you stuff like Bible verses and, how to deal with anxiety, how to, you know, some like emoji guesses, some, some spiritual practice videos.

00:06:51:21 - 00:07:07:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Those are nameless, faceless. So any youth ministry can download those and use them. The custom for you section. What that does is it puts your people, your faces and your stamp on your social media, but that is going to require you to get out of camera, get out your phone, get out someone's phone and film some of these things.

00:07:07:29 - 00:07:31:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so two of those are interview interview questions like man on the street style and transition style videos. Those are two staples of our social media strategy in our youth ministry. Every single Wednesday night, we are filming something and so we're but we're only filming one type of thing per week. So one week we're filming main on the street, and then maybe the next week we're filming transition style videos.

00:07:31:21 - 00:07:53:15
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
I also include For you some bonus content of like topic ideas for either dress and or may seven question style videos. And so those are the others that we have on our monthly schedule. So man, on the street transition style videos, drafts, seven questions. Any given that you come into our youth ministry, we're doing one of those four things.

00:07:53:18 - 00:08:12:16
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so, in the bonus section, the drafts are the seven questions. If you want to start doing some of those, we film those in like a fully, built out studio. I'll link the tour episode to our studio if you want to see our studio, what we've bought, how we outfitted it so that we can have multiple different sets in one, one room, one space.

00:08:12:16 - 00:08:36:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
You can go check that out again. Link down below in the description. But here's some roles for for people in that, in that type of night, in that type of setting. So we record using podcast style microphones, which means we need to record into some sort of audio interface. So we plug it into like a Scarlett focus, eight eight and then that runs into like a computer, and then the computer is running like Adobe Audition.

00:08:36:22 - 00:08:57:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so we have a person who sits there and runs audio. And so they literally do the thing like speeding, speeding, speeding. And so that person makes sure that the audio is actually rolling. And then they'll also put headphones on to ensure that they can hear what the people are saying and they can actually mix it. Do like a live mix using the Scarlett focus right.

00:08:57:24 - 00:09:18:01
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
We'll also have someone running camera. And so they'll literally click the record button on the camera and then they'll click, you know, stop record. And for a while there, we had them clap in front of the camera. But like I said in the intro, we actually just, bought a clapperboard. And so either they can do it or if you have enough people, you can have a whole nother person do it.

00:09:18:03 - 00:09:37:08
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And the clapperboard that we bought is a dry erase. And so you can put like, you know, you can erase it and you can write like drafts, take four and then you can write the names of the people and that way if you could get them to spell their names for you, you're going to get their names on the edit spelled exactly right, which I think is really important.

00:09:37:15 - 00:10:01:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
We also have a television screen, which sometimes for like our leader podcast, we have that on the actual camera and use it as like a presentation, if you will. But for these videos, we actually put it, off camera so that the contestants can see the slides because there's like scripts and stuff, like for example, the script that like for seven questions is, hey, the name of the game is seven questions if you want to play and close your eyes, the answer is going to be right here on the screen.

00:10:02:01 - 00:10:16:25
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
The category is fill in the blank. It's hard sometimes. The sixth grader walks in. They want to be part of the social team. They want to be on in want to do the social challenge. And you tell them the script and they can't remember it. And so that TV right there really helps them, you know what I mean?

00:10:16:25 - 00:10:36:07
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Like, see what they're supposed to do. And then we'll also after that script, we'll just make a slide that says one and that's question one. And then two, three, four. And so that that screen also helps them like keep track of the questions. And then there's always some sort of like call to action at the end of every video like hey, comment below your answer or comment below, did you get it?

00:10:36:07 - 00:11:08:11
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Or you know, whatever. And those are just kind of like prompts so that someone doesn't have to speak them. Because when someone speaks them from off camera, you have to edit them later, which is not the end of the world. But again, it helps. And so you can have someone literally sitting there running slides. It's also helpful to have people recruiting because we're in our studio, students might not know that the social challenge is going on, or they might know now, at this point in our in our context, but they might not be like aware of it or looking for it or, you know, running towards it.

00:11:08:11 - 00:11:23:10
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so you have people who are like, hey, you want to be in social challenge today? And then they'll bring them back to our studio and then they'll help, kind of like queue up a line. And then lastly, you can have a host, a person who is out in the hallway talking to the people, waiting, explaining to them what they're going to do when they get in there.

