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DESCRIPTION
📹 YouTube is an incredible platform for reaching teenagers with the message and hope of the gospel.

🖥️ It's Clear that YouTube is (or should be) the most used platform for Youth Ministries

🎤As a Youth Pastor, you already have natural YouTube skills

💥We'll also unpack some of the other features that YouTube has to offer, beyond long-form video

📹 Follow along as we unpack YouTube for Youth Groups on our FREE Playlist
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLngXlSr64YaLHMhNNfqmmmAsKRJ1VCBJl
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📓SHOWNOTES
//SHOWNOTES & TRANSCRIPTS
http://www.hybridministry.xyz/091

//YOUTUBE VIDEO
https://youtu.be/ucvXfaVRJ6E

//YOUTH MINISTRY LEADER COHORT
https://www.derryprenkert.com/ymlcohort/

//DYM FACEBOOK GROUP
https://www.facebook.com/groups/493666560814931

THE REASONS TO USE YOUTUBE
//INSTAGRAM VS TIKTOK VS YOUTUBE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r73ceADGZxQ&t=1063

YOUTH PASTORS ARE YOUTUBERS
//STATISTICS FROM 4 PLATFORMS ADDED UP
https://youtu.be/slB0Rmf_X0c?t=489

EXCLUSIVE FREE OFFER!
//INQUIRE TO SEE IF THERE'S SPACE
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Website: https://www.hybridministry.xyz

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🆓 FREEBIES 🆓
📅 "The Full Hybrid Ministry Strategy"
https://hybrid-ministry-40060036.hubspotpagebuilder.com/free-hybrid-ministry-e-book

🖥️ "My 9 Favorite DYM Resources"
https://www.hybridministry.xyz/articles/dym

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😨 "Have I already Ruined my TikTok Account?"
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📹 "Adobe Premiere Pro Presets for Animating Layers"
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🛠️TOOLS
Some of the below links are affilate links in which we do recieve a small commission based on your purchase or use of products

//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
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AUTO POD
https://autopod.lemonsqueezy.com?aff=MX7Vv

TRY REV.COM FOR TRANSCRIBING
https://rev.pxf.io/R5nDOa

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🕰️TIMECODES
00:00 You Want to Reach More Students, Right?
01:15 The Statistics that Prove YouTube is a Perfect Strategy to Reaching Teenagers
04:22 The Reasons to Use YouTube
07:14 Youth Pastors are YouTubers
09:30 Exclusive Free Offer!
10:05 Answer Student's Questions
11:20 Other Features of YouTube that I Love!
14:35 It's time to make content on YouTube that's made for YouTube

TRANSCRIPT
00:00:00:02 - 00:00:28:05
Nick Clason
Youth pastor. Let me guess. You want to reach more students and Youth Pastor, let me also guess that you care about pastoring and developing the students that God has already entrusted to you. Let me guess. You pour a lot of time, energy and effort into your teaching messages because you care about the students that God has given you and you want them to grasp the truth that's found in God's Word.

00:00:28:07 - 00:00:56:14
Nick Clason
Listen, I agree with you, and I think that you work too hard to craft and pour over and study and pray and agonize over your messages only for them to die on your hard drive the moment that they're delivered. And so I think that we and all youth ministries should be leaning into the digital presence. That's why I've built this podcast, Hybrid Ministry.

00:00:56:14 - 00:01:24:26
Nick Clason
So in this episode, we are going to talk about why youth ministries need to be on YouTube, why you should be on YouTube, and how you can get started and yeah, maybe even not add more work to your plate. Welcome to the hybrid ministry show. My name is Nick Clason and I'm absolutely pumped and fired up to talk to you about this because in my over a year journey on this podcast, I have grown to love YouTube.

00:01:25:02 - 00:01:54:22
Nick Clason
When I started with social media and when I started trying to reach students on the Internet, YouTube was a distant kind of far strategy that was on my radar. Like it was like, I'll post some videos over there, but in my time since that, which was probably five, six, seven years ago, I have come to love YouTube and I am more and more convinced that YouTube in addition to all other digital and social mediums that we can effectively reach students with.

00:01:54:24 - 00:02:16:21
Nick Clason
But YouTube is one of the best resources out there, and Gen Z, right? Gen Z, I'm not Gen Z, but the students are. We as youth pastors trying to reach they use their mobile device more than any other device combined. I've actually posted a clip that said that exact stat on my Tik tok, all my socials link down below in the description.

