Facebook groups can be difficult to start up. Its like forcing yourself to get friends by being the cool guy. It can be awkward. Group startups are about gaining members by curating content, retaining those members, and on top of that getting them to interact with each other. The scariest part of creating a group is getting those initial members. If you do not regularly post to your personal timeline, or share information about your life (like me) then you understand how scary it is to ask for friends to become members. The easiest way to curate a few initial members is to share your group on your timeline, literally asking for people to join. A few friends might join out of courtesy or curiosity, but unless they are truly interested in the niche group you have made, they probably will not be interactive.
Between 2016–2019, everyone wanted to be a YouTube personality. At the time I worked at an electronics store in the US, specifically in the camera department. At the time I was a freelance photographer, and an even better videographer. But, freelance does not pay a regular income and as a college student, I needed a full time job to pay the bills. So, I became a knowledgeable camera salesman. I worked 5 days a week and EVERY-SINGLE-DAY I had people young and old asking for “the best YouTube camera” or “the best vlogging camera.” To be honest, it really annoyed me. I couldn’t stand to be asked that question 10 times a day. Being someone who made decent money doing part time video work I became frustrated with knowing how much work starting a YouTube channel takes and also knowing how few people actually stay committed and make it happen.
I tell this story because I think the same amount of work goes into creating a successful Facebook group. It takes hours and hours each week to curate content for your group. You have to create rules, schedule posts, come up with new ideas, gain members, retain members, generate conversation and monitor conversation. It can feel like a full time job. (I know because it is my full time job) Of course over time -with growth- a group can naturally do most of the previous on it’s own. Members slowly become the main source of content, members generate their own conversation etc.. I understand that this doesn’t apply to all groups, but many of the ones I am a part of and are thriving have this quality. Let’s look at one of them.
I work as a full-time videographer for a very large church in Florida. My main job is to create extremely engaging content for events, make clips from the previous sermon, highlight events, shoot documentary style testimonies, direct our live stream etc. I make a lot of content during the week and video content is an ever changing thing. New styles become the trend, there are always new techniques, new gear and technology to check out, new visual look etc. One way that I like to help others church creatives when they need help, or to see what other people are doing and what trends are popular, is by looking at Facebook group pictured above.
The “Church Creatives” group is a private group with 24,000 members. They allow members to join by asking questions like “What is your job title?” “What is the name of your church?” If they think you are legitimately a “church creative” then they allow you to join. There are about 30–50 posts a day and hundreds each month. Before covid hit, the group was mostly information about the latest and best equipment, and a place to show your work for some critique or compliments. I loved being able to see what other creatives were working on and what was trending each season. It was an easy way for me to make my own content look more modern and sprinkle in some extra cool edits in my videos. Photo below for example.
Since covid, there has been an influx of members joining to ask questions about live streaming services. Churches all over the world shut down their in-person gatherings due to government limitation, this also included my church for 4 months. We are now back together but in much smaller, socially distanced gatherings. The limitation of in-person gatherings made thousands of small church go into overdrive figuring out how to stream their service. Many people opted to using their phone and facebook page to stream, but churches that wanted a slightly more professional look needed much help. I have a degree in communications and about 6 years of experience in streaming content. This allowed me to help answer some of the hundreds of questions a day regarding how to stream and what equipment to buy. Streaming is not as easy as it seems so it quickly became overwhelming for people to find their answers via google, and turned to facebook groups for answers.
Still today there are questions regarding streaming but the creative content posts are beginning to dominate again and the page is returning to normal. The group has also been posting job openings which is a great way to give back to the community of people who do this for a living.
The group admins have a set of rules or guidelines in the “about” section like most groups do. The rules do not limit very much content, and is very open to almost anything. Honestly, they probably don’t want to limit the interaction that happens by limiting the type of posts on the page. The posts do get submitted for admin approval, but I can’t imagine many get blocked. What is nice about a group full of church folk? Well pretty much everyone is civil, kind and supportive because we all share similar faith. I know this is an anomaly, and I often see arguments in almost every other group I am a part of.
I am unable to scroll back to the very beginning of the group, but I am sure that the admins help generate conversation and bring in like minded members for several weeks until the group did this naturally. I look forward to continuing to be active in the group and get honest feedback from people who do I don’t work with everyday.