00:11:23:15 - 00:11:44:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so you're going to want someone who's got some charisma on that. But, all of those are different roles that we have tried to implement and institute for our studio based social challenge nights. Now, there are those are drafts and seven questions. So that's two out of our four social, challenge, you know, scheduling nights. The other two are when we're out and about.

00:11:44:22 - 00:12:02:21
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
So we grab a tripod, a camera and a microphone, and we hit the street and we don't go anywhere. But just like our student lobby. But we're out and about. We're more visible. So you don't quite need as many, like, hosts or anything like that. But you may need like a recruiter. You still need someone like, hey, you want to come be on social media tonight?

00:12:02:21 - 00:12:18:13
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
You want to come here to some questions. And so they'll fold people in the queue up a line. They'll get them off to the side there. So that's another option or another role. Of course you're going to have your interviewer. So the person that's on camera that's asking the questions like, hey, would you rather this, would you rather that?

00:12:18:15 - 00:12:40:19
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And listen, all of these questions are included in my social media pack. And so what I recommend is that you batch record so that you ask 4 or 5 questions, and you ask 4 or 5 people the same 4 or 5 questions, and then boom, you have 4 or 5 different men on the street style videos. And so that interviewer there's asking the same person these, you know, 4 or 5 different questions.

00:12:40:21 - 00:13:04:14
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Obviously, you're also going to have a camera person. You're also going to have an audio person. And I like to have the audio person, plug the headphones directly into the camera and listen to make sure that they can hear, and that's not too loud. And, you know, if like, anything gets cut out, that they can make them go back and reshoot it with film it, you can have someone holding up like a sheet with the questions or even times we've rolled that TV out.

00:13:04:14 - 00:13:24:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Right? And so we've had a person there, managing that TV or running slides for that, you know, or whatever the case may be. And so those are all different ways and things that you can use for like man on the Street transition style videos are very similar, except for all you really are doing is like, you know, you get like a video of a kid who was riding a skateboard and they fell on the floor and they fell like in this certain position.

00:13:24:19 - 00:13:40:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
So you tell someone, hey, lay like this, and then you give them some sort of script like, oh, that hurt. Make sure that you always have someone to help pick you up. We got that here at our church on Wednesday nights. See you at 630 or something. You know, something silly like that. Like it's kind of meant to be, you know, silly like that.

00:13:41:00 - 00:13:58:01
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Those are the two, like, on the night, jobs. And let me just tell you, like, once we started walking around with the camera, especially for, like, man on the street or, like, transition style videos, the kids came out of the woodwork in their interest level for it. We have, seven, I want to say different like serving teams for students.

00:13:58:01 - 00:14:25:27
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
We have welcome team. We have cafe, we have tech team. We have social team, we have photography. We have worship. Maybe that's it. Oh no. And then we have our table leaders. That's probably like our highest, spiritual bar of of role. The team that people want to be on the most is the social team. And so we have, like, increased our engagement around student serving because the social team exists.

00:14:25:29 - 00:14:48:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But the real, in my opinion, this role right here, this next role, this is really like the role that has changed everything for me. It's the student editor. So I post ten pieces of content per week. And this is a genuine, real, true, authentic statement. I don't edit any of it okay. So let me let me walk you through, what I post.

00:14:48:14 - 00:15:07:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
It's some of it's going to be similar to what you might get in the fall seasonal social media pack. Some of it is a little bit different. You can sprinkle in any of these ideas because I'm asking you in the seasonal social media pack to post three times per week. So if you like any of these ideas you got, you got margin to kind of add this and make it your own and bring your own flair.

00:15:07:20 - 00:15:27:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But I post like a meme Monday every single Monday morning that is just like a static carousel kind of based post. What we've done in our, our staff team is we created a Google Drive folder and we just say, hey, as you're scrolling social media, if you come across memes, save them and dump them in this folder.

00:15:27:12 - 00:15:46:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so all I have to do on Monday is go grab them from that folder, pull them out. You know, I put ten out for carousel post and I post them, recently I've only started doing five because I've also started posting them over on the YouTube posts section, and they only allow five total, as opposed to Instagram, which now I believe allows like 20.

00:15:46:18 - 00:16:16:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
So I wasn't posting, by the way, I wasn't posting to YouTube, but I had a kid who said, are you going to do me Monday anymore? And I was like, yeah. And he's like, on YouTube. And I was like, oh, so that made me, you know, kind of start doing it, on, on YouTube there. Additionally, I post three sermon recap clips, so like, what we do is we film our messages long form posted to YouTube, and then we edit them for YouTube with edits and captions and all the things.