00:02:16:21 - 00:02:34:17
Nick Clason
If you're interested in that, if you are watching via a podcast catcher I am and have some graphs and charts on screen via YouTube. The YouTube link is down below in the description as well, but they use their mobile device. Any other device combined. And one of the comments that I got was like, Well, no duh, what do you want us to do?

00:02:34:17 - 00:02:53:16
Nick Clason
Use a portable DVD player? And I thought it was a hilarious comment because while they were sort of coming at me, it's an it's a fair question, like, yeah, what do we want Gen Z to do? Like use the archaic technology that we as millennials and Gen Xers and and older had to and were forced to use before the invention of the cell phone.

00:02:53:19 - 00:03:21:07
Nick Clason
The cell phone is amazing. Additionally, 45% of teenagers claim to be online get this almost constantly and finally people say that they are two times double as likely to share video based content rather than text based posts. I am in a youth ministry leader cohort is based on Zoom. It's a national thing all across country. More information if you're interested in that down below in the show notes.

00:03:21:07 - 00:03:38:25
Nick Clason
But I recently got tapped and asked in my cohort if I would be willing to workshop this idea of social media, and I was thrilled and honored with the opportunity. And so part of what I'm going to share with you today is actually from that presentation, but I'm going to expound upon it a little bit more because I think about like this.

00:03:38:25 - 00:04:09:21
Nick Clason
If an alien were to come down and were to see these statistics that Gen Z uses their mobile device more than any phone, and 45% of teenagers, 45, almost half claimed to be online constantly and video based content is two times more likely to be shared. Then an alien would come down and be like, Dang, if you people are trying to actively reach young people with the most important message, the message that you have has been laid on your heart and that God has placed on you and said, Go preach the Gospel to all nations.

00:04:09:22 - 00:04:34:09
Nick Clason
And by all means that part of our nations mean that must mean that youth ministries are crushing social media. Well, in the famous words of Lee Corso, Not so fast, my friend. And here's why I actually posted back in July 2019 the download Youth Ministry Facebook Community group linked to that. If you're not in that already on Facebook, it's a great community of ideas and questions and answers.

00:04:34:09 - 00:04:56:24
Nick Clason
It's a really great place. But I my question was this and I think I have like 100 to 200 responses. So not a massive sample size, but also not small either. And I said, Hey, how would you rate your web and social presence right now? And many people said, okay, 49% said okay and 48% said really, really bad.

00:04:56:26 - 00:05:16:23
Nick Clason
And only 3% said it was good, which I don't get how that math adds up, but feel free to double check me on that. Hey, if you are in the okay category, get going. Give me like like we're glad you're here. If you're in the bad category, then you probably only subscribe because this next playlist that we're in, I mean, honestly, it's for you.

00:05:16:23 - 00:05:47:25
Nick Clason
And even if you're in the great category, turn the bell on because I want to help. Level up your YouTube game in this playlist that we are finding ourselves in. Talking about the importance and value of YouTube and why YouTube, right? Pew Research actually have some statistics. Again, if you're listening, you may want to scrub over to the YouTube section of this video where 20 in 2022, 95% of teenagers say that they have used the following apps or sites, the app that 95% of them said they use was YouTube.

00:05:47:28 - 00:06:12:11
Nick Clason
The next highest was Tik Tok at 67%, a massive drop, Instagram at 62 and Snapchat 59 and Facebook at 32, which is down from 71% in this comparative study from 2014. And so actually we debated the topic Instagram versus Tik Tok versus YouTube right here. The video that you'll see if you're on YouTube right now, you can click on that and go watch that video.

00:06:12:11 - 00:06:50:19
Nick Clason
As we explored the pros and cons of each of those categories. And then actually left a final verdict about which of those platforms you should be using. Hint Side note Spoiler alert it was YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world behind Google. Some may classify it as third, but even if you do buy into that third largest search engine in the world, think it's behind Google, Google images and then YouTube, which so Google and Google images kind of are one and the same, which is I think why people debate between second and third, nonetheless, is the only platform backed by the power of Google and the Google search engine.

00:06:50:24 - 00:07:12:27
Nick Clason
So think about it. Why do you use YouTube? You jump on there to ask questions, how to change your oil and how to rewire a ceiling fan into your house and and how to, you know, get fastpass is that Disney, which unfortunately they don't have them anymore. But if you or anyone has connections down in Orlando and you want to give me a ticket, my family or come in in September, so send that on my way.

