Facebook pay per click is one way to go.
Was it just my imagination, or were the religious displays at the annual Here I Am Lord youth conference I attended yesterday more sophisticated than previous years?
The displays seemed bigger and more electronic. It certainly seemed like there were more bowls of complimentary candy all around – or was I more aware of this because I brought my two children, age 10 and under? It seemed like Halloween, they way they were filling their pockets with the stuff.
More on the net
The annual Here I Am Lord youth vocations conference held in the Chicago area March 1 – 4 this year attracted thousands of Catholic youth, and a growing number of religious communities seeking those called to the consecrated life.
In any case, talking with some of the twenty-plus communities there showed that they are venturing into the internet more and more to attract religious vocations.
Does your Facebook page work for you, I asked one community of sisters?
“Just look — these two came from Facebook,” one sister said to me proudly. One was a postulant of about 50, and the other a postulant about half that age.
I was told that another community of sisters there had been placing pay-per-click ads on Facebook. I hope they were getting some results. My message to vocation directors yesterday was that with Facebook you can target specific groups, such a single Catholic women aged 18-25 who are interested in the rosary, Eucharistic adoration, or in a specific geographic location. Facebook tells you right away how many people fit that category. Your ads are displayed only to that target audience, so you don’t waste your 40 or 80 cents, or whatever per click amount you spend.
Failed attempt
Another sister told me of a failed attempt in which their community spent several thousand dollars for a month of ads on Relevant Radio, the Catholic radio network in the Midwest. Relevant Radio has awesome programming, but it didn’t help here. The best result this community got was an invitation to talk to a church youth group. To me, that’s a lot of bucks to spend, and the mistake was that their ad efforts were not targeted to the correct audience.
Vision and Vocations Placement’s services send good contact names, but at least with Vision, you are told how many other communities from which the respondent requested information, and if their interest areas results in 50 communities, well, that’s just too many.
Finding the talent
When it comes to getting all this done, large communities who are all over the globe can afford to have a member who is an internet specialist, but smaller communities of say 40-50 sisters would be better off using the help of an outside promotion expert specializing in reaching religious vocations.
Along with prayer, making smart decisions with modern media is the way to go to enable your community to grow with new vocations.