00:16:16:24 - 00:16:42:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But before, we edit those or I'll have whoever is editing for me because I actually pay for an editor on these. I'll have them send me just a clean copy so they'll they'll compile it all together chronologically, and then they'll send me a copy without captions and without any of the, you know, B-roll or whatever. And I'll take those clean copies and I'll upload them into something like Open Source Pro, which, by the way, there's a link down below if you're interested in checking it out.

00:16:43:01 - 00:17:21:14
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
It doesn't change anything for you, but it is a small, affiliate commission link for me, which would be incredibly helpful if that's something you want to try out. It makes my job so easy. I clips those up, and then we just download three of those and store them to post on three different days in our week. If you don't pre film like a long form message, then my foster seasonal social media pack, it gives you like devotional scripts that you can hold your phone and you can speak direct to camera on those, and it'll tell you exactly what to say and how to include it and that, that, that hits the same

00:17:21:14 - 00:17:40:05
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
basic gist of what, a clip is meant to do where your Devo, clip, which isn't maybe tied to like a specific sermon or message, but it's still it's going to perform really well. I'm going to do a really good job for you on social media. So either one of those is fine, but it's some sort of spiritually charged content, right?

00:17:40:05 - 00:17:58:27
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Because some of these other things aren't spiritually charged content. And so your goal is you want to hook people, hook students, or hook your, your students friends with some of the goofy stuff so that you're showing up more and more in their algorithm. So that's why you also want to include some of these spiritual things so that they'll run across those as well.

00:17:58:27 - 00:18:17:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But the way I don't edit them is I use opus clip if you want to, you know, film something on your phone, that's fine. Then what I would recommend is handing over your phone to a student editor. Or if you pay for like a service like Adobe Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro, DaVinci resolve, you can get them on a computer and they can edit that video for you.

00:18:17:28 - 00:18:36:25
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Or even if you don't want to do it, have a student film there and let them edit it, and they can use something like on their own phone, like cap cut, or even just something simple like the TikTok or Instagram Reels editor. Our four social challenge archetypes remember seven questions drafts, man on the Street, transition style videos, all edited by students.

00:18:36:25 - 00:18:58:19
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And right now I'm actually building like a tutorial. Because, like, I've trained students and it takes a lot of my time to get them up to speed, but I'm building tutorials now, where they're watching me edit one, and then they can go back and they can watch that as reference as they edit. And so now I'm able to recruit more students without any experience, and I'm having them do that on something like Adobe Premiere Pro.

00:18:58:25 - 00:19:14:21
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But I have had students in the past who have their own editing, kind of like chops. And I'll just send them a link from our Google Drive of like, like a seven questions and I'll say, hey, get this under a minute, add captions on the screen, add music, and send it back to me. And they do a great job and I'm fine with it being that way as well.

00:19:14:21 - 00:19:39:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
So it doesn't have to be exactly like I'm doing it, or exactly in like, you know, my template, which, by the way, I have, seven questions and address template link down below. It's included in the for seasonal social media pack, or just in 100 bonus ideas for free listed down below in the description. Another video that we do is like, just like our Wednesday night recap, which is a very simple collage style video.

00:19:39:05 - 00:19:57:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
I walk around with my phone and I get anywhere from like 5 to 7 second clips. Put that in TikTok, it does auto cut for me and boom are done. And then the last remaining of my ten is one of my four seasonal social media packs. Either a verse, a spiritual practice video, a how to carousel or an emoji phraseology guesting.

00:19:57:12 - 00:20:21:13
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And again, all of those are going to be included in my fast seasonal social media pack, which, by the way, if you didn't know, is 1799. However, I have a bonus Patreon podcast for $4 a month where I not only give you everything in my store for free so that includes this pack, but also I, recap what we did from a creative programing standpoint and from social media.

00:20:21:13 - 00:20:48:21
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
From a social media standpoint. The previous week in student ministry. Think of it as like your weekly, debrief meeting with, like, you know, a trusted friend. And if I were you, that's $4 a month. You can charge at times $1,248 to like, professional development or your student ministries budget in that way. But what I'm going to do is I'm going to include a checklist for you of roles, of things to do, of what to film all of that.

00:20:48:21 - 00:21:16:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
That's over on my Patreon. Once again, that will come with a nominal fee because Patreon doesn't let me give it away for free. However, if you are a hybrid hero, you get that checklist that costs you $0 included in your $4 per month membership Hybrid Heroes tier. This is how we do it. This is how I have handed all of this off, and I don't lift a finger any more for capturing, editing, or creating any of our social media content.