00:07:12:27 - 00:07:47:00
Nick Clason
But nonetheless, we get on YouTube to get answers to questions. Guess what? What do we do As youth pastors? We answer students questions. YouTube and youth ministry are a match made in absolute heaven. Think about it. You're actually already doing this. Your series that you have planned for next month. You are planning it in response to answering a student's question, or you are planning it because you think that your students need this particular message or this particular topic or this particular book study.

00:07:47:00 - 00:08:15:27
Nick Clason
Right. And the good news is all four social networks Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok, all of them have a short form, vertical based video component right now that is taking the social media landscape by fire. So what that means for you and what that means for me is we can create one type of content, short form, vertical based video, which by the way, remember video posts two times more likely to be shared, and then we can post them across all of the platforms.

00:08:15:29 - 00:08:45:19
Nick Clason
We no longer have to create content that's specifically curated for each platform. We can create one piece, one type of content to get that message out and spread it across all four of the social networks. I've done this before. A link down below some of my statistics to the particular section in the video where I did it, but I pulled like just four pieces of social media content across all four platforms and I added it up and you know, none of them were like amazingly high in their view rate.

00:08:45:19 - 00:09:21:04
Nick Clason
But when you strung all four of them together, we reached over 500 students on a really badly performing post. And so my question to you and all youth pastors, like I said back at the beginning, is do you want to reach more students? Social media may in fact be the door in which you can reach more students, not because you're looking for vanity metrics, not because you want to become a famous influencer, but because you believe as a youth pastor that you have been given the burden to help carry out the Great Commission from Jesus Christ himself, to reach the world with the message of the Gospel and the message of hope.

00:09:21:07 - 00:09:49:28
Nick Clason
And you can look directly into a camera and share that message with your students. And you, like I said, you're already answering their questions. What if you just started capturing those answers via video? I'm actually opening up a limited amount of spots, three in particular. In fact, they may already be filled up from some of my cohort friends where I am going to offer done for you editing you film your teaching message, you send me the footage, I will send it back to you edited.

00:09:50:05 - 00:10:09:24
Nick Clason
I'll give you three short form, vertical based videos that you can post on whatever platforms you have, and I'll create a YouTube thumbnail for you to go ahead and get that thing started if you're interested. More information link down below in the show notes, in the description or in the podcast catcher wherever you are. But I love what Sean Cannell actually says.

00:10:09:24 - 00:10:30:01
Nick Clason
He says what you should do on YouTube is answer specific questions. He calls it his ASQ strategy. And like I said, you're doing that when you're creating your teaching series. So like for example, in our student ministry, we just got done answering the specific question, How do you use the Bible? How do you use the Bible? Right?

00:10:30:03 - 00:10:43:26
Nick Clason
Answer that question for your students and then when you have a student who comes to you two or three months later that says, Hey, can you help me get started on how to use my Bible? You don't have to be like, dog, we just did a series on that. Three months ago. I wish you would have been here.

00:10:43:28 - 00:11:06:02
Nick Clason
You can give them the link to that content, right? And even your most strict homeschool best parents, which by the way, that's me. I have an eight year old, the five year old. We're probably going to homeschool our kids next year. They love YouTube and they watch YouTube, but they only are allowed to watch it. When we my wife and I are in the room with them on the big screen in our main living room.

00:11:06:04 - 00:11:27:10
Nick Clason
And so you can you can deliver your content via YouTube to even the strictest parents and you can, you know, wave all the way up to the kids with absolutely no parental supervision on the Internet because all students, 95%, are on YouTube. Now, they may not be hungry for your content, and that's why you have to help kind of build and grow that audience.

00:11:27:10 - 00:11:53:11
Nick Clason
And that's why I love that YouTube offers the shorts section. They have the kind of TikTok, discovery based algorithm stuff. We've gained a lot of subscribers just organically, both on this personal channel here and also on my student ministry channel, far more on my student ministry channel, by the way, because we're shooting and producing content with our students and we're also shooting and producing content with our student staff, that's fun, engaging and entertaining.

00:11:53:11 - 00:12:17:21
Nick Clason
And then hopefully they follow us there and then maybe they get a little sneak peek of one of our short teaching reels or videos or whatever, and then that will link to a longer form, more elaborated, fleshed out answer to something that we're answering their specific question. I also love on YouTube. They have now the community tab with like polls and you can ask questions and you can post pictures and all kinds of stuff.

