Taylor Swift. She has over 51 million Twitter followers, 20 million Instagram followers and 73 million likes on Facebook. I’d say she’s pretty popular, but more importantly, I would say she’s a master at using social media.
Now let’s be clear, I’m under no illusion that Taylor actually does the strategy for her social media. I’m sure she does occasionally post from her account, but we all know there’s a very good marketing machine behind the pop princess.
Does this mean churches can’t learn anything from her? Absolutely not. In fact, Taylor Swift’s social media demonstrates some of the attributes your church’s social media should. She engages her audience, she laughs at her mistakes and she makes her audience feel important. Don’t believe me? Here are three key things your church can learn about social media from Taylor Swift.
Shake it Off
Last week, Taylor Swift’s social media accounts were hacked. I’m not sure how it happened, but when you have as many followers as she does, I’m sure it’s a PR person’s worse nightmare. There are precautionary steps you can take to secure your accounts, and certain steps you can take after your account has been hacked; either way, you still have to deal with the fact that you were hacked.
So how does Taylor handle this? Well, by using humor. Just look at this tweet:
By parodying her lyrics and acknowledging what happened, Taylor comes off as graceful, funny and charming. I’m sure some people were scrambling to get it fixed and there was some panicking going on, but to her social media followers, they saw someone who just laughed off an embarrassing moment.
Takeaway: Laugh off mistakes and don’t take yourself too seriously online.
Love Your Audience
When you have as many followers as Taylor does, it’s practically impossible to make each of them feel like they’re part of a community or even engage them to the point where they feel valued. However, when and if you can make them feel valued, you turn some casual fans into life-long fans.
Recently, Taylor decided to gather social media information about a few of her fans and create personalized Christmas presents for them. Here’s a video to show you how it went.
Now as I said above, I’m very aware that there’s a huge marketing machine behind all of this, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that those people in the video feel valued and loved. They feel like someone took the time to get to know them on a level that hadn’t happened before. That’s pretty powerful stuff.
Takeaway: Get to really know your audience and find ways to love them uniquely.
Get Involved with Your Audience
When people comment on my Instagram photos, there’s a 99% chance I know who they are and were friends in real life. Yes, I follow certain sports stars and brands, but I don’t expect them to comment on my filtered photos of the awesome spaghetti I made last night for dinner.
However, if Russell Wilson of the Seattle Seahawks did comment on my photos, I would be somewhat shocked. Well, that very thing happened to some of Taylor’s fans on Instagram. They would post a photo on Instagram and suddenly find that Taylor either like the photo or, even better, commented on them.
Now here’s the thing about these comments, they weren’t comments like “#truth” or “Good for you!” They were well thought out posts that really interacted with the content. In that moment, Taylor seemed to be investing in her audience.
Takeaway: Do more than just like or retweet. Invest in your audience in way that shows you care.
As I said before, we all know this is being done with some very savvy marketing. However, it’s still amazing how a huge pop star can make her fans feel like they are part of something larger.
Does your church’s social media do this? Do your people feel valued, loved or engaged? Click here to share below.