00:21:16:03 - 00:21:38:08
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
You two can build a robust, student led, student driven social media team and social media feed. All you gotta do is start leaning in. Some of the students that God has gifted and and given to you in your context. I'm rooting for you. Don't ever hesitate to reach out. I got the pick my brain. Link down below in my, description.

00:21:38:08 - 00:21:50:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
If there's something that can help you get this up off the ground. But until next time. And as always, my friends, don't forget. Stay hybrid.

]]> Struggling to keep up with your youth group’s social media? In this episode, I’ll show you how to build a student-led social media team for your youth ministry—from recruiting Gen Z content creators to assigning creative roles like studio recruiter, sermon recap editors, and “man on the street” interviewers. Plus, I’ll show you how my Fall Social Media Pack (available on Patreon) gives you 3 months of done-for-you content your students can run without you lifting a finger.

//Social Team Checklist
https://www.patreon.com/posts/social-media-138081327?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link

🍂 FALL SOCIAL MEDIA PACK
https://www.patreon.com/posts/fall-seasonal-137477671?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link

SHOW NOTES
Shownotes & Transcripts
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/165

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//Fully Built out Studio
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVT1xvh9-5k

//TRY OPUS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361

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Hire me to run your church website, social media or communications!
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🛠️TOOLS I USE THAT CAN HELP YOU!
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products
//VIDIQ
https://vidiq.com/hybrid

//BEST DYM RESOURCES
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/dym

//OPUS.PRO FOR AI SHORTS & REELS
https://www.opus.pro/?via=a5d361

//YOUTUBE STARTER KIT FOR UNDER $100
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/youtubestarterkit

--------------
🕰️TIMECODES
00:00 Student Social Team Framework
01:08 Why Students?
6:30 What we post
08:23 Studio Roles
11:43 On the Street Roles
13:46 The Power of the Social team
14:53 How I do no work
20:05 How you can do no work

--------------
TRANSCRIPT

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:01:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
You're tired. Apparently, your

00:00:01:28 - 00:00:02:10
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
weekly

00:00:02:10 - 00:00:02:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
message

00:00:02:22 - 00:00:03:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
isn't writing itself.

00:00:03:29 - 00:00:04:13
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Senior

00:00:04:13 - 00:00:04:23
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
pastors,

00:00:04:23 - 00:00:08:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
who used to be youth pastors, continue to pitch you mid-tier

00:00:08:18 - 00:00:09:00
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
ideas, and

00:00:09:00 - 00:00:09:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
the finance

00:00:09:12 - 00:00:13:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
team, they just won't get off your back for that missing pizza receipt.

00:00:13:03 - 00:00:20:13
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
What in the world would you possibly have time to draft and dream up a fully student led social media team?

00:00:20:13 - 00:00:26:05
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Because of all of that and because of all these commitments, that's why your feed looks like this.

00:00:26:08 - 00:00:28:26
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
What if the answer isn't more of you? But what

00:00:28:26 - 00:00:38:09
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
if the answer is actually more then, because you, as a youth pastor are surrounded by the world's most capable content creator, they're called

00:00:38:09 - 00:00:49:07
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
teenagers. I have, in my context, built, student led, and student completely run social media teams. And in this episode, I'm going to share with you

00:00:49:07 - 00:00:53:11
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
how you can do that mistakes and means and all.

00:00:53:16 - 00:01:14:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And they're going to post things that are not only going to make your feed come to life, but also they'll never post something that's going to result in getting you fired, probably. Welcome to the Hybrid Ministry show. Well, hey everybody, welcome to the Hybrid Ministry show. If you and I haven't had a chance to meet you. My name is Nick Claussen.

00:01:14:13 - 00:01:39:20
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
I am a 15 year youth ministry veteran who's been passionate about social media and digital and ushered into that an absolutely expedited pace in Covid and through Covid. And now, since Covid, I have built social media teams and social media, platforms that completely are self-sustainable. Now at this point, and in this episode, I am going to fully outline in detail for you all of that.

00:01:39:20 - 00:02:04:17
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Because here's the thing. In this, episode and on this podcast, I talk a lot about my hybrid ministry strategy. In fact, my entire hybrid strategy is linked down below. You can download it, you can use it, you can take it in that e-book. I recommend posting ten times per week. And I'm going to share with you the ten posts that I post per week in my current student ministry on social media.