00:12:17:21 - 00:12:45:23
Nick Clason
It mirrors a more traditional sort of social media experience that wasn't there before for YouTube. I also love, love, Love their playlist feature. It is both a great place to dump any and all of your series You can any like three, four, five, six, seven week series can be a three, four, five, six, seven video playlist. And additionally, we're going to get deeper into this in this particular how to use YouTube playlist on this channel.

00:12:45:23 - 00:13:04:03
Nick Clason
It's very meta if you think about it. My playlist helping you create playlists on YouTube for your student ministry. But nonetheless, like you can also offer free courses to things that are necessary and need to be answered by your students. For example, we did one on baptism, but whenever you get up and preach on baptism, think about it.

00:13:04:03 - 00:13:27:24
Nick Clason
A wide and vast majority of those students have already been baptized. And so in a lot of ways, what's a good message and a good reminder? It's also not always like pressing more relevant to every single student in your room. However, if you have a playlist, you can send that information to students and links and descriptions, subscribes, likes, all those types of things where you can help them move on into that next step.

00:13:27:24 - 00:13:53:19
Nick Clason
You can meld the in-person and the digital and use it to work together, just like we all do in our own lives. We're using technology to to weave into an intersect, into the main and real parts of our lives. And also it's got the live kind of portion of the of YouTube that you can put a camera in the room and and livestream and you may be thinking, Dude, I can't livestream.

00:13:53:19 - 00:14:18:18
Nick Clason
I don't have that capability in my youth room. Truth be told, neither do I. And that's actually why I propose that we as youth pastor should film videos very much like I'm doing right now on a camera and so on. This right here on screen is my e-book. It's 100% completely free, and in there is a link to my buyer's guide on getting YouTube gear set up for under $100.

00:14:18:25 - 00:14:52:18
Nick Clason
You buy things like a tripod, a microphone and some lighting. You can do all that for under $100 and then use the cell phone that you already own that's in your pocket. And if you don't have a smartphone, find somebody in your life who does. You probably know someone would be my guess and then start filming pre filming your messages and we can get you started for under $100 and like I said, a limited run right now where I'm offering three people into my kind of beta trial course of I will edit your videos for you on social media, but live streaming is probably what most of us do.

00:14:52:18 - 00:15:19:14
Nick Clason
It's probably how most of us post our church's content onto the internet, but that's not made for YouTube, that's made for church, which is why I actually, you know, I recommend pre filming the messages because you don't have live streaming capabilities, but I also recommend pre filling messages because it's what's made and optimized for YouTube. Would you rather watch a video that's made for YouTube or would you rather watch a video that's made for another experience?

00:15:19:14 - 00:15:44:15
Nick Clason
Or are you sort of just in the back of the room and you're not the focal point? And the speaker, the presenter, they're not focused on you. They're focused on what's in front of them and they should be right. That's why I recommend pre filming your messages. It's not going to be that much more work. All you have to do is find time to sit down for 20 to 30 minutes per week, deliver your message, direct to camera, and potentially send it on to me to edit.

00:15:44:15 - 00:16:14:23
Nick Clason
If not, you can do some basic editing. We're going to get into that in this playlist, but that's why I recommend pre filming because the most dynamic content, if you go to the YouTube home screen on your YouTube account, probably the content that is being delivered to you and fed to you through the algorithm is content that is made for the medium of YouTube and you can create content like that by pre filming your messages that you're already doing the study and work to produce and make.

00:16:14:23 - 00:16:45:18
Nick Clason
And with a few small tweaks, we can get you up and running and launch a YouTube channel where you can reach students with the hope and the message of the gospel with a content that is made for the medium in which you're posting and we're going to get into all of that linked right here on the screen. Make sure that you subscribe so that you don't miss a single other video here in this playlist we here at the hybrid ministry show want to make digital discipleship easy, possible and accessible for you.

00:16:45:21 - 00:16:48:04
Nick Clason
So as always, stay hybrid.

