Since I’m in the mood for answering common questions that show up in my Inbox, here’s another one that shows up quite regularly:
Should I create a Facebook group or a Facebook page for my youth group? Which is better?
Short story: absolutely, definitely, positively, without a doubt, create a page, not a group. Problem solved.
Facebook is no longer developing groups. They served their time back in the day, but pages are under heavy development and will continue to receive boosts and enhancements. A Facebook page acts like a “profile” account for your group and has several key features that group’s do not have:
- Post status updates
- The ability to add Facebook applications
- Post pictures and videos from your cell phone (great for parents while you’re away on a trip)
- Some pages integrate with Twitter
- Create a custom URL that easy for people to remember and share (for example, facebook.com/StudentMinistry)
- View analytics of your page’s fans and interaction with the page
- Promote your page by adding a “fan box” to your website
- Import blog posts from an external site as notes
- Organize photos into albums
There are other advantages of using a page over a group, too, but these are the ones that will pertain to the average youth group.
If you don’t have a Facebook Page for your youth group, get started with one here.
And while you’re at it, become a fan of Life In Student Ministry’s Facebook Page.
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From Ministry Questions.com...
October 6th, 2009 at 4:06 am
I completely agree. We have now switched over our church and youth facebook groups to pages. You can also do photo albums with a page, and with a group I think all the photos go into one place.
October 6th, 2009 at 4:08 am
Yup, photos are annoying with groups. Can't do albums.
October 6th, 2009 at 5:11 am
We have made the switch too…to a Page rather than a group. I was wondering how you have linked your Twitter with your Youth Group or Church page. Seems like I can't get my Twitter to sync with the status updates for the pages if I am logged into my personal page…any ideas?
October 6th, 2009 at 2:10 pm
It's only certain types of pages that can integrate twitter. When you create your page, you select what kind of page it is and who it's for. According to Facebook's blog post, it's for "public figures, musicians, businesses and organizations of all types."
The best way to update Facebook page from your Twitter status is to use the Selective Twitter Status facebook application for your page. To have Facebook page status update your Twitter status, you need to use the integration linked above. Or, to update both simultaneously, use Tweetdeck, which is what I use most of the time.
October 6th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
thanks so much. Great info. We have now created a page and not a group page. Pumped about what God is doing through your life.
October 6th, 2009 at 6:14 pm
Good post – We have been using a page instead of a group. The groups seem to get really stagnant! Thanks for all your resources and help.
Josh
October 6th, 2009 at 9:44 pm
How do you pull blog posts into your facebook page?
October 7th, 2009 at 1:22 am
Under the Notes settings, there's a link to import from an RSS feed. Just import your blog's RSS feeds and it will pull new posts in as notes.
October 7th, 2009 at 2:33 am
ditto to peripatew's questions….
October 7th, 2009 at 4:32 am
I posted a comment here yesterday and now it is gone asking the question about syncing your twitter with your youth group age on Facebook and if you had any tips on how to do that..
October 7th, 2009 at 4:39 am
That's weird. All the other comments are gone now, too. Wonder what's up with Intense Debate.
Here's my response to your comment from yesterday:
It's only certain types of pages that can integrate twitter. When you create your page, you select what kind of page it is and who it's for. According to Facebook's blog post, it's for "public figures, musicians, businesses and organizations of all types."
October 7th, 2009 at 5:01 am
The only thing I don't like about using a page is that your updates go unnoticed by the kids. When we had a group and I sent a message, it went into their inbox and they got a new message notification. Now the updates go into their updates box and the kids never check those. I've started changing the page status to tell them to check their updates, and that has helped, but it's not perfect.
We made the switch a few months ago, and overall it is so much better, though. LOVE the status updates and the photo albums and the twitter connection.
October 7th, 2009 at 2:35 pm
Yeah, I agree that the email notification feature was nice. However, my youth group Facebook group was large enough that Facebook took 2 days to deliver the email anyway, which wasn't really helpful most of the time.
I don't send many page updates anymore – just use Notes and Status Updates mainly.
October 8th, 2009 at 1:15 am
We created a page for TIMS (Teens in Missionary Service) and got rid of the group. Since creating the page we've seen more traffic and interaction. One feature I like about pages versus group is that pages gives you a feature to check the stats; such as interaction and demographics.
October 8th, 2009 at 1:26 am
I prefer the page over group, because I like how much more you get with it. I use the page to communicate with the students and my youth group website to communicate with the parents.
October 13th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
Thanks for the advice! We're up and running with an easy-to-remember page name. I haven't even announced it formally to the youth or parents (I've approached it as a test so far), and in the past two weeks it's been far more effective in communicating than most other things we've been doing in my first four months at our church this summer.
I notice that fans can post on the wall and add their own photos. Have you had to do any moderation with wall comments or photos that have been added? I'm pretty trusting of our youth, but I fear that one, solitary, awful comment that takes 10 seconds to type and causes worlds of hurt within the ministry.
October 13th, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Nah, I kinda take YouTube's approach to moderation: most of what's published is fine, so make it as easy as possible for people to post it, but when something comes up that's inappropriate, just remove it and slap the hand of the person who did it. You're right, one comment can be hurtful, but that's no different on Facebook than it is in real life at youth group. That's a risk no matter what and trying to eliminate it as many more downsides than positives.
October 26th, 2009 at 6:49 pm
Is there a way to track how much traffic your facebook page or group page is getting?
October 26th, 2009 at 7:09 pm
Yup, go to http://www.facebook.com/pages/manage and click "View Insights" under your page.