00:02:04:17 - 00:02:31:02
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
However, if you download my student or my fast seasonal social media pack, which is over on Patreon, the getting started version of that, social media strategy is actually only posting three times per week because I get it. Like youth ministries and youth pastors, they're busy. And so in this episode, what I want to outline for you is how to do that completely through your student volunteers.

00:02:31:02 - 00:02:51:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so we're going to explain, the reason behind why you should pick students as part of your social media team. Also, what are some roles that you can recruit them into as you are creating and building a social media team? We'll talk about some roles for, students. If you're shooting in like a studio, we can talk about roles for students.

00:02:51:28 - 00:03:14:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
If you are shooting some stuff on the street or like out and about in your space. Also, student ministry editors, which are honestly, in my opinion, the biggest life savers and time savers for me. And then finally, I'm going to give you, the opportunity to go grab a checklist of everything that you're going to need for these, for these roles and to build these teams.

00:03:14:29 - 00:03:31:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But first of all, let's take just a quick step back before we get into the nitty gritty. And then once again, there are chapters always listed down below in these episodes. So if you want to jump ahead, you can. But why students you got to understand their digital natives like this is their world. This is what they speak.

00:03:31:06 - 00:03:55:04
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
I like this concept called hybrid, where we go from our in-person moment and we take our online presence and we find a way to blend the two. In fact, the entire playlist linked right here that we just went through for the fall kickoff event idea is all about leaning into your hybrid, from your event to the ongoing donut voting bracket, to the welcome guest, to creating and building a social team like the students.

00:03:55:04 - 00:04:15:15
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Blend that all the time. And while for adults, especially during Covid and us in ministry, we didn't love it, we were even maybe annoyed by it. But like, this is their world. This is their life. YouTube is huge right now. Students spend hours online on YouTube looking at and creating and consuming content. This is just a part of their world.

00:04:15:15 - 00:04:40:17
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so, as we're trying to position ourselves as youth ministries and youth pastors to help spread the the news and message of Jesus, like we should use students to help give us that ability and help give us that chance to help spread and reach and make that message of Jesus known on the social media channels. Also, students are used to this like they're used to having an authentic social media voice.

00:04:40:17 - 00:05:07:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Like this is this is just like I said, they're digital natives. This is who they are. They value authenticity. Like, this is them. This is what they do. Right? There's also on your social media teams, there's a deep well of opportunities. For example, we had a student join last year and, the person who is overseeing the team, just like from a scheduling aspect of it, he looked at me and he's like, Nick, I don't have anywhere to put this person.

00:05:07:03 - 00:05:35:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And I was like, sure you do. And he goes, wait, what do you mean? I said, I don't know those like given those clapperboard, she's like, no, I was like, buy one and then have that person run the clapperboard. I was like, you can always invent opportunities to help make students feel like they're a doing something. But being that there is plenty of runway and avenue to enlist students for, and I'm going to share with you even how to build a team of editors so that you even have more above and beyond opportunities to, recruit people.

00:05:36:06 - 00:06:02:06
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And then, you know, the bonus in all of this is that, like, as they get into this, like, this gives them not only, like leadership experience, but also some opportunity to, like, be a disciple in this avenue of social media. Right? It may not be the most precise, it may not be the most theologically astute. It may not, you know, be the deepest or the the most, like, precision, and, you know, tightened up version of all this stuff.

00:06:02:06 - 00:06:29:11
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But like, they can learn how to influence their friends for and with the message of Jesus. So let's explore now, like, what exactly are some of the roles that we have instituted in our social media team? Let's take a look. So if you download my seasonal social media pack, you'll see that I recommend, two things transition videos and man on the Street videos.

00:06:29:11 - 00:06:51:19
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Those are things that are part of the custom for you section. And what the custom for you section is, is it's the section of my pack that makes it, your church specific because I do, I do give you some done for you stuff like Bible verses and, how to deal with anxiety, how to, you know, some like emoji guesses, some, some spiritual practice videos.

00:06:51:21 - 00:07:07:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Those are nameless, faceless. So any youth ministry can download those and use them. The custom for you section. What that does is it puts your people, your faces and your stamp on your social media, but that is going to require you to get out of camera, get out your phone, get out someone's phone and film some of these things.

00:07:07:29 - 00:07:31:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so two of those are interview interview questions like man on the street style and transition style videos. Those are two staples of our social media strategy in our youth ministry. Every single Wednesday night, we are filming something and so we're but we're only filming one type of thing per week. So one week we're filming main on the street, and then maybe the next week we're filming transition style videos.