All you need and more at: http://www.hybridministry.xyz
Follow along on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@clasonnick
Keep up with what's happening on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/user/@clasonnick

SHOWNOTES

MY STUDENT MINISTRY YOUTUBE CHANNEL: https://www.youtube.com/@crosscreekstudents
CHURCH YOUTUBE STARTER KIT: https://www.hybridministry.xyz/033
TRENDS SITE: http://www.trends.google.com

TIMECODES
00:00-02:30 Intro
02:30-08:05 Why you should begin with YouTube when building out your Social Strategy
08:05-11:35 Optimal YouTube video lengths and watch time analytics
11:35-14:33 Make your intros compelling
14:33-17:42 The importance of titling and metadescriptions
17:42-18:07 Thumbnails on YouTube
18:07-18:44 How to find keywords based on trending topics
18:44-19:10 Comments and shares on YouTube
19:10-20:38 YouTube Conclusion
20:38-22:15 Outro

TRANSCRIPT
Nick Clason (00:01):
Well, hello there and welcome everybody to the Hybrid Minister Show. As always, I am your host, Nick Clason. So excited to be with you. And if you did not hear the trailer that we dropped earlier this week, we are going to be diving into a full fledged social media strategy. And this is part one of the six part series of putting an entire social media framework and strategy, um, in place for the, for your church, for your ministry, um, and for the people that you are attempting to reach. This is aimed at churches and pastors of what can probably be used and adapted for other places in marketplace and whatnot. And so on. Today's very first episode, we are going to be launching and starting with the platform of YouTube. Yes, we most recently dropped a, uh, episode called Don't Sleep on YouTube, A link to that in the show notes.

Nick Clason (00:57):
But we are going to be specifically looking at the strategy, um, the social media strategy. And we are starting with YouTube. And you'll see why here in just a minute. But before we dive in, do not forget a rating or review would be amazing. You can head over to our YouTube channel and see this live with some lower thirds and some graphics woven in to maybe help, uh, support some of the arguments that we're making. So if you find that, uh, helpful or interesting, make sure that you head there. Also, as always, you can head to hybrid ministry.xyz, both for our ebook. Have I already ruined my Church TikTok account, which is a complete guide to post any TikTok from start to finish. If you have no idea what you're doing, here're just getting started, this ebook is for you. And if you are a TikTok veteran, probably still for you cuz honestly, I learned some things as I made it.

Nick Clason (01:49):
Um, and then the other thing is that as always, we provide free a hundred percent free transcript, um, show notes to every single episode. So you can head to hybrid ministry.xyz.xyz. Yes, it is a suffix to a website despite what people might think. Just I like, I actually think it's a creative one, an interesting one. It's very, very like unknown. Um, so if like a.com is taken, I often opt for a.xyz cause I just think it's, it's cool. So anyway, uh, head to those places and, uh, without any further ado, let's dive in. Little break. Let me get some coffee. Let's dive into why we should start with YouTube. Here we go. All right, so why should we start with YouTube? I believe if done optimally, your church social media strategy to borrow from marketing, if you will, um, I'm gonna attempt to create this with my hands.

Nick Clason (02:46):
So if you're watching on YouTube stream, it's gonna make sense to you, but it's like a funnel, right? And so, especially now in the days of the algorithms where it's discovery, discovery focused as opposed to just following your friends like it used to be, um, you are going to want to, uh, catch people at the top of your funnel. And the top of the funnel is very wide now because of YouTube shorts, because of Instagram reels, Facebook reels, and because of TikTok, you can reach and catch people that you would've never otherwise interacted with. Maybe they're people that are local to you geographically, maybe not. But the reality is, is that you're going to be finding people in the top of that funnel that you never would've had that relationship with before. That's amazing. So that's what churches have been looking for and asking for social media for years.

Nick Clason (03:36):
How can we expand our reach? How can we share the gospel of Jesus? How can we find different people that we might want to minister to or share the, the truth or love of Jesus with them? However, what are you going to do with them once you get them? And I think, uh, for me, a lot of the, a lot of the question I was even asking, um, Matt, who was former co-host of this podcast, I was even asking him early on, like, okay, great, that's awesome. So we go viral on TikTok, then what? And, and he didn't even know. So that's how new all of this is. It, it all lives within the life of this podcast, which is under a year old, um, by the time of this posting. And so, so once that funnel, once we start catching people who are finding awareness, we need to drive them to something, what are we driving them to?

Nick Clason (04:24):
I think, and I would propose that the best thing to drive someone to, especially if they're just finding you on social media, is to drive them to listening to longer form, uh, pieces of content. There was, uh, we talked about it in the, the YouTube, uh, trends, the YouTube trends, uh, not trends report. The YouTube Trends podcast I dropped a couple of weeks ago. Um, and I'm trying to look it up right here. Lifetime. So that's why I'm fumbling around. Um, let's see if, uh, I can find it, but I'm probably not gonna be able to find it. But there's a stat that says, um, some percentage that's, that's the sta I'm looking for. I don't know the number, but some percentage of people look up, uh, or use like short form videos in order to find longer form video content or longer form content of some sort.

