Whats the best way to market a Christian Social Network?

[Ken]

Ok, I am launching a Christian social networking site. I am in the middle of programming. I need to know the best way to get members and market the social networking site. I am a Christian and very religious. I would appreciate any help. Also if you are in PR or any form of marketing and would like to help with this I would be greatly appreciative. God Bless

[Pat]

On the more technical end, the site has to be optimized for the search engines. You might want to try setting your parameters and keywords effectively so that it shoes up on Google when people search for "Christian website" or "Christian community" or something to that effect. Some Facebook presence to direct traffic from all the Facebook users who are Christians would be helpful as well; I'm talking about a Facebook fan page that can link to your site, or introducing yourself and your link on existing Facebook Christian-focused groups.

From another standpoint, you can also reach out to churches and various youth group or young professional communities within the Christian realm by emailing them and introducing yourself and your site. This is a good method because most of the representatives have access to mailing lists. If they like what you're doing, they might pass it on to their congregation. You'd get immediate boosts in traffic. It'd be even more effective if your site were prepared to allow these groups to display which fellowship or church they belong to.

You can also reach out to blogs that are centered around a Christian topic. The blog owners might be willing to check out your site and if they like it they'll definitely post about what a great new thing it is and their readers (who might be your most relevant target audience) will check it out.

The point is to be able to create touch points with the most relevant market. In this case, I'd imagine it'd be Christians who are young and tech-savvy and will be active on the site. Find those people using some of the methods above, and you'll be golden.

This advice has been paid for on your behalf.

Good luck!