00:07:31:21 - 00:07:53:15
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
I also include For you some bonus content of like topic ideas for either dress and or may seven question style videos. And so those are the others that we have on our monthly schedule. So man, on the street transition style videos, drafts, seven questions. Any given that you come into our youth ministry, we're doing one of those four things.

00:07:53:18 - 00:08:12:16
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so, in the bonus section, the drafts are the seven questions. If you want to start doing some of those, we film those in like a fully, built out studio. I'll link the tour episode to our studio if you want to see our studio, what we've bought, how we outfitted it so that we can have multiple different sets in one, one room, one space.

00:08:12:16 - 00:08:36:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
You can go check that out again. Link down below in the description. But here's some roles for for people in that, in that type of night, in that type of setting. So we record using podcast style microphones, which means we need to record into some sort of audio interface. So we plug it into like a Scarlett focus, eight eight and then that runs into like a computer, and then the computer is running like Adobe Audition.

00:08:36:22 - 00:08:57:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so we have a person who sits there and runs audio. And so they literally do the thing like speeding, speeding, speeding. And so that person makes sure that the audio is actually rolling. And then they'll also put headphones on to ensure that they can hear what the people are saying and they can actually mix it. Do like a live mix using the Scarlett focus right.

00:08:57:24 - 00:09:18:01
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
We'll also have someone running camera. And so they'll literally click the record button on the camera and then they'll click, you know, stop record. And for a while there, we had them clap in front of the camera. But like I said in the intro, we actually just, bought a clapperboard. And so either they can do it or if you have enough people, you can have a whole nother person do it.

00:09:18:03 - 00:09:37:08
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And the clapperboard that we bought is a dry erase. And so you can put like, you know, you can erase it and you can write like drafts, take four and then you can write the names of the people and that way if you could get them to spell their names for you, you're going to get their names on the edit spelled exactly right, which I think is really important.

00:09:37:15 - 00:10:01:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
We also have a television screen, which sometimes for like our leader podcast, we have that on the actual camera and use it as like a presentation, if you will. But for these videos, we actually put it, off camera so that the contestants can see the slides because there's like scripts and stuff, like for example, the script that like for seven questions is, hey, the name of the game is seven questions if you want to play and close your eyes, the answer is going to be right here on the screen.

00:10:02:01 - 00:10:16:25
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
The category is fill in the blank. It's hard sometimes. The sixth grader walks in. They want to be part of the social team. They want to be on in want to do the social challenge. And you tell them the script and they can't remember it. And so that TV right there really helps them, you know what I mean?

00:10:16:25 - 00:10:36:07
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Like, see what they're supposed to do. And then we'll also after that script, we'll just make a slide that says one and that's question one. And then two, three, four. And so that that screen also helps them like keep track of the questions. And then there's always some sort of like call to action at the end of every video like hey, comment below your answer or comment below, did you get it?

00:10:36:07 - 00:11:08:11
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Or you know, whatever. And those are just kind of like prompts so that someone doesn't have to speak them. Because when someone speaks them from off camera, you have to edit them later, which is not the end of the world. But again, it helps. And so you can have someone literally sitting there running slides. It's also helpful to have people recruiting because we're in our studio, students might not know that the social challenge is going on, or they might know now, at this point in our in our context, but they might not be like aware of it or looking for it or, you know, running towards it.

00:11:08:11 - 00:11:23:10
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so you have people who are like, hey, you want to be in social challenge today? And then they'll bring them back to our studio and then they'll help, kind of like queue up a line. And then lastly, you can have a host, a person who is out in the hallway talking to the people, waiting, explaining to them what they're going to do when they get in there.

00:11:23:15 - 00:11:44:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so you're going to want someone who's got some charisma on that. But, all of those are different roles that we have tried to implement and institute for our studio based social challenge nights. Now, there are those are drafts and seven questions. So that's two out of our four social, challenge, you know, scheduling nights. The other two are when we're out and about.

00:11:44:22 - 00:12:02:21
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
So we grab a tripod, a camera and a microphone, and we hit the street and we don't go anywhere. But just like our student lobby. But we're out and about. We're more visible. So you don't quite need as many, like, hosts or anything like that. But you may need like a recruiter. You still need someone like, hey, you want to come be on social media tonight?

00:12:02:21 - 00:12:18:13
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
You want to come here to some questions. And so they'll fold people in the queue up a line. They'll get them off to the side there. So that's another option or another role. Of course you're going to have your interviewer. So the person that's on camera that's asking the questions like, hey, would you rather this, would you rather that?

