A recent study completed by LifeWay shares that nearly half (47%) of churches these days use social media and social networking as tools of engagement and interaction:
Churches are turning increasingly to social networking tools as ministry aids and Facebook is by far the most popular tool, according to a new study by LifeWay Research.
The survey of 1,003 Protestant congregations was conducted in September and sponsored by LifeWay’s Digital Church partner, Fellowship Technologies. It found that 47 percent of churches actively use Facebook.
This doesn’t surprise me one bit and I would imagine that the number will continue to increase as time progresses.
I will admit that I believe the data to be somewhat limited because most churches in America don’t even have a website so I don’t believe this to be completely representative of the Church in the US (or even abroad).
In another study along the same vein it seems that nearly half of Pastors (46%) are using some sort of social media with their congregation as well.
Ben says
Are they including cell phones as “social media”? I would believe that more readily. These numbers seem skewed somehow. Maybe it’s just me and where I live but something is fishy about those numbers.
Mike Lovato says
It does seem higher than one would think although it can’t be too skewed: their research method was a phone survey of random churches.
Adam Lehman says
I think social media is one place where churches are WAY behind the curve. It’s such a powerful way to spread stories in so many different ways.
It’d be interesting if some research giant could figure out how to measure what sort of effect it was having on those outside of the “christian bubble.”
John Hamman says
But the question is are they using social media correctly and beneficial. I know that if they are using it, social media is used more as a tool for communicating with their current members.
But I have yet to see anyone use it as a church growth tool or outreach tool. Least not in the best way that they could.
For example, We (my company) follow about 900 or so pastors on twitter, and I reviewed a weeks worth of tweets. In a weeks worth of time, we found lots of scriptures quoted, words of encouragement to members, general tweets, and church announcements (mostly on whats going on that day). One thing that surprised me and concerns me is we found NO testimonies or praise reports!
PaulSteinbrueck says
I am very skeptical of that 47% number. I wonder where they got their sample of churches.