There are five questions I use to judge the effectiveness of church websites, these same questions can be used to judge the effectiveness of youth websites:
- Does our website meaningfully answer “The Big Three”? The first three questions most potential members ask are: “When is the next event?”, “Where do you meet?” and “Will I fit in?”.
- Does our website clearly articulate the Gospel? This will be different for every youth group, but a visitor needs to understand that this community is a community of faith.
- Does our website have a defined audience? Is this for youth, for parents, for all members for potential members?
- Is our website seen as valuable by our staff, volunteers and church members? If people at all levels don't see the website as a valuable tool, it is likely to be displaced by other communication methods.
- Is our website sustainable? Once an effective website is launched it has to be able to maintained or it will fail.
A Facebook Group allows you to send a Facebook message to all members, an important way to contact youth. As with the Fan Page, this also gets you mobile communication "for free." If youth are set up to receive updates from Facebook on their cellphones, then messages will reach them wherever they are.
With the ability to have discussion, share photos and video, post events and send messages a Facebook Group provides everything I can think of that a youth group website needs.
Of course it's not all (root) beer and skittles. This method means your youth (and parents) have to have a Facebook account in order to participate. While that may seem like not a big deal now, five years ago it would have been obvious that everyone had a MySpace account. The popularity of social networks will wax and wane and their closed nature means that if Facebook is replaced by another network your content may be "stuck" and you'll have to do a good bit of work to re-create it.
Additionally, there may parents who don't want their kids to be using social networking.
Both of these objections can be overcome by the fact that your group's Wall can generates an RSS feed (for more on RSS feeds read Andy's post here). Using free tools like Widgetbox you can turn that RSS feed into a feature on your church's website in moments. This makes sure that everyone can have access to some level of updates from the group. If you're using Google Sites for your page, there are multiple Google Gadgets that will link to an RSS feed as well.
So instead of having to maintain yet another website, consider ditching your youth website and "leave the driving to Facebook." Would this fly with your group? Have you tried it and have something to add? Comment it up people.
Jacob Smith's big idea is Every Church Online, a way to provide low cost, effective websites to churches. You can find out more at http://everychurchonline.org. He lives with his wife, Erin, a Lutheran Pastor, in New Castle, Pennsylvania. You can contact him at jake@shoeinthedoor.com.
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