Nick Clason (05:20):
So, so, uh, especially the generation, um, that's coming. Gen z, gen Alpha, they might spend time on TikTok, they might spend time on YouTube shorts, see a short snippet of something, and then that might prompt them to go watch something longer. Now here's the thing. Um, no offense, sermons are not, not that new and not that interesting. And so therefore, that may not be the most captivating thing that someone's gonna want to be driven towards. But if they find their way to something creative, something different, or just your pastor's interesting, or the topic that your pastor preached on is interesting, then yeah, I think you are gonna get people to drive towards it. So that's why I say start with YouTube. Now, I I, when I wrote this, I had a very different view of YouTube. We hadn't even started when I, when I wrote this, I wrote this, uh, for a, uh, youth ministry company.

Nick Clason (06:15):
And so when I wrote it, I, I had not even started practically using YouTube in my ministry yet. And, um, what's crazy is even if you listen back to last, last week's episode on Don't Sleep On YouTube, I said, we now have over 70 subscribers to our YouTube. Since the time of that posting, which, or recording from then to now, which is only a week gap in time, we have grown our YouTube to up to 106 subscribers. So we've had 36 or so subscribers join us on YouTube, which is just bonkers crazy. So why start with YouTube? Obviously, YouTube, uh, is owned by Google, so it has a search engine component to it. Um, in addition to that, it's got long form video content and now short form video content. So you can use the short form to get discovered and gain subscribers to then support and supplement and push to your long form video content.

Nick Clason (07:15):
I'm gonna recommend that all the other platforms also PO point to YouTube just as a place where your videos and your containers live. And so, um, that is, that is what I think is optimal, opening the top of the funnel, driving them another step deeper. Obviously, the lowest part of the funnel is them making a decision to follow Jesus, maybe becoming a, a full, fully devoted follower of Jesus, um, integrated into the life of your church and attending regularly in person. But going from watching a 62nd clip to a several minute video, that's a big jump. That's a big step. Let's, let's chat through the elements and purposes and, um, reasons why we should start with YouTube and what we know about it today in 2023. Let's go. All right, so let's talk about watch times. We've talked about this a fair bit on this podcast and other, uh, episodes and whatnot.

Nick Clason (08:12):
But according to backlinko.com, they surveyed 1.3 million YouTube videos, um, to try and better understand the YouTube search feature. And they determined this, uh, fact from their survey. Longer videos significantly outperform shorter videos. Now we're talking long form, wide screen, like typical YouTube videos, not YouTube shorts. It's a completely different section and platform, but longer videos significantly outperform shorter videos. The average length of a first page YouTube video that is indexed on the first page is 14 minutes and 50 seconds. So you're looking in that sweet spot of, I would say anywhere from 12 minutes to 18 minutes is a good length that you want to be shooting for, for your YouTube videos. Now, the question that you might have is like, well, what if I live stream my sermon and my pastor preaches for 35 minutes? Well, that's great, and you can continue to use that and you should continue to put that up on YouTube if you have the live streaming capabilities and whatnot.

Nick Clason (09:18):
However, in some context, if you're starting from scratch, one of the things that I have been pushing and recommending, and one of the things that we have been doing over at our church Cross Creek students, which by the way, if you want, I'll drop a link to our YouTube channel on the show notes. You can see what I'm talking about when I recommend pre-filing your content. So you don't need a lot, I mean, we use a cell phone, which is the same cell phone I'm using to shoot this YouTube video here. So you can check that out, um, on our YouTube channel. Um, we use that to shoot, I grab the couple of like external microphones just so that the audio quality is above average and that is it, you know, some basic lighting stuff, but nothing crazy. Uh, and that gives us a, a multiple different, like, things to do.

Nick Clason (10:06):
Like when we preach live, we're probably preaching that 30 plus minute thing or, or at least bumping up right against it, which is not optimal for the YouTube, um, search length. The other thing is that it does give us extra time with our content. If, if we deliver it once to a phone and then once live in the room, like by the time we're live in the room, like we're pretty well versed with what our content is going to be, it's not gonna be a shock to us. We're not gonna get up there and be like, what is this again? Um, especially if you're using curriculum pre can pre-canned curriculum, you can, um, you can fall under the, the habit of not really reviewing it very well and you get up there and you're, you're much more stuck to your notes than you maybe wanna be, or you wrote it a long time ago and you're dusting it off for a new environment.

