Overview of Social Media for Church Youth Workers

Young People’s Ministry & Media
Emerging Generations Training
Bothell UMC | 10.03.09

Why we’re talking about this
To help us determine how, or whether, we want to pursue these outlets;
This is where many of our young people are.
It increases our digital literacy.

Overview
What is social media?
Why use it?
How are youth using it?
Next steps
Ideas
Questions?

What is Social Media?
Conversations that are happening using online and mobile tools

What is it?
A social structure made up of individuals or organizations that are tied by one more more types of interdependency
values
ideas
friendship

Types of Social Media
Blogs
Multimedia
Forums
Micro blogs

Youth & Media Stats
Of Americans age 13-54, 65.7% of them have at least one video-enabled mobile device, up from 44.9% in a 2006 study*
Half of all teenagers use an audio-only mp3 player each day, while one in four watch video on an mp3 player.
http://www.frankwbaker.com/mediause.htm

Youth & Media Stats

Facebook Facts
Launched in Feb. 2004 as a site for university students and faculty; in 2007 opened to all
Active users
March 2008: 68 million
Today: Over 300 million

What youth are thinking
If you're not on MySpace, you don't exist.
My mom doesn't let me out of the house very often, so that's pretty much all I do, is I sit on Facebook and talk to people and text and talk on the phone, cause my mom's always got some crazy reason to keep me in the house.

Basic Principles
Be authentic
Be respectful
Be open

How to jump in
Create a facebook page
Open a Twitter account and search for topics or trends
Create a YouTube channel for your church or group
Start a blog and invite youth/young adults to contribute
Create your own network on Ning