Comments on: Facebook group vs. Facebook page: Which is better for youth groups?

By: Jarrod

Jarrod — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 07:01:47 +0000

I do a lot of youth minsitry web stuff and have also been telling the leaders I know to go with 'Pages', but it's not such a simple decision anymore.

With the latest Facebook upgrades, Groups received a LOT of love. I think all of the new functionality in groups puts them back on par with Pages, but then the ability to send a message directly to every member's inbox puts Groups WAY over the top for youth ministries (as long as you have under 5,000 members).

The other big plus with groups is that it allows the admin to get personally involved, whereas a page hides the identity of all its admins.

By: Tim Schmoyer

Tim Schmoyer — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 19:09:11 +0000

Yup, go to http://www.facebook.com/pages/manage and click "View Insights" under your page.

By: Jason

Jason — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:49:51 +0000

Is there a way to track how much traffic your facebook page or group page is getting?

By: Linkworthy – 10/18/09 | MattCleaver.com

Linkworthy – 10/18/09 | MattCleaver.com — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 16:01:16 +0000

[...] Facebook pages are the way to go for youth ministries (not groups). Here’s why. [...]

By: Tim Schmoyer

Tim Schmoyer — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:00:49 +0000

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.

By: Benjer

Benjer — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 16:43:53 +0000

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.

By: Todd Porter

Todd Porter — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 01:26:44 +0000

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.

By: Brian Ford

Brian Ford — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 01:15:30 +0000

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.

By: Tim Schmoyer

Tim Schmoyer — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 14:35:10 +0000

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.

By: brandi

brandi — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 05:01:26 +0000

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.

By: Tim Schmoyer

Tim Schmoyer — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 04:39:46 +0000

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."

By: @ScottTinman

@ScottTinman — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 04:32:27 +0000

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..

By: adam lehman

adam lehman — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 02:33:00 +0000

ditto to peripatew's questions….

By: Tim Schmoyer

Tim Schmoyer — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 01:22:36 +0000

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.

By: peripatew

peripatew — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 21:44:53 +0000

How do you pull blog posts into your facebook page?

By: Josh

Josh — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 18:14:56 +0000

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

By: Josh Britt

Josh Britt — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 16:09:30 +0000

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.

By: Tim Schmoyer

Tim Schmoyer — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 14:10:48 +0000

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.

By: @ScottTinman

@ScottTinman — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 05:11:15 +0000

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?

By: Tim Schmoyer

Tim Schmoyer — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 04:08:29 +0000

Yup, photos are annoying with groups. Can't do albums.

By: @rgmmusic

@rgmmusic — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 04:06:10 +0000

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.