Nick Clason (10:52):
Maybe that's exactly what I'm doing all the time. Uh, you know, so, so once YouTube kind of came up with that conclusion, um, that's how, that's how YouTube, uh, chooses what videos get promoted. All right? So the way that they do it is a combination of both overall watch time paired with average percent viewed. So, uh, if it's a 10 minute video and they watch seven minutes, that's 70% of the video viewed. So it turns out that the videos in that 14 to 16 minute range really index well, uh, a couple other factors to help make your videos compelling. Let's check it out. All right, so make the intro of your video compelling. Let's play out a couple scenarios. Scenario number one. Hey everyone, welcome back to church. Excited to be here. Hey, real quick before we dive in, tonight's message, I do wanna remind you about the Churchwide Bake Sale.

Nick Clason (11:52):
It's coming up this Sunday. If you are interested in earning money toward the mission strip, don't forget you have to be in attendance. If for some reason you can't make it, please make sure to talk to, uh, dear Aunt Betty in the back, she's waving her hand, she's got her plaid apron on, let her know that you won't be at the bake sale. So, to dive into tonight's message, we're gonna be in John chapter one, or scenario number two. What would you do if you won a million dollars? Like, think about it, right? Like if I told you that the message that Jesus is giving supersedes the benefit of winning a million dollars, would you be interested in hearing what that message is? All that and more in this video, make sure that you stick around to the very end, cuz we're gonna give away the $1 million checklist.

Nick Clason (12:46):
Like see how those are two completely different things when you pre-lim, that's how you can start your video. When you get up live in a room, you, you might get stuck into giving the announcement about Aunt Betty's bake sale. And, and that's not a bad thing. Like that's, that's not, uh, making you a bad communicator or anything. That's part of what it is to be a pastor, to keep people informed and whatever and whatnot. So make the intros of your video compelling. Now what if you are live streaming already and you, you do get the amp Betty Bake sales stuff? I think that you can drop a minute, 32nd to a minute, uh, separate video in front to do that hook stuff. Um, someone who's already maybe previewed or seen the message or someone who knows what's gonna come and you drop that in before you, uh, drop drop in the rest of the, the sermon video.

Nick Clason (13:40):
Um, now you might be asking like, well, what about worship? I do think that there's pro, there's value in li actual like live, live streaming, like on Sunday morning. But once that's over as far as like posting and indexing to YouTube, I would recommend posting the sermons separately in a separate playlist or a separate video. And when you do that, that's when you can drop that intro video in refrain from the habit of what churches are going to be notorious for, which is like pre-filing one, um, and using it every single week to save on time. I, I would recommend making it custom to what is actually being preached, what is actually being taught so that the hook, the intro is actually relevant to what the actual content of the message is. Not just a generic, Hey, welcome, glad you on our YouTube channel, blah, blah, blah.

Nick Clason (14:29):
No one cares about that, that's not interesting. They're swiping away to the next one. What are some other YouTube best practices? Uh, titling, titling really matters. So for the longest time I was working at church where we, um, were in different, like we would call them seasons, uh, to, to do the video thing, which was at least good, but we would just title it like, um, our show was called Unscripted. So we were titling it unscripted season two, episode four, um, you know, rubber ducky Night or whatever it was. And that titling sucked . It didn't help, it wasn't searchable, right? YouTube is built by Google. So YouTube is a search engine type of content. So a title like, is Hella Real Place dealing with crippling anxiety or is rest even possible in 2023? You see, all of those are much more captivating titles. And so just, uh, a lot of times you gotta think about this, a lot of times churches create a sermon series, um, with a name that's like got some mystery sort of woven into it.

Nick Clason (15:38):
Think about the way that pastors communicate, pastors communicate, where they try to hook you in. They try to hook a live studio audience alive, you know, seated, uh, uh, in auditorium type audience in, but they hold their, they hold their main point. They hold the ultimate thing that they're gonna try and the ultimate truth that they're trying to share till the very end. It's like sort of this like grand reveal. That's, that's a strategy for public speaking. However, think about the videos that you watch online. They tell you instantly right at the top what the video is gonna be. They, they leave some mystery still, yes, some intrigue, but they, they don't mess around. They don't start out slow with some story about their dog from the night before, whatever, whatever it is that, that pastors are notorious for doing. And I can say this cuz I'm a pastor, I was trained that way.