00:12:18:15 - 00:12:40:19
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And listen, all of these questions are included in my social media pack. And so what I recommend is that you batch record so that you ask 4 or 5 questions, and you ask 4 or 5 people the same 4 or 5 questions, and then boom, you have 4 or 5 different men on the street style videos. And so that interviewer there's asking the same person these, you know, 4 or 5 different questions.

00:12:40:21 - 00:13:04:14
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Obviously, you're also going to have a camera person. You're also going to have an audio person. And I like to have the audio person, plug the headphones directly into the camera and listen to make sure that they can hear, and that's not too loud. And, you know, if like, anything gets cut out, that they can make them go back and reshoot it with film it, you can have someone holding up like a sheet with the questions or even times we've rolled that TV out.

00:13:04:14 - 00:13:24:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Right? And so we've had a person there, managing that TV or running slides for that, you know, or whatever the case may be. And so those are all different ways and things that you can use for like man on the Street transition style videos are very similar, except for all you really are doing is like, you know, you get like a video of a kid who was riding a skateboard and they fell on the floor and they fell like in this certain position.

00:13:24:19 - 00:13:40:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
So you tell someone, hey, lay like this, and then you give them some sort of script like, oh, that hurt. Make sure that you always have someone to help pick you up. We got that here at our church on Wednesday nights. See you at 630 or something. You know, something silly like that. Like it's kind of meant to be, you know, silly like that.

00:13:41:00 - 00:13:58:01
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Those are the two, like, on the night, jobs. And let me just tell you, like, once we started walking around with the camera, especially for, like, man on the street or, like, transition style videos, the kids came out of the woodwork in their interest level for it. We have, seven, I want to say different like serving teams for students.

00:13:58:01 - 00:14:25:27
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
We have welcome team. We have cafe, we have tech team. We have social team, we have photography. We have worship. Maybe that's it. Oh no. And then we have our table leaders. That's probably like our highest, spiritual bar of of role. The team that people want to be on the most is the social team. And so we have, like, increased our engagement around student serving because the social team exists.

00:14:25:29 - 00:14:48:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But the real, in my opinion, this role right here, this next role, this is really like the role that has changed everything for me. It's the student editor. So I post ten pieces of content per week. And this is a genuine, real, true, authentic statement. I don't edit any of it okay. So let me let me walk you through, what I post.

00:14:48:14 - 00:15:07:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
It's some of it's going to be similar to what you might get in the fall seasonal social media pack. Some of it is a little bit different. You can sprinkle in any of these ideas because I'm asking you in the seasonal social media pack to post three times per week. So if you like any of these ideas you got, you got margin to kind of add this and make it your own and bring your own flair.

00:15:07:20 - 00:15:27:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But I post like a meme Monday every single Monday morning that is just like a static carousel kind of based post. What we've done in our, our staff team is we created a Google Drive folder and we just say, hey, as you're scrolling social media, if you come across memes, save them and dump them in this folder.

00:15:27:12 - 00:15:46:18
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And so all I have to do on Monday is go grab them from that folder, pull them out. You know, I put ten out for carousel post and I post them, recently I've only started doing five because I've also started posting them over on the YouTube posts section, and they only allow five total, as opposed to Instagram, which now I believe allows like 20.

00:15:46:18 - 00:16:16:22
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
So I wasn't posting, by the way, I wasn't posting to YouTube, but I had a kid who said, are you going to do me Monday anymore? And I was like, yeah. And he's like, on YouTube. And I was like, oh, so that made me, you know, kind of start doing it, on, on YouTube there. Additionally, I post three sermon recap clips, so like, what we do is we film our messages long form posted to YouTube, and then we edit them for YouTube with edits and captions and all the things.

00:16:16:24 - 00:16:42:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But before, we edit those or I'll have whoever is editing for me because I actually pay for an editor on these. I'll have them send me just a clean copy so they'll they'll compile it all together chronologically, and then they'll send me a copy without captions and without any of the, you know, B-roll or whatever. And I'll take those clean copies and I'll upload them into something like Open Source Pro, which, by the way, there's a link down below if you're interested in checking it out.

