Some years ago, a group of BCM Directors working as part of one of the BCNet committees (a national college ministry development and organizational group made up of teams of church and campus based College Ministers) did a survey of 400 plus college students in different states. Why did they attend a Christian event the first time? The responses equal more than one hundred percent because students could give more than one answer. Here are the top seven responses.
7. Website 10%
6. Mail 12%
5. Social Media 17%
4. Advertising 34%
3. Food 35%
2. Appealing Event 46%
1. Someone Invited Me 77%
For some, the obvious take-away from this is to only operate by personal invitations. While I totally believe the most effective form of enlistment is a personal invitation, I am not of the school that says do that only. A church college minister I was working with was aware we did a variety of things to reach students and he wanted me to tell him the best one. His intent was to do only that one. It is not that simple. I am of the opinion that some of these other things help make a personal invitation so effective.
Often, when students would come to one of our events for the first time, I would ask how they knew about it or why they came. A common answer was, "I have been wanting to come, but I did not know anyone who came.". They had seen advertising or social media, etc. The personal invitation finalized it.
One of the things that I had to finally understand was that core students do not automatically invite students to events. They have to be trained, encouraged, and reminded to invite others. I call it "developing an Invite Culture". Having an "Appealing Event" as listed as the number two reason students came makes it much easier for core students to invite others.
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