Catholic Social Media FAQ

Catholic Social Media (CSM) is a subscription-based service that provides daily, high-quality, unbranded Catholic posts for parishes to use on social media.

Our member parishes use the content to meaningfully engage their parishioners online, outside of Mass. This drives greater participation at the parish, builds a sense of community among parishioners and results in increased giving.

A recent national study, conducted by Prenger Solutions Group and eCatholic (Winter 2019) showed that parishes that post at least once a day on Facebook report average household giving 44% higher than parishes that do not.

Social media is the new town square, and it is the mission field for our work in the New Evangelization. Yet too few parishes have the time, resources and skill to post daily content – much less eye-catching images, original videos and interesting content tied to the liturgical calendar.

Parishes are invited to use the service free for four weeks to get a sense of how it works and watch how their parishioners respond. This free trial also allows your pastor to become comfortable with the tone and content and your staff to build familiarity with the process.

During those four weeks, your parish’s point person will receive personalized training on how to use the service. The CSM team tracks your progress and creates a custom final report for you full of actionable ideas – tips like when you should post in order to reach the most parishioners, how to leverage your social media content as an evangelization tool and how to build your parish’s Facebook following.

After reviewing the results of your four-week free trial, your parish will have the opportunity to continue on as an annual subscriber.

The numbers don’t lie. Parishes that post at least once a day on Facebook report average household giving 44% higher than parishes that do not. But that doesn’t mean a parish employee has to be logging on to Facebook seven days a week! Catholic Social Media’s free trial will teach you how to schedule a week’s worth of content in just ten minutes.

While some parishes do use our service as their sole source of social media content, most use our material alongside local posts that focus on parish announcements, photos and events. Very few parishes have the time, staff or resources to do much more than post local photos and announcements. Our research shows this is an enormous missed opportunity.

Your parish has a captive audience of parishioners who want to be fed online, and who want to engage their faith outside of Mass. And that’s where Catholic Social Media comes in.

Research has shown that a parish should be giving its parishioners good news/content eight times for every one time it solicits their support or invites them to an event. By using CSM’s content as part of a larger communications plan, you’ll connect with your parishioners daily…and they’ll show up when you need their help. Plus, CSM helps you evangelize within your parish boundaries.

It’s simple. Every time you publish content on Facebook and it’s reshared by your followers, Facebook pushes your reshared content higher up in the newsfeeds of people in the same geographical area. While you may not have 100 families willing to knock on doors and invite people to Mass, you certainly have 100 families willing to click “share” on Facebook. CSM can help you “digitally door knock” in the neighborhood. 

Check out our pricing page to find the the service level that’s best for your parish.