00:16:43:01 - 00:17:21:14
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
It doesn't change anything for you, but it is a small, affiliate commission link for me, which would be incredibly helpful if that's something you want to try out. It makes my job so easy. I clips those up, and then we just download three of those and store them to post on three different days in our week. If you don't pre film like a long form message, then my foster seasonal social media pack, it gives you like devotional scripts that you can hold your phone and you can speak direct to camera on those, and it'll tell you exactly what to say and how to include it and that, that, that hits the same

00:17:21:14 - 00:17:40:05
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
basic gist of what, a clip is meant to do where your Devo, clip, which isn't maybe tied to like a specific sermon or message, but it's still it's going to perform really well. I'm going to do a really good job for you on social media. So either one of those is fine, but it's some sort of spiritually charged content, right?

00:17:40:05 - 00:17:58:27
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Because some of these other things aren't spiritually charged content. And so your goal is you want to hook people, hook students, or hook your, your students friends with some of the goofy stuff so that you're showing up more and more in their algorithm. So that's why you also want to include some of these spiritual things so that they'll run across those as well.

00:17:58:27 - 00:18:17:28
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But the way I don't edit them is I use opus clip if you want to, you know, film something on your phone, that's fine. Then what I would recommend is handing over your phone to a student editor. Or if you pay for like a service like Adobe Premiere Pro, Final Cut Pro, DaVinci resolve, you can get them on a computer and they can edit that video for you.

00:18:17:28 - 00:18:36:25
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
Or even if you don't want to do it, have a student film there and let them edit it, and they can use something like on their own phone, like cap cut, or even just something simple like the TikTok or Instagram Reels editor. Our four social challenge archetypes remember seven questions drafts, man on the Street, transition style videos, all edited by students.

00:18:36:25 - 00:18:58:19
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And right now I'm actually building like a tutorial. Because, like, I've trained students and it takes a lot of my time to get them up to speed, but I'm building tutorials now, where they're watching me edit one, and then they can go back and they can watch that as reference as they edit. And so now I'm able to recruit more students without any experience, and I'm having them do that on something like Adobe Premiere Pro.

00:18:58:25 - 00:19:14:21
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
But I have had students in the past who have their own editing, kind of like chops. And I'll just send them a link from our Google Drive of like, like a seven questions and I'll say, hey, get this under a minute, add captions on the screen, add music, and send it back to me. And they do a great job and I'm fine with it being that way as well.

00:19:14:21 - 00:19:39:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
So it doesn't have to be exactly like I'm doing it, or exactly in like, you know, my template, which, by the way, I have, seven questions and address template link down below. It's included in the for seasonal social media pack, or just in 100 bonus ideas for free listed down below in the description. Another video that we do is like, just like our Wednesday night recap, which is a very simple collage style video.

00:19:39:05 - 00:19:57:12
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
I walk around with my phone and I get anywhere from like 5 to 7 second clips. Put that in TikTok, it does auto cut for me and boom are done. And then the last remaining of my ten is one of my four seasonal social media packs. Either a verse, a spiritual practice video, a how to carousel or an emoji phraseology guesting.

00:19:57:12 - 00:20:21:13
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
And again, all of those are going to be included in my fast seasonal social media pack, which, by the way, if you didn't know, is 1799. However, I have a bonus Patreon podcast for $4 a month where I not only give you everything in my store for free so that includes this pack, but also I, recap what we did from a creative programing standpoint and from social media.

00:20:21:13 - 00:20:48:21
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
From a social media standpoint. The previous week in student ministry. Think of it as like your weekly, debrief meeting with, like, you know, a trusted friend. And if I were you, that's $4 a month. You can charge at times $1,248 to like, professional development or your student ministries budget in that way. But what I'm going to do is I'm going to include a checklist for you of roles, of things to do, of what to film all of that.

00:20:48:21 - 00:21:16:03
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
That's over on my Patreon. Once again, that will come with a nominal fee because Patreon doesn't let me give it away for free. However, if you are a hybrid hero, you get that checklist that costs you $0 included in your $4 per month membership Hybrid Heroes tier. This is how we do it. This is how I have handed all of this off, and I don't lift a finger any more for capturing, editing, or creating any of our social media content.

00:21:16:03 - 00:21:38:08
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
You two can build a robust, student led, student driven social media team and social media feed. All you gotta do is start leaning in. Some of the students that God has gifted and and given to you in your context. I'm rooting for you. Don't ever hesitate to reach out. I got the pick my brain. Link down below in my, description.

00:21:38:08 - 00:21:50:29
Nick Clason | Hybrid Ministry
If there's something that can help you get this up off the ground. But until next time. And as always, my friends, don't forget. Stay hybrid.

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