Nick Clason (16:33):
I lean that way. Uh, that's my natural inclination to teach that way. So I'm trying to get better at putting things on the front end as well as titling it. And so, but you'll even see churches like Elevation do this. Um, they'll clip Pastor Steven's message cuz he'll preach for a long time. They'll clip it down to that good window. Um, and then they'll retitle it, even if it's different from the sermon series. Because what you gotta understand is your sermon series may be a good title for an in-person congregation audience, but that may not, that may not index well on YouTube, which is a search platform. So retitling is a helpful, helpful thing. The meta-description matters. So just like the title, the meta description is pulling out keywords and words that you have in there. It plays a huge role in your, your rankings.

Nick Clason (17:20):
And if you link to things like your church's website or your social media or maybe even some products or things that you talk about in your video, that also helps. Tags are important. Um, they recommend tags that, that are included in your video that can relate back to the topic of your video. So all three of those factors, tags, titles and meta descriptions help your YouTube search content thumbnails. Uh, if you're on YouTube, I'm gonna put the, this screenshot right here. Look at Mr. Beast's, um, thumbnails. Okay? Um, so he actually spent some time crafting these, creating these. Obviously he has a team, but you can put more effort into your thumbnails that is also gonna help the clickability and the search rate. Uh, those, those things matter. Another thing is trends. And you can use a free tool like trends.google.com, uh, to look up some more searchable type words.

Nick Clason (18:15):
And so, uh, you can take some words and start, uh, playing with them and see how they rank with, with searchability and whatever and whatnot. And that's gonna help you title it. That might also help you, um, as you're titling it, then putting those words on your thumbnail. And so, um, I'll, I'll show a screenshot of what it looks like, um, and, and how that, how that works. But, um, it's just a pretty basic, like, it's just a basic tool where you can compare the searchability of two different types and styles of words. Uh, last thing is, uh, comments and shares. They have a positive corollary effect on your video. So the more that you can, um, encourage and ask for comments and maybe even drum some up is gonna be helpful. So those things help with your videos. Uh, also embedding your videos if you embed your YouTube video onto like, say your church website or something.

Nick Clason (19:04):
Videos that are embedded YouTube indexes and rates really well. So those things also help a lot. So what's our conclusion? Only conclusion. Uh, according to state of Mobile, 2020 two.com, users spend 23.7 hours a month using the YouTube app. So people in your church are spending time on YouTube. They may not be spending time on YouTube for the purposes of your church and maybe spending time on YouTube to change out faucets and sinks in their house. But nonetheless, you putting your message on YouTube puts you in a, uh, position to be discovered and, um, people to come across your content because we have been tasked with the mission of spreading and sharing God's word and his message to the ends of the earth. And so this me, this method helps really bring your, um, church's message into a hybrid space. Now, beyond just your Sunday sermons, don't forget there are other options of content.

Nick Clason (20:05):
There are, um, some, you know, like there are some other ideas, there are some other classes, there are some other types of, uh, uh, content that you can produce and create. But I would start at a bare minimum. If you just can start, I would definitely start getting your, your regular messages, the things that you're already spending time doing, as opposed to creating another thing or another piece of content. But the things you're already doing in the regular flow and rhythm of your week. Get that stuff created, get that stuff, um, out there for the world to see. Well, hey guys, once again, thank you so much for sticking around to the end of this video. I hope you found this helpful. Hey, listen, if you did, it would mean the world to me if you would give us a rating or a review or even better share it with a friend and make sure that if you have not yet go pick up our free ebook.

Nick Clason (20:56):
Have I already ruined my church's TikTok account? A complete guide to posting a TikTok from Scratch. Make sure you grab that. That would be an amazing gift to us. We would love it if you, um, used that and found that helpful in your context, whatever the, your context might be. And finally, make sure you head over to YouTube, subscribe to our YouTube channel There link is gonna be in the show notes because it is under my personal name. It's not under the ministry that is, um, we're just trying some stuff out. We may convert it, we may not. I dunno. We'll see. Uh, I'm not, I'm, I'm not that deep into it yet. Uh, finally, don't forget every single episode we have Transcript Hybrid Ministries, XY Z for that. Excited to be with you on this journey. In our next episode, we are going to be diving in to, uh, I believe gonna be diving into TikTok and talking about that. Uh, and that's where the inspiration from my ebook came from. So excited to have you in for that. Uh, excited to explain to you and talk to you about the ups and downs and the, the wide swirling things of the crazy app and platform known as TikTok. But hey, until next time, my friends will talk to you. Stay hybrid.